this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2024
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131
‘Highway to horror’: 14 wrecked slavers’ ships are identified in Bahamas (www.theguardian.com)
submitted 8 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world
22 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Largest cluster of sunken vessels from the 18th and 19th centuries have been identified, bearing ‘silent witness’ to the colonial past

They were the ships that carried enslaved Africans on hellish transatlantic voyages through the 18th and 19th centuries, with up to 400 in a single vessel. Now the wrecks of 14 ships have been identified in the northern Bahamas, marking what has been described by a British marine archaeologist as a previously unknown “highway to horror”.

The fate of the African men, women and children trafficked in their holds is unknown, but if a vessel was sinking, they were often bolted below deck to allow the crew to escape.

Sean Kingsley told the Observer that this extraordinary cluster of wrecks reveals that enslavers had used the Providence Channel heading south to New Providence, Cuba and around to New Orleans in the Gulf of Mexico.

These ships, which date from between 1704 and 1887, were mostly American-flagged, and profited from Cuba’s sugar and coffee plantations, where enslaved Africans faced a life of cruelty.

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[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

And if I had said anything about stopping the trade, that would be relevant. I did not. This is what I said:

Note that it was made illegal for Americans to take part in the international slave trade in 1800. That’s how little of a shit Americans apparently gave about it.

This is also what I said:

I’m not talking about today. I’m pointing out that in 1860, an American ship was taking part in a slave trade that was made illegal for American ships to take part in 60 years earlier, apparently without the U.S. Navy intervening.

You replied to me after that.

This is what my link said:

The Americans made the Atlantic slave trade illegal in 1807 at shortly after the British, but because of the sectional interests of the American South this law was never upheld and it remained something of a joke right down to the American Civil War, slave trading was put on the statute book as akin to piracy with a penalty of death for those who were captured conducting it, but only one man was ever hung as a slave trader in the United States, and that was in the middle of the American Civil War. The Americans were not capable of suppressing the trade because of the sectional pressures within the pre-civil war United States; the French were not willing to give up the trade for very obvious reasons, which include their possession of Martinique and Guadalupe which had large agricultural economies.

Which agrees with me.

You're never going to stop rape either. That doesn't mean you don't do your best to try.

[–] Deceptichum@kbin.social 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

It also doesnt mean you blame the police for not stationing a guy on a chair in every household for not doing enough to stop it.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You keep pivoting.

Your original question:

Hows the US navy meant to know who was a slave ship to intervene and who wasnt, let alone where and when to intercept them in the 1860s?

I gave you one possible idea. Then I gave you a link that showed you that the British navy had no problem doing that. Then you decided I was talking about stopping the international slave trade when I said no such thing. Now you're going back to something I said before the link I gave you showing you that my original comment of America not giving a shit was 100% correct.

So you've decided to go back to the chair thing... rather than, for some reason, just admitting that yes, it's true, America didn't even try because they didn't care.

[–] Deceptichum@kbin.social 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Mate the bloody link you posted showed that the British had a very clear problem in trying to stop it.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

And you're changing the subject again.

Unless you can provide evidence that the American government did care about stopping American ships engaging in the international slave trade, I'm not sure what your point is.

Because, again, my point is that they didn't care.

Here's more evidence that they didn't care:

The U.S. Navy was slow to institute anti-slaving patrols off the slave ports of Africa—it was not until the 1820 legislation that authority was given to the president to use naval vessels for this task. Even then, enforcement activity was sporadic and largely ineffective. The U.S. position meant that many slave ships from other countries falsely flew the American flag to avoid being seized by British anti-slaving patrols.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Act_Prohibiting_Importation_of_Slaves

"We can't arrest these people for violating laws we know they're violating! They might only be pretending to be American!"

Imagine if that excuse was made about any other possible American law violation.

I mean I can keep digging up more evidence that they didn't give a shit, but this seems like I'm doing all the work here and you're just ignoring it.