‘William Fowler’, Sir William Garrard, Sir John Hawkins and the Sixteenth-Century Atlantic Slave Trade

This article sheds new light on English involvement in the sixteenth-century transatlantic slave trade, especially the voyages of John Hawkins in the 1560s. Its focus is on William Fowler, a merchant who in 1569 was brought in front of the English High Court of the Admiralty to provide expert evidence on behalf of Sir William Garrard and Sir John Hawkins. Fowler was an experienced slave trader who worked within the Spanish system, probably trading out of Seville to New Spain. His testimony in 1569 was of great importance to Hawkins, Garrard and the other investors who backed Hawkins’s ill-fated slaving voyage of 1567–9, for in his testimony Fowler provided independent and up-to-date information as to the value of slaves and other commodities which Hawkins lost in 1568 at San Juan de Ulúa. Hawkins and his backers would use these valuations to bolster their claim for compensation from the Spanish Crown for the goods they lost in 1568. Using previously unpublished sources, the article will investigate the origins of William Fowler and assess the social and economic connections that existed between Hawkins and his investors, and explain why these socio-economic networks brought Fowler to the Admiralty court in 1569. The article concludes with a transcription of Fowler’s testimony.