7/29/2019 Slavery and the Numbers Name

1/4

Slavery and the Numbers Name

Stephen Small, Ph.D.

I was a guest curator at the Merseyside Maritime Museums gallery on Transatlantic

Slavery that opened in 1992. I contributed several chapters to the book that thegallery produced Transatlantic Slavery. Against Human Dignity edited by Tony

Tibbles and published in 1994. The gallery became the International Slavery

Museum in 2007 and offers a major contribution to discussions of slavery not only

in the British Empire, but across the Atlantic world, past and present. As the guest

curators were being selected for the gallery, there was a meeting of more than 15

experts on the slave trade, slavery and transatlantic shipping to discuss its nature,

scope and consequences. This included Alissandra Cummings, Toyin Falola, Paul

Lovejoy, Patrick Manning, David Richardson, Tony Tibbles, James Walvin and others.

I was also present. During that meeting we had a discussion of how many Africans

were kidnapped, enslaved or died during the slave trade and the middle passage.

The numbers discussed varied greatly from 12 million to more than 60 million. Wecould not agree on a final number in that meeting. One of the experts there said that

we will never know exactly how many people were kidnapped, enslaved or died

during transatlantic slavery, but we do have records from all of the nations involved

in slavery that provide estimates of how many Africans were loaded onto ships, how

many died during the middle passage and how many were landed in the Americas.The best current scholarly estimate of these numbers based on the records and on

some calculation of records missing is offered by David Eltis and David Richardson

in their book Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade published by Yale University

Press, in 2010. Overall, they calculate that between 1501 and 1867 an estimated

12.5 million Africans were captured by the European nations involved in the slave

trade. This is an excellent book and must be the solid basis for any discussion of thenumbers game. However, other scholars, including myself, insist, that while wemust use these records, we should also recognize that these records can never be

accurate. Why? Because we know that many records are missing, other records

were falsified, and many people simply refused to keep records. In addition, there

were many ships that sailed even after the slave trade was legally abolished. The

debate continues.

I was introduced to this debate in the Netherlands when I began my research there

in 2006. The debate has continued since I became the Ninsee Extraordinary

Professor of Slavery and its Legacy at the University of Amsterdam in 2010. This is

because whenever I met Dutch people and they asked me what my researchinvolved, they frequently responded but the Dutch did not have that many slaves.I came to the conclusion that there was a great deal of ignorance about how many

Africans were kidnapped, transported and enslaved by the Dutch over the course of

their several hundred years of involvement in the slave trade and slavery. And I

came to the conclusion that people who said the Dutch did not have that manyslaves either had no idea about the actual numbers involved; or they had a narrow

conception of how many were involved; or they compared the Dutch nation with the

7/29/2019 Slavery and the Numbers Name

2/4

British and the Spanish, who had much larger numbers. I found this a troubling

discussion. Not just because people on the street made such claims. But also because

several of the publications I read by Dutch scholars also made similar claims. I call

this the numbers game. I have seen and heard the numbers game being playedin Britain. I have seen and heard it being played in the United States. And I have seen

and heard it being played in Brazil. It is important not just because it raisesquestions of fact and methods. But also because it is frequently used as a moral

compass to suggest that because the Dutch did not have that many slaves theyshould somehow be considered guilty than the other nations. I also find that this

issue often results in many Dutch people suggesting that because the Dutch did not

have that many slaves there is no need for any serious research on Dutch slavery

and its legacies. But I disagree. I disagree fundamentally. Any one of us concerned

with examining the legacy of slavery, and concerned to see a rigorous, accurate and

inclusive account of what happened during slavery and the slave trade must

confront the assumptions and arguments of this numbers game.

It is a fact that one of the most researched issues in the history of slavery and theEuropean slave trade is the question of numbers. How many Africans were

kidnapped from Africa? How many were shipped across the Atlanta to become

enslaved in the Americas? How many survived the Atlantic crossing and how many

were killed during the crossing? Most work has been done on the middle passage

the victims that were loaded like animals onto ships, and those that survived or

were killed during the middle passage. And we have very substantial evidence for

the numbers kidnapped and transported by the British, Dutch, French, Portuguese

and Spanish. All slavery was inhuman and should be condemned regardless of

numbers. But the issue of numbers is important, because it conveys the scope of the

human suffering, as well as the scope of economic activity and profits. But this issue

is not only an issue of counting the numbers. It is also an issue of what kind ofcounting should be done. And it is a moral issue.

So the first thing that needs to be said is that I reject the underlying assumptions of

the numbers game. Violence is violence, suffering is suffering and murder is murder.

It is inhumane to say that violence only matters if it includes large numbers of

people. It is of no consolation to the victims of such inhumanity to learn that the

Dutch only transported 5% of the Africans kidnapped from Africa. It is no

consolation to the families of those kidnapped to know that the Dutch only

transported 5% of Africans kidnapped. Nor is it any consolidate to the descendants

of those that were enslaved people of African origin born in the societies across

the Americas to know that the Dutch only kidnapped 5% of those kidnapped.

But, people like to play the numbers game, and young impressionable people are

affected by it. So we must challenge the numbers game. And when we challenge the

numbers game we quickly discover that the current estimates are also highly

problematic, incorrect and conceptually flawed.

7/29/2019 Slavery and the Numbers Name

3/4

First, the numbers most commonly mentioned by some of the foremost scholars on

Dutch slavery and the slave trade are significant understatement of the actual

number involved. The numbers most often quoted are actually the lowest possible

number in the entire process. That is, the most common number quoted usually

refers only to the numbers of Africans landed by Dutch ships in the Americas. But

we know that many more Africans were loaded on to ships than those that werelanded in the Americas. And we know that an even larger number of Africans were

forced into storage areas and castles on the coast of Africa, than those that were

loaded onto ships. And we know that even larger numbers were kidnapped from

inland areas in Africa, than were loaded into castles or storage areas. And we know

that a significant number were killed or murdered before they were even

transported to the coast. And finally, we know that all those that were killed,

kidnapped, loaded onto ships or landed in the Americas, left before lots of family

members. So we are really talking about numbers much bigger than the millions

transported in ships.

What are the actual numbers? We know that between 1576 and 1850, the Dutchwere responsible for landing in the Americas at least 475,200 Africans that had been

kidnapped from Africa. A large number of these people were later transported to

other places, in South America and the Caribbean mainly via the Spanish Asiento.

We know that at the same time the Dutch were responsible for loading onto ships at

least 554,300 African captives. That means that at least 79,100 Africans were killed

but the Dutch during this transportation process. (Note it is typical to say that

these people died during this passage but this is misleading and distortion. To say

someone died implies that they did not die as a result of the hostile actions of

someone else. In fact these people died because they were kidnapped, treatedinhumanely and transported against their will across the Atlantic Ocean. So I think it

is more accurate to say that they were killed rather than that they died). We knowthat many Africans were killed in the unsanitary and violent conditions of the many

castles built by the Dutch in Africa, before they were even loaded onto ships. We

dont have exact numbers but we know that thousands more were killed during thistime. And we know that thousands more Africans were killed by their captors while

being transported from inland areas in Africa, to the coast. Finally, we know that in

Africa, between the 1570s and the 1850s) Africans had extended families with an

average of more than 5 members. So if 554,200 were loaded onto ships, than at least

thousand more were either killed during the kidnapping and imprisonment process

or were left behind as survivors of families. And it means that another several

million more Africans who were not kidnapped, or killed, saw their family members

kidnapped and killed or transported and enslaved.

In other words a focus just on the number of Africans loaded onto ships or landed in

the Americas is a significant underestimate of the total number of Africans that were

affected by the European slave trade. The most common estimates of numbers

typically focuses on the smallest possible numbers (those landed in the Americas);

uses primarily official documents (ship and government records which are known

to be flawed); and thus ignores the very large numbers of other Africans affected

7/29/2019 Slavery and the Numbers Name

4/4

(those killed during capture or imprisonment in Africa). So it is time for us to revise

the numbers that are being used, and we need to utilize this broader

conceptualization of the numbers involved before we even begin to play this

numbers game.

In light of these concerns I find it difficult to accept thatthe Dutch did not have thatmany slaves when the best estimates produced by scholars indicate that the Dutch

were responsible for landing at least 475,200 Africans in the Americas; we know

that the Dutch were responsible for loading onto ships at least 554,300 African

captives; and thus, we know that the Dutch were responsible for the killing of at

least 79,100 Africans during this process. And according to my analysis this is a

significant understatement of the total number of Africans affected when we take

account of those killed in the castle prisons in Africa, or on the trail from inland to

the coast, and those children, siblings and parents who were left behind. And all of

this is before we begin to calculate the exploitation, suffering and brutality

experienced by Africans and their descendants enslaved in Dutch Colonies such as

Suriname and the Dutch Antilles over a period of more than 200 years. But that isanother question.

The European slave trade and slavery are inherently inhumane and immoral. And

we should not hesitate to condemn them. Even a single person affected by slavery is

an outrage. And so we shouldnteven play the numbers game. But because thenumbers game is so prevalent in the work of academics; because the numbers game

is used by Dutch scholars and many Dutch people to suggest that Dutch involvement

in slavery and the slave trade was not so bad (as compared with say the British or

Spanish) then we must challenge their numbers and the assumptions upon which

their numbers are based.