Essay On Ransom On The High Seas

The Slave Ship by Marcus Rediker is a great fiction novel that describes the horrifying experiences of Africans, seamen, and captains on their journey through the Middle Passage. The Middle Passage marked the water way in the Atlantic Ocean between Africa and the Americas. The use of slaves provided a great economy for the European countries due to the fact that these African slaves provided free labor while cultivating sugar cane in the Caribbean and America. Rediker describes the slave migration by saying, “There exists no account of the mechanism for history’s greatest forced migration, which was in many ways the key to an entire phase of globalization” (10). This tells us that African enslavement to the Americas causes a complete

Somalia is one of the world’s poorest and least developed countries (Campbell). Because of the Civil War, which broke out in 1991, much of Somalia’s economy has been devastated. The war left many

In discussions of the Atlantic Slave Trade, the term “Middle Passage” often arises. The Middle Passage was the stage of the triangular trade in which millions of Africans were shipped to the New World as part of the Atlantic Slave trade. The journey was one of the most horrific aspects of the morally deplorable system of slavery. Death was a constant threat as diseases, starvation, asphyxiation and severe depression rampantly claimed the lives of African and the ship’s crew. Throughout this essay you will understand the tragic journey of the slaves and what hardships they had to go through.

The brand of justice pirates toward vessels they captured was something I found fascinating. For example, on page 88, the incident involving the capture of Captain Snelgraves vessel by the pirate Thomas Cocklyn. Initially Snelgrave resisted Cocklyns takeover so as Cocklyns crew overpowers Snelgraves and is taken by the pirates. Certain that Snelgrave will be killed or beaten for resisting, Snelgraves crew comes to their captains defense thus Cocklyn sparring the respected captains life. Because of the degree of respect Snelgraves had, Cocklyn not often seeing a government captain holding such admiration from a crew offered him a new ship and profits from a captured slave ship for his return to England. This story really caught my attention because of the level of hospitality pirates show to a captain who held such respect with his own crew.

Marcus Rediker’s main point is the Atlantic Pirates were a group of highly intelligent people that unfortunately were forced to a criminal life because it was their only means to Survive. They were intelligent in the reason of choosing to attack the America colonies, but also in the way the pirates made their own governing structure. According to Dr. Rediker “a compact drawn up at the beginning of a voyage or upon election of a new captain, and agreed to by the crew. By these articles crews allocated authority, distributed plunder, and enforced discipline. These arrangements made the captain the creature of his crew”.(Rediker 209). These pirates knew that they had recently escaped a system of oppression that had done them wrong in many ways. This is why they made a system where everyone counted and where everyone got what they deserved. In a way they kept each other on check. An example of this today would be friend making sure another friend doesn’t cheat on his

“If any of the seamen refuse to perform their services, or passengers to pass their freight; If any refuse to help, in person or purse, towards the common charges or defense; If any refuse to obey the common laws and orders of the ship, concerning their common peace or preservation; – I say, I never denied, but in such cases, whatever is pretended, the commander or commanders may judge, resist, compel, and punish such transgressors, according to their deserts and

After years of treacherous fighting, it is known that every American Citizen holds both undeniable individuals rights and extreme commercial prospect. It would be an embarrassment and a shame to forfeit these extraordinary liberties back to our enemies as result of lack in a strong naval power. It is imperative that every man decide to protect our land, way of life, and commerce by vesting trust in the abilities of a National Navy. Some, such as Thomas Jefferson, would argue that investment in a suitably sized Navy would have an ‘adverse effect’ (Jefferson 1785) on our economy. I however, would raise that it would be nearly impossible to function as a sovereign nation if our trade, and effectively our economic system, was infested with fear of piracy and unstable trade-routes. How can we gain international respect if as soon as we leave port, our sailors and cargo are at risk of being overtaken by any force? I say ‘any force’ because quite frankly, in our current state of naval defense, it is plausible for even the smallest of nation-states or gang

Somalia is one of the world's poorest and least developed countries (Campbell). Because of the Civil War, which broke out in 1991, much of Somalia's economy has been devastated. The war left many

Colley’s view was taken from the imperial perspective – from the perspective of the captive men and women British citizens. The British fear was that pirates would corrupt British citizens, willingly or unwillingly. Although unwilling captivation seems to be the most threatening to the empire, Colley makes sure to have the reader consider the opposite. If British citizens are so willing to change their opinions of Indians and themselves, even seeing them as equals, this was detrimental to the core of the empire’s platform of power. Britain was able to go into countries like these, take control, and influence power because of their one basic belief – the British were, without a doubt, at a higher social standing and, therefore, in a better position to make decisions regarding politics, money, military power. This is the story we are all used to

In the “Ransom of Red Chief” I don’t feel sympathy for the kidnappers because they aren't suppose to be kidnapping anyway. They should have known from the beginning when Red Chief threw a brick at them that he was going to be tough to kidnap. They really picked a bad decision on who to kidnap and this was their fault. I don't feel sympathy for them because they didn't really have a great plan. The kidnappers kept Red Chief in a cave to where they could keep him in. The reason they chose to kidnap this kid was because he came from a rich family. They thought they would take the kid then ask for money to give him back in exchange. Once the kid was gone for a while they wrote a letter asking for money from his father to give the kid back. This

The pirates have created a unique system that has easily allowed them to continue to pirate with little conflict between one another. The former fishers, military, and technicians have joined together and mutually have all the skills needed to pirate including; difficulties of the navigation and handling ships, weapon and fighting training, and high tech equipment. They happen to be in a spot where lots of cargo ships have to go through as well as Somalis in port cities that tell the pirates when these ships are coming through. The pirates have a good distribution of power and profits and, without a greedy leader, everyone gets paid and no one rebels which could cause the whole system to collapse from the inside. They

The Seafarer by Burton Raffel was written during the Anglo-Saxon period where the Anglo-Saxon warriors lived to defend their King, like in the story Sir Gawain and The Green Knight. One of the warriors speaks about his challenges and begins saying that his story is not at all joyful. It is a story full of pain and suffering. The story paints a picture of what it means to be “dislocated”, “set out”, all by oneself and how badly it feels. “My feet were cast in icy bands, bound with frost,with frozen chains, and hardship groaned around my heart. Hunger tore at my sea-weary soul. No man sheltered on the quiet fairness of earth can feel how wretched I was”.(Raffel 1) The powerful imagery in this stanza sets the tone that the narrator is trying to

on the abusive treatment he got from the jail officers and upon his release, he later states “Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison” (Thoreau 9). Specifically, he is highly alert about the ways the jail officers treated him as if he

The scope of influence of the four-imperialist pirate regiment is still rather complicated. It is not that the entire new world is completely divided into four sites, but different sizes and many neutral areas.

These new pirates are similar to their predecessors in a variety of aspects. They are split up into two groups: those who work for themselves and others who have an alliance with a government. The most famously known group is currently known as the Somali pirates. They attempted to attack and capture the U.S. cargo vessel called Maersk Alabama in April 2009. However, they were fought off, and their one hostage, the ship’s skipper, was rescued five days later (Boot, Max. “Pirates, Then and Now”). Pirate techniques of stealing and escaping have not changed either. Sea robbers continue to elude the authorities by using state and country flags to become unrecognizable. Their ships are designed to be fast and easy to maneuver through coves and channels. On the other hand, technological advances have made it easier for ordinary ocean vessels to become victims of piracy. Wooden ships with shallow bottoms and cannons were ingenious a century ago, but speedboats have become the new pirate transportation. Somali pirates tend to have a larger, ‘mother ship’ used for deep ocean assaults (May, Laura.