NEN Gallery

Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton was born in Essex in 1786 . He was privately educated and went to Trinty College Dublin. He became a close friend of Joseph Gurney after his mother (a Quaker) introduced him to the Norfolk based family. He started to attend Quaker meetings with the Gurney family and married Joseph's sister, Hannah, in 1807. He became a partner in a brewing company and became involved in several campaigns for social reform. Joseph's sister was Elizabeth Fry's and Buxton became involved in her campaign for prison reform. In 1818 Buxton was elected MP for Weymouth, a position he held until 1837. He was a strong advocate for the abolition of slavery in the British Colonies. In 1823 he formed the Society for the Extinction of the Slave Trade, the committee co-ordinated the campaign for total abolition. In 1824 he succeeded William Wilberforce as head of the anti-slavery party in parliament, continuing the struggle, until the Slavery Abolition Act in 1833 freed all eslaved people in the British Empire. In 1838 Buxton published The African Slave Trade and Its Remedy. In this book he told the British government to make treaties with rulers in Africa. An expedition was sent in 1841 to put the plan into action but it failed mainly because of the large number of deaths among the expedition members from yellow fever and malaria. He was made a Baron in 1840 and is famous for saying. "With Ordinary talent and extraordinary perseverance, all things are attainable."