Benjamin Lay

Benjamin Lay (January 26, 1682 – February 8, 1759) was an Anglo-American Quaker humanitarian and abolitionist. He is best known for his early and strident anti-slavery activities which would culminate in dramatic protests. He was also an author, farmer, vegetarian, and distinguished by his concern for the ethical treatment of animals. Born in England, into a farming family, his early trade was as a shepherd and glove-maker. After becoming a Quaker, he worked as a sailor, and in 1718 moved to Barbados. Here he witnessed the horrific treatment of enslaved Africans, which instilled in him his lifelong abolitionist principles. Lay later settled in Philadelphia, and was made unpopular among his fellow Quakers by his confrontational anti-slavery stance. He published several pamphlets on social causes during his lifetime, and one book—All Slave-Keepers That Keep the Innocent in Bondage, Apostates—which was one of the earliest North American works against slavery. Biography Benjamin Lay was born in 1682 to Quaker parents in Copford, near Colchester, England. After working as a farmhand and shepherd, later as an apprentice glove-maker, Lay ran away to London and became a sailor at age 21. He later returned to England and married Sarah Smith by 1718. In 1718, Lay moved to Barbados as a merchant, but soon his abolitionist principles, fueled by his Quaker radicalism, made him unpopular with those fellow residents who profited from slavery and human trafficking. In 1731, Lay emigrated to the British Pennsylvania colony, settling first in Philadelphia (in what is now the Olney neighborhood), and later in Abington. In Abington, he was one of the earliest and most zealous opponents of slavery, at a time when Quakers were not yet organized in opposition to slavery. Lay stood barely over four feet tall, referring to himself as "Little Benjamin". He was a hunchback with a protruding chest, and his arms were as long as his legs. He was a vegetarian; he ate only fruits, vegetables, and honey, and drank only milk and water. He did not believe that humans were superior to non-human animals. He created his own clothes to boycott the slave-labor industry. He would not wear anything, nor eat anything, made from the loss of animal life or provided by any degree by slave labor.