The Slave Ship: A Human History [Hardcover]

Marcus Rediker (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 4, 2007

The missing link in the chain of American slavery

For three centuries slave ships carted millions of people from the coasts of Africa across the Atlantic to the Americas. Much is known of the slave trade and the American plantation system, but little of the ships that made it all possible. In The Slave Ship, award-winning historian Marcus Rediker draws on thirty years of research in maritime archives to create an unprecedented history of these vessels and the human drama acted out on their rolling decks. He reconstructs in chilling detail the lives, deaths, and terrors of captains, sailors, and the enslaved aboard a “floating dungeon” trailed by sharks. From the young African kidnapped from his village and sold into slavery by a neighboring tribe to the would-be priest who takes a job as a sailor on a slave ship only to be horrified at the evil he sees to the captain who relishes having “a hell of my own,” Rediker illuminates the lives of people who were thought to have left no trace.
This is a tale of tragedy and terror, but also an epic of resilience, survival, and the creation of something entirely new. Marcus Rediker restores the slave ship to its rightful place alongside the plantation as a formative institution of slavery, a place where a profound and still haunting history of race, class, and modern economy was made.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. In this groundbreaking work, historian and scholar Rediker considers the relationships between the slave ship captain and his crew, between the sailors and the slaves, and among the captives themselves as they endured the violent, terror-filled and often deadly journey between the coasts of Africa and America. While he makes fresh use of those who left their mark in written records (Olaudah Equiano, James Field Stanfield, John Newton), Rediker is remarkably attentive to the experiences of the enslaved women, from whom we have no written accounts, and of the common seaman, who he says was a victim of the slave trade... and a victimizer. Regarding these vessels as a strange and potent combination of war machine, mobile prison, and factory, Rediker expands the scholarship on how the ships not only delivered millions of people to slavery, [but] prepared them for it. He engages readers in maritime detail (how ships were made, how crews were fed) and renders the archival (letters, logs and legal hearings) accessible. Painful as this powerful book often is, Rediker does not lose sight of the humanity of even the most egregious participants, from African traders to English merchants. (Oct. 8)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Bookmarks Magazine

Marcus Rediker is professor of maritime history at the University of Pittsburgh and the author of Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea (1987), The Many-Headed Hydra (2000), and Villains of All Nations (2005), books that explore seafaring, piracy, and the origins of globalization. In The Slave Ship, Rediker combines exhaustive research with an astute and highly readable synthesis of the material, balancing documentary snapshots with an ear for gripping narrative. Critics compare the impact of Rediker’s history, unique for its ship-deck perspective, to similarly compelling fictional accounts of slavery in Toni Morrison’s Beloved and Charles Johnson’s Middle Passage. Even scholars who have written on the subject defer to Rediker’s vast knowledge of the subject. Bottom line: The Slave Ship is sure to become a classic of its subject.

Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 448 pages
• Publisher: Viking Adult; 3rd prt. edition (October 4, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670018236
• ISBN-13: 978-0670018239
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (33 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #421,744 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Horrific Account of a Horrific Business, December 29, 2007

By 

Bruce Trinque (Amston, CT United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Slave Ship: A Human History (Hardcover)

Marcus Rediker subtitles "The Slave Ship" as "A Human History", and that is an accurate description of its focus and method -- and its strengths and most evident weakness. The book has as its primary focus British and American slave ships of the 18th century (when the transAtlantic slave trade was at its height and before it was outlawed), and how it shaped and warped those who sailed, voluntarily or involuntarily, aboard those vessels. Redicker constructs his history by drawing upon first-hand accounts, mostly written by seamen and ships' captains, but also some from merchants and even a few slaves. He presents the horrific details of the psychological, social, and cultural impact of such a horrific business. It is said that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Then, slave ships certainly proved -- especially perhaps to their captains -- an enormously corrupting activity. Even those who considered themselves as humane and compassionate people were inevitably stained and warped by the experience. But for all of Rediker's obvious (and sometimes perhaps too obvious) horror at what happened, I think the book could have been even stronger and better if the author had provided more numbers and statistics to help quantify the enormity of the events; he makes passing references to studies of the numbers of Africans enslaved and the number who died in the process, but nowhere are these figures clearly presented for an overall portrait.

The book makes for unsettling reading, with murder, rape, and casual brutality leaping off nearly every page (and, as Redicker demonstrates, the brutality was not confined to use against the slaves alone, but also the crews). One aspect that I had never encountered before was that not infrequently slaves being transported from Africa across the Atlantic were pressed into service to supplement the crew in sailing the ship and even fighting off enemy privateers and often (this reminded me of tales from Holocaust death camps) they acted as "trustees" to keep other slaves in line.

Fans of the recent movie "Amazing Grace" will be interested to see that several historical characters from that film make appearances in the pages of this book, including Captain John Newton, Thomas Clarkson, and Olaudah Equiano.

48 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fasinating epic........................., October 13, 2007

By 

Tanis "Tanis Yvonne Somerville" (Seahurst, Washington) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Slave Ship: A Human History (Hardcover)

The slave ship gives a fascinating forte in the archives of slavery and the making of modern history. It was a vehicle, transporting captives whose labor was necessary for America's economic survival; it was a factory, where African men, women, and children were transformed into "cargo"; and it was an instrument of war, complete with fearsome weapons with the capability to destroy any who might challenge its gruesome mission. In Marcus Rediker's book it explores these historical uses of the slave ship by drawing on an astonishing array of archival material, revealing the voices of slaves, common sailors, pirates, captains, and traders in all their complex humanity. Rediker's talent as a writer and a historian is to bring this kind of disparate information into one solid, available and enthralling narrative.

21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not just for the Americas, February 5, 2008

By 

A. Akande "babshai" - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Slave Ship: A Human History (Hardcover)

I saw the review of this book in the WSJ and decided this was worth reading. As an African who comes from one of the major regions where slaves were taken, it was indeed a difficult read; I sometimes had to put it aside and reflect on what my people went through before, during, and after the passage. The material in this book does not just cover the history of the slaves taken to the Americas, but also the sailors and, especially, Africans themselves. I would implore my fellow Africans to read this book because it shows an essential part of our history that rarely gets the deserved attention. And it is only by knowing that history that we can move forward. Rediker does an impressive job showing why the stories of the slave ship should never be forgotten.