Brooks (1781 ship)
The Brookes print was an image widely used by campaigners for the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade. First designed in Plymouth, UK, in 1788 by the Plymouth Chapter of the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade [1] and depicting the conditions on board the slave ship Brooke. The print has become an iconic image of the inhumanity of the slave trade.
The image portrayed slaves arranged on the ship's lower planking and poop deck, in accordance with the Regulated Slave Trade Act of 1788.[2] The Brookes was reportedly allowed to stow 454 African slaves, by allowing a space of 6 feet (1.8 m) by 1 foot 4 inches (0.41 m) to each man; 5 feet 10 inches (1.78 m) by 1 foot 4 inches (0.41 m) to each women, and 5 feet (1.5 m) by 1 foot 2 inches (0.36 m) to each child. However, the poster's text alleges that a slave trader confessed that before the Act, the Brookes had carried as many as 609 slaves at one time.[3]
In July 2007, students and faculty at Durham University in Northeast England were criticized as being insensitive, when they re-created the image of the Brookes print to draw attention to the atrocities of the middle passage, in an exercise that involved lying on the ground in a manner similar to the slaves arranged on the Brookes.[4][5]
References
- ^ "The Brookes - visualising the transatlantic slave trade". 2007. Retrieved 2008-03-06.
- ^ "Stowage of the British slave ship "Brookes" under the regulated slave trade act of 1788. [n. p. n. d.]. -- Piece 1 of 1,". An American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Other Printed Ephemera. The Library of Congress. Retrieved 22 July 2011.
- ^ "Stowage of the British slave ship "Brookes" under the regulated slave trade act of 1788. [n. p. n. d.]. -- Full Text". An American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Other Printed Ephemera. The Library of Congress. Retrieved 22 July 2011.
- ^ "Palace Green transformed into a slave ship". Durham First. Durham University. Retrieved 17 July 2011.
- ^ "The Brookes - visualising the transatlantic slave trade". 1807 Commemorated: The abolition of the slave trade. Institute for the Public Understanding of the Past. 2007. Retrieved 17 July 2011.