Figure 1.-- The Biard painting tells many different stories, but the focus is with the white crew menmbers here and the ship captain to the right. Notice how they are armed, unusual on a sailing ship of the era or even today. We are not entirely sure what is happeing here. There are two black victims, neoyher have been stripped like the other Afrucan captives. In the case of the yoing woman, it was probbly just the artists attempt at modesty. As for the male it is is very strange. He is wearing a kilt--something unusual in an African village and why hs ne not been striped like the oyher captives. It is also not clear what the two crew menmbers are doing to him. He seems to have been bound, but therope ties look as if they have been cut. Perhaps readers will have some insight here.

Another interesting question is who were the white crew members on a slaver. Here the Biard painting provides few clues other than the age range. There is much that we do not know. One question of particular interest is if the crew of a slaver was a sailor fundamentally different than that of an ordinary sailing vessel. Th common perception is that they were. We are not sure about that. It must be remembered that the Abolitionist Movements did not begin to gain real strength until the very late-18th century. (America was not a significant participant in the slave trade.) The British and Amerucan abolitionist movements were the only two such movements of real imprtance. And hre was no Islanic abolitionist movent at all. And only a few years later, Britain outlawed the slave trade and began to suppress it (1807). So any public moral opprobrium, if nay, only existed in the final years. Further complicating the issue is that Britain was only one of the countries involved and not the most important which was Portugal. And while we know a little about the English crews, we know next to nothing about the Portuguese and other foreign crews. We had assumed that wages were higher for slaver crews, but we cannot yet confirm that. We are somethings we do know about the crews, at least the English crews. First, the crew of an slaver was larger than a normal merchant vessel. This was because they not only had to sail the ship, but had to control the substantial number of captive Africans aboard. Second, it was not only Africans who died aboard the slavers, the Europe crews also died, often in comparable numbers. This was because disease was the primary killer. Africans were exposed to European diseases, but the European crews were like wise exposed to African diseases like malaria. This can be seen in the records of slave voyages. Moralities of 10-20 percent were common with 10 percent becoming more common in the final years of the trade. This is about the same range for crew members. We suspect that the African death rate was somewhat higher, but not hugely so. Third, it was not only Africans who were mistreated, but available records show that plenty of captains also mistreated the crew members. Of course this was nothing like the African experience, but it is worth noting. Fourth, much of the crew was young, commonly in their late-teens or 20s as well as the 30s. Most had cabin boys, usually boys aboyn13-14 years old. There might be several such boys, depending in the size of the slaver. This information can be found in the 'muster rolls' which are available in English archives, usually in port cities like Bristol. We are less sure about other countries. Fifth, as the crews were recruited locally, they were almost all white. There may have been an occasional black, but it was not common. This may have been different on Portuguese slavers. Here we are not sure. Sixth, much of the crew was illiterate, suggesting that at least with English and Dutch slavers that they were not of a religious bent. (Literacy was much higher in Protestant than Catholic countries.) Seventh, English sailors signed a contract -- the 'Articles of Agreement'. This detailed wages, food, and other matters. We believe that the sane was true for other countries involved in the slave trade, but provisions probably varied. How well the captain adhered to these contracts we are uncertain. One interesting provision found in most of these English contracts is that the Africans were not to be mistreated. Enforcement of this provision by the captains seems to have varied widely. Eighth, the slavers often returned home with much smaller crews. This was because of crew mortalities or the crew members remaining in the New World. Here this was sometimes because the crew member voluntarily decided to remain or the captain for various reasons would not allow him to do so. This usually meant staying in Brazil (for the Portuguese) or the Caribbean. Relatively few slavers delivered their human cargo to the 13 English colonies which became the United States.

Created: 6:51 AM 5/27/2022
Last updated: 5:05 PM 5/28/2022