The Harrowing Realities of Slave Ship Captains and Crews
The role of a captain aboard a slave ship was one of immense responsibility, though deeply rooted in the exploitation and dehumanization of others. As an employee of European or American merchants and companies, the captain’s duties extended far beyond navigation. He was tasked with hiring and managing the crew, outfitting the ship for its journey, and overseeing the sale of human cargo on the African coast. Once the ship was loaded with enslaved individuals, the captain enforced strict discipline during the Middle Passage, a harrowing voyage across the Atlantic that was fraught with suffering, disease, and death. Upon arrival in the Americas, he was responsible for selling the enslaved individuals at the highest possible price.
Discipline was at the heart of the captain’s responsibilities. Historian Marcus Rediker identified it as “the crux of the whole enterprise.” Maintaining order was critical to ensuring the ship functioned effectively, particularly given the volatile mix of desperate sailors and enslaved Africans confined within its limited space. The routine violence employed by captains and their officers permeated all levels of the ship’s hierarchy. As noted in Liverpool and Slavery, “The captain bullies the men, the men torture the slaves, and the slaves’ hearts are breaking with despair.” This chain of cruelty created an environment rife with fear and suffering.
The threat of rebellion or mutiny loomed large on these voyages. Captains often resorted to public displays of terror to suppress resistance, whether it came from crew members or enslaved Africans. Punishments included flogging with a cat-o’-nine-tails—a whip with nine knotted cords—or full horsewhips. Africans were subjected to additional brutal devices such as thumbscrews. While these punishments were intended to maintain control, excessive violence risked provoking mutiny, insurrection, or even mass suicide among the enslaved. Captains were thus forced to strike a delicate balance between enforcing discipline and avoiding outright rebellion.
Merchants occasionally instructed captains not to mistreat their human cargo, but such directives were rarely enforced. Few captains demonstrated any regard for the well-being of the enslaved individuals aboard their ships. One notable exception was John Newton, who experienced a religious awakening and sought to treat his captives more humanely. However, such cases were exceedingly rare. More common were captains described by James Field Stanfield, who observed that as slave ships approached Africa, “the Demon cruelty seems to fix his residence within the captain.”
The crews under these captains fared little better than the enslaved individuals they guarded. Many sailors were coerced into service due to debts or legal troubles and faced grueling labor aboard slave ships. Their tasks included constructing barriers to confine enslaved individuals, preparing food, cleaning the filthy decks and holds, and policing the captives. Crew members were also subjected to harsh discipline from their officers and suffered from the same diseases that ravaged the enslaved population. Mortality rates among sailors were alarmingly high; a survey conducted between 1784 and 1790 revealed that over 21 percent of sailors on slave ships perished during their voyages. Rediker notes that “Half of all Europeans who journeyed to West Africa in the eighteenth century, most of them seamen, died within a year.”
Despite their hardships, crew members played an active role in perpetuating the suffering of enslaved Africans. Punishments for perceived infractions were common and often brutal. The infamous case of the slave ship Zong in 1781 exemplifies the extreme cruelty inflicted upon enslaved individuals. Over several days, the crew—acting on orders from their captain—bound and threw 122 living Africans overboard. An additional ten committed suicide and sixty succumbed to disease, reducing the ship’s human cargo from 470 to 278. The captain’s motivations were financial; while disease-related deaths would have been a loss for the ship’s owners, “unnatural” deaths—such as those caused by punishment or being thrown overboard—were covered by insurance.
The slave trade was a system built on violence, fear, and exploitation at every level. Captains wielded unchecked authority, enforcing discipline through terror while navigating a precarious balance between control and chaos. Sailors endured grueling conditions and high mortality rates but were complicit in the horrors inflicted upon enslaved Africans. The Middle Passage remains one of history’s most harrowing chapters, a stark reminder of humanity’s capacity for cruelty in pursuit of profit.