Chapter 15 Summary

Chapter 15 of Hochschild's Bury the Chains begins by giving a rundown of what has happened so far and how far they'd come in their efforts to end slavery in Britain. The chapter then moves into describing some of the methodology used by the abolitionists in an effort to plead their case. One reason he cites is that due to the smaller, more densely populated geography of Great Britain they were able to spread their anti-slavery message throughout the country more efficiently then most and were able to get the message to more people in a shorter period of time. Their effort to make people aware of the ills of slavery was also strongly aided by the British Postal Service which was the most advanced in the world at the time. The thing I found most interesting about the chapter though was the short poem "Rule Britannia! Britannia rules the waves. Britons never, never, never shall be slaves". The idea of shock and horror that Britons had for seeing their countrymen enslaved might have led to the national opinion on slavery beginning to change once Britons were made aware of the humanity of those that they had enslaved.