Picto Diary - 09 December 2019 - Slavery
Regent Seven Seas Explorer 09 September 2018.
Lisbon to Cape Town.
On board ship lecture.
Andy Jampoler.
SLAVERY
At sea between Banjul, The Gambia and Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire.
Regent Seven Seas Explorer. 09 December 2019.
On board lecture.
Andy Jampoler.
SLAVERY
Our ship's route, red line (see image) from Lisbon to Cape Town, crosses over all of the slave trade routes to the Americas.
Over a 200 year period of active slave trade, 14 million Africans were captured and moved as slaves to the Americas...of which 500K to US.
Trading slaves to US became illegal after 1808. Thereafter, the build up in US slaves to 4 million by the end of the Civil War was accomplished internally, by birth.
While there is, of course, zero rationale for slavery, the southern meme of oft times beneficent, family oriented treatment of slaves by many their "owners" has a ring of truth. Since plantation owners could not "import" slaves, it was very much in their interest to create family conditions where slave families would bear a lot of contented children (new slaves).
Harriet Beecher Stowe, 10th child of a Congregational minister in Litchfield, Connecticut, didn't buy into Southern benificence. Her book, "Uncle Tom's Cabin," energized the anti slavery movement in the North...and, well, the rest is history.
On meeting Harriet Beecher Stowe Lincoln purportedly said, "So you're the little lady who started a war."
Per ship lecturer Jampoler, the oft quoted number of Civil War killed in action of 500K is understated. Current scholarship, he says has the Civil War KIA number at 750K.
Note: Henry Ward Beecher, fire breathing, abolitionist preacher from Brooklyn, was Harriet Beecher Stowe's older brother.
Henry Ward Beecher substituted for Lincoln as keynote speaker at end of war, US flag raising, commemoration at Ft. Sumpter, Charleston, South Carolina. In lieu, that evening, Lincoln chose to attend a play at Ford's theater in Washington, DC.
Regent Seven Seas Explorer. 09 December 2019.
On board lecture.
SLAVERY
Andy Jampoler
Chart shows annual slave embarkations and disembarkations to US over a period of 300 years through 1807.
Difference between light and dark blue is deaths en route.
Regent Seven Seas Explorer. 09 December 2018.
Deck Five. Walking to the beat.
Bob Seger - "Sunspot Baby."
She packed up her bags and she took off down the road.
Left me her stranded with the bills she owed.
She gave me a false address...took off with my American Express.
Sunspot Baby, she sure had me way out guessed.
Left me here stranded like a dog out in the yard.
Charged up a fortune on my credit card.
She used my address and my name...man that was sure unkind.
Sunspot Baby, she sure had a real good time.
I looked in Miami, I looked in Negril. Closest I came was a month old bill.
I checked the Bahamas and they said she was gone.
I can't understand why she did me so wrong!
Regent Seven Seas Explorer. 09 December 2018.
Constellation Theater.
"Canadians are really Americans with health care and no guns."
Semi funny Brit comic gets too political. Tries, and fails, to keep everybody in his audience happy.
His musical numbers redeemed his performance.
Nice Christmas suit!
Note: TIMDT says I'm overreacting... the guy was genuinely, uncontroversially funny, she says. She's probably right. He was OK, I guess.
Addendum:
Steve - I've enjoyed the informative posts from your cruise - especially now that you are in West Africa. The Gambian pictures recall Monrovia - also pretty grim, I understand.
Do you stop in Liberia? Not sure how set up they are for cruise ships. I don't know what's happened to the old Bank of Monrovia building, but Google Maps shows changes in the bank compound north of the city.
Hope you cruise continues to be interesting!
Best, Airstream
Santa Barbara, CA
Monrovia/Liberia not on ship's itinerary. We sailed by. This is a rare cruise ship itinerary. That's why it is fully subscribed. Banjul gets three cruise ships a year. Same further south. Local authorities work pretty hard to accommodate a visit, but, its clear they are not used to the scale of ferrying 800 westerners of a certain age around town.