The Atlantic slave trade was the selling of African slaves by Europeans that happened in and around the Atlantic Ocean. It lasted from the 15th century to the 19th century. Most slaves were shipped from West Africa and brought over to the New World on a slave ship. The slaves were transported on a ship on which slaves lived in bad conditions. The journey by ship was known as the Middle Passage.

Sources of slaves 
Some slaves were captured in battles or through raids and kidnapping. Some were sold into slavery as punishment or to pay a debt, usually by other Africans. Then they were shackled together and marched to the coast on journeys lasting weeks or months. When they arrived they were imprisoned in forts where they were purchased by Europeans. Most historians today think that between 12 million and 13 million Africans arrived in the New World.

The Dahomian army was involved and traded slaves for weapons to protect themselves. King Gezo of Dahomey said in the 1840s:
{{quote|The slave trade is the ruling principle of my people. It is the source and the glory of their wealth...the mother lulls the child to sleep with notes of triumph over an enemy reduced to slavery...}}

 Slave trade 
The slave-trade is sometimes called the Maafa'' by African and African-American scholars. It means catastrophe in the Swahili language. Some slave ships worked a three-part economic cycle often called the triangular trade. It tied the economies of several regions and continents together. The main triangular trading countries were England, The Netherlands, France, Spain and Portugal. Other ships just worked the slave trade.

Christopher Columbus first came to the Americas in 1492 while seeking the West Indies. This led to an economic reason for the transatlantic slave trade. Slaves were first imported in large numbers for mining and later to grow sugarcane in plantations. Slavery is much more ancient than the transatlantic trade. Slaves were used in many ancient societies.

Abolition and illegal trade 
In the 18th century, a small opposition developed against the slave trade in Britain, America, and some parts of Europe. In Britain and America, opposition to the trade was led by the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and establishment Evangelicals such as William Wilberforce. People who protested against the trade were opposed by the owners of land in the Americas. After 1772, slaves became free upon entering the British isles. Abolitionism became stronger in the 19th century.

Denmark was the first European country to ban the slave trade, in 1792, which took effect in 1803. On 22 February 1807, the work of William Wilberforce was rewarded with victory. By an overwhelming 283 votes for to 16 against, the motion for the Slave Trade Act to abolish the Atlantic slave trade was carried in the House of Commons. The United States abolished it later that year. The Royal Navy set up a Blockade of Africa to stop the trade, and treaties with other nations allowed the blockade ships to stop their slave trade. However, smuggling of slaves was very common and hundreds of thousands of black people were enslaved illegally. New York City was a center for this illegal slave trade, and judges in New York avoided punishing slave traders through the 19th century. Many slaves continued to be sent to Spanish colonies of Puerto Rico and Cuba as well as much of South America.

Related pages
African slave trade
Middle Passage
Slave ship
Slavery
Arab slave trade

References 

Historic slave trade