Transcript Chapter 18: The Atlantic System and Africa 1550-1800

Chapter 18:
The Atlantic System and Africa
1550-1800
Notes by: Grace Cramer and Mike
Rajecki
Introduction
• Slaves branded to show ownership
• Royal African Company (RAC)association of English investors
– 1672, received a charter from English
monarchy
– Rights to trade Atlantic coast of Africa
• Slaves had to stay healthy on the ships
• Atlantic system- moved goods, wealth,
people, and cultures around the Atlantic
Plantations in the West Indies
Colonization Before 1650
• West Indies revived
after 1600 European
settlements
– Montserrat
– Barbados
• French settlements
– Martinique
– Guadeloupe
• New, important cash
crop: tobacco
Colonization Before 1650
• Chartered companies
– Private investors get
monopolies over colonies
for an annual fee
• Increase of indentured
servants, but eventually
changed to mostly African
slaves
• 1600 = Brazil is world’s
greatest sugar producer
• Dutch merchants invest in
Brazil sugar
Colonization Before 1650
• Dutch fighting for independence from Spanish
crown
• Dutch West India Company in 1612
– Carried conflict to Spain’s possession
– Private trading company
– Capture of Spanish fleet in 1628 finances attack on
Brazil’s sugar areas
– Took trading port of Luanda on Angolan Coast, 1614
– Shipped slaves to Brazil and West Indies
Colonization Before 1650
• Portuguese free of
Spanish, 1640
• Portuguese drove out
Dutch sugar planters
from Brazil
• Expelled planters
gave knowledge to
smaller Caribbean
colonies, English, and
French Caribbean
islands
Sugar and Slaves
• Dutch knowledge brings wealth to
European colonies
• 1700, West Indies surpassed Brazil as the
worlds main export of sugar
• Huge increase in number of slaves
– Come from Africa
– Going mainly to Brazil, but also to English,
French, and Dutch West Indies
Sugar and Slaves
• Is now decided that the increase of slavery
was because Africans had cheep labor
costs
• Slaves not cheep however
– Indentured servants cost half as much
– But…slaves lived longer, while indentured
servants’ contract was about four years
• Sugar prices raised to help buy slaves
Plantation Life in the
Eighteenth Century
Intro.
• England founds Jamaica
• French take half of Hispaniola
– This colony, Saint Domingue (present day Haiti), now
the leading producer of sugar
Technology and Environment
• Tools for sugar
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Spade for planting
Hoes for weeds
Machete to harvest
Crushing and
processing equipment
• Cane juice boiled,
dried, and packed for
shipping
• Typical size of
plantation increases
Technology and Environment
• Plantations were very
damaging to the
environment
– Soil exhaustion
– Deforestation
• All animals and plants in
the Caribbean were ones
that Europeans had
brought
– Crowded out indigenous
species
– Some indigenous people
also wiped out, Europeans
and Africans take over
Slaves’ Lives
• Plantations
– 90% Slaves
– Power = plantocracy
• Rich men who owned the slaves and land
• Slaves
– Workday: up to 18 hours
– Assigned task (except for ill, infants, and very
old)
– Organized by age, sex, and ability
Slaves’ Lives
• “Great Gang”
– Strongest slaves
– Heaviest work
• “Grass Gang”
– Children with adult supervision
– Weeding, and collecting grass
• Women
– Field workers
– Nursing mothers took babies to the field
Slaves’ Lives
• Working hard= food,
clothing, time off, or
escape punishment
• Driver- privileged male
slave who ensured that
work was completed
• Punishment
– Iron muzzle
– Flogging
– confinement
Slaves’ Lives
• Sunday = live their own life
• No rest/relaxation
– Sing to pass the time
• No education/schooling
• Deaths outnumbered births for slaves
– Males’ life expectancy: 23 years
– Females’ expectancy: 25.5 years
• Greatest killer was disease
– Newly arrived slaves go through seasoning, which is
an adjustment to the new environment, 1/3 usually
died
Slaves’ Lives
• Lots of slave deaths =
increase in slave trade
• Slaves wanted freedom
– Tried to run away
– 1760, large slave
rebellion in Jamaica
• Led by Tacky
• Stormed plantations,
lighting them on fire
and killing
• Europeans tried to curb
African traditions
Free Whites and Free Blacks
• Social Class
– Grands Blancs/“Great Whites”
• Dominated the economy and society
– Petits Blancs/“Little Whites”
• Farmed
• Sold goods
– Free Blacks
• Some even owned their own slaves
• ¾ of the farmland in Jamaica belonged to
people who owned at least 1,000 acres
Free Whites and Free Blacks
• 1774, Invested $100,000 to receive
medium-size plantation (600 acres)
– 1/3 money for land
– 1/4 equipment
– Most was to buy slaves
• Rich planters translated wealth into
political power
• 1730-1775, rich planters secured election
to British Parliament
Free Whites and Free Blacks
• Manumission- legal grant of freedom to an
individual slave
• Free blacks less common in British
colonies, manumission was rare
• Runaway slaves were known as maroons
• 1739, recognized independence of
maroon communities in return for stopping
runaways
Creating the Atlantic Economy
Capitalism and Mercantilism
• Spain and Portugal trying to keep monopolies
• Private investors to fund growth of Atlantic
economy
• Capitalism- system of large financial institutions
(banks, stock exchanges…) that helped
investors to reduce risks and increase profit
• Banks the center of capitalism
• Mercantilism- policies adopted by European
states to promote their citizens’ overseas trade
and bring in precious metals
– Chartered companies were the first example
Capitalism and Mercantilism
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1672, royal charter placed
English trade with West Africa
with the new Royal African
Company
– Headquarters: Cape Coast
Castle (picture)
Restrictions on Dutch access to
French/English colonies
provoked wars with Netherlands,
1652-1678
1698, England opened trade in
Africa, ending monopolies
1660s, England passed
Navigation Acts, confined trade
to English ships and cargoes
1698, French mercantilist
legislation, Exclusif
Britain’s imports = 1/5 from West
Indies
The Atlantic Circuit
• Atlantic Circuit
– Clockwise network of
sea routes
– Started in Europe, to
Africa, then to Americas,
and back to Europe
– Wind and “desire” drove
ships
• First leg
– Europe to Africa
– Carried European
manufactures (metal
bars, guns…)
The Atlantic Circuit
• Middle Passage
– Slaves to plantations
• Third leg
– Plantation goods from
colonies to Europe
• Other trading voyages also
– Triangular Tradecarried rum to West
Africa, and slaves to
West Indies, then rum
back to New England
The Atlantic Circuit
• European interests
dominated the Atlantic
system
• 1700, annual consumption
of sugar in England rose to
four pounds per person
– Started to put sugar in
beverages
• 1750, annual consumption
of sugar in Britain had
doubled twice to 18 pounds
per person
• Flow of sugar depended on
flow of slaves
The Atlantic Circuit
• 1650-1800, boom in sugar production and in
slave trade
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7.5 million slaves traded
1/2 West Indies
1/3 Brazil
5% in Spanish America
• Slaves carried on specific ships, packed tight
• Slave trade in the hands of chartered companies
• Many deaths on the ship to the Americas
The Atlantic Circuit
• Slaves shackled to prevent
them from trying to escape
from the boat
• “Fixed Melancholy”developed by slave, deep
depression
– Some slaves are said to
have willed themselves to
death
• Some slaves tried to
overpower their captors
– Rarely successful
• Whippings/Beatings took
place on the ship
• Many people didn’t want to
be involved with slave trade
The Atlantic Circuit
• Most slaves, however, died of disease
rather than abuse
– Smallpox
– Dysentery
• Crew members also died from these
diseases, but also had malaria
– Death of crew could be as bad as deaths of
slaves, on board
Africa, the Atlantic, and Islam
The Gold Coast and the Slave
Coast
• Europeans didn’t want to
colonize Africa, but to trade
with it
• Royal African Company
made 40% of profit from
gold/ivory/forest products
• African merchants were picky
about what they traded for
slaves
– Mostly wanted: textiles,
guns, and hardware
– 1680s, 60%
Indian/European textiles,
30% hardware/weapons,
3% beads/jewelry
– Cowrie shells (picture)
used for money
The Gold Coast and the Slave
Coast
• Eighteenth century: goods needed to purchase a
slave on the Gold Coast doubled
• Each European nation had a trading “castle” on
the Gold Coast
– Reduced Europeans’ bargaining strength
• 1700, Willem Bosman, head of Dutch East India
Company, didn’t like the fact that to stay
competitive, he had to add to Africans’ military
power
• 1772, Whydah, small slave port annexed by
larger Dahomey
– Rise in 1720s depended on firepower
The Gold Coast and the Slave
Coast
• 1730, Dahomey overrun by Oyo
• Asante, west of Dahomey, expanded after 1680
• Oyo and Asante were stimulated, but not
controlled by external trade
• Slaves were not parents selling their children,
but prisoners of war
• English rulers sentenced seventeenth-century
Scottish/Irish prisoners to forced labor in the
West Indies
The Bight of Biafra and Angola
• Coast Sizable States = No wars
– No prisoners of war
– Kidnappings were main source of slaves
• Slaves = debtors, kidnapped victims, and criminals
• “Slave Fairs”
• Portuguese = middlemen between inland traders and
Brazilian ships
• Drought of Angola was a huge business for powerful
African leaders, who exploited the needs of refugees
– Most powerful of these leaders became the heads of states
established to stabilize the area after the drought
• Most inland slaves were prisoners of war from expansion
Africa’s European and Islamic
Contacts
• Two main European bases = Angola (Portuguese) and
East India Company’s Cape Colony (Dutch)
– Most slaves imported from Madagascar, South Asia,
and the East Indies
• During 16th century, nearly all of North Africa was added
to the Islamic Ottoman Empire
• Songhai pushed Sahara region from south
– Drew wealth from trans-Saharan trade
– Ruled by indigenous Muslim dynasty
• Moroccan conquest over Songhai yielded massive
tributes of slaves and goods
• After Moroccan conquest, Hausa cities attracted much
more attention
Africa’s European and Islamic
Contacts
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Most Islamic slaves were soldiers and servants
Bornu = Sudanese kingdom power
Islam influential in African trading cities
Europeans obtained 4x as many slaves as Muslims
Overall African population stayed the same throughout
slave trade
• Local businesses in Africa suffered greatly
• More men sold than women = greater ability to recover
from population loss
• European goods importation did not affect African local
artisans greatly
First Hand Account
The first object which saluted my eyes when I arrived on the coast was the sea,
and a slave ship, which was then riding at anchor, and waiting for its cargo.
These filled me with astonishment, which was soon converted into terror,
which I am yet at a loss to describe nor the then feelings of my mind. When
I was carried on board I was immediately handled, and tossed up, to see if I
were sound by some of the crew; and I was now persuaded that I had got
into a world of bad spirits, and that they were going to kill me. Their
complexions too differing so much from ours, their long hair, and the
language they spoke, which was very different from any I had ever heard,
united to confirm me in this belief. Indeed, such were the horrors of my
views and fears at the moment, that, if ten thousand worlds had been my
own, I would have parted with them all to have exchanged my condition with
that of the meanest slave in my own country. When I looked around the ship
too, and saw a large furnace or copper boiling, and a multitude of black
people of every description chained together, every one of their
countenances expressing dejection and sorrow, I no longer doubted of my
fate; and, quite overpowered with horror and anguish, I fell motionless on
the deck and fainted. When I recovered a little, I found some black people
about me, who, I believed were some of those who brought me on board,
and had been receiving their pay; they talked to me in order to cheer me,
but all in vain. I asked them if we were not to be eaten by those white men
with horrible looks, red faces, and long hair? They told me I was not; and
one of the crew brought me a small portion of spirituous liquor in a wine
glass; but, being afraid of him, I would not take it out of his hand. …
continued
…One of the blacks therefore took it from him, and gave it to me, and I
took a little down my palate, which, instead of reviving me, as they
thought it would, threw me into the greatest consternation at the
strange feeling it produced, having never tasted any such liquor
before. Soon after this, the blacks who brought me on board went
off, and left me abandoned to despair. I now saw myself deprived of
any chance of returning to my native country, or even the least
glimpse of hope of gaining the shore, which I now considered as
friendly; and I even wished for my former slavery, in preference to
my present situation, which was filled with horrors of every kind, still
heightened by my ignorance of what I was to undergo. I was not
long suffered to indulge my grief; I was soon put down under the
decks, and there I received such a salutation in my nostrils as I had
never experienced in my life; so that, with the loathsomeness of the
stench, and crying together, I became so sick and low that I was not
able to eat, nor had I the least desire to taste any thing. I now
wished for the last friend, Death, to relieve me; but soon, to my grief,
two of the white men offered me eatables; and, on my refusing to
eat, one of them held me fast by the hands, and laid me across, I
think, the windlass, and tied my feet, while the other flogged me
severely....
Questions to Consider
• Why did the slave say he would have
preferred death to continued existence on
the slave ship?
• How did the slave find himself is such a
terrible predicament? Did he seem to hold
any grudge against his original captors?
• Where was the slave going, and what
awaited him when he got there?
First Hand Account
Not a few in our country fondly imagine that parents here sell their children,
men their wives, and one brother the other. But those who think so, do
deceive themselves; for this never happens on any other account but
that of necessity, or some great crime; but most of the slaves that are
offered to us, are prisoners of war, which are sold by the victors as their
booty.
When these slaves come to Fida, they are put in prison all together;
and when we treat concerning buying them, they are all brought out
together in a large plain; where, by our surgeons, whose province it is,
they are thoroughly examined, even to the smallest member, and that
naked both men and women, without the least distinction or modesty.
The invalids and the maimed being thrown out, as I have told you, the
remainder are numbered, and it is entered who delivered them. In the
meanwhile, a burning iron, with the arms or name of the companies,
lies in the fire, with which ours are marked on the breast. This is done
that we may distinguish them from the slaves of the English, French, or
others (which are also marked with their mark), and to prevent the
Negroes exchanging them for worse, at which they have a good hand. I
doubt not but this trade seems very barbarous to you, but since it is
followed by mere necessity, it must go on; but we yet take all possible
care that they are not burned too hard, especially the women, who are
more tender than the men.
continued
We are seldom long detained in the buying of these slaves, because their price is
established, the women being one fourth or fifth part cheaper than the men. The
disputes which we generally have with the owners of these slaves are, that we will not
give them such goods as they ask for them, especially the boesies [cowry shells] (as I
have told you, the money of this country) of which they are very fond, though we
generally make a division on this head, in order to make one part of the goods help
off another; because those slaves which are paid for in boesies, cost the company
one half more than those bought with other goods.
When we have agreed with the owners of the slaves, they are returned to their prison;
where, from that time forwards, they are kept at our charge, cost us two pence a day
a slave; which serves to subsist them, like our criminals, on bread and water: so that
to save charges, we send them on board our ships with the very first opportunity,
before which their masters strip them of all they have on their backs; so that they
come to us stark-naked, as well women as men: in which condition they are obliged
to continue, if the master of the ship is not so charitable (which he commonly is) as to
bestow something on them to cover their nakedness.
You would really wonder to see how these slaves live on board; for though their number
sometimes amounts to six or seven hundred, yet by the careful management of our
masters of ships, they are so [well] regulated, that it seems incredible. And in this
particular our nation exceeds all other Europeans; for as the French, Portuguese, and
English slave-ships are always foul and stinking; on the contrary, ours are for the
most part clean and neat.
The slaves are fed three times a day with indifferent good victuals, and much better than
they eat in their own country. Their lodging place is divided into two parts; one of
which is appointed for the men, the other for the women, each sex being kept apart.
Here they lie as close together as it is possible for them to be crowded.
Questions to Consider
• From whom did Bosman acquire the slaves he
traded for in Guinea? How did the process
actually work?
• What were the conditions of those enslaved?
• Why did Bosman maintain that the Dutch slave
ships were so much cleaner than those of other
European states?
• What is the importance of having both male and
female slaves? What role will each play on the
plantation?