[Drop-Head Title:] Cape Coast Castle. Return To An Address Of The Honourable The House Of Commons, Dated 29 July 1850. [Parliament]

26pp, [2]. Docket title to verso of terminal leaf. Disbound. Later resewn. Early alternate pagination in manuscript to upper corners. From the recently dispersed library of William St Clair, with his distinctive pencilled ownership inscription to head of title. A series of dispatches relating to the violent torture of Cape Coast native Robert Erskine. In 1847, whilst a domestic in the service of Captain Augustus William Murray of the 1st West-India Regiment, and stationed at the infamous Cape Coast Castle, Erskine was accused of having stolen sundry articles of jewellery from the officer. Despite his protestations of innocence, and a lack of any evidence connecting him with the crime, Erskine was brutally tortured for eight days. In consequence of his torment he lost the use of his hands. It was later ascertained that the actual culprit was a soldier of the 1st West India Regiment, and likely one of the individuals who engaged in Erskine's maltreatment. A year after the event, the Aborigines Protection Society took up Erskine's case, and successfully prosecuted it in 1851. From the recently dispersed library (without any indication of such) of British scholar and senior civil servant William St Clair (1937-2021), and presumably used by him in his research for his acclaimed book The Grand Slave Emporium: Cape Coast Castle and the British Slave Trade (2006). Size: Folio