OLAUDAH EQUIANO RECALLS THE MIDDLE PASSAGE

- By Olaudah Equiano
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Abolitionist and writer (c. 1745 – 1797) For the exoplanet named in his honour, see HD 43197 b. For the Swedish king, see Gustav Vasa. Olaudah EquianoEquiano by Daniel Orme, frontispiece of his autobiography (1789)Bornc. 1745Essaka in IgbolandDied31 March 1797 (aged 52)Westminster, Middlesex, United KingdomOther namesGustavus Vassa, Jacob, MichaelOccupations Sailor writer merchant Known forInfluence over British abolitionists; The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah EquianoSpouse Susannah Cullen ​ ​(m. 1792; died 1796)​ChildrenAnna Maria Vassa Joanna Vassa Olaudah Equiano (/əˈlaʊdə/; c. 1745 – 31 March 1797), known for most of his life as Gustavus Vassa (/ˈvæsə/), was a writer and abolitionist. According to his memoir, he was from the village of Essaka in modern southern Nigeria.[1][2] Enslaved as a child in West Africa, he was shipped to the Caribbean and sold to a Royal Navy officer. He was sold twice more before purchasing his freedom in 1766. As a freedman in London, Equiano supported the British abolitionist movement, in the 1780s becoming one of its leading figures. Equiano was part of the abolitionist group the Sons of Africa, whose members were Africans living in Britain. His 1789 autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, sold so well that nine editions were published during his life and helped secure passage of the British Slave Trade Act 1807, which abolished the slave trade.[3] The Interesting Narrative gained renewed popularity among scholars in the late 20th century and remains a useful primary source.[4][5] Early life and enslavement[edit] According to his memoir, Equiano was born around 1745 in the Igbo village of Essaka in what is now southern Nigeria. He claimed his home was in the Kingdom of Benin, but this was likely a geographical error.[6][7] Equiano recounted an incident of an attempted kidnapping of children in his Igbo village, which was foiled by adults. When he was around the age of eleven, he and his sister were left alone to look after their family premises, as was common when adults went out of the house to work. They were kidnapped and taken far from their home, separated and sold to slave traders. He tried to escape but was thwarted. After his owners changed several times, Equiano happened to meet with his sister but they were separated again. Six or seven months after he had been kidnapped, he arrived at the coast where he was taken on board a European slave ship.[8][9] He was transported with 244 other enslaved Africans across the Atlantic Ocean to Barbados in the British West Indies. He and a few other slaves were sent on for sale in the Colony of Virginia. Literary scholar Vincent Carretta argued in his 2005 biography of Equiano that the activist could have been born in colonial South Carolina rather than Africa, based on a 1759 parish baptismal record that lists Equiano's place of birth as Carolina and a 1773 ship's muster that indicates South Carolina.[5][10] Carretta's conclusion is disputed by other scholars who believe the weight of evidence supports Equiano's account of coming from Africa.[11] In Virginia, Equiano was bought by Michael Henry Pascal, a lieutenant in the Royal Navy. Pascal renamed the boy "Gustavus Vassa", after the 16th-century King of Sweden Gustav Vasa[8] who began the Protestant Reformation in Sweden. Equiano had already been renamed twice: he was called Michael while on board the slave ship that brought him to the Americas, and Jacob by his first owner. This time, Equiano refused and told his new owner that he would prefer to be called Jacob. His refusal, he says, "gained me many a cuff" and eventually he submitted to the new name.: 62  He used this name for the rest of his life, including on all official records; he only used Equiano in his autobiography.[1] Pascal took Equiano with him when he returned to England and had him accompany him as a valet during the Seven Years' War with France (1756–1763). Equiano gives witness reports of the Siege of Louisbourg (1758), the Battle of Lagos (1759) and the Capture of Belle Île (1761). Also trained in seamanship, Equiano was expected to assist the ship's crew in times of battle; his duty was to haul gunpowder to the gun decks. Pascal favoured Equiano and sent him to his sister-in-law in Great Britain so that he could attend school and learn to read and write. Equiano converted to Christianity and was baptised at St Margaret's, Westminster, on 9 February 1759, when he was described in the parish register as "a Black, born in Carolina, 12 years old".[12] His godparents were Mary Guerin and her brother, Maynard, who were cousins of his master Pascal. They had taken an interest in him and helped him to learn English. Later, when Equiano's origins were questioned after his book was published, the Guerins testified to his lack of English when he first came to London.[1] In December 1762, Pascal sold Equiano to Captain James Doran of the Charming Sally at Gravesend, from where he was transported back to the Caribbean, to Montserrat, in the Leeward Islands. There, he was sold to Robert King, an American Quaker merchant from Philadelphia who traded in the Caribbean.[13] Release[edit] "Bahama Banks 1767" from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African Robert King set Equiano to work on his shipping routes and in his stores. In 1765, when Equiano was about 20 years old, King promised that for his purchase price of 40 pounds (equivalent to £5,800 in 2021) he could buy his freedom.[14] King taught him to read and write more fluently, guided him along the path of religion, and allowed Equiano to engage in profitable trading for his own account, as well as on his owner's behalf. Equiano sold fruits, glass tumblers and other items between Georgia and the Caribbean islands. King allowed Equiano to buy his freedom, which he achieved in 1766. The merchant urged Equiano to stay on as a business partner. However, Equiano found it dangerous and limiting to remain in the British colonies as a freedman. While loading a ship in Georgia, he was almost kidnapped back into enslavement. Freedom[edit] By about 1768, Equiano had gone to Britain. He continued to work at sea, travelling sometimes as a deckhand based in England. In 1773 on the Royal Navy ship HMS Racehorse, he travelled to the Arctic in an expedition towards the North Pole.[15] On that voyage he worked with Dr Charles Irving, who had developed a process to distill seawater and later made a fortune from it. Two years later, Irving recruited Equiano for a project on the Mosquito Coast in Central America, where he was to use his African background to help select slaves and manage them as labourers on sugar-cane plantations. Irving and Equiano had a working relationship and friendship for more than a decade, but the plantation venture failed.[16] Equiano met with George, the "Musquito king's son". Equiano left the Mosquito Coast in 1776 and arrived at Plymouth, England, on 7 January 1777.[citation needed] Pioneer of the abolitionist cause[edit] Equiano settled in London, where in the 1780s he became involved in the abolitionist movement. The movement to end the slave trade had been particularly strong among Quakers, but the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade was founded in 1787 as a non-denominational group, with Anglican members, in an attempt to influence parliament directly. Under the Test Act, only those prepared to receive the sacrament of the Lord's Supper according to the rites of the Church of England were permitted to serve as MPs. Equiano had been influenced by George Whitefield's evangelism. As early as 1783, Equiano informed abolitionists such as Granville Sharp about the slave trade; that year he was the first to tell Sharp about the Zong massacre, which was being tried in London as litigation for insurance claims. It became a cause célèbre for the abolitionist movement and contributed to its growth.[7] On 21 October 1785 he was one of eight delegates from Africans in America to present an 'Address of Thanks' to the Quakers at a meeting in Gracechurch Street, London. The address referred to A Caution to Great Britain and her Colonies by Anthony Benezet, founder of the Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage.[17] Equiano was befriended and supported by abolitionists, many of whom encouraged him to write and publish his life story. He was supported financially in this effort by philanthropic abolitionists and religious benefactors. His lectures and preparation for the book were promoted by, among others, Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon. Memoir[edit] Plaque at Riding House Street, Westminster, noting the place where Equiano lived and published his narrative Entitled The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African (1789), the book went through nine editions in his lifetime. It is one of the earliest-known examples of published writing by an African writer to be widely read in England. By 1792, it was a best seller and had been published in Russia, Germany, Holland and the United States. It was the first influential slave narrative of what became a large literary genre. But Equiano's experience in slavery was quite different from that of most slaves; he did not participate in field work, he served his owners personally and went to sea, was taught to read and write, and worked in trading.[7] Equiano's personal account of slavery, his journey of advancement, and his experiences as a black immigrant caused a sensation on publication. The book fuelled a growing anti-slavery movement in Great Britain, Europe and the New World.[18] His account surprised many with the quality of its imagery, description and literary style. In his account, Equiano gives details about his hometown and the laws and customs of the Eboe people. After being captured as a boy, he described communities he passed through as a captive on his way to the coast. His biography details his voyage on a slave ship and the brutality of slavery in the colonies of the West Indies, Virginia and Georgia. Equiano commented on the reduced rights that freed people of colour had in these same places, and they also faced risks of kidnapping and enslavement. Equiano embraced Christianity at the age of 14 and its importance to him is a recurring theme in his autobiography. He was baptised into the Church of England in 1759; he described himself in his autobiography as a "protestant of the church of England" but also flirted with Methodism.[19] Several events in Equiano's life led him to question his faith. He was distressed in 1774 by the kidnapping of his friend, a black cook named John Annis, who was taken forcibly off the British ship Anglicania on which they were both serving.[citation needed] His friend's kidnapper, William Kirkpatrick, did not abide by the decision in the Somersett Case (1772), that slaves could not be taken from England without their permission, as common law did not support the institution in England & Wales. Kirkpatrick had Annis transported to Saint Kitts, where he was punished severely[why?] and worked as a plantation labourer until he died. With the aid of Granville Sharp, Equiano tried to get Annis released before he was shipped from England but was unsuccessful. He heard that Annis was not free from suffering until he died in slavery.[20] Despite his questioning, he affirms his faith in Christianity, as seen in the penultimate sentence of his work that quotes the prophet Micah (Micah 6:8): "After all, what makes any event important, unless by its observation we become better and wiser, and learn 'to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly before God?'" In his account, Equiano also told of his settling in London. He married an English woman and lived with her in Soham, Cambridgeshire, where they had two daughters. He became a leading abolitionist in the 1780s, lecturing in numerous cities against the slave trade. Equiano records his and Granville Sharp's central roles in the anti-slave trade movement, and their effort to publicise the Zong massacre, which became known in 1783. Reviewers have found that his book demonstrated the full and complex humanity of Africans as much as the inhumanity of slavery. The book was considered an exemplary work of English literature by a new African author. Equiano did so well in sales that he achieved independence from his benefactors. He travelled throughout England, Scotland and Ireland promoting the book, spending eight months in Ireland alone between 1792-3.[21] He worked to improve economic, social and educational conditions in Africa. Specifically, he became involved in working in Sierra Leone, a colony founded in 1792 for freed slaves by Britain in West Africa. Later years, radical connections[edit] During the American Revolutionary War, Britain had recruited black people to fight with it by offering freedom to those who left rebel masters. In practice, it also freed women and children, and attracted thousands of slaves to its lines in New York City, which it occupied, and in the South, where its troops occupied Charleston, South Carolina. When British troops were evacuated at the end of the war, their officers also evacuated these former American slaves. They were resettled in the Caribbean, in Nova Scotia, in Sierra Leone in Africa, and in London. Britain refused to return the slaves, which the United States sought in peace negotiations. In 1783, following the United States' gaining independence, Equiano became involved in helping the Black Poor of London, who were mostly those former African-American slaves freed during and after the American Revolution by the British. There were also some freed slaves from the Caribbean, and some who had been brought by their owners to England and freed later after the decision that Britain had no basis in common law for slavery. The black community numbered about 20,000.[22] After the Revolution some 3,000 former slaves had been transported from New York to Nova Scotia, where they became known as Black Loyalists, among other Loyalists also resettled there. Many of the freedmen found it difficult to make new lives in London or Canada. Equiano was appointed "Commissary of Provisions and Stores for the Black Poor going to Sierra Leone" in November 1786.[citation needed] This was an expedition to resettle London's Black Poor in Freetown, a new British colony founded on the west coast of Africa, in present-day Sierra Leone. The blacks from London were joined by more than 1,200 Black Loyalists who chose to leave Nova Scotia. They were aided by John Clarkson, younger brother of abolitionist Thomas Clarkson. Jamaican maroons, as well as slaves liberated from illegal slave-trading ships after Britain abolished the slave trade, also settled at Freetown in the early decades. Equiano was dismissed from the new settlement after protesting against financial mismanagement and he returned to London.[23][24] Equiano was a prominent figure in London and often served as a spokesman for the black community. He was one of the leading members of the Sons of Africa, a small abolitionist group composed of free Africans in London. They were closely allied with the Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Equiano's comments on issues were published in newspapers such as the Public Advertiser and the Morning Chronicle. He replied to James Tobin in 1788, in the Public Advertiser, attacking two of his pamphlets and a related book from 1786 by Gordon Turnbull.[25][26] Equiano had more of a public voice than most Africans or Black Loyalists and he seized various opportunities to use it.[27] Equiano was an active member of the radical working-class London Corresponding Society, which campaigned for democratic reform. In 1791–92, touring the British Isles with his autobiography and drawing on abolitionist networks he brokered connections for the LCS, including what may have been the Society's first contacts with the United Irishmen.[28] In Belfast, where his appearance in May 1791 was celebrated by abolitionists who five years previously had defeated plans to commission vessels in the port for the Middle Passage,[29] Equiano was hosted by the leading United Irishman, publisher of their Painite newspaper the Northern Star, Samuel Neilson.[30] Following the onset of war with revolutionary France, leading members of the LCS, including Thomas Hardy with whom Equiano lodged in 1792, were charged with treason, and in 1799, following evidence of communication between leading members and the insurrectionary United Irishmen, the society was suppressed. Marriage and family[edit] A portrait of an unknown man previously identified as Ignatius Sancho,[31][32] or as Equiano,[33] in the Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter On 7 April 1792, Equiano married Susannah Cullen, a local woman, in St Andrew's Church, Soham, Cambridgeshire.[34] The original marriage register containing the entry for Vassa and Cullen is held today by the Cambridgeshire Archives and Local Studies. He included his marriage in every edition of his autobiography from 1792 onwards. The couple settled in the area and had two daughters, Anna Maria (1793–1797) and Joanna (1795–1857) who were baptised at Soham church. Susannah died in February 1796, aged 34, and Equiano died a year after that on 31 March 1797.[8] Soon after, Anna died at the age of four, leaving Joanna to inherit Equiano's estate when she was 21; it was then valued at £950 (equivalent to £77,000 in 2021). Anna Maria is commemorated by a plaque at St Andrew's Church, Chesterton, Cambridge.[35] Joanna Vassa married the Reverend Henry Bromley, a Congregationalist minister, in 1821. They are both buried at the non-denominational Abney Park Cemetery in Stoke Newington, London; the Bromleys' monument is now a Grade II listed building.[36] Last days and will[edit] He drew up his will on 28 May 1796. At the time he was living at the Plaisterers' Hall,[37] then on Addle Street, in Aldermanbury in the City of London.[38][39] He moved to John Street (now Whitfield Street), close to Whitefield's Tabernacle, Tottenham Court Road. At his death on 31 March 1797, he was living in Paddington Street, Westminster.[40] Equiano's death was reported in American[41] as well as British newspapers. Equiano was buried at Whitefield's Tabernacle on 6 April. The entry in the register reads "Gustus Vasa, 52 years, St Mary Le bone".[42][43] His burial place has been lost. The small burial ground lay either side of the chapel and is now Whitfield Gardens.[44] The site of the chapel is now the American International Church. Equiano's will, in the event of his daughters' deaths before reaching the age of 21, bequeathed half his wealth to the Sierra Leone Company for a school in Sierra Leone, and half to the London Missionary Society.[39] Controversy related to memoir[edit] Following publication in 1967 of a newly edited version of his memoir by Paul Edwards, interest in Equiano revived. Scholars from Nigeria have also begun studying him. For example, S.S. Ogede identifies Equiano as a pioneer in asserting "the dignity of African life in the white society of his time".[45] In researching his life, some scholars since the late 20th century have disputed Equiano's account of his origins. In 1999 while editing a new version of Equiano's memoir, Vincent Carretta, a professor of English at the University of Maryland, found two records that led him to question the former slave's account of being born in Africa. He first published his findings in the journal Slavery and Abolition.[10][46] At a 2003 conference in England, Carretta defended himself against Nigerian academics, like Obiwu, who accused him of "pseudo-detective work" and indulging "in vast publicity gamesmanship".[47] In his 2005 biography, Carretta suggested that Equiano may have been born in South Carolina rather than Africa, as he was twice recorded from there. Carretta wrote: Equiano was certainly African by descent. The circumstantial evidence that Equiano was also African-American by birth and African-British by choice is compelling but not absolutely conclusive. Although the circumstantial evidence is not equivalent to proof, anyone dealing with Equiano's life and art must consider it.[5] According to Carretta, Equiano/Vassa's baptismal record and a naval muster roll document him as from South Carolina.[10] Carretta interpreted these anomalies as possible evidence that Equiano had made up the account of his African origins, and adopted material from others. But Paul Lovejoy, Alexander X. Byrd and Douglas Chambers note how many general and specific details Carretta can document from sources that related to the slave trade in the 1750s as described by Equiano, including the voyages from Africa to Virginia, sale to Pascal in 1754, and others. They conclude he was more likely telling what he understood as fact, rather than creating a fictional account; his work is shaped as an autobiography.[15][7][48] Lovejoy wrote that: circumstantial evidence indicates that he was born where he said he was, and that, in fact, The Interesting Narrative is reasonably accurate in its details, although, of course, subject to the same criticisms of selectivity and self-interested distortion that characterize the genre of autobiography. Lovejoy uses the name of Vassa in his article, since that was what the man used throughout his life, in "his baptism, his naval records, marriage certificate and will".[7] He emphasises that Vassa only used his African name in his autobiography. Other historians also argue that the fact that many parts of Equiano's account can be proven lends weight to accepting his account of African birth. As historian Adam Hochschild has written: In the long and fascinating history of autobiographies that distort or exaggerate the truth. ... Seldom is one crucial portion of a memoir totally fabricated and the remainder scrupulously accurate; among autobiographers ... both dissemblers and truth-tellers tend to be consistent.[49] He also noted that "since the 'rediscovery' of Vassa's account in the 1960s, scholars have valued it as the most extensive account of an eighteenth-century slave's life and the difficult passage from slavery to freedom".[7] Legacy[edit] The Equiano Society was formed in London in November 1996. Its main objective is to publicise and celebrate the life and work of Olaudah Equiano.[50][51] In 1789 Equiano moved to 10 Union Street (now 73 Riding House Street). A City of Westminster commemorative green plaque was unveiled there on 11 October 2000 as part of Black History Month. Student musicians from Trinity College of Music played a fanfare composed by Professor Ian Hall for the unveiling.[52] Equiano is honoured in the Church of England and remembered in its Calendar of saints with a Lesser Festival on 30 July, along with Thomas Clarkson and William Wilberforce who worked for abolition of the slave trade and slavery.[53][54] In 2007, the year of the celebration in Britain of the bicentenary of the abolition of the slave trade, Equiano's life and achievements were included in the National Curriculum, together with William Wilberforce. In December 2012 The Daily Mail claimed that both would be dropped from the curriculum, a claim which itself became subject to controversy.[55] In January 2013 Operation Black Vote launched a petition to request Education Secretary Michael Gove to keep both Equiano and Mary Seacole in the National Curriculum.[56] American Rev. Jesse Jackson and others wrote a letter to The Times protesting against the mooted removal of both figures from the National Curriculum.[57][58] A statue of Equiano, made by pupils of Edmund Waller School, was erected in Telegraph Hill Lower Park, New Cross, London, in 2008.[59] The head of Equiano is included in Martin Bond's 1997 sculpture Wall of the Ancestors in Deptford, London Author Ann Cameron adapted Equiano's autobiography for children, leaving most of the text in Equiano's own words; the book was published in 1995 in the U.S. by Random House as The Kidnapped Prince: The Life of Olaudah Equiano, with an introduction by historian Henry Louis Gates Jr. On 16 October 2017, Google Doodle honoured Equiano by celebrating the 272nd year since his birth.[60] A crater on Mercury was named "Equiano" in 1976.[61] The exoplanet HD 43197 b was officially named Equiano in 2019 as part of NameExoWorlds.[62] In 2019, Google Cloud named a subsea cable running from Portugal through the West Coast of Africa and terminating in South Africa after Equiano.[63] In 2022, the city of Cambridge honoured Equiano by renaming Riverside Bridge to Equiano Bridge.[64][65] Representation in other media[edit] The Gambian actor Louis Mahoney played Equiano in the BBC television mini-series The Fight Against Slavery (1975).[66] A 28-minute documentary, Son of Africa: The Slave Narrative of Olaudah Equiano (1996), produced by the BBC and directed by Alrick Riley, uses dramatic reconstruction, archival material and interviews to provide the social and economic context for his life and the slave trade.[67] Numerous works about Equiano have been produced for and since the 2007 bicentenary of Britain's abolition of the slave trade: Equiano was portrayed by the Senegalese musician Youssou N'Dour in the film Amazing Grace (2006). African Snow (2007), a play by Murray Watts, takes place in the mind of John Newton, a captain in the slave trade who later became an Anglican cleric and hymnwriter. It was first produced at the York Theatre Royal as a co-production with Riding Lights Theatre Company, transferring to the Trafalgar Studios in London's West End and a national tour. Newton was played by Roger Alborough and Equiano by Israel Oyelumade. Kent historian Dr Robert Hume wrote a children's book entitled Equiano: The Slave with the Loud Voice (2007), illustrated by Cheryl Ives.[68] David and Jessica Oyelowo appeared as Olaudah and his wife in Grace Unshackled – The Olaudah Equiano Story (2007), a BBC 7 radio adaptation of Equiano's autobiography.[69] The British jazz artist Soweto Kinch's first album, Conversations with the Unseen (2003), contains a track entitled "Equiano's Tears". Equiano was portrayed by Jeffery Kissoon in Margaret Busby's 2007 play An African Cargo, staged at London's Greenwich Theatre.[70][71] Equiano is portrayed by Danny Sapani in the BBC series Garrow's Law (2010). The Nigerian writer Chika Unigwe has written a fictional memoir of Equiano: The Black Messiah, originally published in Dutch: De zwarte messias (2013).[72] In Jason Young's 2007 short animated film, The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano, Chris Rochester portrayed Equiano.[73] A TikTok series under the account @equiano.stories recounts "the true story of Olaudah Equiano", a collection of episodes reimagining the childhood of Equiano. The story is captured as a self-recorded, first-person account, within the format of Instagram Stories/TikTok posts, using video, still images, and text.[74] In 2022 a documentary entitled The Amazing Life of Olaudah Equiano was broadcast by BBC Radio 4.[75] See also[edit] Ottobah Cugoano, an African abolitionist active in Britain in the late 18th century Phillis Wheatley, recognised in the 18th century as the first African-American poet; first African-American woman to publish a book List of civil rights leaders List of slaves References[edit] ^ a b c Lovejoy, Paul E. (2006). "Autobiography and Memory: Gustavus Vassa, alias Olaudah Equiano, the African". Slavery & Abolition. 27 (3): 317–347. doi:10.1080/01440390601014302. S2CID 146143041. ^ Christer Petley, White Fury: A Jamaican Slaveholder and the Age of Revolution (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), p. 151. ^ Equiano, Olaudah (1999). The Life of Olaudah Equiano, or, Gustavus Vassa, the African. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications. ISBN 978-0-486-40661-9. ^ F. Onyeoziri (2008),"Olaudah Equiano: Facts about his People and Place of Birth" Archived 17 October 2017 at the Wayback Machine. ^ a b c Carretta, Vincent (2005). Equiano, the African: Biography of a Self-Made Man. University of Georgia Press. p. xvi. ISBN 978-0-8203-2571-2. ^ "Equiano's World". www.equianosworld.org. ^ a b c d e f Paul E. Lovejoy, "Autobiography and Memory: Gustavus Vassa, alias Olaudah Equiano, the African" Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine, Slavery and Abolition 27, no. 3 (2006): 317–347. ^ a b c "Olaudah Equiano". BBC History. Archived from the original on 13 July 2006. Retrieved 5 July 2006. ^ Equiano, Olaudah (2005). The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano. Printed for, and sold by the author. ISBN 9781615362622. ^ a b c Robin Blackburn, "The True Story of Equiano", The Nation, 2 November 2005 (archived). Retrieved 28 September 2014 (subscription required). ^ Bugg, John (October 2006). "The Other Interesting Narrative: Olaudah Equiano's Public Book Tour". PMLA. 121 (5): 1424–1442, esp. 1425. doi:10.1632/pmla.2006.121.5.1424. JSTOR 25501614. S2CID 162237773. ^ David Dabydeen, "Equiano the African: Biography of a Self-made Man by Vincent Carretta" (book review), The Guardian, 3 December 2005, Archived 14 November 2017 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 11 January 2018. ^ Equiano, Olaudah (1790). The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African. ^ Walvin, James (2000). An African's Life: The Life and Times of Olaudah Equiano, 1745–1797. Continuum International Publishing Group. p. 71. ISBN 978-0-8264-4704-3. ^ a b Douglas Chambers, "'Almost an Englishman': Carretta's Equiano" Archived 8 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine, H-Net Reviews, November 2007. Retrieved 28 September 2014. ^ Lovejoy (2006), p. 332. ^ "Chelmsford". 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(London: Open University, 2014), pp. 28–33. ^ Vincent Carretta; Philip Gould (5 February 2015). Genius in Bondage: Literature of the Early Black Atlantic. University Press of Kentucky. p. 67. ISBN 978-0-8131-5946-1. ^ Peter Fryer (1984). Staying Power: The History of Black People in Britain. University of Alberta. pp. 108–9. ISBN 978-0-86104-749-9. ^ Shyllon, Folarin (September 1977). "Olaudah Equiano; Nigerian Abolitionist and First Leader of Africans in Britain". Journal of African Studies. 4 (4): 433–451. ^ Featherstone, David (2013). "'We will have equality and liberty in Ireland': The Contested Geographies of Irish Democratic Political Cultures in the 1790s". Historical Geography. 41: 124–126. ^ Rolston, Bill (2003). "A Lying Old Scoundrel". 18th–19th - Century History, Features. 11 (1) – via History Ireland. ^ Rodgers, Nini (1997). "Equiano in Belfast: A study of the Anti-Slavery Ethos in a Northern Town". Slavery and Abolition. 18 (2): 73–89. doi:10.1080/01440399708575211. ^ "Trading faces". BBC. ^ "Portrait of an African (probably Ignatius Sancho, 1729–1780)". artuk.org. ^ "The Equiano Portraits". brycchancarey.com. Archived from the original on 1 February 2017. Retrieved 18 May 2017. ^ "Olaudah Equiano or Gustavus Vassa The African - 200th Anniversary of the Abolition of Slavery". equiano.soham.org.uk. Retrieved 14 August 2021. ^ Historic England, "Church of St Andrew, Cambridge (1112541)", National Heritage List for England, retrieved 20 October 2020 ^ Historic England, "Monument to Joanna Vassa in Abney Park Cemetery (1392851)", National Heritage List for England, retrieved 18 January 2020 ^ Bamping, Nigel (17 July 2020). "The Plaisterers and the abolition of slavery". Plaistererslivery.co.uk. Archived from the original on 16 November 2020. Retrieved 14 November 2020. ^ "Will of Gustavus Vassa or Olaudah Equiano, Gentleman of Addle Street Aldermanbury, City of London." England & Wales, Prerogative Court of Canterbury Wills, 1384-1858, PROB 11: Will Registers: 1796 - 1798, Piece 1289: Exeter Quire Numbers 238 - 284. The National Archives, Kew. Retrieved 14 November 2020. ^ a b "Transcript Gustavus Vassa Provides for His Family PROB 10/3372". Nationalarchives.gov.uk/. TNA. Retrieved 14 November 2020. ^ Vincent Carretta, Equiano, the African: Biography of a Self-made Man, University of Georgia Press, 2005, p. 365. ^ "DEATHS: In London, Mr. Gustavus Vassa, the African, well known to the public for the interesting narrative of his life." Weekly Oracle (New London, CT), 12 August 1797, p. 3. ^ "{title}". 16 October 2017. Archived from the original on 23 October 2017. Retrieved 23 October 2017. ^ London Metropolitan Archives; Clerkenwell, London, England; Whitefield's Memorial Church [Formerly Tottenham Court Road Chapel], Tottenham Court Road, Saint Pancras, Register of burials; Reference Code: LMA/4472/A/01/004 ^ "Whitfield Gardens". Londongardensonline.org.uk. Retrieved 21 January 2020.[permanent dead link] ^ O. S. Ogede, "'The Igbo Roots of Olaudah Equiano' by Catherine Acholonu" Archived 23 June 2016 at the Wayback Machine, Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, Vol. 61, No. 1, 1991, at JSTOR (subscription required) ^ Vincent Carretta, "Olaudah Equiano or Gustavus Vassa? New Light on an Eighteenth-Century Question of Identity", Slavery and Abolition 20, no. 3 (1999): 96–105. ^ "Slave fiction?". Florida International University. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 26 December 2015. ^ Alexander X. Byrd, "Eboe, Country, Nation, and Gustavus Vassa's Interesting Narrative" Archived 5 November 2016 at the Wayback Machine, William and Mary Quarterly 63, no. 1 (2006): 123–148, at JSTOR (subscription required) ^ Hochschild, Adam (2006). Bury the Chains: Prophets and Rebels in the Fight to Free an Empire's Slaves. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. p. 372. ISBN 978-0-618-61907-8. ^ "The Equiano Society: Information and Forthcoming Events". brycchancarey.com. Archived from the original on 22 April 2012. Retrieved 5 August 2012. ^ Thomas, Shirley (10 February 2019). "Iconic Guyanese working to promote Caribbean heritage in Britain". Guyana Chronicle. Retrieved 26 March 2020. ^ "City of Westminster green plaques". Archived from the original on 16 July 2012. ^ "William Wilberforce, Olaudah Equiano and Thomas Clarkson" Archived 9 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine, Common Worship Texts: Festivals. Retrieved 28 September 2014. ^ "The Calendar". The Church of England. Retrieved 27 March 2021. ^ "Here's why Mary Seacole and other inspiring black figures should stay". Independent.co.uk. 8 February 2013. ^ "OBV initiate Mary Seacole Petition". Operation Black Vote (OBV). 3 January 2013. Archived from the original on 9 January 2013. Retrieved 19 January 2013. ^ Hurst, Greg (9 January 2013). "Civil rights veteran Jesse Jackson joins fight against curriculum changes". The Times. ^ "Open letter to Rt Michael Gove MP". Operation Black Vote (OBV). 9 January 2013. Archived from the original on 14 January 2013. Retrieved 19 January 2013. ^ "Little treasures: #1 Equiano". Brockley Central. 25 June 2008. Retrieved 7 May 2019. ^ "Olaudah Equiano's 272nd Birthday". Archived from the original on 16 October 2017. Retrieved 16 October 2017. ^ WGPSN ^ "2019 Approved Names". NameExoworlds. Retrieved 30 September 2023. ^ "Introducing Equiano, a subsea cable from Portugal to South Africa". Google Cloud. Retrieved 14 April 2020. ^ "News". Equiano Bridge. 2022. Retrieved 14 October 2022. ^ "City bridge to be renamed after writer and abolitionist Olaudah Equiano". Cambridge Independent. Cambridge. 27 October 2022. ISSN 2398-8959. Retrieved 28 October 2022. ^ "The Fight Against Slavery". IMDb. Retrieved 24 July 2022. ^ Son of Africa: The Slave Narrative of Olaudah Equiano Archived 1 October 2006 at the Wayback Machine, 1996, sale at California Newsreel. ^ Robert Hume (2007), Equiano: The Slave with the Loud Voice, Stone Publishing House, ISBN 978-0-9549909-1-6. ^ "Grace Unshackled: The Olaudah Equiano Story". BBC. 15 April 2007. Archived from the original on 2 February 2009. Retrieved 15 January 2009. ^ "An African Cargo, 2007". Nitro Music Theatre, 4 February 2007. Archived 18 April 2015 at the Wayback Machine. ^ "Vassa's Legacy". Equiano's World. Retrieved 24 May 2022. ^ Chika Unigwe (2013), De zwarte messias, De Bezige Bij, ISBN 978-90-8542-454-3 ^ The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano at IMDb ^ "The true story of Olaudah Equiano". A joint feature film project by Stelo Stories Studio and the DuSable Museum of African American History. Early 2022. ^ "The Amazing Life of Olaudah Equiano". BBC. Retrieved 26 June 2022. Further reading[edit] The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African at Wikisource. For the history of the Narrative's publication, see James Green, "The Publishing History of Olaudah Equiano's Interesting Narrative", Slavery and Abolition 16, no. 3 (1995): 362–375. S. E. Ogude, "Facts into fiction: Equiano's narrative reconsidered", Research into African Literatures, Vol. 13, No. 1, 1982 S. E. Ogude, "Olaudah Equiano and the tradition of Defoe", African Literature Today, Vol. 14, 1984 James Walvin, An African's Life: The Life and Times of Olaudah Equiano, 1745–1797 (London: Continuum, 1998) Luke Walker, Olaudah Equiano: The Interesting Man (Wrath and Grace Publishing, 2017) External links[edit] Wikiquote has quotations related to Olaudah Equiano. Wikisource has original works by or about:Olaudah Equiano Wikimedia Commons has media related to Olaudah Equiano. Works by Olaudah Equiano in eBook form at Standard Ebooks Works by Olaudah Equiano at Project Gutenberg Works by or about Olaudah Equiano at Internet Archive Works by Olaudah Equiano at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks) Frederick Quinn, "Olaudah Equiano", Dictionary of African Christian Biography, article reproduced with permission from African Saints: Saints, Martyrs, and Holy People from the Continent of Africa, copyright © 2002 by Frederick Quinn, New York: Crossroads Publishing Company Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, Brycchan Carey website, Carey 2003–2005. Includes Carey's comprehensive collection of resources for the study of Equiano. The Nativity section [1] includes a detailed comparison of differing data related to his place of birth. The Equiano Project Archived 23 October 2018 at the Wayback Machine, The Equiano Society and Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery Part I: "Olaudah Equiano", Africans in America, PBS "Historic figures: Olaudah Equiano", BBC vteHistory of slavery in Virginia Slavery in the colonial history of the United States History of Virginia Enslaved people Angela (fl. 1619–1625) Emanuel Driggus (c. 1620s-d. 1673) Henry Box Brown (c. 1815–1897) John Casor (living 1655) Olaudah Equiano (c. 1745–1797) Isabella Gibbons (c. 1836–1890) William D. Gibbons (1825–1886) John Graweere (living 1641) Elizabeth Key Grinstead (Greenstead) (1630–1665) Left, husband of Jane Webb (fl. 1704–1727) Mary and Anthony Johnson (1600–1670) Dangerfield Newby (c. 1820–1859) John Punch (fl. 1630s, living 1640) Gabriel Prosser (1776–1800) William Tucker (born 1624) Booker T. Washington (1856–1915) Slave owners Presidents of the United States Washington Jefferson Madison Monroe Tyler John Armfield (1797–1871) Landon Carter (1710–1778) Robert "King" Carter (1663–1732) Robert Carter III (1728–1804), freed 450 slaves Thomas Roderick Dew (1802–1846) Andrew Hunter (1804–1888) Robert M. T. Hunter (1809–1887) Eppa Hunton Richard Bland Lee (1761–1827) William Mahone (1826–1895) George Mason (1725–1792) James M. Mason (1798–1871) John Page (1628–1692) Thomas Prosser Randolph family of Virginia William Barton Rogers (1804–1882) George Henry Thomas William Tucker (died 1642) John Wayles (1715–1773) Henry A. Wise (1806–1876) Plantations Beall-Air Berry Hill Brookfield Kenmore Monticello Montpelier Mount Airy Mount Vernon (enslaved people) Oatlands Poplar Forest Shirley Stratford Hall Tuckahoe Westover Woodlawn List of plantations in Virginia Laws Virginia laws An act concerning Servants and Slaves, 1705 Federal laws Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves, 1808 Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 Slave pens Franklin and Armfield Office Lumpkin's Jail Related articles The 1619 Project African American Burial Ground Atlantic Creole Burning of Winchester Medical College Coastwise slave trade First Africans in Virginia Indentured servitude in Virginia District of Columbia retrocession Gabriel's Rebellion Great Dismal Swamp maroons Human trafficking in Virginia John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry Liberation and Freedom Day Memorial to Enslaved Laborers Nat Turner's slave rebellion Virginia in the American Civil War Virginia v. John Brown White House of the Confederacy vteSlave narratives Slave Narrative Collection Individualsby continentof enslavementAfrica Robert Adams (c. 1790–?) Marcus Berg (1714-1761) Francis Bok (b. 1979) Isaac Brassard (1620–1702) Felice Caronni (1747–1815) James Leander Cathcart (1767–1843) Ólafur Egilsson (1564–1639) Petro Kilekwa (late 19th c.) Elizabeth Marsh (1735–1785) Maria ter Meetelen (1704–?) Mende Nazer (b. 1982) Hark Olufs (1708–1754) Thomas Pellow (1705–?) Joseph Pitts (1663 – c. 1735) Guðríður Símonardóttir (1598–1682) Antoine Qaurtier (1632–1702) Andreas Matthäus Wolfgang (1660–1736) Johann Georg Wolffgang (1644–1744) Asia Brigitta Scherzenfeldt (1684–1736) Europe Lovisa von Burghausen (1698–1733) Olaudah Equiano (c. 1745 Nigeria – 31 March 1797 Eng) Ukawsaw Gronniosaw (c. 1705 Bornu – 1775 Eng) Jean Marteilhe (1684-1777) Roustam Raza (1783–1845) Nunzio Otello Francesco Gioacchino (1792 – fl. 1828) Ottoman Empire Johann Schiltberger Konstantin Mihailović George of Hungary North America:Canada Marie-Joseph Angélique (c. 1710 Portugal – 1734 Montreal) John R. Jewitt (1783 England – 1821 United States) North America:Caribbean Juan Francisco Manzano (1797–1854, Cuba) Esteban Montejo (1860–1965, Cuba) Mary Prince (c. 1788 Bermuda – after 1833) Venerable Pierre Toussaint (1766 Saint-Dominque – June 30, 1853 NY) Marcos Xiorro (c. 1819 – ???, Puerto Rico) North America:United States Sam Aleckson Jordan Anderson William J. Anderson Jared Maurice Arter Solomon Bayley Polly Berry Henry Bibb Leonard Black James Bradley (1834) Henry "Box" Brown John Brown William Wells Brown Peter Bruner (1845 KY – 1938 OH) Ellen and William Craft Hannah Crafts Lucinda Davis Noah Davis Lucy Delaney Ayuba Suleiman Diallo Frederick Douglass Kate Drumgoold Jordan Winston Early (1814 – after 1894) Sarah Jane Woodson Early Peter Fossett (1815 Monticello–1901) David George Moses Grandy William Green (19th century MD) William Grimes Josiah Henson Fountain Hughes (1848/1854 VA – 1957) Omar ibn Said John Andrew Jackson Harriet Jacobs Thomas James John Jea Paul Jennings (1799–1874) Elizabeth Keckley Boston King Lunsford Lane J. Vance Lewis Jermain Wesley Loguen James Mars (1790–1880) Solomon Northup Greensbury Washington Offley John Parker (1827 VA – 1900) William Parker James Robert Moses Roper William Henry Singleton James Lindsay Smith Venture Smith Austin Steward (1793 VA – 1860) Venerable Pierre Toussaint (1766 Saint-Dominque – 1853 NY) Harriet Tubman Wallace Turnage Bethany Veney Booker T. Washington Wallace Willis (19th century Indian Territory) Harriet E. Wilson Zamba Zembola (b. c. 1780 Congo) South America Mahommah Gardo Baquaqua (1845–1847, Brazil) Miguel de Buría (? Puerto Rico – 1555 Venezuela) Osifekunde (c. 1795 Nigeria – ? Brazil) Non-fiction books The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano (1789) The Narrative of Robert Adams (1816) American Slavery as It Is (1839) Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave (1845) The Life of Josiah Henson (1849) Twelve Years a Slave (1853) My Bondage and My Freedom (1855) Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) The Underground Railroad Records (1872) Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (1881) Up from Slavery (1901) Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States (1936–38) The Peculiar Institution (1956) The Slave Community (1972) Barracoon: The Story of the Last "Black Cargo" (2018) Fiction/novels Oroonoko (1688) Sab (1841) Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) The Heroic Slave (1852) Clotel (1853) The Bondwoman's Narrative (c. 1853 – c. 1861) Dred: A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp (1856) Our Nig (1859) Jubilee (1966) The Confessions of Nat Turner (1967) Roots: The Saga of an American Family (1976) Underground to Canada (1977) Kindred (1979) Dessa Rose (1986) Beloved (1987) Middle Passage (1990) Queen: The Story of an American Family (1993) Hang a Thousand Trees with Ribbons (1996) Ama: A Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade (2001) Walk Through Darkness (2002) The Known World (2003) Unburnable (2006) The Book of Negroes (2007) The Underground Railroad (2016) Young adult books Amos Fortune, Free Man (1951) I, Juan de Pareja (1965) Copper Sun (2006) Essays "To a Southern Slaveholder" (1848) A Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin (1853) Plays The Escape; or, A Leap for Freedom (1858) The Octoroon (1859) Omar (2022) Documentaries Unchained Memories (2003) Frederick Douglass and the White Negro (2008) Related Abolitionism in the United States African-American literature Anti-Tom novels Atlantic slave trade Captivity narrative Caribbean literature Films featuring slavery Slavery in the United States Songs of the Underground Railroad Treatment of slaves in the United States List of last surviving American enslaved people Book of Negroes (1783) Cotton Plantation Record and Account Book (1847) Slave-Trading in the Old South (1931) Sarah Johnson's Mount Vernon (2008) Slave Songs of the United States (1867) Amazing Grace: An Anthology of Poems about Slavery (2002) The Hemingses of Monticello (2008) Authority control databases International FAST ISNI VIAF National Norway Spain France BnF data Germany Israel Belgium United States Sweden Japan Czech Republic Greece Korea Netherlands People Deutsche Biographie Other IdRef

OLAUDAH EQUIANO RECALLS THE MIDDLE PASSAGE

"Olaudah Equiano" by Unknown is in the public domain.

The first object which saluted my eyes when I arrived on the coast was the sea, and a slave ship, which was then riding at anchor, and waiting for its cargo. These filled me with astonishment, which was soon converted into terror when I was carried on board. I was immediately handled and tossed up to see if I were sound by some of the crew; and I was now persuaded that I had gotten into a world of bad spirits, and that they were going to kill me. Their complexions too differing so much from ours, their long hair, and the language they spoke, (which was very different from any I had ever heard) united to confirm me in this belief. Indeed such were the horrors of my views and fears at the moment, that, if ten thousand worlds had been my own, I would have freely parted with them all to have exchanged my condition with that of the meanest slave in my own country.

When I looked round the ship too and saw a large furnace or copper boiling, and a multitude of black people of every description chained together, every one of their countenances expressing dejection and sorrow, I no longer doubted of my fate; and, quite overpowered with horror and anguish, I fell motionless on the deck and fainted. When I recovered a little I found some black people about me, who I believed were some of those who brought me on board, and had been receiving their pay; they talked to me in order to cheer me, but all in vain. I asked them if we were not to be eaten by those white men with horrible looks, red faces, and loose hair. They told me I was not...

Soon after this the blacks who brought me onboard went off, and left me abandoned to despair. I now saw myself deprived of all chance of returning to my native country, or even the least glimpse of hope of gaining the shore, which I now considered as friendly; and I even wished for my former slavery in preference to my present situation, which was filled with horrors of every kind, still heightened by my ignorance of what I was to undergo. I was not long suffered to indulge my grief; I was soon put down under the decks, and there I received such a salutation in my nostrils as I had never experienced in my life: so that, with the loathsomeness of the stench, and crying together, I became so sick and low that I was not able to eat, nor had I the least desire to taste any thing. I now wished for the last friend, death, to relieve me; but soon, to my grief, two of the white men offered me eatables; and, on my refusing to eat, one of them held me fast by the hands, and laid me across I think the windlass, and tied my feet, while the other flogged me severely. I had never experienced any thing of this kind before; and although, not being used to the water, I naturally feared that element the first time I saw it, yet nevertheless, could I have got over the nettings, I would have jumped over the side, but I could not; and, besides, the crew used to watch us very closely who were not chained down to the decks, lest we should leap into the water: and I have seen some of these poor African prisoners most severely cut for attempting to do so, and hourly whipped for not eating. This indeed was often the case with myself.

In a little time after, amongst the poor chained men, I found some of my own nation, which in a small degree gave ease to my mind. I inquired of these what was to be done with us; they gave me to understand we were to be carried to these white people's country to work for them. I then was a little revived, and thought, if it were no worse than working, my situation was not so desperate: but still I feared I should be put to death, the white people looked and acted, as I thought, in so savage a manner; for I had never seen among any people such instances of brutal cruelty; and this not only shown towards us blacks, but also to some of the whites themselves...

I could not help expressing my fears and apprehensions to some of my countrymen: I asked them if these people had no country, but lived in this hollow place (the ship): they told me they did not, but came from a distant one. 'Then,' said I, 'how comes it in all our country we never heard of them?' They told me because they lived so very far off. I then asked where were their women? had they any like themselves? I was told they had: 'and why,' said I, 'do we not see them?' they answered, because they were left behind. I asked how the vessel could go? they told me they could not tell; but that there were cloths put upon the masts by the help of the ropes I saw, and then the vessel went on; and the white men had some spell or magic they put in the water when they liked in order to stop the vessel. I was exceedingly amazed at this account, and really thought they were spirits. I therefore wished much to be from amongst them, for I expected they would sacrifice me: but my wishes were vain; for we were so quartered that it was impossible for any of us to make our escape.

The stench of the hold while we were on the coast was so intolerably loathsome, that it was dangerous to remain there for any time, and some of us had been permitted to stay on the deck for the fresh air; but now that the whole ship's cargo were confined together, it became absolutely pestilential. The closeness of the place, and the heat of the climate, added to the number in the ship, which was so crowded that each had scarcely room to turn himself, almost suffocated us. This produced copious perspirations, so that the air soon became unfit for respiration, from a variety of loathsome smells, and brought on a sickness among the slaves, of which many died, thus falling victims to the improvident avarice, as I may call it, of their purchasers. This wretched situation was again aggravated by the galling of the chains, now become insupportable; and the filth of the necessary tubs, into which the children often fell, and were almost suffocated. The shrieks of the women, and the groans of the dying, rendered the whole a scene of horror almost inconceivable. Happily perhaps for myself I was soon reduced so low here that it was thought necessary to keep me almost always on deck; and from my extreme youth I was not put in fetters...

One day, when we had a smooth sea and moderate wind, two of my wearied countrymen who were chained together (I was near them at the time), preferring death to such a life of misery, somehow made through the nettings and jumped into the sea: immediately another quite dejected fellow, who, on account of his illness, was suffered to be out of irons, also followed their example; and I believe many more would very soon have done the same if they had not been prevented by the ship's crew, who were instantly alarmed. Those of us that were the most active were in a moment put down under the deck, and there was such a noise and confusion amongst the people of the ship as I never heard before, to stop her, and get the boat out to go after the slaves. However two of the wretches were drowned, but they got the other, and afterwards flogged him unmercifully for thus attempting to prefer death to slavery.

In this manner we continued to undergo more hardships than I can now relate, hardships which are inseparable from this accursed trade. Many a time we were near suffocation from the want of fresh air, which we were often without for whole days together. This, and the stench of the necessary tubs, carried off many...

At last we came in sight of the island of Barbados, at which the whites on board gave a great shout, and made many signs of joy to us. We did not know what to think of this; but as the vessel drew nearer we plainly saw the harbor, and other ships of different kinds and sizes; and we soon anchored amongst them off Bridge Town. Many merchants and planters now came on board, though it was in the evening. They put us in separate parcels, and examined us attentively. They also made us jump, and pointed to the land, signifying we were to go there. We thought by this we should be eaten by these ugly men, as they appeared to us; and, when soon after we were all put down under the deck again, there was much dread and trembling among us, and nothing but bitter cries to be heard all the night from these apprehensions, insomuch that at last the white people got some old slaves from the land to pacify us. They told us we were not to be eaten, but to work, and were soon to go on land, where we should see many of our country people. This report eased us much; and sure enough, soon after we were landed, there came to us Africans of all languages. We were conducted immediately to the merchant's yard, where we were all pent up together like so many sheep in a fold, without regard to sex or age...

We were not many days in the merchant's custody before we were sold after their usual manner, which is this: On a signal given, (as the beat of a drum) the buyers rush at once into the yard where the slaves are confined, and make choice of that parcel they like best. The noise and clamor with which this is attended, and the eagerness visible in the countenances of the buyers, serve not a little to increase the apprehensions of the terrified Africans, who may well be supposed to consider them as the ministers of that destruction to which they think themselves devoted. In this manner, without scruple, are relations and friends separated, most of them never to see each other again.

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GRADE:9

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Rating: Words in the Passage: 1190 Unique Words: 569 Sentences: 53
Noun: 337 Conjunction: 166 Adverb: 153 Interjection: 4
Adjective: 92 Pronoun: 216 Verb: 319 Preposition: 239
Letter Count: 7,374 Sentiment: Positive Tone: Neutral (Slightly Conversational) Difficult Words: 291
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