WILBERFORCE, WILLIAM (1759-1833), English phi lanthropist whose name is chiefly associated with the abolition of the slave trade, was descended from a Yorkshire family which possessed the manor of Wilberfoss in the East Riding from the time of Henry II. till the middle of the 18th century. He was the only son of Robert Wilberforce, member of a commercial house at Hull, by his wife Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Bird of Barton, Oxon, and was born at Hull on Aug. 24, 1759. At the age of 9 he lost his father and was transferred to the care of a paternal uncle at Wimbledon; but in his 12th year he returned to Hull, and was placed under the care of the master of the en dowed school of Pocklington. Here he neglected his studies, but he entered St. John's college, Cambridge, in Oct. 1776. Left by the death of his grandfather and uncle the possessor of an inde pendent fortune under his mother's sole guardianship, he was somewhat idle at the university, though he acquitted himself in the examinations with credit ; but in his serious years he "could not look back without unfeigned remorse" on the opportunities he had then neglected. In 1780 he was elected M.P. for Hull. He soon found his way into the fast political society of London, and at the club at Goosetrees renewed an acquaintance begun at Cambridge with Pitt, which ripened into a close friendship. In the autumn of 1783 he set out with Pitt on a tour in France; and after his return his eloquence proved of great assistance to Pitt in his struggle against the majority of the House of Com mons. In 1784 Wilberforce was elected for both Hull and York shire, and took his seat for the latter constituency.
A journey to Nice in the autumn of the same year with Dr. Isaac Milner (1750-182o), who had been one of his masters at Hull grammar school, and afterwards became president of Queens' college, Cambridge, and dean of Carlisle, led to his con version to Evangelical Christianity. The change had a marked ef fect on his public conduct. In the beginning of 1787 he busied himself with the establishment of a society for the reformation of manners. About the same time he met Thomas Clarkson, and began the agitation against the slave trade. Pitt recommended Wil berforce to undertake the guidance of the project as a subject suited to his character and talents. While Clarkson conducted the agitation throughout the country, Wilberforce took every oppor tunity in the House of Commons of exposing the evils and horrors of the trade. For the history of the various motions introduced by
Wilberforce see the article SLAVZRY. It was not till 1807, the year following Pitt's death, that the first great step towards the aboli tion of slavery was accomplished. When the anti-slavery society was formed in 1823, Wilberforce and Clarkson became vice-presi dents ; but before their aim was accomplished Wilberforce had retired from public life, and the Emancipation Bill, which was the culmination of his life-work, was not passed till Aug. 1833, a month after his death.
In May 1797 he married Barbara Ann Spooner and took a house at Clapham, where he became one of the leaders of the "Clapham Sect" of Evangelicals, including Henry Thornton, Charles Grant, E. J. Eliot, Zachary Macaulay and James Stephen. In connection with this group he planned a religious periodical which should admit "a moderate degree of political and common intelligence," the result being the appearance in January 18o1 of the Christian Observer. He also interested himself in a variety of schemes for the social and religious welfare of the community. In parliament he was a supporter of parliamentary reform and of Roman Catholic emancipation. In 1812, on account of failing health, he exchanged the representation of Yorkshire for that of Bramber, Sussex. In 1825 he retired from the House of Com mons, and the following year settled at Highwood Hill, near Mill Hill. He died at London on July 29, 1833, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.
In 1797 Wilberforce published A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians in the Higher and Middle Classes of this Country Contrasted with Real Christianity, which within half a year went through five editions and was translated into French, Italian, Dutch and German.
The chief authorities of the career of William Wilberforce are his Life (5 vols., 5838) by his sons, Robert, Isaac and Samuel, and his Correspondence (1840) also published by his sons. A smaller edition of the Life was published by Samuel Wilberforce in 1868. See also The private papers of William Wilberforce, edited by A. M. Wilber force (1897) ; Sir James Stephen, Essays in Ecclesiastical Biography (1849) ; J. C. Colquhoun, Wilberforce, His Friends and Times (1866) ; John Stoughton, William Wilberforce (188o) J. J. Gurney, Familiar Sketch of Wilberforce (1838) ; J. S. Hartford, Recollections of W. Wilberforce (1864) and R. Coupland, Wilberforce (Oxford, 1923).