their
active cooperation, he built in 1797 a schoolhouse without their aid.

Because of his independent means and his skill as a mariner, he visited
with little or no difficulty most of the larger cities of the country,
held frequent conferences with the representative men of his race, and
recommended the formation of societies for their mutual relief and
physical betterment. Such societies he formed in Philadelphia and New
York, and then having made ample preparation he sailed in 1811 for
Africa in his brig "The Traveller," reaching Sierra Leone on the West
Coast after a voyage of about two months.

Here he organized the Friendly Society of Sierra Leone and then went to
Liverpool. Even here one of his characteristic traits manifested itself
in taking with him to England for education a native of Sierra Leone.

While in England, Cuffe visited London twice and consulted such friends
of the Negro as Granville Sharp, Thomas Clarkson and William
Wilberforce! These men were all interested in a proposition to promote
the settlement on the West Coast of Africa of the free people of color
in America, many of whom had come into the domains of Great Britain as
an outcome of the Revolutionary War. This opinion was at this period the
prevailing sentiment of England respecting what was best for the Negro.
Sir J. J. Crooks, a former governor of Sierra Leone, in alluding to its
origin, says: "There is no doubt that the influence of their opinion was
felt in America and that it led to emigration thence to Africa before
Liberia was settled. Paul Cuffe, a man of color ... who was much
interested in the promotion of the civil and religious liberty of his
colored brethren in their native land, had been familiar with the ideas
of these philanthropists, as well as with the movement in the same
direction in England."[1]

[1] _History of Sierra Leone_, Dublin, 1903, p. 97

This explains Cuffe's visit to England and to Africa--a daring venture
in those perilous days--and the formation of the Friendly Societies in
Africa and in his own country, the United States.

When his special mission to England was concluded, he took out a cargo
from Liverpool for Sierra Leone, after which he returned to America.

Before he made his next move, Cuffe consulted with the British
Government in London and President Madison at Washington. But the
strained relations between the two nations, as well as the financial
condition of the United States at the