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Chapter 02
An Inhuman Trade

Following Columbus’s voyage in 1492, European’s traveled across the Atlantic and began the process of colonization. They displaced indigenous people, including killing some, placing others in bondage and seizing indigenous lands. As the global demand for slave labor grew, so did the Transatlantic Slave Trade, fueled in part by a new system of forced labor in the Atlantic World. Cowries, manillas, beads, and guns changed hands in exchange for African men, women, and children. By 1700, Europeans made money from the sale of African people and their labor—clearing land, carving out profitable landscapes, and cultivating cash crops in the Atlantic World.

Illustration of Africans being taken by traders

The Trauma of Transition

The Trauma of Transition

The transition to slavery was traumatic. With each step of the process, captive Africans experienced immense physical and psychological strain. Torn away from their homelands and loved ones, they were marched hundreds of miles from the interior. Once they reached the coast, they were crammed into barracoons, or slave barracks, for an average of three months before being forced onto slave ships to cross the Atlantic. Those who survived carried forward their cultures, faiths, and the value of freedom.

Slave Coffle Forced to the Coast

Ankle Shackles

Restraint Collar

I was brought from a state of innocence and freedom, and in a barbarous and cruel manner, conveyed to a state of horror and slavery.

Ottobah Cugoano, 1787

Kidnapping: Capturing People

Vue de Ben dans le pays de Cayor pres de Goree

Armed with European rifles, African and European slave catchers raided the homes of their rivals to capture men, women, and children for the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

Vue de Ben dans le pays de Cayor pres de Goree

We had a . . . discontented journey . . . in . . . fear that the people . . . would murder me . . . travelling so far by land . . . upwards of a thousand miles . . . I was about thirteen.

Louis Asa-Asa, 1831

Storing: Filling the Barracoons

Slave Barracoon, Sierra Leone

Captive Africans were kept in overcrowded prisons called barracoons. Fifteen to 30 percent died before they could be sold and put aboard slave ships.

Slave Barracoon, Sierra Leone

The slaves were all put into a pen, and . . . ordered not to look about . . . to insure obedience, a man . . . with a whip . . . [was] ready to strike.

Mahommah Baquaqua, 1854

Inspecting: Appraising Property

English man tasting the sweat of an enslaved African man

European slave traders inspected captive Africans to see if they were free of illness and mentally sound. This illustration depicts a European licking an African to taste for disease.

English man tasting the sweat of an enslaved African man

The captains go ashore from time to time to examine the negroes . . . and to make their purchases . . . if they are afflicted . . . they are rejected.

Alexander Falconbridge, 1788

Branding: A Permanent Mark

Branding a Negress

Once purchased, enslaved people were burned with the mark of the purchaser to keep track of the new inventory.

Branding a Negress

A burning iron, with the . . . name of the companies, lies in the fire . . . [and is] marked on the breast.

Willem Bosman, 1700

Transporting: Shore to Ship

Chaloupe filled with newly purchased enslaved African people, transporting them to ships off the West African Coast.

After inspection, purchase, and branding, enslaved Africans were taken to slave ships waiting off the coast.

Chaloupe filled with newly purchased enslaved African people, transporting them to ships off the West African Coast.

A vessel arrived to conduct us . . . to the ship, it was a . . . horrible scene, there was nothing to be heard but rattling of chains . . . and groans and cries of our fellow men.

Ottobah Cuagano, 1787