Charts the history of slave ships, their crews, and their enslaved passengers, documenting such stories as those of a young kidnapped African whose slavery is witnessed firsthand by a horrified priest from a neighboring tribe responsible for the slave's capture.

"Fifty years after the Atlantic human trade was outlawed in the United States, Cudjo Lewis was captured and sold into bondage.  By the time he was eighty-six, he was the only person alive to tell the story of that journey.  Cudjo shared his firsthand account with legendary folklorist, anthropologist, and writer Zora Neale Hurston" --

When European settlers first started their migration to the Western Hemisphere, they found land that was ready for farming. To build this agricultural society, they bought and sold slaves from Africa. Through the detailed text, contemporary and historical images, and informative sidebars, readers get a sense of how complex and dangerous the transatlantic slave trade was in the early years of New World exploration. Powerful quotes from primary sources...

The most feared ship in Britain's West Africa Squadron, His Majesty's brig Black Joke was one of a handful of ships tasked with patrolling the western coast of Africa in an effort to end hundreds of years of global slave trading. Sailing after the spectacular fall of Napoleon in France, yet before the rise of Queen Victoria's England, Black Joke was first a slaving vessel itself, and one with a lightning-fast reputation; only a lucky capture in 1827...

The first comprehensive, up-to-date atlas on the 350-year history of kidnapping and coercion behind the transatlantic slave trade.

Examines the history of Africa from the sixteenth through the nineteenth century, discussing such topics as the different cultures that existed on the continent, the importance of Islam, European colonization, and the slave trade.