William Boats
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William Boats (1716-1794) was a Liverpool slave trader.[1] Boats was responsible for 157 slave voyages, over half of his slaves were sent from the Bight of Biafra to Jamaica.[2]
Slave trading and privateering
Boats had shares in at least 156 Guineaman.[3] In the book History of the Liverpool Privateers the author wrote that Boats was a waif found in a boat and enrolled in a Blue Coat School. It claims that he was apprenticed to the sea and rose to be a commander of a slave ship, becoming "one of the leading merchants and shipowners of Liverpool". Continuing, it says he married Ms. Brideson and captured a Spanish ship rich in gold and treasure. A Liverpool paper[vague] which announced his death at the age of 78, called him a "most useful member of society".[4]
Boats was the first slaver to have his ships sheathed in copper to prevent infestations of wood-boring parasites.[5]
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