When the slaves reached the West Indies and America, they were fattened up again so they could be sold off to plantation owners. These slaves would work 18 hours a day. When they gave birth to children, they would also become slaves. In the plantations, they would grow sugar cane, coffee and cotton. These would then be sent to the European market.
The American Civil War.
- This war was between the Southern states and the Northern States (The Yankees). The southern states included Alabama, Georgia, North and South Carolina. The northern states wanted to abolish slavery and therefore the slaves supported them.
- The Yankees won the civil war and so slavery was abolished. Although slavery was abolished, black people were still treated badly. Most of the black people decided to move to cities in the North such as: New York, Chicago and Detroit.
Because of the movement of the black people, there was no one to run the plantations and so the European market which consisted of sugar and coffee decreased. The British people now decided to import Indian people to do their “dirty work.” So the British coerced 2 million illiterate Indians and made them sign contracts with their thumb print. This contract included them going to work inn the British colony e.g. West Indies and Guyana. These Indians were promised riches and their return to India but 99% of them did not return. Due to this there are many Indian people in the West Indies.
Nowadays children in the Indian Continent are used as slaves to make carpet, footballs etc. Many of these children (who are as young as 5) are kidnapped or sold as servants. After sometime these children forget their culture, their language and their parents.
Some children are also used as Slaves in the Coco industry in Africa. They are kidnapped for the army or for Guerrilla warfare. The boys are given guns and the girls are used as sex slaves.
In Thailand, the sex slave industry is very large and this is partly due to the corrupt government. In India, a rich land owner often buys a peasant of lower class. If the labourer has a child who needs medical aid, the labourer is forced to borrow money from the landowner. The landowner accepts this deal but charges interest at an extortional rate and so the debt is never paid off. Therefore the debt is then carried on by the labourers offspring and they cannot do anything about the debt because the police are corrupt and the labourer is illiterate.
Also the Japanese in World War II, made slaves of British prisoners of war by making them work up to 18hours a day to build the bridge on the River Kauai in Cambodia.
White Slavery –The Barbary Coast.
The Barbary Coast is the coastline of the Mediterranean and includes countries such as Algeria, Libya, Tunisia, Senegal and Chad. During the
late 1500’s and early 1600’s, pirates travelled from the Barbary Coast to Europe and took slaves. There were around 35,000 European Christian slaves held throughout this time on the Barbary Coast - many in Tripoli, Tunis, and various Moroccan towns, but most of all in Algiers. The greatest numbers were sailors, taken with their ships, but many were fishermen and coastal villagers.
First of all the slaves were presented to the Sultan’s and then they were sold of to rich businessmen at an auction. Some of the women slaves got married and were treated with very high status. This can be seen from the way that they were buried in the graveyards. On arrival in these countries, many of the slaves died as they were shocked with the way of life in these countries.
There are no records of how many men, women and children were enslaved, but it is possible to calculate roughly the number of fresh captives that would have been needed to keep populations steady and replace those slaves who died, escaped, were ransomed, or converted to Islam. On this basis it is thought that around 8,500 new slaves were needed annually to replenish numbers - about 850,000 captives over the century from 1580 to 1680.
By extension, for the 250 years between 1530 and 1780, the figure could easily have been as high as 1,250,000 - this is only just over a tenth of the Africans taken as slaves to the Americas from 1500 to 1800, but a considerable figure nevertheless. White slaves in Barbary were generally from impoverished families, and had almost as little hope of buying back their freedom as the Africans taken to the Americas: most would end their days as slaves in North Africa, dying of starvation, disease, or maltreatment.
Some sources describe the slaves as being treated badly. One of the sources that I obtained contained the following information:
Slaves in Barbary fell into two categories. The 'public slaves' belonged to the ruling pasha, who by right of ruler ship could claim an eighth of all Christians captured by the corsairs, and buy all the others he wanted at reduced prices. These slaves were housed in large prisons known as baños (baths), often in wretchedly overcrowded conditions. They were mostly used to row the corsair galleys in the pursuit of loot (and more slaves) - work so strenuous that thousands died or went mad while chained to the oar.
During the winter these galeotti worked on state projects - quarrying stone, building walls or harbour facilities, felling timber and constructing new galleys. Each day they would be given perhaps two or three loaves of black bread and limited water; they received one change of clothing every year. Those who collapsed on the job from exhaustion or malnutrition were typically beaten until they got up and went back to work. The pasha also bought most female captives, some of whom were taken into his harem, where they lived out their days in captivity. The majority, however, were purchased for their ransom value; while awaiting their release, they worked in the palace as harem attendants.
Many other slaves belonged to 'private parties.' Their treatment and work varied as much as their masters did. Some were well cared for, becoming virtual companions of their owners. Others were worked as hard as any 'public' slave, in agricultural labour, or construction work, or selling water or other goods around town on his (or her) owner's behalf. They were expected to pay a proportion of their earnings to their owner - those who failed to raise the required amount typically being beaten to encourage them to work harder. As they aged or their owner's fortunes changed, slaves were resold, often repeatedly. The most unlucky ended up stuck and forgotten out in the desert, in some sleepy town such as Suez, or in the Turkish sultan's galleys, where some slaves rowed for decades without ever setting foot on shore.
