Benjamin Godwin

Reverend Benjamin Godwin (10 October 1785 – 20 February 1871) was a Baptist clergyman, abolitionist and activist. He was a pastor at Dartmouth, Great Missenden, Bradford, and Oxford as well as a teacher of classics. He became involved in debates on the ethics of slavery and a schism in the Baptist missionary community. Godwin's writing's are an interesting source as he wrote 58 letters to his son to record his autobiography. When Godwin finished school he was apprenticed to a shoemaker. Hearing that he had been mischievously drafted into the militia, Godwin left Aylburton in 1807. He worked well with his Anglican counterpart raising money for missionary work, but he was disappointed to find that he was gaining some of his diminishing congregation. Godwin was paid well but the money failed to arrive on time.

ELECTORS OF THE COUNTY OF YORK

You honourably distinguished yourselves

In the ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE

by your zealous support of

WILLIAM WILBERFORCE

Who can be more worthy of your choice as a

REPRESENTATIVE FOR THE COUNTY

the enlightened friend and champion of Negro Freedom

HENRY BROUGHAM

by returning him

YOU WILL DO AN HONOUR TO THE COUNTY

and

A SERVICE TO HUMANITY and in Boston, Massachusetts (in 1836). Godwin relented, but within a few months he again felt that he was not enjoying the support he deserved. He had given up his role at the Horton Academy to concentrate on his ministry but still he heard criticism. Godwin resigned again and despite having nowhere to go he did not give in to those who asked him to retract again. The convention unanimously accepted his paper which condemned not only slavery but the religious leaders and communities who had failed to condemn the practise. The convention resolved to write to every religious leader to share this view. The convention called on every religious communities to eject any supporters of slavery from their midst.

Godwin was included in a large commemorative painting of the 1840 convention where he can just be seen behind the head of Joseph Sturge who organised the conference. The painting now hangs in the National Portrait Gallery. Godwin was meeting and mixing with the international anti-slavery activists. He was invited to meet French abolitionists in Paris the following year.

Selected publications The Substance of a Course of Lectures on British Colonial Slavery: Delivered at Bradford, York and Scarborough, 1830 Paper presented to the General Anti-Slavery Convention, 1840 The Philosophy of Atheism Examined and Compared with Christianity. A course of popular lectures delivered at the Mechanics’ Institute, Bradford, on Sunday afternoons, in the winter of 1852-1853, 1853