The slave ships and the slave market

The slave ships, the Middle Passage, the slave market, plantations and how enslaved people resisted. Read one part at a time and tap “I know this”. Then test yourself in the quiz.

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The trade

Many were held in forts on the West African coast before the voyage.

Plantation owners wanted enslaved labour to make profit without wages. On plantations: long hours, little food and no rights; cotton for clothing, sugar cane for sugar. In West Africa, before Europeans arrived, people became slaves mostly as war captives, or because of debt or as punishment for a crime. There, enslaved people could often marry and own things, and their children could become free members of the community. In the Americas, enslaved people were property for life, and so were their children (chattel slavery). The indigenous people of North America are called Native Americans.

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Resistance

Africans fought back or escaped. Enslaved people resisted by escaping, working slowly and rising up (a plantation uprising).
Music and storytelling kept their culture and hope alive. Toussaint Louverture led the Haitian Revolution.
Slavery was abolished in the British Empire in 1834. We study it to understand how injustice happens.

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Remember this: your summary

The triangular trade sailed between three continents: Europe → Africa → Americas → Europe.
About 15% of the captives did not survive the voyage: overcrowded, hungry and too little water.
A captive is taken and held by force; people were captured and abducted, not handed over willingly. They were never paid.
At a slave market people were sold like goods; families were often separated because buyers bought individuals.
Portugal and Britain carried the most captives; Liverpool sent the most British slave ships.

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Memory trick

15% did not survive the Middle Passage: almost one in every seven people.

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