Middle Passage: Forced Journey Of Slaves From Africa To America

Middle Passage is a term used to describe the forced journey of African slaves from Africa to America in exchange for goods from Europe. It is called the middle passage because it was the middle leg of the ‘triangular trade’. During the 17th century heaps of slaves were kidnapped and transported from the west coast of Africa to America in slave ships. These ships travelled across the Atlantic ocean from and this took about six to eight weeks depending on the weather. Conditions for slaves were horrible on board and it was very hard for them to handle and this led to suicides and death. Lots of slaves suffered in the middle passage from 1500s, all the way to middle of 1800s.

The conditions on board were unsanitary and cramped. As soon as
Equiano Olaudah, who was a young slave been part of the middle passage said “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
They were stuffed together with no space to even stand. Women and children were allowed to be on be on the deck but due to the closeness to the ship’s deck they often became prey to captain and crew members who would often rape them.Since the ratio of slaves to crew members is uneven by a huge amount, the crew members whipped the slaves to control them. Another way they used to control the slaves was by threatening them. For example a slave master scared the slaves by using the sharks following the ship. He got a woman and tied her upside down on a rope and put her into the water, after few seconds he pulled the rope up and the poor woman was dead. This incident scared the slaves that they knew they can’t fight for their lives.

Due to overcrowded decks, lack of clean water and bad sanitation diseases spread very quickly.Two major diseases were dysentery and smallpox.These diseases didn’t take that long to spread and killed 95% of the slaves. Some other diseases were syphilis, measles etc.Some slaves suicided by not eating proper food, throwing themselves overboard or simply with no hope.The conditions the slaves lived under was horrible and the lack of medical help caused a lot of death. For example most of the slaves had sea sickness and threw up too many times.If the crew members or slave master notice any symptoms of disease/sickness from a slave, the slave will be thrown overboard