The real story of Leeds eyewitness to life on a slave ship

Like many good detective stories, the search for the real William Butterworth centred on a case of mistaken identity.

Back in the late 18th-century, Butterworth left his family and ran away to sea, joining hundreds of other youngsters in search of adventure.

Persuaded to serve on a slave ship, the 17-year-old, who had grown up in the streets of Leeds settled down to life on the ocean wave. He spent more than a decade abroad, crossing the waters between Africa and the Caribbean, before finally returning to Yorkshire in 1788.

Back home and in need of a living, he joined his father’s already successful engraving and copperplate printing businesses. Once he had learned the ropes and assured he would be able to earn a decent living, Butterworth decided to use his new skills to record the details of his voyage for posterity.

They didn’t go in for eye-catching titles back then, but Three Years Adventures of a Minor in England, Africa, the West Indies, South Carolina and Georgia soon came to be regarded as an important addition in the history of the slave trade.

The book was first published in 1823, but for the last 150 years the work has been wrongly attributed to another Leeds printer, Henry Shroeder. Butterworth’s descendant Philip Astley takes up the story.

“It started with simple mistake, but unfortunately it was one that was never corrected. When Shroeder died in 1853 the journalist who compiled a newspaper obituary, named him as the author of the book. He knew it had been written by a Leeds printer and assumed Butterworth was his pen name. Basically he put two and two together and came up with five.

“William had died almost 20 years earlier and no one ever set him straight. Forever after Shroeder and the book were linked and Butterworth was pushed into the shadows.”

However, for the last few years Philip has been piecing together the story of his ancestor’s life and with the publication today of the latest Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, the record has finally been set straight with Butterworth taking his place alongside 58,000 other entries.

“It’s good to see that William’s contribution to the historical records has finally been restored,” says Philip, who trawled numerous parish records and census documents to plot Butterworth’s movements from his birth in 1769 to his death at the age of 65 in 1834.

“William was born in Kirkgate, the son of an engraver and copperplate printer and while still a teenager he went on this incredible adventure. His eye-witness account of service on the slave-ship Hudibras is incredibly observant and sensitive. Most of the common seamen, like William, were illiterate. They were unable to write much more than their own name, so this first-hand account of what life was like on board not only for the boy sailors, but also for the slaves, is incredibly valuable.

“It contains some fascinating detail. While the conditions on board these ships were horrific, according to William the slaves often had a much better diet than the crew. They were expendable, but the slaves were a valuable commodity and needed to be sold on in the very best condition possible. It’s quite chilling when you read some of the passages.

“William’s time at sea gave him detailed first-hand knowledge of sailing and when he came back to Leeds he also engraved the illustrations for The Young Sea Officer’s Sheet Anchor, a manual of seamanship which was important on both sides of the Atlantic during the 19th century.”

Twice married, Butterworth was buried in St Michael’s Church in Headingley, but the family name continued to be associated with the printing business until 2002 when the Butterworth and Pilkington company closed its doors for the final time.

“The business may be no more,” adds Philip. “But at least now the life and times of William Butterworth won’t be forgotten.”

The teenage ship-hand and printer isn’t the only new addition to the ODNB. Dr Rosemary Mitchell, director of the Leeds centre for Victorian Studies has provided a new profile of the artist George Bernard O’Neil, whose best-known painting, Public Opinion, hangs in the city’s main art gallery and art historian Anne Anderson has also contributed a reappraisal of the work of landscape painter Joseph Farquharson.

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For more details about how to access the dictionary visit www.oxforddnb.com