Reviving the Memory of a Black Pioneer

“Of all my favorite authors, not one has drawn a tear in favour of my miserable black brethren,” Ignatius Sancho wrote in a letter to the novelist Laurence Sterne, “excepting yourself . . . . I am sure you will applaud me for beseeching you to give one half hour’s attention to slavery, as it is at this day practised in our West Indies.” The letter, sent in 1766, illustrates—by its eloquence, moral clarity, and deep involvement with the issues of the day; and by a certain understated brashness on the part of its author—why Sancho was considered an “exceptional” specimen of his race, ultimately becoming the first black citizen to cast a ballot in the United Kingdom. Born in 1729, Sancho was separated from his parents at an early age, then bartered into servitude to three sisters, who named him after Don Quixote’s comic sidekick, Sancho Panza. Thanks to a chance encounter, he was eventually enlisted into the service of the Duke of Montague, who encouraged his love of letters and, especially, of the theatre.