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Thomas Spring Rice

1790 - 1866

This person is the subject of ongoing research. We have started by researching their relationship to the enslavement of people.

Biographical notes

Politician and Irish landowner.

ÁùºÏ²ÊÔ¤²â Trustee (1835–1866).

Summary of activity

No known connections with slavery.

Abolition connections

In 1833, he supported the ministerial plan for the abolition of slavery, including a grant of £20m: ‘The method adopted he acknowledged might be unusual, and not altogether constitutional; but the case was sui generis, and was to be taken on its own merits’. (Hansard HC Deb. vol.20 col.292, 2 August 1833 [online], <> accessed 6 August 2021.)

ODNB refers to his ‘lifelong attachment to the anti-slavery movement’. (Ellis Archer Wasson, ‘Rice, Thomas Spring, first Baron Monteagle of Brandon (1790–1866)’, in C. Matthew et al. (eds), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography [online], Oxford 1992 -, <> accessed 6 August 2021.)

A letter from abolitionist Thomas Clarkson, 25 May 1843, mentioning the example of Nelson Hackett (q.v. Sir Charles Bagot) and urging him to object to the 10th article of the Webster-Ashburton Treaty, dealing with the return of enslaved people, is at St John’s College, Cambridge (Papers of Thomas Clarkson, Clarkson/Folder 1-5/Doc 78, <> accessed 6 August 2021).

Bibliography

S. Farrell, 'RICE, Thomas Spring (1790-1866), of Mount Trenchard, nr. Foynes, co. Limerick', in History of Parliament Trust (ed.), The History of Parliament: British Political, Social & Local History, London 1964-, 1820-1832,
Checked and found

J. Turner et al. (eds), Grove Art Online, Oxford 1998-,
Checked and not found

UCL Department of History (ed.), Legacies of British Slave-ownership, London 2020,
Checked and not found

E. A. Wasson, 'Rice, Thomas Spring, first Baron Monteagle of Brandon', in C. Matthew et al. (eds), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford 1992-,
Checked and found