As the title suggests, the engraving shows the hold of the Gloria, a Brazilian slave-ship upon which the author travelled. In Chapter XV of his Revelations, Drake described the conditions on board: "our slaves," he wrote, "were crammed in hold, cabin, and peak, and packed like herrings, on the shelves, around our vessel's sides; and what was worse, gratings were kept down half the time." (p. 88-89) Continuing to describe the "horrors of this dreadful passage," he added, "The sick and dying were chained together. I saw pregnant women give birth to babes, whilst chained to corpses, which our drunken overseers had not removed. The blacks were literally jammed between decks, as if in a coffin; and a coffin that dreadful hold became, to nearly one-half of our cargo, before we reached Bahia." (p. 89) In the engraving, Ruiz, the ship's captain, has entered the hold with one of his mates. In addition to a lantern, the captain carries a large sword, while his mate carries a rifle. A cat-o'-ninetails can be seen on the floor., Fold-out plate in Richard Drake's Revelations of a Slave Smuggler: Being the Autobiography of Capt. Rich'd Drake, an African Trader for Fifty-Years from 1807 to 1857; during which Period He Was Concerned in the Transportation of Half a Million Blacks from African Coast to America (New York: Robert M. De Witt, publisher, [c1860]), p. 28., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Scenes from the Slave Trade.
Creator
Andrew & Filmer, engraver
Date
[c1860]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1860 Dra 72735.O p 28, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2806
