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After the grueling voyage through the Middle Passage, which lasted anywhere from two to six months, slave ships arrived in American ports. Preparations for the sell of slaves began before the slaves even disembarked from the ship. Usually about two to three days before the ship landed, slaves were given bigger meals and more water in order to fatten them up a to make them more appealing for sale at the market (Daniel Mannix and Malcolm Cowley 127). The slaves were allowed out of their shackles and were brought on deck to �dance�, which was really an excuse for exercise. Crew members also took provisions to ensure that the slaves looked more aesthetically pleasing. They bathed the slaves with fresh water, shaved their bodies, and oiled their scars in order to hide them and make the slave appear healthier to prospective buyers. In some cases, steps were taken to cover up illness. Dr. Alexander Falconbridge, a British doctor on a slave ship, described first-hand an example of the things that were done to conceal illness. He claimed that when Africans were inflicted with a disease known as the flux, their anuses were stopped up with corks in order to prevent any discharge from excreting from their bodies (Alexander Falconbridge, http://vi.uh.edu/pages/mintz/9.htm). There were prominent slave ports throughout the Americas, depending on economics and who had control of the asiento (a formal charter to sell slaves) at the time. Popular ports of the mid-1600s were the British ports in Barbados, Jamaica, St. Christopher, and St. Vincent, and Spanish ports in Havana, Cuba. These initial ports were used to sell slaves into the business of sugar-cultivation on the sugar plantations in the Western Caribbean (John Hope Franklin and Alfred A. Moss, Jr., 51-52). There were prominent ports for slave ships and auction sites in the Caribbean, Latin America, and the United States. Some notable ports in the Caribbean in the late 1600s were the British ports in Barbados, Jamaica, Haiti, Nevis, St. Christopher, Antigua, and Montserrat, French ports in Guadeloupe, Martinique, Marie Galante, St. Lucia, and Grenada, and Danish ports in St. Thomas (Franklin and Moss, 51). Latin America, which was controlled mostly by Spaniards, had ports in Mexico, Panama, Columbia, Venezuela, Peru, and Ecuador. During the mid-1700s until the end of the slave trade, America became the prime consumer of slaves for the harvesting of tobacco and cotton, and new slave ports were established there, in places like New Orleans, Mobile, Savannah, and Charleston. |
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The actual process by which slaves were sold took different forms. In rare cases, entire slave ships were designated to one rich plantation owner, and they were sold directly to that planter the moment they got off the ship, without having to go through the auction process (Mannix and Cowley 128). In other instances, the captain of the slave ship was responsible for selling the slaves himself, without having to go through a slave merchant. If this were the case, the captain would parade his cargo through town in order to reveal them to buyers before he brought them to the public square where they were later sold (Mannix and Cowley 128). The most common method of sale was the �scramble�. This was divided into two different auctions�one for the sale of diseased slaves and another for healthy ones. The diseased slaves were sold first using a method known as �by inch of candle�. All the sick slaves were brought into a tavern and were bid on while a candle was lit; the winning bid was that which was reached when one inch of the candle had burned. The average price of these slaves was about five or six dollars (Mannix and Cowley 128). After this step came the actual scramble itself. The healthy male and female slaves were given a set price and sent to the merchant�s yard to be bought and sold. They were basically bought by the first person that could get their hands on them.
The selling process was physically and mentally straining on the slaves. Many slaves were terrified by this chaotic procedure. Families were torn apart and the slaves entered a world totally unknown to them. Some slaves tried to escape this, though. Falconbridge wrote of one incident in which several slaves �were so terrified by these proceedings that�through fear climbed over the walls of the courtyard and ran wild about the town� (Falconbridge, http://vi.uh.edu/pages/mintz/9.htm). They were unsuccessful in their attempt, though, and they �were soon hunted down and retaken�� (Falconbridge, http://vi.uh.edu/pages/mintz/9.htm). |
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