1. I NTRODUCTION TO P RIMARY S OURCE A NALYSIS Slavery and the Atlantic World

2. W ARM UP - W HAT ARE P RIMARY S OURCES ? With a partner: What are primary sources? What are secondary sources? A Definition of Primary Sources: Primary sources are accounts/objects created either at the time a historical event occurred, or later, when eyewitnesses chose to document their experiences. What are examples of types of primary sources? Public records (government documents, tax records) Personal documents (diaries, letters) Artifacts (furniture, tools) Art Architecture Media (tv, newspaper articles) Literary works (novels, essays)

3. W HY USE P RIMARY S OURCES ? Primary sources enable students and historians to understand the past from the perspective of the people who lived at a particular time. If historical thinking skills are the tools of the historian’s trade, then primary sources are the raw materials. Historians and students of history must become skilled at analyzing primary sources. We will practice this all year to prepare for the AP test and beyond.

4. C ONTENT T OPIC : T HE A FRICAN S LAVE T RADE

5. E VALUATION OF P RIMARY S OURCES Below is a list of sources of information about the Atlantic slave trade. Rate the reliability of each source on a 5 point scale in which 1 is reliable and 5 is very unreliable. 1.____ The 1789 autobiography of Olaudah Equiano, an enslaved African who was later freed and became an abolitionist. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, 1789. 2.____ An account written by the historian Philip D. Curtain based on modern research and statistical methods. The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census, 1972. 3.____ The 1788 description of the “middle passage” by Alexander Falconbridge, who was a surgeon on several slave ships. 4. ____An advertisement for a slave auction in South Carolina in 1769. 5. ____The 1762 logbook from the Bristol slave ship the Black Prince kept by the Captain William Miller. 6. ____ Trial records of the 1781 Zong massacre where Captain Collingwood of the British ship Zong commanded his crew to throw one-third of the slave cargo overboard when he believed they were off course. 7. ____A U.S. history high school textbook description of the Atlantic slave trade. 8. ____ British and American census data, early 17 th century -1810.

6. D ISCUSS “R ELIABILITY ” R ANKINGS What was your reasoning behind your evaluation? 1 is reliable and 5 is very unreliable. 1.____ The 1789 autobiography of Olaudah Equiano, an enslaved African who was later freed and became an abolitionist. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, 1789. 2.____ An account written by the historian Philip D. Curtain based on modern research and statistical methods. The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census, 1972. 3.____ The 1788 description of the “middle passage” by Alexander Falconbridge, who was a surgeon on several slave ships. 4. ____An advertisement for a slave auction in South Carolina in 1769. 5. ____The 1762 logbook from the Bristol slave ship the Black Prince kept by the Captain William Miller. 6. ____ Trial records of the 1781 Zong massacre where Captain Collingwood of the British ship Zong commanded his crew to throw one-third of the slave cargo overboard when he believed they were off course. 7. ____A U.S. history high school textbook description of the Atlantic slave trade. 8. ____ British and American census data, early 17 th century -1810.

7. I NTRODUCING PPAC There are many questions you could ask of primary sources, but we will be using a targeted approach called PPAC. P (Purpose) What is the document about? What was its intended use? When, where, and why was it created? P (Point of view—author’s) Who is the author? Why did he/she create this piece? What is his/her point of view? A (Audience) For what audience was the source created? C (Context—historical context) What is the context in which the document was created?

8. P RACTICING PPAC S OURCE 1 John Barbot. A Description of the coasts of North and South-Guinea. Collection of Voyages. London. 1732. vol. 5. plate 9. p. 156. Howard Tilton Memorial Library. Tulane University. Senegalese captives being transported to slave ships in pirogues.

9. P RACTICING PPAC S OURCE 2 Thomas Phillips, a slave-ship captain, A Journal of a Voyage Made in the Hannibal, 1693-1694, published 1732. The negros are so loath to leave their own country, that they have often leaped out of the canoa, boat and ship, into the sea, and kept under water till they are drowned, to avoid being taken up…. They are fed twice a day, at 10 in the morning and 4 in the evening, which is the time they were aptest to mutiny, being all upon deck; therefore all the time, what of our men are not employed in distributing their victuals to them, stand to their arms, and some with lighted matches at the great guns that yaun upon them, loaden with partridge, till they have done and gone down to their kennels between decks.

10. P RACTICING PPAC S OURCE 3 Olaudah Equiano, a captured African from the region of Nigeria, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, 1789. “The closeness of the place, and the heat of the climate, added to the number in the ship, which was so crowded that each had scarcely room to turn himself, almost suffocated us. This produced copious perspirations, so that the air soon became unfit for respiration, from a variety of loathsome smells, and brought on a sickness among the slaves, of which many died— thus falling victims to the improvident avarice, as I may call it, for their purchasers.