William Elford

(1749 - 1837)

William Elford was an English banker, politician, artist, and baron who was friends with William Pitt the Younger and served as chairman of the Plymouth chapter of the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade. His written works include “A Short Essay on the Propagation and Dispersion of Animals and Vegetables, Being Chiefly Intended as an Answer to a Letter Lately Published, and Supposed to Be Written by a Gentleman of Exeter, in Favour of Equivocal Generation” and a widely influential abolitionist pamphlet.