ABSTRACT
Between 1860 and 1900, British authorities repeatedly accused the French government of fostering the Indian Ocean slave trade as France allowed Indian Ocean dhows to fly the French flag. This chapter intends to show readers how dhows flying the French flag became synonymous with slavers in the British anti-slavery discourse throughout the second half of the nineteenth century. Using British and French archives and new historical data – mainly drawn from the House of Commons Parliamentary Papers, the Slave Trade Department as well as the correspondence of the French consulate in Zanzibar – this part will challenge the idea that the French flag was the major factor explaining the persistence of the Indian Ocean slave trade after 1860. It will make clear that if dhows under the French flag played a quite substantial role in the illegal slave trade across the Indian Ocean, they were far from being the main actor in this traffic. Above all, this chapter will demonstrate that these controversies around the French flag mirrored and crystalized Anglo-French imperial rivalries in the Indian Ocean.
