1. Research Sheet Source A.
Engraving showing the treatment of an African slave girl by the British Captain Kimber of the merchant ship ‘Recovery’. The girl, aged 15, was whipped to death for allegedly refusing to dance naked for the captain. Following a public outcry, Kimber was arrested and tried before the High Court of Admiralty in He was ultimately acquitted (let off), the jury having concluded that the girl had died of disease, and not maltreatment.
Source B: Written by Alexander Falconbridge, a surgeon who served on a number of slave ships
“The floor was covered with blood and mucus and resembled a slaughterhouse. After fifteen minutes I was so overcome by the heat, stench and foul air that I nearly fainted”
“The slaves meals consist chiefly of horse beans, boiled to a pulp; of boiled yams and rice..”
Source E from “The Life of Olaudah Equiano the African” (1789). Olaudah Equiano, was captured and sold as a slave in the kingdom of Benin in Africa.
“I was soon put down under the decks, and there I received such a greeting in my nostrils as I had never experienced in my life; so that, with the [foulness] of the stench, and crying together, I became so sick and low that I was not able to eat, nor had I the least desire to taste anything. I now wished for the last friend, death, to relieve me; but soon, to my grief, two of the white men offered me [food]; and, on my refusing to eat, one of them held me fast by the hands… while the other flogged me severely.”
Source D. Sick slaves being thrown overboard so that they did not make other slaves ill.
Source C: From John Newton’s “Journal of a Slave Trader” 1788.
He was an ex-slave trader.
“The poor creatures, thus cramped for want of room, are likewise in irons, for the most part both hands and feet … which makes it difficult for them to turn or move, to rise or lie down, without hurting themselves”
Source H. Shackles from on board a slave ship, circa 1800s.
Source G. Slaves being forced to dance for exercise, those who refused or did not dance enough were whipped.