The middle passage

• The Middle Passage was the journey from West Africa to the Americas across the Atlantic Ocean, lasting from six to twelve weeks and influenced by the weather, the occurrence of wars and the ship’s encounter with pirates or privateers.
• The Middle Passage may be sub-divided into six stages: capture, march to the coast, storage at the coast, packing the ship, the Atlantic crossing and their sale in the Americas.
• Africans were primarily taken from the Grain Coast, the Ivory Coast, the Gold Coast and the Slave Coast.
• Africans were taken from their homes through various methods including prisoners of war being sold to slave dealers, criminals being sold to dealers instead of serving a prison sentence, debtors being sold to pay off their debts and avoid imprisonment, villages being raided, and African leaders starting wars with neighbouring villages to secure persons to sell to slave dealers.
• After their capture, Africans were marched from the interior regions to the West African coast in a coffle, a method of chaining slaves together via the use of forked sticks around their necks.
• Approximately 20% of those in the coffle died before reaching the coast.
• Once the coffles reached the coast, Africans were sold to European factors/agent who were responsible for shipping them to the New World.
• At the coast, Africans were housed in barracoons which were structures used for holding captured Africans before shipment.
• The length spent in the barracoon depended on the health of the captive and the availability of ships.
• Africans were specially built ships called slavers which transported the captives to the Americas but many ships were regular freighting ships called freighters.
• Most ships’ captains tried to pack as many Africans as possible on board, a method called tight-packing, accommodating for any loss of cargo during the crossing.
• Other captains relied on loose packing which involved loading the vessels with less captives than they could accommodate, believing it resulted in a higher survival rate.
• The captives were stored below deck and were allotted a space of 6 ft long, 16 inches wide and 3 ft high.
• Ships were also packed with food and water.
• Once packed, the ships began the 6 to 12 week voyage across the Atlantic.
• Conditions on the ships were horrible and 10-20% of Africans, as well as European sailors died due to various reasons including a sinking ship, suicide, heatstroke, starvation, excessive cruelty, diseases, and being deliberately drowned.
• After they were sold, Africans were taken to their plantations and assigned to a slave who taught them the language, the rules of the plantation, and the duties they were expected to perform as enslaved labourers, a period called the seasoning period.
• The Middle Passage was the journey from West Africa to the Americas across the Atlantic Ocean, lasting from six to twelve weeks and influenced by the weather, the occurrence of wars and the ship’s encounter with pirates or privateers.
• The Middle Passage may be sub-divided into six stages: capture, march to the coast, storage at the coast, packing the ship, the Atlantic crossing and their sale and seasoning in the Americas.
• Africans were primarily taken from the Grain Coast, the Ivory Coast, the Gold Coast and the Slave Coast.
• Africans were taken from their homes through various methods including prisoners of war being sold to slave dealers, criminals being sold instead of serving a prison sentence, debtors being sold to pay off their debts and avoid imprisonment, villages being raided, and African leaders starting wars with neighbouring villages to secure persons to sell to slave dealers.
• After their capture, Africans were marched from the interior regions to the West African coast in a coffle, a method of chaining slaves together via the use of forked sticks around their necks.
• Approximately 20% of those in the coffle died before reaching the coast.
• Once the coffles reached the coast, Africans were sold to European factors/ agents who were responsible for shipping them to the New World.
• At the coast, Africans were housed in barracoons, structures/ huts used for holding captured Africans before shipment.
• The length spent in the barracoon depended on the health of the captive and the availability of ships.
• Africans were packed into specially built ships called slavers which transported them to the Americas, but many ships were regular freighting ships called freighters.
• Most ships’ captains tried to pack as many Africans as possible on board, a method called tight-packing, accommodating for any loss of cargo during the crossing.