Another factor that made the slave trade significant to the growth of the British Empire was the amount of trade it produced. It became the most important part of Britain’s overseas trade; due to the high demand for sugar, tobacco and other commodities made by the American plantations. The establishment of the Royal African Company in 1672 formalised the slave trade under the royal charter and gave a monopoly to the port of London. During 1672-1689 the RAC transported 90,000-100,000 enslaved Africans to work at plantations in North America. The RAC was extremely successful “It had built forts, dispatched 500 ships and transported 100,000 Africans, exported £1.5 million worth of goods and imported 30,000 tons of sugar.”[3] However this didn’t last long, by 1720 it could no longer supply the demand it created. This slowed the growth of the empire because it suffered the problem of being unable to deal with interlopers stealing their trade by selling slaves for cheaper leaving them powerless to trade in a viable way.
On the other hand, British involvement expanded rapidly in response to the demand for labour to cultivate sugar in Barbados and other British West Indian islands. By the 1760s Britain was the foremost European country engaged in the Slave trade. The profits gained from chattel slavery helped to finance the industrial revolution and the Caribbean islands became the hub of the British Empire. The sugar colonies were Britain’s most valuable colonies. By the end of the eighteenth century, four million pounds came into Britain from the West Indian plantations.
With the increased demand for slaves, large ships were travelling across the Atlantic to Africa in order to carry more slaves in a single roundtrip. This sparked a new age of ship architecture as new models with greater stability and reliance were being built. This gave more jobs to the British people, some started working on building ships to owning plantations. “Around 1730, in Bristol it was estimated that on a fortunate voyage the profit on a cargo of about 270 slaves reached 7,000 pounds of 8,000”[4] Due to the growing necessity for slaves and as a result, the considerable decrease in the number of Africans to be enslaved, commercial farmers and planters were going out of their way to buy these slaves. It was seen as a long term-investment with greater profit outcomes and less work on their part. The British Empire was greatly influenced by the evolution of this slave trade, the trade gave a triple stimulus to British industry many people saw slavery as a racist point of view, but nobody ever thought of the economic position it gave Britain. The use of slavery by Britain aided them in becoming one of the main countries in the triangular trade. They simply saw slavery as an easy way to make enough money to build their economy instead of seeing it as unethical and unjust. “This is what society is like. The infrastructure is more important than the super-structure, the economic base than the ideologies”[5]. This goes back to show home important building the economy was for Britain during that time period.
Moreover, another factor that contributed to the growth of the British Empire was the establishment and maintenance of plantation economies in the West Indies and American colonies. Barbados eventually had one of the world's biggest sugar industries after starting sugar cane cultivation in 1640. The workable sugar plantation required a large investment and a great deal of heavy labour, therefore to solve this problem instead of using indentured servants American colonists found a new source of labour in enslaved Africans. “By 1680 there were seventeen African slaves for every indentured servant.”[6] Enslaved Africans required a period of ‘seasoning’ to get them used to the work and the country. One in three of the newly imported slaves died within three years, and planters needed a continuous supply of new slaves. It became cheaper for plantation owners to work their slaves to death and import new ones rather then look after the one already on the plantations. This increased Britain’s profits of trading slaves as the more slaves that died the more plantation owners would need to buy to maintain their work loads. This resulted in boosting the British economy which later they could invest in developing the empire. It wasn’t just work that was hard for the enslaved Africans. The white population on the islands was outnumbered by the black population, and they were frightened of rebellion. Therefore, punishment for any breaking of the rules was harsh. Rebellion was usually punished by death, often by a slow and painful method, to deter any others who thought of rising up against their owners.
In conclusion, the slave trade was very significant in the growth of the British Empire as it provided a more efficient way of harvesting crops like sugar and tobacco, so that plantation owners could keep up with the high demand of commodities in Britain and Europe and earn a good profit. Through keeping up with this work load plantation owners had to maintain their plantation economies, unfortunately enslaved Africans would die easily so they had to buy new ones which helped the British economy because then more people would buy slaves from them. Moreover the slave trade gained the British more territory, which showed off their power and dominance over trade to the European countries. However other factors other than the slave trade helped in the growth of the British Empire such as commerce. But overall I believe the slave trade was one of the most significant things that developed the British Empire.
Bibliography:
1. An Introduction to Stuart Britain 1603-1714
2. Black Ivory: slavery in the British Empire
3. Sins of the Fathers: The Atlantic Slave Trade 1441-1807
4. Capitalism and Slavery
5.
[1] Angela Anderson, An Introduction to Stuart Britain 1603-1714, Hodder Education, 1999, Pg. 234
[2] James Walvin, Black Ivory: slavery in the British Empire, Blackwell publishing, 2001, Pg. 29
[3] James Walvin, Black Ivory: slavery in the British Empire, Blackwell publishing, 2001, Pg. 31
[4] James Pope-Hennessy, Sins of the Fathers: The Atlantic Slave Trade 1441-1807, Castle Books, 2004
[5] Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery, The University of North Carolina Press, 1994
[6]
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