When the "New World" needed cheap labor for its plantations, slave traders kidnapped Africans from their home villages. A "triangle trade" system forever changed the lives of an entire people. Explore this collection to learn what those slaves endured, and discover stories of other types of slavery such as forced labor camps in the Soviet GULAG.
Account book from the snow Molly, a slave ship.
Account of Slaves Sold in Barbados, on the 26th of February, 1685. Click the image to expand its view. The UK National Archives provides a key ...
On the 9th of November, 1789, Benjamin Franklin published an "Address to the Public from the Pennsylvania Society for promoting the Abolition of Slave...
Page from the autobiography of Olaudah Equiano (also known as "Gustavus Vassa, The African"). Here he tells us what it was like to see a slave s...
Image of a Harper's Weekly article published on February 9, 1861 called Now ready - American slavery Justified, by Reverend Samuel Seabury, ...
This is a page from the Affidavit of Kimbo, one of the Amistad Africans who had been kidnapped in Sierra Leone. The original document is maintai...
Ann Maria Jackson, and her seven children, escaped slavery and made it to Canada. William Still includes their story in his book, The Undergroun...
Page from the autobiography of Olaudah Equiano (also known as "Gustavus Vassa, The African"). As Equiano's ship drew closer to land, he was allowed t...
Bass Reeves was one of 200 Deputy U.S. Marshals appointed to help Judge
This image is the first page of a Bill of Sale regarding Frederick Douglass (then known as Frederick Bailey). Since slaves were considered prope...
This image depicts a mutiny aboard La Amistad, led by a kidnapped African named Sengbe (also spelled Singweh and/or Cinqué) Pieh. &nb...
Excerpt from a catalog advertising goods used in the slave trade.
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