George Manville Fenn

The Black Bar George Manville Fenn

HMS Nautilus is on patrol off the west coast of Africa, intercepting the American slave ships that were trying to purchase cargoes of slaves and then take them across the Atlantic in loathsome conditions. Slavery had been abolished in British territories in 1772, many years before, and the British were actively policing African waters in the hope of deterring the Americans and the Portuguese from retaining the slave trade.