The Americas were full of tons of ways to make money. Originally the Native Americans were forced to work in mines and plantations, but eventually the use of Native Americans was outlawed. Because of this the african slave trade increased. They were treated horribly and without dignity. The absence of humanitarian concerns influenced the african slave trade in three main ways: treatment, punishment, and transportation.
There was no concern for the Africans' well being when it came to their treatment. The Europeans physically and mentally abused them. In document one it says “Their masters are making them work too hard and giving them too little to eat”. They were starved, making them too weak to work. Because they were too weak it often resulted in them being abused worse because they weren’t doing exactly what the Europeans wanted to even though they physically could not. They were beaten and chained together. In document 8 it says the slaves were cut, mangled, and all together treated with no respect. There was no respect for their lives and they were treated like animals. They were burned with an imprint to make it known that they were owned. Taking away any sense of freedom or dignity.
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In document seven it says common crimes the slaves were punished for were neglect, absence of work, eating the sugar cane, theft. If they were caught committing these crimes they could be whipped, beaten with a stick, chained, an iron crook around the neck, a ring around their ankle, or confinement in the dungeon. There was no common decency, or sympathy when it came to the punishment or treatment of the Africans. In document 4 an image of people being thrown overboard is shown. This was also another punishment they might face if they “misbehaved”. They would be left to drown or be eaten in the ocean. These punishments shortened the life of many Africans and caused lots of
This is an example of horrible things committed to slaves but the act of tying them up and mistreating them was not commanded by any government. Slaves were bought or captured by individuals who were looking to make a profit. People who acted like this showed but a small portion of the entire population and you can therefor not say that most Europeans were not
Many slaves being shipped to America had been betrayed by their own race, kidnapped and sold into slavery. The conditions on the ship were horrendous and each man was chained to an area and given about six feet long by fifteen inches wide. The boats were extremely packed with close corners and no bathroom, and women or children got even less space than the men. Many a times, the crew tried to justify the chaining by stating the it was a form of protection to avoid an uprising. In one of the examples Rediker gave, the slave ship, with Captain Tomba, who was known for brutal beatings including whipping, handing out cruel punishments to scare the other slaves into not acting out.
They were required to eat when too sick, but were not allowed much food in general and otherwise. The slaves were scared into staying aboard and not jump to sea to quicken their death. Also, against their greatest will, the slaves were forced to stay packed under the decks with smells, diseases, and conditions that led to many horrid
The African slave trade was very harsh for many reasons. This is because the idea of capture/sale was inhumane, blacks were kept in cages, conditions of ships were horrible, and one out of every three blacks died on the way over. By 1800, ten to fifteen million blacks had been transported as slaves to the Americas; while in Africa, fifty million human beings lives' were lost to death and slavery in those years. Blacks were easier to enslave than whites and Indians, but still were trouble to keep under thumb. These Afro-Americans rebelled by often running away and attempt to find family or sabotaging their work.
Beyond all the horrible treatments that slaves received, enslaved women also had to go through master-slave relationships. Women were not just only bought to do housework or labor in the fields, many times they were purchased for male pleasure and reproduction. "Enslaved women were forced to comply with sexual advances by their masters on a very regular basis" (Sonnen 1). The consequences of resistance often came in the form of physical beatings. This wasn't always the case, even that it was very rare there are examples that show ordinary master-slave relationships, were enslaved women were treated good.
Furthermore, these slaves were transported on a “slave ship” which tightly held 562 slaves and were infiltrated with life-threatening diseases (Document 7). While aboard the ship, the slaves were branded with their owner’s mark and were crammed so tightly into the ship that they couldn’t even slightly change their position (Documents 7 & 8). Since European ports facilitated goods entering by sea, slaves were traded in these crowded ports and were then taken to the New World (Document 6). The slave trade not only had an impact on Africa as it caused small African states to disappear and new powerful kingdoms to arrive, but also affected the economic development of the New World and introduced debilitating diseases there as
The treatment was undoubtedly inhumane, one can argue it was the event during the slave trade that stripped African people of power and
Slaves endured an extreme amount of physical abuse. Some were whipped daily while others were starved. Slaves don't get to eat much each day. They were given a food allowance once a month. Some days they might not eat at all because they made their owners mad or they were being punished for doing something wrong.
They were punished as if they were animals that needed to be disciplined. Unfortunately this is not the only cruelty of being a slave, Slave parent and child were often separated from each other, no matter what age they were. “My mother and I were separated
The treatment was very poor. They were treated inhumanly as part of property. The slaves were no different than land or food at an auction (Doc 2). Slave auctions were places where slaves were split off from family members to the highest bidders. Many families never seen each other again after being auctioned off.
Slaves were often beaten by their masters or overseers in order to keep them in line and stop them from disobeying their masters by instilling fear and a constant physical reminder
One of the reasons is that it is very expensive and troublesome to transport a huge number of slaves across the ocean. People were treated horribly, but in those days such actions were not crimes. Even if we consider them as crimes, they can not be regarded as
Unlike today’s times, they didn’t face any punishment whatsoever. Slavery is a flawed system because not only is it morally wrong, it also violates the human rights of these slaves and makes them submit by mentally scarring
Slaves were given harsh treatment and this is arguably the biggest injustice in slavery. With whippings and other ways of torture slaves were treated like animals on a leech so it was probably horrible to go through. On the website "The Brutality of Slavery. " Mises Institute it states “2-8-09: Jenny and Eugene were whipped.5-13-09: Mrs.Byrd whips the nurse.6-10-09: Eugene (a child) was whipped for running away and had the bit put on him.11-30-09: Jenny and Eugene were whipped.12-16-09: Eugene was whipped for doing nothing yesterday.4-17-10: Byrd helped to investigate slaves tried for “High Treason”; two were hanged.7-1-10: The Negro woman ran away again with the bit in her mouth.7-15-10: My wife, against my will, caused little Jenny to be burned with a hot iron.8-22-10: I had a severe quarrel with little Jenny and beat her too much for which I was sorry.1-22-11: A slave “pretends to be sick.”
Due to the conditions “This produced copious perspirations, so that the air soon became unfit for respiration from a variety of loathsome smells, and brought sickness among the slaves, of which many died,” (25) They were chained and packed which ultimately lead to