M&D Deep Duck: Slave Trade - numbers

[Becky Lindroos]

Ray Raphael is excellent -  I read his People’s History of the American Revolution several years back.  In IT’S OWN WAY (!!) it’s better than Howard Zinn’s People’s History,  in part because Raphael took note of early critics and included very good source notes the first time round. (Zinn caught up on that in subsequent editions.)  Also a bit better because the subject matter is confined to the Revolutionary era.  Otoh,  it’s not quite up to Zinn’s standards in surprise and freshness.  Zinn has a whole series of “People’s History” books - 

The series:   http://www.amazon.com/Peoples-History-List-Through-quot/lm/R1G1YR210EQQSS

Looking at Founders now,  thanks. 

Becky



> On Feb 6, 2015, at 4:20 PM, David Casseres <david.casseres at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> A data point: Ray Raphael's excellent book "Founders" says that in 1765 the population of the city of Charleston, South Carolina was three-quarters black. Whites flew into panic and vigilantism at the slightest rumor of insurrection.
> 
> On Wed, Feb 4, 2015 at 8:29 AM, Monte Davis <montedavis49 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Glancing over that website's tables for "flag" [of slave ships] rather than destination, my impression is that British (and later Americans) were a significantly larger fraction of carriers (which may or may not be the same as traders) than they were of "destination slave populations." Maybe we Anglophones developed moral qualms about slaveholding per se a bit earlier than those mainland Europeans -- but hey, as long as they were buying from Africa  and needed transport, and we had good ships & sailors, no sense leaving money on the table. 
> 
> On Wed, Feb 4, 2015 at 9:45 AM, Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
> Very useful information to contextualize the time. So essentially the largest slave traders, which were the dominant sea powers and colonizers -Portugal, Spain, Netherlands, Great Britain, France and US were also  the dominant purchasers and owners of slaves, largely in their colonial holdings.
>     I just saw Selma last night. These events were closer to the time of the beginning of Pynchon's writing career. One sees the depth of influence everywhere. Pynchon takes the realities of our time and looks for the roots.
>    Hoping someone can fill in some gaps in my history. So were Spanish slave dealers all directly working for the crown or were there corporate structures there too?
>    This certainly is an ignominious origin for Capitalism.
> On Feb 3, 2015, at 4:13 PM, Monte Davis wrote:
> 
> > The handiest compilation I've seen online for the trans-Atlantic slave trade is the interactive tables at
> >
> > http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/assessment/estimates.faces
> >
> > In broadest strokes, for the whole tabulated span 1501-1866:
> >
> > 12.5 million slaves embarked, 10.7 million disembarked. So ~14% died on the voyage (inherent vice, y'know)
> >
> > Ranked destinations:
> >
> > Brazil: 4.8 million
> > Caribbean/West Indies: 3.9 million
> > Spanish Americas: 1.3 million
> > North America: 390,000
> >
> > (That last surprises many people: it wasn't all or even mostly about us, not that that's anything to preen about)
> >
> > Slaves to Brazil peaked in 1800-1850, to Caribbean and North America in 1750-1800. Spanish America had an early peak in 1600-1650 and another in 1800-1850
> >
> > As I've noted here before, other sources concur that in total, there were roughly two slaves for every European settler. Obviously the ratio varied wildly from place to place -- but viewed from Mars, the story is less
> >
> > "Europeans settle New World, don't miss the tragic appendix about slavery"
> >
> > than
> >
> > "Europeans, using twice their own number of expendable prisoners, spend ~300 years getting a firm enough beachhead that other Europeans can really start pouring in in the early 19th century."
> >
> > Becky, re your "American slavery was probably the most vicious and inhumane form of slavery the world has ever known":
> >
> > Not so at the brute quantitative level of "how many died?" and "how well did the slave population reproduce itself and grow?" In the Caribbean death rates were much higher: disease, climate, sugar cultivation even tougher than cotton, tobacco or indigo) Slave population growth was lower or negative, rebellions and brutal repression much more common. And Brazil was no picnic, although ISTR it was there that the largest proportion of any New World slave population was able to slip into the forest as maroons, and/or blend with indigenes.
> >
> > But at the more refined level of "How hard was it for a slave to become free?"... or "How many knots did the law twist itself into to make slaves pure chattel rather than Nth-class citizens?"... or "How wide was the gap between public rhetoric about freedom and the actual slave society?"...or "How much pseudo-science was ginned up to justify slavery?" ...the US version was certainly right up (down) there.
> 
> -
> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
> 
> 

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Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l