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Lot Essay
Sir William Young, the sitter in this intimate portrait, was the son of Sir William Young, 1st Bt. (1724⁄5-1788), Governor of Dominica, and his second wife, Elizabeth Taylor. The portrait was painted circa 1767, the same period during which Young sat for the nearly identical portrait by Benjamin West that remains at Eton College (Berkshire), and is among the earliest of the Eton leaving portraits executed by the artist (H. von Erffa and A. Staley, loc. cit.). The present version was sent home to the sitter's family, and shows some slight changes in the lace cuff and neckerchief. Young continued his education at Clare College, Cambridge, but later transferred to University College, Oxford.
After the death of his father in 1788, Young inherited four sugar plantations in Antigua, St. Vincent, and Tobago, 896 enslaved people, as well as an enormous debt of around £110,000. In 1791, he undertook a voyage to the West Indies, with the intent to save his plantations from bankruptcy. He recorded his journey in the 1801 publication, A Tour through the several islands of Barbadoes, St Vincent, Tobago and Grenada in the years 1791 and 1792, which also put forward an argument in opposition to the abolition of the slave trade advocated by William Wilberforce and his supporters. He argued for providing the enslaved peoples with extra holidays, provisions, adequate housing, medical care, and religious instruction in hope of improving the conditions of slavery such that eventually there would be no need for the slave trade. His argument ignored the inherent immorality of the slave trade and Wilberforce and the abolitionists prevailed. Although Parliament abolished the slave trade in 1807, it would be decades before it was eradicated completely. In that very same year, Young was made Governor of Tobago, a position he held until his death in 1815. In 1810-1812 he made a report of the conditions of slavery in Tobago, noting in the years following the abolition, that there remained 16,671 enslaved people on the island. Young's attempt to find a moderate position on the practice of slavery and the slave trade was ultimately contradictory; although he argued for the improvement of the living conditions and legal protections for enslaved people, he continued to deny their humanity by insisting they remained the property of landowners.
After the death of his father in 1788, Young inherited four sugar plantations in Antigua, St. Vincent, and Tobago, 896 enslaved people, as well as an enormous debt of around £110,000. In 1791, he undertook a voyage to the West Indies, with the intent to save his plantations from bankruptcy. He recorded his journey in the 1801 publication, A Tour through the several islands of Barbadoes, St Vincent, Tobago and Grenada in the years 1791 and 1792, which also put forward an argument in opposition to the abolition of the slave trade advocated by William Wilberforce and his supporters. He argued for providing the enslaved peoples with extra holidays, provisions, adequate housing, medical care, and religious instruction in hope of improving the conditions of slavery such that eventually there would be no need for the slave trade. His argument ignored the inherent immorality of the slave trade and Wilberforce and the abolitionists prevailed. Although Parliament abolished the slave trade in 1807, it would be decades before it was eradicated completely. In that very same year, Young was made Governor of Tobago, a position he held until his death in 1815. In 1810-1812 he made a report of the conditions of slavery in Tobago, noting in the years following the abolition, that there remained 16,671 enslaved people on the island. Young's attempt to find a moderate position on the practice of slavery and the slave trade was ultimately contradictory; although he argued for the improvement of the living conditions and legal protections for enslaved people, he continued to deny their humanity by insisting they remained the property of landowners.