At last we came in sight of the island of Barbadoes, at which the whites on board gave a great shout, and made many signs of joy to us.
The slaves had a terrible couple days on the ship ride to the new world and when they saw land it was a sight for joy but little didi they know what was going to be happening to them when they got to the new land.
loathsome
Loathsome means "causing hatred or disgust; repulsive."
Slave ships
The slave ships would have multiple levels where they would hold the slaves. There was no way for them to physically move around or stretch without bumping into someone else or hitting their head on the roof.
The slave ship Brookes was allowed to carry up to 454 enslaved people
Something they did not add in this passage was the amount of time the slaves would be on this ship. They were not allowed to move because of the shackles so there was so way to get up and use the bathroom so they would simply go while they lay there. The ship ride was more then a couple hours long.
Petition of Rose the mulatto daughter of Mary Davis of the province of Maryland now a servant of Mr. Henry Darnall of the County aforesaid.
Sense Rose Davis was born from a mixed family, she now has a child and has her DNA from her mother. She is trying to say that sense she is not an African American, she should not be a slave.
Rose Davis was born to an indentured servant white woman and a Black man.
Rose Davis was born into a family where her mother was white and father was black. She petitioned her freedom to the court yet lost to a life time of slavery. The thing that I find interesting is if she has kids they could by law be a slave.
This song was written from the perspective of a young girl who was sent to Virginia against her will, where she faced a life of hunger and never-ending work.
The people that she is trying to reach are the other slaves as well as maybe the white slave owners. This is a young girl ready to come to the new world for more opportunities, which she said in her song, turned into hard labor and cruel behavior on her.
The rations upon the ship were very bad... Every ten persons received three pounds of butter a week, four cans of beer and two cans of water a day, two platters full of peas every noon, meat four dinners in the week and fish three, and these we were obliged to prepare with our own butter.
How I see this, I have to question how people can do this to other people. The living space for these people were terrible on the way to America. And for the lack of nutritious food that was given to them was just cruel.
I have undergone in this vale of misery of my exile
This is very significant because we normally hear about what they slaves had to endure from the slave owners but what we do not hear as much is what they felt when going through the journey here. This slave describes his experience and he was truly in agony.
Thirdly, Every Free-man and Free-woman that transport themselves and Servants by the 25 of March next, being 1667.
The slaves had no say in who they belonged to or where they will go. The white slave owners would bring them before that date and the slaves were considered their property.