The Transatlantic Slave Trade And The Middle Passage Essay

It took place across the Atlantic Ocean from the 15th to the 19th centuries. It was a trade of human beings from African societies who were shipped across the Atlantic Ocean to the Americas. About 1.8 million people died during the Atlantic Slave Trade due to harsh conditions on the ship. Furthermore, many others perished during the process of capture and transport to the African coast done by the middle men. Slaves were kept in dungeon fortresses and suffered horrid living conditions while waiting to be sent out to sea on boats headed for America. Both on the forts and the ships, they were kept in dirty, dark rooms with little moving space and almost no food and drink. They were usually kept in chains and forced to lie on their backs. The transatlantic slave trade is sometimes known as the "Triangular Trade" because it was trade among three ports or regions. The voyages were from Europe to Africa, from Africa to the Americas, and from the Americas back to Europe. The raw materials and natural resources like rice, tobacco, cotton and sugar that were found in the Americas were brought to Europe. Europe then brought manufactured products such as cloth, beads and guns to Africa in exchange for slaves who were brought to the Americas. This voyage impacted the world. Africa became a permanent part of the interacting Atlantic world and millions of people were

As requests for work developed, so did the cost of contracted laborers. Numerous landowners likewise felt debilitated by recently liberated workers interest for land. Landowners adhered to African slaves as a more productive and ever-renewable wellspring of work and the move from obligated laborers to racial servitude had started (3) Slavery was formerly enacted by the Virginians in 1661 (3). The English entry into the Atlantic slave trade gave the Southern planter an opportunity to purchase slaves more readily and more cheaply than before (4). The middle passage witnessed about 10-20% deaths during the uneasy voyage (5). The condition they found themselves in was dependent on their location and master. In chattel slavery, which mostly took place in the farmlands the primary obligation was to ensure the presence of effective cultivation (1). However, on the plantations, the slaves were closely monitored by “overseers”, who excessively maltreated them sometimes for personal gain (1). They tortured them because the owners had left it to them to watch over their progress, yet instead of encouraging them they rather brutalized them with words and

Although all this documents stress voices from the Slave Trade, each document sheds a unique light on the much-debated question about who should be held responsible for the tragedy of the Atlantic slave trade. For example, Document 15.1 sheds light on the role of both European and African merchants in the trafficking of slaves as well as the human suffering of the slave trade. However Document 15.2 reveals the cooperation between local African rulers and European and African traders in the slave trade. Moreover, Documents 15.3 focus on how disruptive European traders could be to established African governments, even those that actively opposed the slave trade. And finally, Document 15.4 shows how some African leaders were attached to the slave trade and promoted it even when European were moving to end it. Nonetheless, all the documents do shed a clear and a full light on what should be held responsible for the

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.

It is shocking how little humanitarian concern was raised for the slaves, especially with these tight quarters. Slave lives were devalued even more, when sailors were forced to throw living Africans overboard to stop the vigorous spreading of diseases, as shown in the image in Document 4. This image along with Document 5 shows how cruel slaves were treated, and clearly represent the point of view of someone who felt sympathy for the African slaves. The Middle Passage ships restricted slaves to remain motionless for several weeks of

Now not many of us understand how it was like to be born or abducted to be slaves. I know people have heard and read about how these poor innocent people were forced from their home country and commanded to do hard labor; but I don’t think they really actually understood the severity and harsh conditions these human beings underwent. Olaudah Equiano wrote this document of his journey through the Middle Passage to show people

The transatlantic slave trade began in the 15th century, after the Portuguese started exploring the coast of West Africa. This had a long term effect on Africa because even though it started out benefiting the upper class in Africa, the long term effect was devastating. When Europeans started to enter Africa, they enjoyed “the triple advantage of guns and other technology, widespread literacy, and the political organization necessary to sustain expensive programs of exploration and conquest”(Doc 4). Africa’s relations with Europe depended on common interests, which Europe did not share. Europe’s contact with Africa, involving economic exchanges and political relationships, was not mutually beneficial.

The New World in the seventeenth century presented itself in different ways to differing groups of people as portrayed in the accounts written by Olaudah Equiano in The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, John Smith in The General History of Virginia, and William Bradford in Of Plymouth Plantation. Olaudah Equiano is a slave through the Middle Passage as a child and spends ten years of his life being traded from owner to owner in Barbados. John Smith is one of the men to lead the first set of colonists to the New World and to establish the first settlement in Jamestown, Virginia. William Bradford is one of the leaders of the Pilgrim colony aboard the Mayflower who settled in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Each man experiences his own form of fear upon board the ship that will take him to the New World as the anticipation of seeing what the future holds grows. Aboard each ship and in each settlement, conditions worsen as food supplies run low and the chance for illness increases. Dehumanization also occurs in each passage to a group of people who those from a richer, European background deem as a threat to an orderly community or as lesser in quality. As written by Olaudah Equiano, John Smith, and William Bradford, journeying to a new land is a petrifying experience when the level of supplies decreases, the chance of illness increases, and the respect for outside groups decreases.

In the Atlantic slave trade, African slaves were treated like animals or even objects. White people took advantage and mistreated them. A few examples of this

To really show the horrendous conditions that the slaves endured, the author includes a 1787 replication drawing of the slave ship Brooks. Built in 1781 with a lower deck intended to accommodate 294 slaves, giving each slave a space comparable to the size of a coffin. Adult males were allocated a space six feet long and fifteen inches wide and allowing even less space for adult women, boys, and girls. The height of the same area was just five feet, and did not include any toilet facilities for the slaves. In most cases, the captains would load double the number of slaves their ships were designed for leading to even worse conditions onboard with more mouths to feed but not enough provisions to compensate. Those slaves who died during the journey through the Middle Passage were simply thrown overboard, where their bodies were eaten by ravenous sharks.

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.

The changes in African life during the slave trade era form an important element in the economic and technological development of Africa. Although the Atlantic slave trade had a negative effect on both the economy and technology, it is important to understand that slavery was not a new concept to Africa. In fact, internal slavery existed in Africa for many years. Slaves included war captives, the kidnapped, adulterers, and other criminals and outcasts. However, the number of persons held in slavery in Africa, was very small, since no economic or social system had developed for exploiting them (Manning 97). The new system-Atlantic slave trade-became quite different from the early African slavery. The

The transatlantic slave trade first began in 1502, with records of the first slaves in the New World, lasting nearly four centuries. It connected the economies of three continents. The route began in West Europe, where it continued to Africa, trading manufactured goods such as rum, textiles, weapons, and gunpowder for slaves. From Africa, the ship went along the Atlantic to America, distributing slaves, and bringing agricultural products such as coffee, cotton, rice, and sugar back to Europe. The entire route typically lasted eighteen months. The slave trade ended in 1867, seventeen years after Britain began arresting slave ships.

The history of America is encompassed with several instances of violence, wars, and gruesome practices. One of the biggest events of the slave trade during American history was the Middle Passage. It took place between the continents of Europe, Africa, and the Americas from the seventeenth century to the nineteenth centuries. The first part of the voyage carried cargo from Europe to the African coast, where the goods were exchanged for African captives. In the second phase of the trade, Africans were traded for European goods. During this time, the slaves were packed like cargo into the carriages of sailboats and lived in repugnant conditions. The voyages lasted for several months and had severe effects on those onboard the ships.

Slavery developed in the Americas because of exploration and need or labor. Europeans captured Africans and transported them across the deadly Middle Passage, to the Americas, where they would be forced to poor under harsh conditions. Slavery had many lasting effects. Africa was depopulated, and Africans in America lost their cultures and identity while Europeans made money from the resources being exported in the Americas at the expense of Africans’ lives and culture.