PALO ALTO COLLEGE
SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS
The Cruelest Trade HISTORY 1301
Theme Three 		The Triangle Slave Trade
Robert Hines
Assistant Professor of History

Theme Three:
World Trade, Virginia and
The Origins of Slavery in the American Colonies

 

Assigned Readings:

Myers Text, Chapter 9
Several Web Sites
Not Required: Youtube Clip from the film "Amistad"

 

Internet Required: (A) (B) (C) & (D)

Instructor's Introduction:

Many Europeans saw the new world as a great big real-estate grab. It is true. There were not many people here, and most of the land was not being "used" by anyone. Most people who came here were on the make. The old world was short on land, title, and opportunity. Those who came to America were usually risk-takers, hazarding death for the opportunity to work hard and make it big. Other people came to the new world to express (or not express) their religious views freely. Others came here against their will, the property of another, a slave to do the hard, dirty work. Most came to these shores to make a living - either off of the land, or in a boat catching fish or transporting people or products.

Previous histories of America stressed the religious zeal of the Pilgrims , the Puritans, or the Quakers. Others focused on the "Democratical" origins of our institutions. These events and people were no doubt important. But this theme will take a different tact: What about money? How were people put to work, and for whom? How were the fortunes made? How did the slave labor system get started in this country? What were the ramifications of that decision?

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It may be impossible for the modern audience to comprehend the scope of the trans-Atlantic slave trade: For over three hundred years, from about 1450-1850, millions of workers, utilizing tens of thousands of ships, operating on four continents, would capture, transport, then sell anywhere from twelve to thirty million human beings into the abyss of slavery. Think of it: the massive impact of this trade in human beings dwarfed anything else in the economies of scores of countries. It was the equivalent, if I might venture a comparison, of the automobile, computer, and airline businesses of today - combined! And it was all about the capture and sale people for profit!

With this theme, we will investigate the origins the Virginia colony in British North America. In doing so, we will make the necessary connections between the English land grab in America and the booming transatlantic trade in everything from fish and furs, to tobacco and sugar, to guns and slaves. It is an often sordid, but fascinating story.

 

Leg shackles,used on captured people

 

 

(A) The first Virginians were not accustomed to hard work, but they were determined to acquire wealth. There was no gold in Virginia. Opportunities for quick wealth did not exist. Virginians came to the depressing conclusion that they would have to acquire wealth the old-fashioned way: by creating it. The one thing Virginia had going for it was an abundance of arable land. Virginians learned from the Indians about a weed we now call Tobacco. Tobacco grew well in Virginia, but it required lots of labor.

Go to The Terrible Transformation. Based on the information on this page, answer the following questions in ONE essay:
*What was an indentured servant?
*What was the legal difference between an indentured servant and a slave?
*Who was John Punch, and what role did he play in the evolution of the institution of slavery in this country?
*Who was Anthony Johnson, and what happened to him?
*Why did Indentured Servitude end, and slavery take its' place?

 

(B) Archeology and History

Navigate your website ship Unearthing Secret America into Colonial Virginia. What happened in Jamestown? And how do we discover what happened in Jamestown?

Answer the following in ONE essay:

1. What role does science play in our discovery? What can we learn from tree rings and the fate of Jamestown?

2. What can be discovered in Bought and Sold In Williamsburg? What uncovered evidence reveals much about the lives of slaves in America during the colonial period up through the 19th Century? What does the slaves' daily diet reveal about their lives?

3. What can historians learn from other disciplines to better piece together the past? Give other examples of this sort of "borrowing" that historians do. Who must s/he rely upon to provide a more adequate picture of that past? Why does history change over time?

This website is the companion for Alan Alda's Scientific American Frontiers PBS television show.

Agriculture and Trade in the Atlantic Basin

PBS's Unearthing Secret America

 

(C) The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
  1. How did the trans-Atlantic slave trade work?
  2. What was in it for those involved in the trade? What industries were they involved in?
  3. How many Africans were brought to this hemisphere?
Using the map of the Atlantic Basin included here, answer the following questions in ONE essay:
* Where were most of the slaves captured?
* Where did most of them wind up?
* What crops were grown in areas they worked?

Atlantic Slave Trade Timeline

 

(D) Middle Passage What was the Middle Passage? What happened to the captives? For a film interpretation of the Middle Passage, view the film, Amistad, directed by Steven Spielberg. (You are NOT required to view the film.) Olaudah Equiano

Africa and the Slave Trade

Read Chapter 9 in the Myers Text. Answer the following questions in ONE essay:


  1. What were them main reasons that Europeans shipped Africans to the colonies as slavees?
  2. What was the middle passage?
  3. What were conditions like on slave ships?
  4. What were Olaudah Equiano's fears regarding the middle passage?
  5. What did the captured Africans do to avoid being slaves?
  6. Who were the "infidels, and why were they refered to that way?

     

     

    Additional On-Line Resources:


    Amistad History
    Great story of a rebellion on-board a slave ship bound for Cuba.
    Youtube Clip from the film "Amistad"


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