author
James Field Stanfield
d. 1824
An Irish actor turned abolitionist writer, he drew on firsthand experience in the slave trade to expose its cruelty in powerful poems and prose. His life moved from the stage and the sea into reform-minded writing that still stands out for its moral urgency.
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About the author
Born in Dublin around 1749, James Field Stanfield was educated in France for the Roman Catholic priesthood but did not take orders. Instead, he went to sea and later became an actor and writer, spending much of his career in northern England.
Stanfield is best remembered for writing from direct experience about the Atlantic slave trade. After surviving a voyage connected to that trade, he published works condemning its brutality, including Observations on a Guinea Voyage and the poem The Guinea Voyage. That firsthand witness gave his abolitionist writing unusual force.
He also wrote for the theatre and was active on the stage, showing a career that ranged across performance, poetry, and political writing. He died on May 10, 1824, and is also known as the father of the painter Clarkson Stanfield.