Introduction to The Slave Trade and The Middle Passage http://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-by-era/slavery-and-anti-slavery/resources/facts-about-slave-trade-and-slavery www.pbs.org

What was the slave trade? Approximately 11,863,000 Africans were shipped across the Atlantic, with a death rate during the Middle Passage reducing this number by 10-20 percent. As a result between 9.6 and 10.8 million Africans arrived in the Americas. About 500,000 Africans were imported into what is now the U.S. between 1619 and 1807--or about 6 percent of all Africans forcibly imported into the Americas.

What was The Slave Trade? Well over 90 percent of African slaves were imported into the Caribbean and South America. Only about 6 percent of imports went directly to British North America. Yet by 1825, the U.S. had a quarter of blacks in the New World. The majority of African slaves were brought to British North America between 1720 and 1780.

How much did slaves have to work? Sugar field workers in Jamaica worked about 4,000 hours a year--three times that of a modern factory worker. Cotton workers toiled about 3,000 hours a year. The average person would work 2,080 hours a year if they worked 40 hours a week/52 weeks a year.

What was The Middle Passage? (see short video clip) The Middle Passage was so named because it was the middle part 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. Slaves were fed twice daily and some captains made vain attempts to clean the hold. Air holes were cut into the deck to allow the slaves breathing air, but these were closed in stormy conditions. The bodies of the dead were simply thrust overboard. And yes, there were uprisings.

What did the newly captured slaves think about what was happening to them? Olaudah Equiano, an African captured as a boy who later wrote an autobiography, recalled . . . “When I looked round the ship too and saw a large furnace of copper boiling, and a multitude of black people of every description chained together, every one of their countenances expressing dejection and sorrow, I no longer doubted of my fate and quite overpowered with horror and anguish, I fell motionless on the deck and fainted. . . . I asked if we were not to be eaten by those white men with horrible looks, red faces and long hair?"

The Middle Passage route Notice that it begins in Europe, then Africa then to the New World

Image of a slave ship

Other resources Index of slave narratives collected by the WPA from 1936-1938: http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/wpa/index.html “The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Eqiano” “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl”- by Harriet Jacobs (from Edenton, NC)