Chapter 4, Section 3Chapter 4, Section 3Slavery in the ColoniesSlavery in the Colonies

How did slavery develop in the colonies and affect colonial life?

Slavery started as a way to provide labour, especially on plantations. It became restricted to Africans; and developed into a system in which slaves and their descendents were bound for life.

The Atlantic Slave TradeThe Atlantic Slave Trade-Between the 1500s and 1800s, more -Between the 1500s and 1800s, more than 10 million Africans were than 10 million Africans were enslaved and brought to the enslaved and brought to the Americas.Americas.-The first Africans were brought to -The first Africans were brought to the Americas by the Spanish and the the Americas by the Spanish and the Portuguese.Portuguese.-In time, the British, Dutch, and -In time, the British, Dutch, and French entered the slave trade.French entered the slave trade.-Slave traders in Africa brought -Slave traders in Africa brought captives from the interior. Many than captives from the interior. Many than half of the captives died during the half of the captives died during the long journey to the coast.long journey to the coast.

Middle Passage – passage across the Atlantic Ocean from West Africa to the Americas the was the route of the African American slave trade

The Middle PassageThe Middle Passage-Once the Enslaved Africans -Once the Enslaved Africans arrived on the coast, they were arrived on the coast, they were traded for guns and other goods. traded for guns and other goods.

-They then traveled the Middle -They then traveled the Middle passage, a voyage across the passage, a voyage across the Atlantic Ocean.Atlantic Ocean.-To increase profits, come ship -To increase profits, come ship captains crammed the maximum captains crammed the maximum number of captives on board. As number of captives on board. As many as 350 people might be many as 350 people might be bound together.bound together.

A diagram of the slave ship Brookes a Ship based in Liverpool, which regularly sailed between Britain, Africa & West Indies. The black marks are slaves. What do you think life was like on board this ship?.

The Triangular The Triangular TradeTrade

Titled "Plan and Sections of a Slave Ship," this detailed and famous drawing shows cross-sections of the ship," and how Africans were stowed in the holds. The inset drawing depicts a revolt aboard a slave ship, showing the crew shooting insurrectionists. The Brookes carried 609 slaves (351 men, 127, women, 90 boys, and 41 girls) crammed into its decks. Published 1789.

Shackles recovered from Slave Ship Henrietta Marie, 1700, which transported about 200 slaves from the Bight of Biafra,

West Africa to Jamaica.

Pencil and watercolor by Lt. Francis Meynell, "Slave deck of the Albaroz, Prize to the Albatross, 1845", shows liberated Africans. The Albaroz (or, possibly, Alboroz) was a Portuguese/Brazilian vessel, bound for Brazil, captured by the Royal Navy ship, Albatross, off the mouth of the Congo River in 1845; 300 Africans were on board.

Engraving showing the treatment of an African slave girl by the British Captain Kimber of the merchant ship ‘Recovery’. The girl, aged 15, was whipped to death for allegedly refusing to dance naked for the captain. Following a public outcry, Kimber was arrested and tried before the High Court of Admiralty in 1792. He was ultimately acquitted (let off), the jury having concluded that the girl had died of disease, and not maltreatment.

Branding irons with the owners’ initials.

What was the Middle Passage?

The voyage that carried captured people across the Atlantic from the West African coast to slavery in the Americas.

What was the purpose of slave codes?

They were designed to restrict travel and communication among enslaved people. The codes were intended to prevent slave revolts.

What cultural influences did Africans bring to America?

They brought language, crafts, musical styles, and other cultural influences to America.

Whip lash marks on the back of a slave in the late nineteenth

century.

Iron shackles used in the slave trade.

An iron mask with hooks around the neck to stop slaves running away or resting. The mask also stops the slaves from eating or drinking due to a flat piece of metal which goes into the mouth. The shackles and spurs would also have made it difficult for captured slaves to run away.  

Poster announcing a slave auction in Virginia, USA,

1823

This eighteen-year-old girl was whipped by her owner for refusing to have sex with him. She received 200 lashes for her actions.

An illustration from a novel showing the deck of a slave ship as it anchors in Jamaica, while the slaves were being prepared for sale. They were brought up on the top deck. “Each individual was seized by a sailor, who stood by with a soft brush in his hand and a pail at his feet; the latter containing a black composition of gunpowder, lemon-juice, and palm-oil. Of this mixture the unresisting captive received a coating which, by the hand of another sailor, was rubbed in the skin, and polished with a brush" until his skin glistened like a newly-blacked boot. . . . . It was not the first time those unfeeling men had helped prepare a slaver's cargo for market.”  

"Captives . . . are hobbled with roughly hewn logs which chafe their limbs to open sores; sometimes a whole tree presses its weight on their bodies while their necks are penned into the natural prong formed by its branching limbs.” Written by E.J. Glave, The Slave-Trade in the Congo Basin

What was life like on board What was life like on board the Brookes?the Brookes?

Carried 400 slavesCarried 400 slaves Distance between Distance between

decks 1.5 metresdecks 1.5 metres Men in bow, boys in Men in bow, boys in

centre, women in centre, women in sternstern

Temperatures - 35Temperatures - 35ºCºC Journey lasted 40-70 Journey lasted 40-70

daysdays DysenteryDysentery 20 million slaves 20 million slaves

(1450-1807)(1450-1807)

'Inventory of Negroes, Cattle, Horses, etc on the estate of Sir James Lowther Bart in Barbados taken this 31st day of December 1766'

The Arrival of Europeans in Africa - 1795

The Portuguese, under the sponsorship of Prince Henry, had landed in West Africa 350 years earlier.

This engraving, entitled An African man being inspected for sale into slavery while a white man talks with African slave traders, appeared in the detailed account of a former slave ship captain and was published in 1854.

The slave ship Brookes with 482 people packed onto the decks. The drawing of the slave ship Brookes was distributed by the Abolitionist Society in England as part of their campaign against the slave trade, and dates from 1789.

Interior of a Slave Ship, a woodcut illustration from the publication, A History of the Amistad Captives, reveals how hundreds of slaves could be held within a slave ship. Tightly packed and confined in an area with just barely enough room to sit up, slaves were known to die from a lack of breathable air.

• Africans were crowded and chained cruelly aboard slave ships.

"...the excessive heat was not the only thing that rendered their situation intolerable. The deck, that is the floor of their rooms, was so covered with the blood and mucus which had proceeded from them in consequence of the flux, that it resembled a slaughterhouse."

Taken from Alexander Falconbridge, a surgeon aboard slave ships and later the governor of a British colony for freed slaves in Sierra Leone.

Frequently, slaves were permitted on deck in small groups for brief periods, where the crew would encourage, and many times force, captives to dance for exercise.

"Exercise being deemed necessary for the preservation of their health they are sometimes obliged to dance when the weather will permit their coming on deck. If they go about it reluctantly or do not move with agility, they are flogged…”

Taken from Alexander Falconbridge, An Account of the Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa.

Heading for Jamaica in 1781, the ship Zong was nearing the end of its voyage. It had been twelve weeks since it had sailed from the west African coast with its cargo of 417 slaves. Water was running out. Then, compounding the problem, there was an outbreak of disease. The ship's captain, reasoning that the slaves were going to die anyway, made a decision. In order to reduce the owner's losses he would throw overboard the slaves thought to be too sick to recover. The voyage was insured, but the insurance would not pay for sick slaves or even those killed by illness. However, it would cover slaves lost through drowning.

The captain gave the order; 54 Africans were chained together, then thrown overboard. Another 78 were drowned over the next two days. By the time the ship had reached the Caribbean,132 persons had been murdered.

Hear a BBC dramatization of Olaudah Equiano's account of his experiences

"I was soon put down under the decks, and there I received such a salutation in my nostrils as I had never experienced in my life: so that, with the loathsomeness of the stench, and crying together, I became so sick and low that I was not able to eat, nor had I the least desire to taste anything.

I now wished for the last friend, death, to relieve me; but soon, to my grief, two of the white men offered me eatables; and on my refusing to eat, one of them held me fast by the hands and laid me across I think the windlass, and tied my feet, while the other flogged me severely.”

- Olaudah Equiano, giving the first eyewitness account of life on a ship from a slave's point of view.

THIS is the Vessel that had the Small-Pox on Board at the Time of her Arrival the 31st of March last: Every necessary Precaution hath since been taken to cleanse both Ship and Cargo thoroughly, so that those who may be inclined to purchase need not be under the least Apprehension of Danger from Infliction.

The NEGROES are allowed to be the likeliest Parcel that have been imported this Season.

• Diseases, such as dysentery, malaria, and smallpox killed thousands of Africans.

• Between 1699 and 1845 there were 55 successful African uprisings on slave ships.

William Snelgrave, from A New Account of Some Parts of Guinea, and the Slave Trade

• From 13% - 20% of the Africans aboard slave ships died during the Middle Passage.