Lesson Y8-U03-L06

Y8-U03-L06 How Was the Slave Trade Abolished Quiz: KS3 History, Unit 9

20 questions

Written by Revision Ninja · Last reviewed 11 October 2026

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Lesson Y8-U03-L06, How Was the Slave Trade Abolished: 20 multiple choice questions for the KS3 History (National Curriculum), Unit 9: Year 8: Slavery, written with Revision Ninja.

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The 20 questions

  1. In what year was the British slave trade abolished by law?

    • 1787
    • 1833
    • 1807
    • 1834

  2. Which organisation was founded in 1787 to coordinate the national campaign against the slave trade?

    • The East India Company
    • The Royal Navy
    • The Royal African Company
    • The SEAST

  3. Which religious group sent the first big petition to Parliament against the trade in 1783?

    • The Mughals
    • The Tories
    • The Jacobites
    • The Quakers

  4. Which campaigner rode thousands of miles collecting evidence and interviewing sailors?

    • Thomas Cranmer
    • Thomas More
    • Thomas Cromwell
    • Thomas Clarkson

  5. Which MP led the fight for abolition in the House of Commons?

    • John Pym, the leader of the Commons opposition during the early years of the Civil War
    • Robert Clive, the soldier who won the Battle of Plassey for the East India Company
    • Oliver Cromwell, the New Model Army commander who later became Lord Protector
    • William Wilberforce

  6. Roughly how many people took part in the sugar boycott?

    • About 300,000
    • About 3 million
    • About 30
    • About 300

  7. Which Black writer published 'Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil of Slavery' in 1787?

    • Ottobah Cugoano
    • Ibn Battuta
    • Toussaint L'Ouverture
    • Olaudah Equiano

  8. What did the Slave Trade Act of 1807 make illegal?

    • Owning any sugar, which was taxed heavily by the government in London each year
    • British ships carrying enslaved Africans across the Atlantic
    • Reading books that described the cruelties of the slave trade in print
    • Living in the Caribbean, where many of the planters had settled with their families

  9. Which statement about the 1807 Act is FALSE?

    • It freed people already enslaved in the British Caribbean
    • It ended the British slave trade
    • It was passed by Parliament
    • It banned British ships from carrying enslaved people

  10. What did the 'Brookes' diagram show?

    • A map of the Atlantic showing the trade routes between Africa, Europe and the Americas
    • A royal palace in London where the King and his ministers held their councils
    • The sugar price list published each year by the merchants of Bristol and Liverpool
    • A ship's cargo hold packed with enslaved people

  11. Which phrase appeared on Josiah Wedgwood's 1787 medallion?

    • Am I Not a Man and a Brother?
    • Liberty or Death, the slogan used by many rebels across the Atlantic world
    • God Save the King, the national anthem sung at every public event in the realm
    • Rule Britannia, the patriotic song that celebrated the power of the navy at sea

  12. Why did campaigners target the trade first rather than slavery itself?

    • Slavery had already ended in most parts of the British Empire by that date
    • The Pope demanded it in a letter to the English King and his ministers in London
    • The trade was legal in Africa and the African rulers approved of it openly
    • It was a more winnable target than ending slavery itself

  13. Why was the sugar boycott powerful even for people without a vote?

    • It made sugar illegal in Britain, so no one could buy or sell it in the shops
    • It forced slavery to end overnight across all the British colonies in the world
    • It hit the slave-owners' profits, so shoppers could pressure Parliament
    • It gave them seats in Parliament, so they could vote on the abolition bills directly

  14. Why was Clarkson's evidence important to the campaign?

    • It was a royal order that commanded every sailor to stop sailing to West Africa
    • It was a painting of the Queen that hung in the royal palace at Windsor for many years
    • It proved sugar was dangerous to health and should be banned from the British diet
    • It gave MPs hard facts, such as shackles and sailors' accounts, that could not be dismissed

  15. Why could Wilberforce NOT have ended the trade on his own?

    • Laws only passed after years of public pressure from many groups
    • He was against abolition and only supported the trade until the end of his life
    • The trade had already ended by the time he began his campaign in Parliament
    • He was not an MP, and so he had no vote in the House of Commons at all

  16. Source C, a 1907 textbook, credits Wilberforce 'almost single-handed'. Why is this a problem?

    • It was written in Africa by a scholar who had studied the trade in great detail
    • It ignores the many groups, including formerly enslaved campaigners and boycotters, who helped
    • It is too long and contains far too many dates and names for a school textbook
    • It was a secret report that was hidden from the public and the government for over a century

  17. Why is Source B, by Thomas Clarkson, a useful source about the campaign?

    • He was an opponent of abolition
    • He never met a campaigner
    • He was a ship's captain
    • He was an insider who knew the campaign took many people, so his account is credible

  18. Why did the Quakers play a major role in the campaign?

    • They controlled the Royal Navy and ordered its ships to stop the trade
    • They sent the first big petition and funded the campaign
    • They owned sugar plantations in Jamaica and grew the crop for the London market
    • They wrote the Slave Trade Act in their meeting house and presented it to Parliament

  19. Why does the lesson say the 1807 Act did NOT free enslaved people?

    • It only banned British ships carrying people, so those already enslaved stayed enslaved
    • It made slavery illegal across the world, and every country followed Britain's lead
    • It freed every enslaved person in Britain and gave each one a parcel of land
    • It ended the sugar trade, so the plantations were closed and their workers sent home

  20. Why is the abolition campaign described as a 'combination' of testimony, evidence and organisation?

    • The campaign had no organisation, but its members were simply lucky in their timing
    • Testimony alone ended the trade, since the public read the books and changed their minds
    • No single element would have worked alone; emotion, proof and reach together built pressure
    • Only organisation mattered, because petitions were all the campaigners needed to win

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