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The Atlantic slave trade or transatlantic slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of enslaved African people, mainly to the Americas. The outfitted European slave ships of the slave trade regularly used the triangular trade route and its Middle Passage, and existed from the 16th to the 19th centuries. The vast majority of those who were transported in the transatlantic slave trade were from Central and West Africa who had been sold by West African slave traders mainly to Portuguese, British, Spanish, Dutch, and French slave traders, while others had been captured directly by the slave traders in coastal raids; European slave traders gathered and imprisoned the enslaved at forts on the African coast and then brought them to the Americas. Except for the Portuguese, European slave traders generally did not participate in the raids because life expectancy for Europeans in sub-Saharan Africa was less than one year during the period of the slave trade.
The Middle Passage was the stage of the Atlantic slave trade in which millions of enslaved Africans were transported to the Americas as part of the triangular slave trade. Ships departed Europe for African markets with manufactured goods, which were then traded for slaves with rulers of African states and other African slave traders. Slave ships transported the slaves across the Atlantic. The proceeds from selling slaves were then used to buy products such as furs and hides, tobacco, sugar, rum, and raw materials, which would be transported back to Europe to complete the triangle.
The Slave Coast is a historical name formerly used for that part of coastal West Africa along the Bight of Biafra and the Bight of Benin that is located between the Volta River and the Lagos Lagoon. The name is derived from the region's history as a major source of African people sold into slavery during the Atlantic slave trade from the early 16th century to the late 19th century.
Calabar is the capital city of Cross River State, Nigeria. It was originally named Akwa Akpa, in the Efik language. The city is adjacent to the Calabar and Great Kwa rivers and creeks of the Cross River.
Sengbe Pieh, also known as Joseph Cinqué or Cinquez and sometimes referred to mononymously as Cinqué, was a West African man of the Mende people who led a revolt of many Africans on the Spanish slave ship La Amistad in July 1839. After the ship was taken into custody by the US Revenue-Marine, Cinqué and his fellow Africans were eventually tried for mutiny and killing officers on the ship, in a case known as United States v. The Amistad. This reached the U.S. Supreme Court, where Cinqué and his fellow Africans were found to have rightfully defended themselves from being enslaved through the illegal Atlantic slave trade and were released. The US government did not provide any aid to the acquitted Mende People. The United Missionary Society, a black group founded by James W.C. Pennington, helped raise money for the return of thirty-five of the survivors to Sierra Leone in 1842.
The Efik are an ethnic group located primarily in southern Nigeria, and western Cameroon. Within Nigeria, the Efik can be found in the present-day Cross River State and Akwa Ibom state. The Efik speak the Efik language which is a member of the Benue–Congo subfamily of the Niger-Congo language group. The Efik refer to themselves as Efik Eburutu, Ifa Ibom, Eburutu and Iboku.
Bristol, a port city in south-west England, was involved in the transatlantic slave trade. Bristol's part in the trade was prominent in the 17th and 18th centuries as the city's merchants used their position to gain involvement. It is estimated that over 500,000 enslaved African people were traded by Bristol merchants.
Duke Town, originally known as Atakpa, is an Efik city-state that flourished in the 19th century in what is now southern Nigeria. The City State extended from now Calabar to Bakassi in the east and Oron to the west. Although it is now absorbed into Nigeria, traditional rulers of the state are still recognized. The state occupied what is now the modern city of Calabar.
A scramble was a particular form of slave auction that took place during the Atlantic slave trade in the European colonies of the West Indies and the domestic slave trade of the United States. It was called a "scramble" because buyers would run around in an open space all at once to gather as many enslaved people as possible. Another name for a scramble auction is "Grab and go" slave auctions. Slave ship captains would go to great lengths to prepare their captives and set prices for these auctions to make sure they would receive the highest amount of profits possible because it usually did not involve earlier negotiations or bidding.
Panyarring was the practice of seizing and holding persons until the repayment of debt or resolution of a dispute which became a common activity along the Atlantic coast of Africa in the 18th and 19th centuries. The practice developed from pawnship, a common practice in West Africa where members of a family borrowing money would be pledged as collateral to the family providing credit until the repayment of the debt. Panyarring though is different from this practice as it involves the forced seizure of persons when a debt was not repaid.
John Kimber was the captain of a British slave ship who was tried for murder in 1792, after the abolitionist William Wilberforce accused him of torturing to death an enslaved teenaged girl on the deck of his ship. Kimber was acquitted, but the trial gained much attention in the press. The case established that slave ships' crew could be tried for murder of slaves.
Moses Grandy was an African-American author, abolitionist, and, for more than the first four decades of his life, an enslaved person. At eight years of age he became the property of his white playmate, James Grandy, and two years later he was hired out for work. The monies Moses earned were collected and held until James Grandy turned 21. Moses helped build the Great Dismal Swamp Canal and learned how to navigate boats. It was that skill that led him to be made commander of several boats that traveled the canal and Pasquotank River, transporting merchandise from Elizabeth City, North Carolina, to Norfolk, Virginia. The position allowed him to be better fed, shod, and dressed. Able to keep a portion of his earnings, Moses arranged to buy his freedom twice and twice his owners kept the money and held him in slavery. An arrangement was made for an honorable man to buy him and Grandy earned the money to buy his freedom a third time, this time successfully.
Eyo Honesty II was the ruler of Creek Town from 1835 until his death on 3 December 1858. Creek Town was part of the Efik city-states of the Old Calabar province in the Bight of Biafra. Eyo was born into the family of Eyo Nsa and Inyang Esien Ekpe. His father Eyo Nsa, alias Willy Eyo Honesty or Eyo Willy Honesty, was one of the prominent figures of the 18th century in Efik maritime history. His mother, Princess Inyang Esien Ekpe, was the daughter of Esien Ekpe Oku.
William Davenport was a British slave trader who was, by the number of ships disembarked, the single most prolific slave trader from the Port of Liverpool. He took part in 163 slaving voyages and his slave ships carried almost 40,000 enslaved Africans.
Thomas was the ship Sally that James Jones acquired in 1785. Thomas made seven voyages from Bristol as a slave ship in the triangular trade in enslaved persons. On her fourth such voyage,Thomas and five other enslaving ships, bombarded Calabar for more than three hours to force the local native traders to lower the prices they were charging for captives. The French captured her in 1794 as she was on her way for her eighth voyage.
William Earle (1721–1788) was an English slave trader. In a career lasting 40 years he was responsible for at least 117 slave voyages and by the number of slave voyages he was the sixth most active slave trader in the period 1740–1790 from the Port of Liverpool.
Thomas Earle (1754–1822) was an English slave trader. He was responsible for at least 73 slave voyages and alongside his brother he transported over 19,000 enslaved people. Of these 3,000 died on board his ships. One of his ships, Annabella, was seized by the British Crown for slave trading with the enemy. He was Mayor of Liverpool in 1787.
William Whaley was an English slave trader. He was involved in at least 22 slave voyages from the Port of Liverpool, and was one of the biggest slave traders in British America. He employed two of the biggest slave traders, William Davenport and William Earle, before they became slave traders.
Liverpool Hero was built in France in 1777, probably as Jeune Emilia. She was taken in prize in 1780. In 1781 she entered into the triangular trade in enslaved people. From 1781 she made six complete voyages from Liverpool as a slave ship. On her fourth enslaving voyage she suffered an exceptionally high mortality rate among the captives she had embarked. Her third voyage had been marred by high mortality, but on the fourth 330 captives, 59% of the number she had embarked, died. She was lost in 1794 off the coast of Africa on her seventh voyage, probably with her crew and captives.
Grandy King George was a local Efik slave trader and ruler of Old Town, Calabar in present-day Nigeria. He lived around the late eighteenth century. Little Ephraim Robin John was his brother and Ancona Robin John was his nephew.
References
- ↑ Roark, James L.; Johnson, Michael P.; Cohen, Patricia Cline; Stage, Sarah; Hartmann, Susan M. (2012-03-01). The American Promise, Volume A: A History of the United States: To 1800. Macmillan Higher Education. pp. 123–124. ISBN 9781457626524.
- 1 2 3 "Ancona Robin John and Little Ephraim Robin John | Slavery and Remembrance". slaveryandremembrance.org. Retrieved 2018-11-29.
- 1 2 3 4 Childs, Matt (2004). "Captors to Captives to Christians to Calabar: Navigating the Boundaries of Slavery and Freedom in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade". Common-place. 5: 1–4.
- ↑ Akyeampong, Emmanuel K; Gates, Henry Louis, eds. (2012). "Robin, John, Little Ephraim and Ancona". Robin, John, Little Ephraim and Ancona - Oxford Reference. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/acref/9780195382075.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-538207-5 . Retrieved 2018-11-28.
- ↑ Clarkson, Thomas (1789). The Substance of the Evidence of Sundry Persons on the Slave-trade: Collected in the Course of a Tour Made in the Autumn of the Year 1788. James Phillips.
- ↑ Kupperman, Karen Ordahl (2012-08-08). The Atlantic in World History. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199986552.
- 1 2 3 Sparks, Randy J. (2008). The two princes of Calabar : an eighteenth-century Atlantic odyssey. Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674032057. OCLC 221175566.
- ↑ Cruickshank, Johanna. "CHARLES WESLEY, THE MEN OF OLD CALABAR, AND THE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY" (PDF). Aldersgate Papers V7.
- 1 2 3 Sparks, Randy J. (2002). "Two Princes of Calabar: An Atlantic Odyssey from Slavery to Freedom". The William and Mary Quarterly. 59 (3): 555-584 (pp. 582-583). doi:10.2307/3491465. ISSN 0043-5597. JSTOR 3491465 – via JSTOR.