The Slave Trade

Background Information

1. Slavery is defined as when one person owns another as property.

2. Slavery has existed as long as humans have existed.

3. It is an unfortunate truth about history and even today.

1. Atlantic Slave Trade

1. The slave trade from Africa to the Americas was dubbed as the Atlantic Slave Trade.

2. This slave trade took place between 1500 and 1900.

3. During this time there were roughly a total of 12 million Africans taken from their homeland and sold into slavery.

Atlantic Slave Trade: Why?

1. Africans were taken mainly for economic reasons:a. Worked hard labor for freeb. Helped countries and slave owners make more money

Slave Work

Atlantic Slave Trade: Who?1. Europeans were the primary slave owners. The countries listed below took part in slavery:

a. Portugalb. Englandc. Franced. Netherlands (Dutch)e. United States of America

U.S.APortugal

England

France

Netherlands (Dutch)

Atlantic Slave Trade: Who? Cont.

1. The majority of slaves came from many dominate African tribes selling other Africans to Europeans as slaves in return for money and goods.

2. Other instances occurred where Europeans would go on raids to capture Africans as slaves.

Atlantic Slave Trade: Where?

1. In the Atlantic Slave Trade, most of the slaves were transported to the North and South American continents.

2. Check out the map and the chart on the next slides…

http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/assessment/intro-maps/01.jsp

Spain / Uruguay

Portugal / Brazil Great Britain Netherlands U.S.A. France Denmark/Baltic Totals

1501-1600 119,962 154,191 1,922 1,365 0 66 0 277,506

1601-1700 146,270 1,011,192 428,262 219,931 4,151 38,435 27,391 1,875,631

1701-1800 10,654 2,213,003 2,545,297 330,014 189,304 1,139,013 67,334 6,494,619

1801-1866 784,639 2,469,879 283,959 3,026 111,871 203,890 16,316 3,873,580

Totals 1,061,524 5,848,265 3,259,440 554,336 305,326 1,381,404 111,041 12,521,336

http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/assessment/estimates.faces

Show

Freeze!

1. Complete the “Atlantic Slave Trade Chart Analysis” as a class before continuing!

American Slavery

1. Let’s take a look at slavery in American now that we understand the overall basics.

2. A good majority of the African-American population today can trace their ancestry back to slaves.

American Slavery cont.

1. The slaves in America were primarily used for free labor.

2. Slavery was an acceptable way of life for many early Americans.

3. A lot of our early leaders owned slaves.

A Change in Slavery

1. The Industrial Revolution changed the landscape of slavery in our nation.

2. The Industrial Revolution was a time when people started to work in factories and other parts of the industry world in order to make goods.

3. More people began to work and earn their own wages during the Industrial Revolution.

4. This drastically changed the way Americans worked and began to split two major sections of the country: the North and the South.

A Major Divide1. The north embraced the Industrial Revolution with expanded

their infrastructure.

2. Infrastructure is defined as roadways, railroads, factories and other structures that help a country expand and operate.

3. The south pursued cotton (considered “white gold”) production and continued to use slaves to help gather and sell cotton.

4. The north stopped using slaves and called for the south to stop using slaves. This was called the abolitionist movement.

Wait a minute…

1. If owning slaves are outlawed in America today then how did we get to this point?

2. What do you think?

3. What did it take?

It took…

1. A war which resulted in 620,000 deaths.

2. 3 Amendments (changes to the Constitution).

3. Many brave men and women risking their lives to be treated equally.

4. All of this we will talk about in the future.

Pictures of Slavery