The Atlantic Slave Trade

David Walker acknowledged that slavery had long been practiced in Africa, but he charged white Christian slaveholders with greater crimes against humanity and greater hypocrisy in justifying those crimes than any prior slave system had been guilty of. Twentieth century scholarship has lent much support to the contentions of Walker’s and others in the African American antislavery vanguard that slavery as perpetrated by the European colonizers of Africa and the Americas brought man’s inhumanity to man to a level of technological efficiency unimagined by previous generations.

Beginning in the late 1600s and continuing through the 1700s the demand for sugar became incredibly high due to its addictive qualities. To supply the consumers with sugar they were craving, wealthy Europeans established sugar plantations throughout the Caribbean and built a thriving slave industry, so their need for cheap labor could be satisfied. Sugar consumption increased from 4.6lbs to 16.2lbs per capita annually from 1700 to 1770 due to the increasing addiction of the consumers. The manufacturers were faced with maintaining a high crop yield, but luckily the Caribbean islands provided an ideal location for growing cane sugar. Once plantations were constructed yet another issue confronted the owners, cheap labor. For the plantations to produce large enough quantities of sugar to fulfill the demand, many slaves were necessary; thus, a successful slave industry arose with the aid of these wealthy entrepreneurs who hoped to own successful plantations. The absentee owners in England, Spain, and France became increasingly wealthy as the demand and industry for sugar

Labor systems have been the foundation for civilizations since the beginning of time. Who did what and how they benefited each other, in other words, specialization of labor, came to be a defining factor in whether a society was truly a civilization or not. Most great civilizations were founded on agricultural labor systems, and societies with no systematic format on their workforce were seldom able to take the main stage in world history. Between 1450 and 1750, the Americas began to mark their place in the world, proving they were just as relevant as Europe, Africa, or Asia. The labor systems established during 1450-1750 were key factors in how they were able to do so. However, it was a process of trial and error, since labor systems saw many

The Atlantic Slave Trade was the movement of Africans to the Americas as slaves. The slave trader, Captain Thomas Phillip in document B he says “ We endure twice the misery; and yet by their mortality our voyages are ruined.”(Phillips). He is saying that they are dying and that it isn’t a good thing, but for a different reason. He also says “But what the smallpox spared, the flux swept off, to our great regret, after all our pains and care to give [the slaves] their messes,... keeping their lodgings as clean and sweet as possible…”(Phillips). That is saying the conditions that they live in and how they “try” to keep it clean.

The English colonies lacked full support from the crown of England, which in turn helped set up local government, and local interests, including the economics of the region. The English settled up and down the Atlantic coast line, and in accordance to the region of where the colony was located had much to do with their economics. The New England, middle, Chesapeake, southern, and British West Indies colonies all had different economic interests.

Following the period of Exploration, explorers discovered new lands rich with resources such as gold, silver, and other precious materials that needed to be mined, and crops that needed to be farmed. However, workers who could perform these tasks were scarce. The Native American population had been killed by disease and war, and the colonists weren’t often willing to do this labor. Fortunately for the European colonists, they had access for a convenient and inexpensive labor market via the means of African Slave Trade. Millions of African men, women, and children were plucked from their homes and shipped over to the colonies in exchange for goods. As a result of the absence of humanitarian concerns, slaves during the period of Atlantic

The slaves were forced into European sugar plantations, and used for profits, forced labor, and brutal beatings. Slaves were outsiders and restricted to limited positions. (Strayer , 688). While, the Europeans hold responsible for agricultural slave practices, the Portuguese searched West Africa for gold,

The diary writing by William Byrd show us how slaves had a major part in the economy of the colonial America and how most of them were treated. Most elites European come to the Americas looking for wealth and power, but they did not have the workforce to accomplish their goals they need people to work their cultivation. Slave Africans became a shipper and easier solution to this problems. (63) “From 1492 to 1820 enslaved African migrants outnumbered Europeans migrants to the new world by nearly five to one”. This incoming slaves Africans did most of the hurt work for this elite Europeans. Slave live difficult life under the power of the elite Americans. One of the major issues Africans slaves had was that they were consider property and did

The Atlantic Slave Trade was one of the largest and inhumane human slavery systems in history. William Wilberforce played a key part in its abolishment, however; he was not the sole person responsible for its downfall. William Wilberforce can be seen as the leader of the ‘abolitionist’s’, so it can be said that he had a large part to play in the slave trades abolition although there were other key people involved in its abolition like; Olaudah Equiano, John Newton, Thomas Fowell Buxton and Thomas Clarkson. There were also groups involved such as the Quakers and Women and Women’s groups. The abolishment of slavery was not due solely to the work of William Wilberforce because there were many people who aided him in his fight for its abolition

Many years ago a continental drift caused a split between North and South Africa from Eurasia and Africa. The Columbian Exchange was named by Alfred W. Crosby in 1972. It refers to a period of time in which cultural and biological exchange between the New and Old Worlds occurred. By far the most devastating impact of the Columbian Exchange followed the introduction of new diseases into the Americas. Many inhabitants brought diseases such as smallpox and measles. Due to the split, both sides experience similar and different challenges. After the arrival of Christopher Columbus the animal and plant life of these two worlds began to mix. He reunited the two worlds one again. It included an exchange of diseases, plants, animals, and technological

The greatest slave trade stage was enslaved people transportation from West and central Africa to the New World- America. The trans-Atlantic slave trade was the largest forced movement and prior from the 16th through the 19th centuries. The salve trade between Western and Central Africa and the America reached its peak in the middle of 18th century when over 80.000 Africans annually crossed the Atlantic to spend all their rest of lives in chains. “For three centuries the white man seized and enslaved millions of Africans and transported them, with every circumstance of ferocious cruelty, across the seas.” (Morel.1903) Approximately from the 10 to 12 million Africans from the central and western parts of continent were sold by others Africans

Over the years from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century, slaves were not only transported to just the United States, but to all around the world. They were sold and traded to many different countries which meant that their cultures went with them. As they would grow and multiply in an area, they would repopulate in others. Forced labor migrations contributed to globalization because when slaves of different ethnicities were shipped to other parts of the world, they took their culture and history with them.

The beginning of the 17th Century marked the practice of slavery which continued till next 250 years by the colonies and states in America. Slaves, mostly from Africa, worked in the production of tobacco and cotton crops. Later , they were employed or ‘enslaved’ by the whites as for the job of care takers of their houses. The practice of slavery also led the beginning of racism among the people of America. The blacks were restricted for all the basic and legally privileged rights. Not only them but others outsiders (to America) such as Asian-Americans , native Americans etc.

The increasing commodification of sugar from the 1500s onward has had lasting implications in both the New and Old Worlds. In Sweetness and Power by Sidney W. Mintz, the anthropological interpretation of the evolution of the sugar industry highlights how Europe transitioned from mercantilism to capitalism, agriculture to industry, class changes, and an overall increase in the quality of life. The Caribbean colonies saw an influx of African slaves and Europeans, with the former transforming the islands from backwaters into ultra- profitable cash crop centers, exacerbating the slave trade while increasing returns on investments for their European financiers. While Europe saw sugar as factor in bridging class differences, African

Throughout the 16th and 19th centuries, slave trade had become one of the most crucial parts for changing the world. Everything during this period was reliant on the slave trade. Consequently, it ended being beneficial for Europeans and disastrous for Africans.