ABSTRACT
Georges Edmond Pierre Achille Morel de Ville was the only son of a French civil servant and an Englishwoman of Quaker stock. Towards the turn of the century, Morel met two people who were to influence profoundly both the views he held on African affairs and the direction of his career. The first was the explorer, writer and campaigner, Mary Kingsley, and the second was John Holt, the founder and owner of the shipping company of the same name, who was to give him both moral and financial backing over a period of years. Morel himself, being concerned, both as an Elder Dempster employee and as a freelance journalist, to follow closely the Free State's affairs, was well aware of the accounts of the atrocities there which had appeared in the course of the 1890s. From John Holt he found support for his advocacy of free trade and minimal government as essential conditions for progress and prosperity in Africa.
