{{Short description|Scottish abolitionist (1792–1877)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=February 2017}} {{Use British English|date=February 2017}} {{Infobox person |name = William Smeal |image = William Smeal.jpg |image_size = |caption = Smeal in 1865 |birth_name = |birth_date = 1792 |birth_place = |death_date = {{death year and age|1877|1792}} |death_place = |known_for = founding the Glasgow Emancipation Society |family = Jane Smeal }}
'''William Smeal''' (1792–1877) was a grocer and an abolitionist Quaker from Glasgow.
==Life== William Smeal was born in 1792. He and his brother James were both grocers and were active in the anti-slavery movement in Scotland.<ref>[http://www.theglasgowstory.com/story.php?id=TGSDH&PHPSESSID=17713de792b7c84332ae83da33928795 Second City of The Empire: 1830s to 1914], The Glasgow Story, accessed September 2012</ref> He is credited with founding the Glasgow Anti-Slavery Society, forerunner of the Glasgow Emancipation Society, in 1822.<ref name=drbleaflet>[http://www.theedinburghreporter.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/DRB-Exhibition-Booklet.pdf Women on the Platform], DRBs Scottish Women’s History Group, retrieved 3 June 2015</ref> He was noted as a tea merchant,<ref name=nls/> and his sister Jane Smeal was also a leading abolitionist.<ref name=drbleaflet/>
Smeal attended the week-long World Anti-Slavery conference in 1840. His presence there was captured in a portrait, where he appears alongside other Quakers such as Josiah Forster, businessmen such as Tapper Cadbury and Samuel Fox, bankers such as George Head Head, and other prominent abolitionists from a number of countries including America, South Africa and Jamaica. The meeting had been organised by Joseph Sturge from Birmingham. {{Anti-Slavery Society Convention 1840|align=left|size=300px|caption=Smeal is on the right at the back in this painting which is of the 1840 World Anti-Slavery Convention.<ref name=npg>[http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait.php?search=ap&npgno=599&eDate=&lDate= The Anti-Slavery Society Convention, 1840], Benjamin Robert Haydon, 1841, National Portrait Gallery, London, NPG599, Given by British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society in 1880</ref> Move your cursor to identify him or click icon to enlarge}}
==Legacy== William Smeal's family were unusual in Scotland for being Quakers. In 1851 a census found that there were fewer than 400 practising Quakers in Scotland.<ref name="bread">{{cite book|last=Pickering|first=Paul A|author2=Alex Tyrrell |title=The people's bread: a history of the Anti-Corn Law League p 55|publisher=Leicester University Press|year=2000|pages=304|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oAzdnKItEIwC&pg=PA55 |accessdate=16 January 2010 | isbn=978-0-7185-0218-8}}</ref>
Smeal died in 1877, and his obituary recorded his interests in opposing injustice throughout his life. He opposed the corn laws, alcohol, stamp duties, capital punishment, war and slavery. He has been considered a model of a Quaker's contribution to public life.<ref name="bread"/> His sister Jane was a leader of the anti-slavery movement, and her stepdaughter Eliza Wigham was a noted campaigner for abolitionism and women's rights.<ref name=nls>[http://www.nls.uk/collections/topics/slavery/index.html Emancipation and the American Civil War] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091206183918/http://www.nls.uk/collections/topics/slavery/index.html |date=6 December 2009 }}, National Library of Scotland, accessed 16 January 2010</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Smeal, William}} Category:1792 births Category:1877 deaths Category:Quaker abolitionists Category:Businesspeople from Glasgow Category:Scottish abolitionists Category:Scottish Quakers