Essay On African American Slave Trade

As the European owners struggled with a demand in labor they turned to the Native Americans for cheap labor but millions of them started to die because of disease, warfare, and brutal treatment. Therefore, Europeans in Brazil, the Caribbean , and the Southern colonies of North America soon turned to Africa for workers. The demand of cheap labor resulted in the slave trade. Slavery had existed in Africa for centuries but it was minor. The spread of Islam into Africa in the 17th century increased slavery and the slave trade. African rulers justified enslavement with the Muslim belief that non-Muslim prisoners could be bought and sold as slaves. As a result, the English had transported 1.7 million Africans to the West Indies. Some slaves were
African slaves were preferable to the colonists. British and French-owned colonies and Spanish American holdings were 47% slaves. Dutch, Danish, and Swedish colonies were 5% slaves and
USA were 7% slaves. African kings reaped the financial gains of slavery by bartering directly with Europeans. In addition, African sellers captured slaves and traded them in coastal markets for cloth, iron, firearms, liquor and decorative items from European and American traders. They were able to achieve marked prestige from their newfound wealth, which was brought on the backs of slaves. Plantation system’s produced huge fortunes for many nations, companies, and individuals. By 1650, almost 300,000 Africans labored throughout Spanish America on plantations and in gold/silver mines. By the end of the Slave Trade in 1870, 9.5 million Africans were imported to the Americas. “The Columbian Exchange shows us that Africans were sold into slavery on the far side of the ocean to toil in fields of tobacco, sugar, and cotton.” (Shmoop Editorial Team) Slavery in the Colombian exchange impacted their ways of life and lasted for hundreds of years and effects many parts of the globe