MIDDLE PASSAGE & TRANSATLANTIC

SLAVE TRADE

Slavery Timeline (to 1660s)

• 10th century – Islamic slave trade across the Sahara and Central Africa begins

• 1472 First Portuguese slave traders in Benin• 1481 First “slave factory” in Elmira on the Guinea

coast• 1502 First mention of African slaves in the

Americas• 1518 Spanish asiento begins• 1520 Sugar plantations begin in Brazil• 1619 First slaves arrive in Jamestown• 1620s Chesapeake tobacco plantations

increase the demand for slaves• 1660s Chattel slavery emerges in the

southern colonies

Trans-Atlantic exports by region1650-1900

Region

Number of slavesaccounted for %

Senegambia 479,900 4.7

Upper Guinea 411,200 4.0

Windward Coast 183,200 1.8

Gold Coast 1,035,600 10.1

Blight of Benin 2,016,200 19.7

Blight of Biafra 1,463,700 14.3

West Central 4,179,500 40.8

South East 470,900 4.6

Total 10,240,200 100.0

Various ethnic groupsIncluding:IboEweBakongoWolofSererBambaraAradaYorubaDahomeyAshantiFulaniMandingoHausa

TRIANGULAR TRADE

• To Africa: Beads, cowrie shells (used as money), textiles, brandy, horses, and perhaps most importantly, guns from Europe. The guns were used to help expand empires and obtain more slaves, until they were finally used against

the European colonizers.

TRIAGULAR TRADE

• To EuropeFurs, fish, whale products, naval stores, grain, iron, tobacco, rice, indigo, and deerskins from North America

Sugar and rum from Caribbean

TRIANGULAR TRADE

• To North AmericaManufactured goods from EuropeSlaves from AfricaSugar, rum, molasses, slaves from Caribbean

TRIANGULAR TRADE

• To CaribbeanManufactured products from EuropeSlaves from AfricaFish, livestock, meat, wood products, grain, and rice from Caribbean

Many years had passed between the arrival of Europeans to Africa and 1795, the time this image was engraved. The Portuguese, who had explored much of the coast of western Africa under the sponsorship of Prince Henry, landed along the shores of the Senegal River 350 years earlier.

Image Credit: Musée national des Arts d'Afrique et d'Oceanie

Slave Trading Companies• Portuguese control trade initially

– 1440s Prince Henry of Portugal, organized the Lagos Company

– 1692 Portuguese Company of Cacheo is established

• Dutch– 1621 Dutch establish Dutch West India

Company• French

– 1634 French Company of the West Indies established

– 1673 French created Company of Senegal• British

– 1660 British establish Royal Adventurers which becomes the Royal African Company

BaracoonsThe Spaniards kept them in baracoons -- crude structures, many of them little more than walled, open-air pens, with high, stout walls -- built on the marshy, low-lying islands along the river. The slaves were chained together in pairs by leg irons to discourage escape or revolt.

Ships usually overcrowded – ex. Henrietta Marie, a British ship that sailed from London in 1699 should have been fully loaded with 240 slaves; instead carried 350 to Barbados

Cargo space generally only 5 feet high to pack more slaves; about 20-25 inches headroom with planks of 5.5 feet long and 1.3 feet wide

Males chained together

Empty tubs used for excrement

Mortality rates high because of unsanitary conditions. Bet. 1715 and 1775 slave deaths on French ships averaged 15%. Overall 1/3 of slaves died before reaching slave ship.

Time for crossing varied – 40 days to 6 months

Today, you can find hundreds, if not thousands, of books offering advice and hints relating to specific professions and trades, ranging from TV repairmen to CEOs to office managers. This type of book has been around for centuries, as demonstrated by the French publication, Le commerce de l'Amerique par Marseille. About maritime trade, this would have been the book for you if you were the captain of an 18th century merchant ship.

The 1764 publication offers information about the trade of tobacco, cotton, indigo, etc., as well as captive Africans and the "precautions to take in buying slaves, and how to transport them to America in good health."

The book included this 1725 engraving by Serge Daget entitled An Englishman Tastes the Sweat of an African. Accompanying the engraving was a numbered list of descriptions in French, the numbers of which corresponded to those on the image.

1. Negroes displayed for sale in a public market.2. A Negro Slave being examined before being purchased. 3. An Englishman licking the Negro's chin to confirm his age, and to discover from the taste of his sweat that he is not sick.4. Negro Slave wearing the mark of slavery on his arm.