Caribbean

The first slaves to arrive as part of a labour force in the New World reached the island of Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic) in 1502. Cuba received its first four slaves in 1513. Jamaica received its first shipment of 4,000 slaves in 1518.^[14] "Between the 1490s and the 1850s, Latin America, including the Spanish-speaking Caribbean and Brazil, transported the largest number of African slaves to the New World, generating the single-greatest concentration of black populations outside of the African continent."^[15] About 4 million enslaved Africans were transported to the Caribbean by way of the transatlantic slave trade.^[16] Cuba, the largest slave colony in Hispanic America, transported 800,000 enslaved Africans and participated in the illegal slave trade longer than any other.^[17] Enslaved Africans worked about 16 hours a day on the sugarcane plantations. They brought their traditional religions from West Africa; these developed in the new world as religions that scholars call African diaspora religions.^[18]

Central America

Slave exports to Honduras and Guatemala started in 1526. Historian Nigel Bolland writes of the slave trade in Central America: "The demand for labor in the early Spanish settlements of Hispaniola, Cuba, Panama, and Peru resulted in a large-scale Indian (Indigenous people) slave trade in Central America in the second quarter of the 16th century. Indeed, the first colonial economy of the region was based on slave trading."^[19]

In the 16th century, the majority of Africans transported to Central America came from present-day Senegambia and other West African regions. Between 1607 and 1640, Portuguese slave traders transported Africans from Angola to Honduras and were sold in Santiago de Guatemala to work in the sugar and indigo plantations. The majority of the Africans working in the plantations were from the Luanda region in Central Africa.^[20]

United States

The first enslaved Africans to reach what would become the United States arrived in August 1526 as part of a Spanish attempt to colonise San Miguel de Gualdape.^[21] By November, the 300 Spanish colonists were reduced to 100, and their slaves from 100 to 70^[why?]. The enslaved people revolted in 1526 and joined a nearby Native American tribe, while the Spanish abandoned the colony altogether (1527). The area of the future Colombia received its first enslaved people in 1533. El Salvador, Costa Rica, and Florida began their stints in the slave trade in 1541, 1563, and 1581, respectively. According to research, about 40 percent of enslaved Africans arrived at Gadsden's Wharf, which was the largest slave port in the United States.^[22]

In the 17th century in colonial Boston in Massachusetts, about 166 transatlantic voyages embarked out of Boston. Boston transported enslaved people from Africa and exported rum.^[23] Peter Faneuil organised and profited from the trans-Atlantic voyages out of Boston and transported manufactured goods from Europe, and transported enslaved people, rum, and sugar from the Caribbean.^[24] Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island were the three New England states with the largest slave populations. The enslaved population in South Kingston, Rhode Island was thirty percent, in Boston the slave population was ten percent, in New London it was nine percent, and in New York it was 7.2 percent.^[25] The earliest documentation of enslaved people in New England was 1638. In Northern American British colonies, Massachusetts Bay colonies was the center for slave trading and colonial Boston was a major slave port in the North importing slaves directly from Africa.^[26][27]

The 17th century saw an increase in shipments. Africans were brought to Point Comfort – several miles downriver from the English colony of Jamestown, Virginia – in 1619. The first kidnapped Africans in English North America were classed as indentured servants and freed after seven years. Virginia law codified chattel slavery in 1656, and in 1662 the colony adopted the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which classified children of slave mothers as slaves, regardless of paternity. Under British law, children born of white male slave owners and black female slaves would have inherited the father's status and rights. The change to maternal inheritance for slaves guaranteed that anyone born with any slave ancestors was a slave, with no regard to the nature of the relations between the white father and the black mother, consensual or not.^[30]

In addition to African persons, Indigenous peoples of the Americas were trafficked through Atlantic trade routes. The 1677 work The Doings and Sufferings of the Christian Indians, for example, documents English colonial prisoners of war (not, in fact, opposing combatants, but imprisoned members of English-allied forces) being enslaved and sent to Caribbean destinations.^[31][32] Captive Indigenous opponents, including women and children, were also sold into slavery at a substantial profit, to be transported to West Indies colonies.^[33][34]

South America

The Spanish and Portuguese colonised South America and enslaved the Indigenous people. They later enslaved Africans brought from West and Central Africa in ships by way of the Atlantic slave trade. Brazil transported 4.8 million enslaved Africans.^[35] Africans who escaped slavery there formed quilombos, maroon communities with degrees of self-governance. Palamares, a quilombo community, lasted for 100 years while other communities were quickly removed by the Dutch and Portuguese.^[36][37][38] The Africans transported to Brazil were Yoruba, Fon, Bantu and others. Their religions from Africa developed into new world religions in Brazil called Candomblé, Umbanda, Xango, and Macumba.^[39]

Historian Erika Edwards writes of the slave trade in Argentina: "In 1587 the first slaves arrived in Buenos Aires from Brazil. From 1580 to 1640, the main commercial activity for Buenos Aires was the slave trade. More than 70 percent of the value of all imports arriving in Buenos Aires were enslaved Africans. Slaves came primarily from Brazil via the Portuguese slave trade from Angola and other western states in Africa. Once arriving in Buenos Aires, they could be sent as far as Lima, Peru; slaves were provided to Mendoza, Tucumán, and Salta Jujuy as well as to Chile, Paraguay, and what is today Bolivia and southern Peru."^[40]

Russia

By 1802, Russian colonists noted that "Boston" (U.S.-based) skippers were trading African slaves for otter pelts with the Tlingit people in Southeast Alaska.^[41]

Notes:

• Before 1820, the number of enslaved Africans transported across the Atlantic to the New World was triple the number of Europeans who reached North and South American shores. At the time this was the largest oceanic displacement or migration in history,^[43] eclipsing even the far-flung, but less-dense, expansion of Austronesian-Polynesian explorers.
• The number of Africans who arrived in each region is calculated from the total number of slaves transported, about 10,000,000.^[44]
• Includes British Guiana and British Honduras

• 
  Punishing slaves at Calabouço, in Rio de Janeiro, c. 1822
• 
  Recently bought slaves in Brazil on their way to the farms of the landowners who bought them c. 1830
• 
  A 19th-century lithograph showing a sugarcane plantation in Suriname

Conditions

Typical slave ships contained several hundred slaves with about 30 crew members.^[45] Some voyages had as many as 450-700 enslaved Africans.^[11] Deaths directly attributable to the Middle Passage voyage are estimated at up to two million; a broader look at African deaths directly attributable to the institution of slavery from 1500 to 1900 suggests up to four million deaths.^[46]

The captive Africans were normally chained together in pairs to save space—right leg chained to the next man's left leg. The chains or hand and leg cuffs were known as bilboes, which were among the many tools of the slave trade and which were always in short supply. Bilboes consisted of two iron shackles locked on a post and were usually fastened around the ankles of two men.^[47] Captive Africans were held below decks in such confined spaces that they were forced to lay on their sides in "a space of six feet by one foot four inches for a man, and a little less for a woman."^[11]

At best, captive slaves were fed beans, corn, yams, rice, and palm oil, once per day with water, if at all. When food was scarce, slaveholders would have priority over the enslaved.^[48] Sometimes captives were allowed to move around during the day, but many ships kept the shackles on throughout the arduous journey. Aboard certain French ships, the slaves were brought on deck to periodically receive fresh air. While enslaved women were typically permitted to be on deck more frequently, enslaved men would be watched closely to prevent revolt when above deck.^[49]

The enslaved Africans lived for months in squalid conditions. Disease and starvation were the main contributors to the death toll, with amoebic dysentery and scurvy causing the majority of deaths.^[50] Additionally, outbreaks of smallpox, syphilis, measles, and other diseases spread rapidly in the close-quarter compartments.^[51] Alexander Falconbridge, who was a doctor on a slave ship testified that the deck "was so covered with the blood and mucus which had proceeded from them in consequence of the flux that if resembeled a slaughter-house."^[11] The rate of death increased with the length of the voyage, since the incidence of dysentery and of scurvy increased with longer stints at sea as the quality and amount of food and water diminished. Enslaved Africans who became sick were often separated from other captives and stored under the half-deck.^[11] Dr. Falconbridge recounted that "those who are emacaited frequently have their skin, and even their flesh, entirely rubbed off by the motion of the ship... so as to render the bones in those parts quite bare."^[11] Mortality rates were high and those who had been sick and died were not always found immediately. This made the intolerable conditions even worse. Many of the living could have been shackled to someone who was dead for hours, or perhaps days.^[47] Captors threw the bodies of those who died overboard and schools of sharks followed slave ships "waiting to devour the dead bodies thrown overboard almost every day."^[11]

Treatment of enslaved people and resistance

Treatment of the enslaved individuals was horrific since the captured African men and women were considered less than human; to slavers, they were "cargo", or "goods", and treated as such. Women with children were not as desirable for enslavement because they took up too much space, and toddlers were not wanted because of everyday maintenance.^[52]

The enslaved were kept fed and supplied with drink as healthy slaves were more valuable. Enslaved Africans who refused to eat had their mouths forced open with an oral speculum or were burned with hot coals.^[11] Punishment of the enslaved and torture was very common, as on the voyage the crew sought to make those who were enslaved obedient^[53] Mortality was high; those with strong bodies survived. Young women and girls were raped by the crew. The mortality rates were considerably higher in Africa during the process of capturing and transporting the enslaved people to the coast.^[54] Many women suffered at the hands of crew members through sexual violence and the responsibility of caregiving for sick captives.^[55] Women would even give birth during the voyage, without assistance or medical care. Most newborns did not survive.^[55]

The worst punishments were for rebelling; in one instance a captain punished a failed rebellion by killing one involved enslaved man immediately and forcing two other slaves to eat his heart and liver.^[56]

As a way to counteract disease and maintain the health of their "cargo," the crew would force the enslaved onto the deck of the ship to dance, usually resulting in beatings because the enslaved would be unwilling to dance for them or interact.^[57] These beatings would often be severe and could result in enslaved Africans dying or becoming more susceptible to diseases.

Sailing technologies

The duration of the transatlantic voyage varied widely,^[2] from one to six months depending on weather conditions. The journey became more efficient over the centuries: while an average transatlantic journey of the early 16th century lasted several months, by the 19th century the crossing was faster at five to seven weeks.^[67]

The desire for profits in the 18th-century Atlantic market economy drove changes in ship designs and in managing human cargo, which included enslaved Africans and the mostly European crew. Improvements in air flow on board the ships helped to decrease the infamous mortality rate that these ships had become known for throughout the 16th and 17th centuries. The new designs that allowed ships to navigate faster and into rivers' mouths ensured access to many more enslaving posts along the West African coast.^[68] The monetary value of enslaved Africans on any given American auction-block during the mid-18th century ranged between $800 and $1,200, which in modern times would be equivalent to $32,000–48,000 per person. Therefore, ship captains and investors sought technologies that would protect their human cargo.^[69]

Throughout the height of the Atlantic slave trade (1570–1808), ships that transported the enslaved people were normally smaller than traditional cargo ships, with most ships that transported the enslaved measuring between 150 and 250 tons. This equated to about 350 to 450 enslaved Africans on each slave ship, or 1.5 to 2.4 per ton. The English ships of the time normally fell on the larger side of this spectrum and the French on the smaller side. Ships purposely designed to be smaller and more maneuverable were meant to navigate the African coastal rivers into farther inland ports; these ships therefore increased the effects of the slave trade on Africa.

The ships' sizes increased slightly throughout the 18th century; however, the number of enslaved Africans per ship remained the same. This reduction in the ratio of enslaved Africans to ship tonnage was designed to increase the amount of space per person and thus improve the survival chances of everyone on board. These ships also had temporary storage decks that were separated by an open latticework or grate bulkhead. Ship masters would presumably use these chambers to divide enslaved Africans and help prevent mutiny. Some ships developed by the turn of the 19th century had ventilation ports built into the sides and between gun ports (with hatches to keep inclement weather out). These open deck designs increased airflow and thus helped improve survival rates.^[68]

Another major factor in "cargo protection" was the increase in knowledge of diseases and medicines (along with the inclusion of a variety of medicines on the ships). First the Dutch East India Company in the 18th century, followed by some other countries and companies in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, realized that the inclusion of surgeons and other medical practitioners aboard their ships was an endeavor that proved too costly for the benefits. So instead of including medical personnel, they stocked the ships with a large variety of medicines. While this was better than no medicines, and given the fact that many crew members at least had some idea of how disease was spread, without the inclusion of medical personnel the mortality rate was still very high in the 18th century.^[70]

Sailors and crew

While the owners and captains of slave ships could expect vast profits, the ordinary sailors were often inadequately paid and subject to brutal discipline. Sailors often had to live and sleep without shelter on the open deck for the entirety of the Atlantic voyage as the entire space below deck was occupied by enslaved people.^[71]

A crew mortality rate of around 20% was expected during a voyage, with sailors dying as a result of disease (specifically malaria and yellow fever), flogging or slave uprisings.^[71][72] A high crew mortality rate on the return voyage was in the captain's interests as it reduced the number of sailors who had to be paid on reaching the home port.^[73] Crew members who survived were frequently cheated out of their wages on their return.^[71]

The sailors were often employed through coercion as they generally knew about and hated the slave trade.^{[citation needed]} In port towns, recruiters and tavern owners would induce sailors to become very drunk (and indebted) and then offer to relieve their debt if they signed contracts with slave ships. If they did not, they would be imprisoned. Sailors in prison had a hard time getting jobs outside of the slave ship industry since most other maritime industries would not hire "jail-birds", so they were forced to go to the slave ships anyway.^[74]

Profit and economics

The violence was done out of economic motives. Captains of the ships and investors tried to balance profit with survival by overcrowding ships and lowering rations to maximize gains.^[75] Some captains were even granted bonuses if the death tolls were lower, yet it was still a system that produced something called "calculated cruelty," in which human lives were seen as opportunity costs versus profits.^[75] Voyages to Brazil or the Caribbean, due to distance and tropical disease saw higher mortality rates than those to North America.^[10] By the 19th century, mortality still remained devastatingly high even with improvements to the ships.^[10]