Liverpool

In the span of a hundred years, from 1700 to 1800, the town of Liverpool in northwest England was transformed from what was "not much more than a fishing village" into one of the busiest slave-trading ports on the Atlantic, with its ships accounting for over 40% of the European slave trade from Africa to the New World.There was no single reason for Liverpool's dramatic growth. By 1700, ties with the American colonies had been firmly established -- the port was importing shiploads of sugar and tobacco in exchange for white indentured servants. Also, early in the 18th century, the areas surrounding Liverpool saw an extensive rise in the manufacturing of textiles, iron, and firearms and gunpowder -- tempting items for the black slave traders of Africa. Another reason for the growth was the availability of capital. Landowners and merchants hoping to increase their wealth began funneling their money into shipping ventures. And still another reason: the Royal African Company's monopoly on the slave trade had recently ended, opening the trade to all.Liverpool's first slaving vessel, ironically named the Blessing, set sail in 1700. In 1730, 15 Liverpool slave ships headed toward Africa; in 1799, 134 ships made the voyage. Although some voyages reaped huge profits -- the ship "Lively" made a profit of 300% in 1737 -- the overall profit for the trade during the second half of the century ranged between eight and ten percent. Still, due in large measure to profits from the slave trade, Liverpool prospered. Slave-trading voyages stopped in 1807 when England abolished its participation in the trade. Liverpool, however, would turn to industrial manufacturing and would continue to prosper for many years.

Liverpool's extensive growth during the 18th century, due in large measure to profits made in the Atlantic slave trade, brought an increasing demand for storage space. In 1793, in response to this demand, successful merchants built the Goree Warehouses, named after Senegal's Goree Islands off the coast of Africa. When fire destroyed the buildings in 1802, merchants rebuilt the warehouses in 1811, for trade with Africa continued after Parliament brought an end to the British slave trade. Artist Samuel Austin made this engraving in 1829.

Live Africans Thrown overboard

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.

When the ship returned to England the owners made their claim -- they wished to be compensated the full value for each slave lost. The claim might have been honored had if it had not been for former slave Equiano, then living in England, who learned of the tragedy and alerted an abolitionist friend of his. The case went to court. At first the jury ruled in favor of the ship's owners. Since it was permissible to kill animals for the safety of the ship, they decided, it was permissible to kill slaves for the same reason. The insurance company appealed, and the case was retried. This time the court decided that the Africans on board the ship were people. It was a landmark decision.

The Middle Passage

For weeks, months, sometimes as long as a year, they waited in the dungeons of the slave factories scattered along Africa's western coast. They had already made the long, difficult journey from Africa's interior -- but just barely. Out of the roughly 20 million who were taken from their homes and sold into slavery, half didn't complete the journey to the African coast, most of those dying along the way.

The captives were about to embark on the infamous Middle Passage, so called because it was the middle leg of a three-part voyage -- a voyage that began and ended in Europe. The first leg of the voyage carried a cargo that often included iron, cloth, brandy, firearms, and gunpowder. Upon landing on Africa's "slave coast," the cargo was exchanged for Africans. Fully loaded with its human cargo, the ship set sail for the Americas, where the slaves were exchanged for sugar, tobacco, or some other product. The final leg brought the ship back to Europe.

The african Slave Trade

Along the west coast of Africa, from the Cameroons in the south to Senegal in the north, Europeans built some sixty forts that served as trading posts. European sailors seeking riches brought rum, cloth, guns, and other goods to these posts and traded them for human beings. This human cargo was transported across the Atlantic Ocean and sold to New World slave owners, who bought slaves to work their crops.

European traders such as Nicolas Owen waited at these forts for slaves; African traders transported slaves from the interior of Africa. Equiano and others found themselves sold and traded more than once, often in slave markets. African merchants, the poor, royalty -- anyone -- could be abducted in the raids and wars that were undertaken by Africans to secure slaves that they could trade. The slave trade devastated African life. Culture and traditions were torn asunder, as families, especially young men, were abducted. Guns were introduced and slave raids and even wars increased.





After kidnapping potential slaves, merchants forced them to walk in slave caravans to the European coastal forts, sometimes as far as 1,000 miles. Shackled and underfed, only half the people survived these death marches. Those too sick or weary to keep up were often killed or left to die. Those who reached the coastal forts were put into underground dungeons where they would stay -- sometimes for as long as a year -- until they were boarded on ships.

Slave Traders,

Africa's west coast was known as the "white man's grave," and for good reason. The slave traders who worked along the coast lived in an inhospitable land. Exposure to the hot, damp climate and to diseases that their bodies had little resistance to resulted in short life expectancies. There was a reason to be there, though, and that reason was money. Every slave trader had the hope of making a quick fortune, and although many would become successful, there were many more -- such as Nicolas Owen -- who wouldn't.

An entry in the journal of Nicolas Owen reads as follows: "I have found no place where I can enlarge my fortune so soon as where I now live, wherefore I entend to stay in order to enlarge my fortune by honest mains." Owen was sincere when he stated that the slave trade was a way to prosper "by honest means" -- nowhere in his journal, which he kept for five years, does he show any compassion for slaves or the least bit of remorse for being involved in the slave trade.

Owen had sailed to Africa with his brother. Once there, they were captured and imprisoned. A slave dealer named Richard Hall rescued the two and offered them jobs as his agents. With no money to return home, the two brothers accepted the offer. Like all traders at the time, Owen did not capture slaves himself.

it was Africans who acquired slaves and traded the captives for various European goods. Sometimes the captives would be prisoners of war. Other times, groups would venture deep into Africa's interior for the sole purpose of capturing slaves.

passages illustrate the inherent dangers of being a slave trader. In one account, Owen tells of how some Africans had seized an Englishman who was walking at night on a trail. "As soon as their prize is secure they devour him without mercey along with their ascociates in the bushes, who has prapared a fire for that purpose.

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Phillis Wheatley, Negro servant to Mr. John Wheatley, of Boston.

Phillis Wheatley, Negro servant to Mr. John Wheatley, of Boston." Born in present-day Gambia around 1753, little is known of Wheatley's early life. When 7 or 8 years old, she was kidnapped and shipped from the Gambia to Boston; her purchasers named her Phillis after the ship that brought her to Massachusetts. Living in their household as a servant, she was permitted to learn to read, and not long after began writing poetry; her first published poem appeared in 1767. She left no account of her life in Africa or the middle passage, and her life ended sadly in Boston in 1784. Her portrait was done when she was about 20 years old.

Jigger - flea

Extracting a jigger, scene in the Brazils"; shows a black woman extracting a chigger from the foot of a white man in what appears to be some sort of tavern; note, pottery jug in left-hand corner. A tropical flea native to the Americas, the chigger (jigger, chigoe) was extremely troublesome to Europeans and Africans in many areas of the New World; invading the skin through the feet or toes, they laid their eggs and if the egg sacs were not removed (by a simple technique), they could ultimately cause a serious itching pain. The English painter, Earle, visited Rio de Janeiro in 1820.

Baltimore 1861

The Dandy Slave: A Scene in Baltimore, MD." According to the accompanying article, "Whenever a negro can afford it, he dresses well, sometimes quietly and in good taste . . . . One rainy Sunday in Baltimore, our artist saw and sketched one of these dandy negroes escorting home from church his mistress. He was a slave, and this poor old faded woman owned him" (p. 307). This man was apparently hired out by his owner and worked as a waiter on steam-boats or hotels; he was, of course, compelled to share his wages with the owner.

Free woman

A "missie" (that is, a common-law wife or mistress of a white man, usually a free woman of color) taking her child to be baptized, accompanied by two slaves-- one carries the infant, the other a bible; the women are dressed in their finest.

Slave sales and auctions

Slave Markets

Top, advertisement is for sale of 170 recently imported Africans from Angola; bottom ad offers reward for return of two African-born slaves, Billy and Quamina, from a plantation.

"A Slave-Coffle passing the Capital" and depicting slaves wearing handcuffs and shackles passing the U.S. Capital, meant to depict a scene ca. 1819. This image was intended to illustrate part of a debate in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1819, concerning the admission of Missouri to the Union. The representative from New York, James Tallmadge, Jr., proposed that as a condition of admission slavery not be permitted in Missouri "except of those already held as slaves." While the debate was going on, Tallmadge pointed out that the South wanted Missouri to be a slave state and that a "striking illustration of what the South" wanted was to be viewed at that moment in front of the Capital. Apparently, as the debate was in progress "a trafficker in human flesh . . . has passed the door of your Capital . . . driving before him about fifteen of these wretched victims of his power. The males . . . were handcuffed and chained to each other, while the females and children were marched in their rear, under the guidance of the driver's whip" (p. 265).

Bibb describes this scene. He writes about a Mr. Young, a Methodist, "who was the owner of a large number of slaves, many of whom belonged to the same church with their master. They worshipped together." Bibb describes Young as a kind master who ultimately became "deeply involved in debt" forcing him to sell his property, including his slaves, "many of whom were his brothers and sisters in the church. . . . The slaves were offered on the auction block one after another, until they were all sold before their old master's face. . . . After the men were all sold they then sold the women and children. They ordered the first woman to lay down her child and mount the auction block; she refused to give up her little one and clung to it as long as she could, while the cruel lash was applied to her back for disobedience . . . . There was each speculator with his hand-cuffs to bind his victims after the sale; . . . the Christian portion of the slaves asked permission to kneel in prayer on the ground before they were separated" (pp. 199-200). One of the most celebrated of the North American slave narratives. Bibb was born of a slave mother in Kentucky in 1815, escaped from slavery in 1838, and ultimately became a leading figure in the fugitive slave community of Canada.

To be sold on board the ship Bance-Island . . . a choice cargo of about 250 fine healthy Negroes". Advertisement in the South Carolina Gazette by a prominent merchant firm and a leading importer of slaves in Charleston. The advertisement announces the forthcoming sale of Africans from the “Windward and Rice Coast,” and stresses their freedom from smallpox. The Library of Congress assigns a possible date "from the 1780s (?)", but the advertisement was, in fact, published on April 26, 1760. See Philip Hamer, ed., The Papers of Henry Laurens (Univ. of South Carolina Press, 1972), vol. 3, pp. 35-36.

Caption, "un Anglais de la Barbade vend sa maitresse" (an Englishman from Barbados sells his mistress/lover). Image is probably based on one version or another of the story of Yarico, an Amerindian woman, and her lover, Inkle, an English sailor who allegedly duped her and sold her into slavery in Barbados. For details, see Jerome S.` Handler, A Guide to Source Materials for the Study of Barbados History, 1627-1834 (Southern Illinois Univ. Press, 1971), passim.

Slave market, 1764

Caption, "marche d'esclaves" (slave market); engraving made from author's description. Scenes depicted (our translations), top,1) Negroes for sale in a public market; 2) Negro slave examined before being purchased; 3) an Englishman licking a Negro's chin to ascertain his age, and to determine from the taste of his sweat if he is sick; 4) Negro slave with the brand of slavery on his arm. Bottom: 5) slave ship lying in the harbor waiting for the trading to be completed; 6) chaloupe loaded with newly purchased slaves transporting them to the ship; 7) Negroes on shore wailing and crying at the sight of their loved ones and friends being sent away

Salve trade - kidnapping

Caption, "Kidnapping" The illustrations in this anti-slavery book strongly reflect its abolitionist position. Here is illustrated the kidnapping of a free person of color to sell him as a slave. "Nothing is more common," the author writes, "than for two of these white partners in kidnapping . . . to start upon the prowl; and if they find a freeman on the road, to demand his certificate, tear it in pieces, or secrete it, tie him to one of their horses, hurry off to some jail, while one whips the citizen along as fast as their horses can travel. There by an understanding with the jailor who shares in the spoil, all possibility of intercourse with his friends is denied the stolen citizen. At the earliest possible period, the captive is sold out to pay the felonious claims of the law . . . and then transferred to some of their accomplices of iniquity . . . who fill every part of the southern states with rapine, crime, and blood"