<Tr> <Th_colspan="2"> Status: Repealed </Th> </Tr> <Tr> <Th_colspan="2"> Text of statute as originally enacted </Th> </Tr> <P> The Slavery Abolition Act 1833 (3 & 4 Will . IV c. 73) was an 1833 Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom abolishing slavery throughout the British Empire (with the exceptions "of the Territories in the Possession of the East India Company", Ceylon, now Sri Lanka, and Saint Helena; the exceptions were eliminated in 1843). The Act was repealed in 1998 as part of a wider rationalisation of English statute law, but later anti-slavery legislation remains in force . </P> <P> In May 1772, Lord Mansfield's judgement in the Somersett's Case emancipated a slave in England, which helped launch the movement to abolish slavery . The case ruled that slavery was unsupported by law in England and no authority could be exercised on slaves entering English or Scottish soil . In 1785, English poet William Cowper wrote: </P>

When did the slave trade end in britain