Chapter Ten: The Long Voyage of the Slave Ship

We have finally reached the end of the slave trade. The chapter begins by explaining the impact abolitionist had on the slave trade, and then it transitions into the dates of the last voyage of the trade. This chapter ties all of the previous chapters together and explains why it all came to an end. However, it also elaborates on the lasting effects the trade had on all four major focuses of the book: sailors, captains, merchants, and slaves. I thought that Rediker did an excellent job with carrying out those four titles throughout the entire novel. This chapter also gives out interesting dates and statistics dealing with the trade. Overall, a well executed ending to a book covering the details of the slave ship.

Chapter Nine: From Captives to Shipmates

This chapter is especially sad. It focuses on the slaves aboard the ships and really emphasizes on their lives aboard and how poorly they were treated. It is understood that Rediker views the enslaved as victims within the slave trade because of how he wants the reader to feel after reading this chapter specifically on the enslaved. I believe he wants you to feel for the slaves in a time where they had no control. The images in this chapter are vivid and horrid. Although, Rediker somewhat stands up for the captains and sailors in previous chapters, that does not justify the unruly punishment the slaves receive aboard the ships. Many first hand stories are added in this chapter from slaves who experienced the trade as another way to evoke some type of emotion from his readers. This chapter is necessary to understanding life as a slave, never the less extremely sad and depressing.

Chapter Eight: The Sailor's Vast Machine

Chapter eight is all about the sailors. Rediker gives the reader plenty of primary sources within this chapter to make his arguments credible. He talks about what the slave trade offered to a common sailor and how that ultimately drew them in. "What the slave trade offered above all else was ready money-an advance of two or three months' wages. This was the key to enticing sailors to join a trade they did not like." I believe this chapter is the basis of understanding the sailors involved in the trade. Rediker makes it clear that most of them did not join because they agreed with slavery or punishing the enslaved. Yet, they needed money and an opportunity, and they would do just about anything to receive it.

Chapter Seven: The Captain's Own Hell

This chapter was somewhat difficult to follow. However, it does give the reader multiple viewpoints. The chapter's main topic is all of the captain's worries while on the slave trade, and during this discussion Redicker adds first hand stories from a few captains who wrote about the slave trade later on in their lives. I was not a huge fan of this chapter simply because a lot of the same topics were already discussed, and Redicker seemed to lack organization in the midst of the chapter. He did, though, add in some good points about all of the different worries captains had while aboard, and why that made them so hostile. For example, management of the voyage and how to maintain the ship and its social order, resistance waged by both slaves and sailors, suicide and insurrection among the enslaved, and the health of all those on board. It was mentioned in the book that, "maintaining proper discipline was the crux of the whole enterprise." Which is seen as no surprise after reading about all of the captain's worries. Discipline was the only thing a captain had to maintain order on board, and scare the others into doing what they were asked. Unfortunately, most captains abused this power and turned discipline into harsh violence. "Many slave ship captains adopted a domineering style of shipboard leadership that can be summed up in a word: bully."

Chapter Six: John Newton and the Peaceful Kingdom

Redicker now switches his focus to a slave ship captain. The captain he chose to write about was named, John Newton. Newton has long been the best-known captain in the history of the African slave trade. "His fame derives from his subsequent career, in which he became an active, visible minister of the evangelical bent in the Church of England." However he has declared himself as a sinner for his previous career as a slave ship captain, in charge of the horror aboard the ship. The captain of a slaver was told to "wield the greatest power of all" for he had to manage common sailors and African captives. When Newton first started his career as a captain he was reluctant to inflict violence among his crew and the slaves. However, he eased into inflicting harsh violence upon them as he began to accept the power he was granted. As his cruelty intensified, those aboard began to resist and sometimes rebel. The book includes a story Newton once told about a slave on his ship poisoning a cask of water, with the intent to kill all who drank it. Years into his career, Newton began to realize the cruelty he was promoting was inhumane. Therefore, his life began to take a more religious turn. He began to keep a spiritual diary for three purposes: "to bring myself a deep sense of my past sins and follies, to enlarge my mind, and to compose my heart to a perfect peace and charity with all mankind." With a new mindset Newton started to lessen his violence because he was concerned with "saving the souls" of those aboard his ship. He still had to discipline the crew and the slaves, but now he did so aware of the consequences harsh violence could create. "It took Newton years before he wrote a critical word about the slave trade, and it would be more than three decades before he would declare himself against it."

This chapter gives you a deeper understanding of the mind behind an eighteenth century slave ship captain. Instead of viewing all captains as completely evil, John Newton exemplifies someone who saw opportunity in his career but came to see it as unkind. Therefore, offering the reader a different view of slave ship captains who inflicted harsh violence among their crew and the enslaved.

Chapter Five: James Field Stanfield and the Floating Dungeon

This was an interesting chapter because the focus shifted to a crew member aboard the slave ship. After I finished reading it, I had a new perspective on those who worked on the ships. Going into the chapter I viewed the slaves as being the only ones to be treated poorly during the Middle Passage. However, this chapter gives you a whole new perspective. The focus of the chapter is a sailor named James Field Stanfield and he was the first to write about the slave ship from the perspective of the common sailor. Redicker tells his audience that "Stanfield's descriptions of the trade and the ship were among the very best ever written by a working sailor." The chapter begins at the beginning of Stanfield's life. We learn that Stanfield was well educated and that science had "opened his views of the world." He described himself as "a man of feeling" and wanted to search for the joys and beauties of nature and philosophy, which is what drew him to sailing. He also proclaimed that sailors did not like the slave trade, however they needed money in their pockets. Stanfield did not like most merchants, as they were the ones who lured sailors aboard to work in the Middle Passage. Despite the horrors of the slave trade, Stanfield could not deny the thrill ships and the open sea gave him, "the ship was a thing of beauty, with new sails and fresh paint, with colors flying, and banners streaming in the sea breeze." This is where I began to gain a new perspective…Redicker adds that sailors were extremely undernourished just like the enslaved, if not more. This was because the captain an economic incentive to feed the slaves and keep them alive during the Middle Passage. Stanfield thought that slaves were in certain respects better off than the crew. The captains violence was completely overpowering, and he inflicted that on both the slaves and the sailors. Before reading this chapter I had no idea how horrible the sailors lives were on the ships, which I believe is due to the abundance of publicized works from the enslaved drawing our attention more towards the slaves and not the crew. James Field Stanfield's account of the slave trade gave a new perspective of the ships to many of his readers. Redicker says it is, "more detailed, more gruesome, and more dramatic than anything that had yet appeared in 1788 (the year it was published).

Chapter Four: Olaudah Equiano: Astonishment and Terror

Chapter four is the first chance Rediker gives his readers to follow one person, stretched out over one chapter, and their journey on the Middle Passage. This specific chapter is based on Olaudah Equiano, who was seized from his home in Igbo (present day Nigeria) at age eleven. Equiano and his sister were forced to work at the home of their captors. His captors later pulled him and his sister apart and they were both sold many times. Six or seven months after being captured he had arrived at the sea coast and likely the slave trading port of Bonny. He was placed aboard one ship and described an instant distinction of terror. "Whites looked and acted as I thought in so savage a manner; for I have never seen among any people such instances of brutal cruelty." At this point the reader feels for all of the enslaved aboard as Rediker inserts a passage from Equiano's narrative which goes into conditions of the ship. "Everyone was confined together belowdecks, the apartments were so crowded that each had scarcely room to turn himself. The enslaved were spooned together in close quarters, each with about as much room as a corpse in a coffin. The stench became absolutely pestilential as the sweat, the vomit, the blood, and the necessary tubs full of excitement almost suffocated us" I thought this chapter was very intriguing because it focused on one person's experience. What made Olaudah Equiano different from other the enslaved aboard slave ships, was what he did with himself after he landed in Virginia. The book mentions Equiano, "learned all he could from the sailors about how the ship worked." This later became his own path to liberation. He went on to work as a sailor, and buy his freedom at age twenty four. Equiano was also the first person to write about the slave ship from the perspective of the enslaved. Therefore, I believe the Rediker chose his focus of this chapter wisely. The reader is really able to get a feel for life as a slave before, during, and after the Middle Passage.

Chapter Three: African Paths To The Middle Passage

Chapter three gives the reader background information to why the slaves involved in the slave trade came from where they did. This chapter was very interesting to me, because it explained the underlying causes of the trade and why it unfolded the way it did. However, the chapter is extremely disheartening as well. Redicker mentions that enslavement began in the interior of Africa, and most people who ended up on slave shops were enslaved by force, in capture or through judicial punishments as a sentence of crime committed. I find this very ironic due to the fact that slavery was later seen as crime. Redicker goes on to say that slavery was an ancient and widely accepted institution throughout larger societies of Africa. These slaves were traded in highly commercial markets because slave-ship captains wanted to deal with ruling groups and strong leaders, people who could command labor resources and deliver the “goods” and partly because wealth and powerful technologies accrued to these people during the course of trade. This explanation, in my opinion, is helpful in understanding the slave trade and why captains chose to trade with certain parts of Africa over others. The last bits of the chapter are focused on different regions of Africa and their culture and geography and how that affected the slaves within the trade. It also talks about the spread of culture, for example the spread of Islam, as a result of the trade. The very last thing Redicker talks about in chapter three is how Africans and African-Americans had come to express the “wrenching” departure of slaves through the symbol of the “door of no return”. Captives would have no choice but to live in struggle, a never-ending fight to survive. 

Chapter Two: The Evolution Of The Slave Ship

Chapter two is centered around how the slave ships were made and organized for the Slave Trade. The importance of the ships, not only to the Slave Trade but to mankind, is strongly emphasized in this chapter. Rediker describes the machine as "one of the most useful ever invented". Ships were important because they helped connect the globe and were the historic vessel for the emergence of capitalism. The author goes into the origins of the slave ship, which dates back to the late fifteenth century, when the Portuguese made their historic voyages to the west coast of Africa, where they bought gold, ivory, and human beings. The ships could be made as expensive or as cheap as the buyer wanted. It was a way for people to display their wealth to others. Although, the ships were a display of wealth they also served a purpose, and were made to efficiently carry slaves from one place to another. The ships were also organized in a way to make sure everything ran as smooth as possible, attempting to keep the majority of slaves alive and healthy. The organization of labor on the slave ship began with the captain, the first person hired and the last to be discharged by the shipowner at the voyage's end. Most slave ships had two mates as well, because the threat of mortality required that several people be on board who knew navigation. There was always a doctor on board to keep the crew and the slaves alive from one side of the Atlantic to the other. The carpenter was responsible for the structural soundness of the ship and its various parts. Lastly, the landsmen on board were in charge of guarding the slaves. This chapter also describes how the ships were set up in order to hold large amounts of slaves. The building of these ships were strategic as it was all about carrying as many slaves as possible while keeping as many of them alive.

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Chapter One: Life, Death, and Terror in the Slave Trade

Marcus Rediker begins "The Slave Ship" with various short stories centered around the people involved in the Slave Trade during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. I got a great feel for what life was like aboard the ships and the dangers faced after I read the first chapter. Many of the stories' subjects are the slaves that were unjustly taken from their homes and traded throughout North America and the Caribbean. The terrors of their time aboard are exemplified through Rediker's writing. He explains in multiple stories that if a slave passed away in mid journey they were thrown overboard as a feast for the sharks. This method was also used as show for other slaves in attempt to evoke fear and keep them obedient to the captain's orders. However, the novel is not just focused on the slaves, it also gives the reader the ships captains' points of view. One captain describes his career choice as one that allows for opportunity. He ran the boat not because he was pro-slavery per say but because it was an opportunity to make money, and the harsh tactics put in place for the passengers aboard were methods to keep passengers subordinate to those who were running the ships. This first chapter is broad but a well developed intro to the rest of the novel.