 However, those disputes predominantly concerned disputes between slave merchants (the notable exception being "Shanley v Harvey", as to which see below), for whom it would have been commercially unwise to plead that slavery was unlawful.It is inferred that, because he was from Russia, Cartwright's slave was white, and probably a Christian, although this is not recorded.However, it is possible that he was African, as, although they were uncommon, African slaves in Russia were not unknown prior to the emergence of the Atlantic slave trade.