Factors Of The European Slave Trade In The 17th Century

The Atlantic slave trade which was inevitably began by the Portuguese, but later in time taken over by the English, was the sale and exploitation of African slaves by Europeans that occurred in and throughout the Atlantic Ocean from the 15th century to the 19th century. Most slaves were transported from West Africa and Central Africa to the New World. Although slavery and slave trading already existed it became well known and practiced in all cultures. During this time while Europeans obtained most slaves through coastal trade with African states, some slaves

In the essay "The Evolution of Slavery in Colonial America," author Jon Butler examines the growth of the slave practice in the land which would become the United States. As the European nations began exploring North America, they overtook the native populations of the areas and turned them into unpaid laborers. However, these people were not enough to supply landholders with sufficient aid. To make up the necessary numbers, plantation owners utilized indentured servants and then a number of slaves imported from Africa. Indentured servants were people who would be taken from the Old World to the New in order to start a new life. However, since they would not have the necessary funds to pay for their transportation, their journey would be funded by either a manufacturer or a plantation owner and their debt would be paid off by working for their benefactor. Slaves were not given this opportunity. These were people who were taken from their homes and families and forced into labor by threat of violence or death. This practice did not begin in the United States, but America was still allowing slavery well into the 19th century, long after other nations had come to the conclusion that slavery was inhumane and brutal.

The slave trade in the North American colonies began to grow in the 1600s. The African slave trade sourced their slaves from many different West African villages and countries. The business of slavery was a growing and profitable field, not only for the slavers, but also for the slaveholders. With the decrease of indentured servants, settlers in the English colonies looked for a new source of labor to satisfy their growing labor demands. The next source was Africa. “By the 1690s slaves outnumbered indentured servants four to one” (45). Europeans largely disregarded the ethical dilemma posed by slavery due to the European view of Africans and their culture as uncivilized, foreign, and heathen (44). The largest forced migration in history (44)

Africans were brought to the Americas through the Transatlantic Slave Trade to make up for the labor shortage created after the Native Americans died (doc 1). Most slaves became workers on plantations which allowed the New World to produce raw materials which would later be traded with Europe (doc 1). However, the increase of raw materials, such as sugarcane, resulted in the New World becoming a part of an international trade (doc 2). This allowed them to gain access to raw materials, such as Indigo rice tobacco coffee cocoa and cotton (doc 2). So even though slaves were forcibly brought to the Americas, the increase in slave labor resulted in an overall increase of trade between Europe and the

The two majors drivers that led to the transatlantic slave trade was the European desire for the agricultural products of the Americas and the need for laborers to work the land in the Americas. All participants, besides for the slaves, benefited from the trading.

As the profitability of the colonists’ agricultural enterprises quickly rose, it was essential to procure a sufficient number of workers since labor shortages were a constant headache.7 Enslavement of the Indigenous Peoples had become steadily more problematic and by the 1750’s this practice had ceased altogether.8 European workers were both expensive and tended to leave their employers to start plantations of their own, or to return home. Therefore, a more reliable source of economically viable labor became a necessity, and that baleful need coincided with the rise of the Trans- Atlantic Slave Trade from Africa.

The world wars had hit the Europeans so hard that they seriously and urgently needed a source of labor that would help in the rebuilding of their cities and mine their minerals such as coal, gold, and silver among others. They decide to turn to Africa for this labor and therefore, slave trade was born in the middle of the 15th century on the continent. The first batch of slaves was imported to Cuba.

During the 17th and 18th centuries, the influences of European powers were seen throughout the Americas. The first countries who got the ball rolling on the impaction from Europe were Spain and Portugal. Both these countries created plantation farms in the West Indies and produced many types of products. The bad thing about these plantations was the fact that each was worked on by hundreds of African slaves, who were badly beaten. This led to the first ever successful slave uprising in later years.

During the seventeenth century, the growth of tobacco, rice and indigo crops created a high demand for land as well as manual labor; two problems thought to be solved by the introduction of indentured servitude. Throughout the seventeenth century, the majority of Europeans coming to the America’s were Indentured Servants. Incentives were high for both employers and servants and this type of contract slave labor quickly became the method of choice for plantation owners. Increasing manual labor and land was critical to the colonies economic success, however time would eventually uncover the problems indentured servitude would create for the colonies, the land and ultimately farmers would prefer traditional slave labor to indentured servants.

The American Industrial Revolution (1820-1870) was responsible for a significant growth to the American economy. This economic growth, translated into material prosperity for early white American settlers, who owned farms because, the demand for their products increased exponentially. However, this demand resulted in a negative consequence in America society that saw expansion of domestic slave trade. The domestic slave trade expanded after the American government abolished the African slavery not only because, white American settler’s needed slaves to produce cotton, and sugar, but domestic slavery became a profitable business.

[x] France for example has created New France in Canada and also down into Florida and Spain had a large portion of Mexico and Southern America. [xi] These new colonizes helped create trade between the New and Old World. Government ventures lended money for explorers to set forth and trade in the West and elsewhere.[xii] This also led to the role of mercantilism in the Atlantic as well. They helped promote overseas trade between a country and its own colonizes.[xiii] As they controlled more trade, different trading companies began to emerge in response to mercantilism. The Dutch West Indian Company and the royal African Company chartered by their motherlands all participated in a system which included other non- European countries as well. This system was known as the Atlantic Circuit which was a clockwise network of trading links that moved goods, wealth and people around the Atlantic system.[xiv] This helped make the slave trade more efficient because now a vast amount of slaves could be transported to their specific destinations as requested by a country. As document 8 shows, the slaves which came from Africa each followed a specific route in the Atlantic Circuit. [xv] tying in with document 4 the work that had to be done on the plantation was a lot and that is why with the help of city ports in Africa they were able to get a large number of slaves to help in the Americas. An example of the type of work they did can be

In the 1500s to 1900s, Africans were taken from Africa and brought across the Atlantic Ocean where they were traded and sold for labor in the New World, which included the Caribbean Islands, and North and South America. Around the 1600s, the Europeans captured and bought slaves, which began the Atlantic Slave trade and the forced migration of about 24 million people from Africa.

During the development of the colonies and the nation as a whole, slaves were utilized in order to produce the crops and perform laborious tasks that were “below” white people. In the 1660s, there was an increased demand for tobacco products as well as indigo and rice in England (“African American Slavery in the Colonial Era, 1619-1775”). In order to fulfill the demand, there was a spike in interest in purchasing slaves. More and more slaves were needed to produce larger amounts of crops for the plantation owners.

History has proven in many points has proven that growth within a country is trade, and a market. As countries grow the population demands different goods, and some become more valued than others. Some countries grow into vast empires, because of the economy built around these trades. The Netherlands and Portugal became great empires, due to the importance of trade, slave trade, and companies that helped power trade.

During the mid fifteenth through eighteenth century, due to the limiting of trade from Western Europe to Asia, the Western Europeans sought out to new passages in search for a faster route to the Indies and to explore new areas of the uncharted oceans. The Portuguese were the first to commence the voyage for which they returned with thousands of slaves. Due to the exploration of Spanish conquistadors, thousands of African slaves were brought to the new world and Europe, which in return caused the economy of Western Europe to change in such ways as a rise of new economic powers in Western Europe and the development of new economic systems, such as mercantilism throughout Western Europe.