Middle Passage

The **Middle Passage** was the part of the Atlantic slave trade where African slaves were brought to the Americas on slave ships.  Millions of African people were shipped to the Americas over the Middle-Passage. This was a type of human trafficking that took place for a long period of time.

## Overview
According to the Slave Voyage Database hosted by Rice University, more than 36,000 voyages forcibly transported enslaved Africans across the Middle Passage between 1514 and 1866. 

Enslaved people were treated so badly on the slave ships that about 15% of them died during the Middle Passage.  Even more were killed before they left West and Central Africa, when slave traders were trying to kidnap them and force them onto the slave ships.  

Historians think that up to two million African people died during the Middle Passage. However, somewhere between 9.4 million and 12 million African people survived and arrived in the Americas as slaves.

## The triangular trade
The transatlantic trade of African people had three different parts.  Because of this, it was called "the triangular trade."  The Middle Passage got its name because it was the middle part of the triangular trade.  The three parts of the Atlantic slave trade are described below.

The three parts of the Atlantic slave trade were:

### Part 1: Europe to West and Central Africa
This step involved bringing goods from Europe to West and Central Africa. Ships brought weapons, gunpowder, cloth, rum, and manufactured goods. They traded these things for African people who had been bought as slaves or kidnapped.

### Part 2: Africa to the Americas
During this part of the slave trade, slave ships brought people from West and Central Africa over the Middle Passage to the Americas. There they were sold as slaves, or traded for raw materials that other enslaved people had made (like sugar, tobacco, and cotton).

### Part 3: The Americas to Europe
These raw materials would be sent to Europe, where they were used to make things. Then the triangular trade would start all over again. For example, cotton would be used to make cloth. That cloth could then be sent to West and Central Africa to trade for more enslaved people.

## Journey
Sailing through the Middle Passage could take anywhere from one to six months, depending on the weather.

### Before the ships
After being kidnapped, enslaved African people were usually forced to march to forts along the western coast of Africa.  There they were sold to European, European American and European Brazilian human traffickers.  They might have to wait in these forts, which were like prisons, for months before slave ships arrived.  (The famous drawing on the right shows how closely enslaved people were packed together on some slave ships.) 

Enslaved men were often chained together at the ankles.

### Crossing the Middle Passage
Enslaved people were treated barbarically and wickedly during the Middle Passage because they were not viewed as human. Instead, they were viewed as "cargo" or "goods" to be bought and sold: property instead of people. In this view, enslaved people did not have any rights or deserve respect because they were less than human. 

## Living conditions
### Starvation and dehydration
Many enslaved people died during the Middle Passage because they were not given enough food or enough water to survive.  However, enslavers did not always feed the enslaved people every day. If there was not enough food for the sailors and the slaves, the enslavers would eat first, and the enslaved might not get any food.

### Enslaved Africans
Most of the African slaves came from eight different areas:  Kidnapping people in West and Central Africa and selling them into slavery became more and more popular, and the slave trade grew.

### Others
Historians think that some African warlords, African kings, African queens and private kidnappers (Europeans, European Americans, European Brazilians and Africans alike) participated in kidnapping people into slavery.

## Gallery

File:Slave baracoon, Sierra Leone, 1849.jpg|In slave barracoons, like this one in 1849 Sierra Leone, enslaved Africans were jailed until slave ships were ready.
File:The Slave Trade by Auguste Francois Biard.jpg|*The Slave Trade (Slaves on the West coast of Africa)* by Auguste François Biard.
File:Slaveshipposter.jpg|Plan of the slave ship *Brookes*, showing how tightly slaves were packed into the ship.
File:NavioNegreiro.gif|Illustration of how crowded it was on many slave ships.
File:Thomas-Clarkson-De-kreet-der-Afrikanen MG 1315.tif|Drawing of a large, four-level slave ship.
File:Slave-ship.jpg|Painting of dead and dying slaves being thrown into the sea, by J.M.W. Turner.

## References