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The Middle Passage and the Material Culture of Captive Africans

2009; Frank Cass & Co.; Volume: 30; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/01440390802673773

1743-9523

Jerome S. Handler,

Archaeology and Rock Art Studies

Abstract Scholars of the Atlantic slave trade have not systematically addressed the question of what material objects or personal belongings captive Africans took aboard the slave ships and what goods they may have acquired on the Middle Passage. This topic has implications for the archaeology of African descendant sites in the New World and the transmission of African material culture. This paper reviews the evidence for clothing, metal, bead, and other jewelry, amulets, tobacco pipes, musical instruments, and gaming materials. In so doing, the paper provides an empirical foundation for the severe limitations placed upon enslaved Africans in transporting their material culture to the New World. Acknowledgments Jelmer Vos generously shared his unpublished data on the Dutch slave trade; David Eltis helped with sources and data; Sara Bon-Harper, Chris Espenshade, and Alexandra Jones provided information on archaeological materials in the Chesapeake and South Carolina. Benjamin Guichard assisted with French sources and translations from the French. Judith Carney, Laurent Dubois, Barry Higman, Jean Howson, and Philip Morgan offered comments on different sections of earlier drafts of this paper, and I am particularly grateful to Trevor Bernard, Neil Norman, and Marcus Rediker for their careful and detailed reading and comments on later drafts. Notes Posnansky, 'West Africanist Reflections', 29. Contemporary illustrations of the wide range of clothing types and styles in West and West Central Africa during the era of the Atlantic slave trade are shown in Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade; search categories, 'pre-colonial Africa', 'clothing'. British Parliamentary Papers, testimony of Augustino, in 'Report from a Select Committee', 163; Smith et al., 'Ali Eisami Gazormabe,' 213; Wilkes, 'Abu Bakr Al-Siddiq', 162. See also brief comments of Mahommah Baquaqua (Law and Lovejoy, Biography, 40–41, 153) and Venture Smith (Narrative of the Life and Adventures, 12–13; cf. Handler, 'Survivors of the Middle Passage', 46–47). Ligon, True & Exact History, 46; Hinke, 'Report of the Journey', 116. Atkins, Voyage to Guinea, 111; Towne, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1791 and 1792', 17; Bosman, New and Accurate Description, 341. Bosman's account was first published in Dutch in 1703, and the first English translation was published in 1705. Van Dantzig ('English Bosman and Dutch Bosman') has systematically compared the latter and the former and seems to raise no objection to how the above quotation was translated. Winsnes, Letters on West Africa, 176. Robert Harms suggests that slaves were 'naked' on board the Diligent, a French slaving vessel in 1731–32, and that they came aboard the ship in that condition (Diligent, 297, 312; cf. Stein, French Slave Trade, 102). Reasons given as to why captives were stripped of their clothing include health and sanitation on the ships, as well as exposing any bodily evidence of disease or illness before purchase (e.g., Littleton, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1788 and 1789', 219–220; Grandpré, Voyage à la Côte Occidentale, Vol. 1, 75; Conneau, Slaver's Log Book, 82; Ligon, True & Exact History, 46). However, Rediker (Slave Ship, 266) speculates that another reason may have been to prevent concealment of any weapons on their persons. Littleton, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1788 and 1789', 219–220; Conneau, Slaver's Log Book, 82; Hurston, 'Cudjo's Own Story', 657. Other first-hand accounts provide similar, albeit usually very perfunctory, information, e.g., Barbot, 'Description of the Coasts', 547; Duncan, Travels, Vol. 1, 143; Beecham, Ashantee, 354, 356; Hawkins, History of a Voyage, 92–93; Newton, Thoughts, 105; Robinson, Sailor Boy's Experiences, 55, 78; Thorp, 'Chattel with a Soul', 447; Africanus. 'To the Editor' (and Riland, Memoirs, 56, 57; see note 23); Edwards, History, Civil and Commercial, Vol. 2, 328; Oldendorp, History of the Mission, 214, 219. Joshua Carnes quotes an unnamed source: 'When the poor slaves … are driven down to the sea-shore, they are stripped naked, and strictly examined by the European surgeons, both men and women, without the least distinction of modesty' (Carnes, Journal of a Voyage, 237). Cf. Mouser, 'Théophilus Conneau'; Jones, 'Théophile Conneau'. A report of slaving activities on the African coast was given to the St. Helena Gazette in 1848. This tiny British colony in the South Atlantic had become a depot for illegal slaving ships captured by the British navy. By this date, about four decades after the British had abolished the slave-trade, these captured ships presumably were not British. Enslaved Africans were taken from their holding areas on the coast to the beach. Before being branded with the slave dealer's mark and loaded onto the canoes that transported them to the waiting slave ship, 'the little piece of cotton cloth tied round the loins of the slave is stripped off' (quoted in Jackson, St. Helena, 259). "Africans of the Slave Bark Wildfire", Harper's Weekly 4 (June 2, 1860): 244–346. This article has several engravings based on daguerreotypes, the most famous of which shows the deck of the 'Wildfire' with its rescued captives huddled together; see Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade; image reference 'E027'. Phillips, 'Journal of a Voyage', 201; Pinckard, Notes, Vol. 1, 228–229; Cresswell, 'Journal', 79; Barnes, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1788 and 1789', 100; see also, Winsnes, Reliable Account, 115. Speaking of slaves purchased by the French, a French naval officer visiting Angola in 1786–87 briefly commented: 'cleanliness forces us to keep them completely nude. This state is hardly embarrassing to them because modesty/indecency/shame is a sentiment that they do not know '('la propreté nous impose la loi de les tenir completement nus. Cet état n'est point genant pour eux, car la pudeur est un sentiment qu'ils ignorent'; Grandpré, Voyage à la Côte Occidentale, Vol. 1, 75). What being stripped entirely naked meant to many West and West Central African men and women (children were generally completely naked), coming from a diversity of cultures and value systems, and whether denuding categorically meant for all the millions concerned, 'profound humiliation and disintegration of identity' (Gomez, Exchanging Our Country Marks, 159) are large and relevant questions in considering the impact of enslavement; yet, to deal with these questions would stray far from the central aims of this paper and would require another type of empirical investigation into African societies at the time of the Atlantic slave trade. Aside from comments quoted above, in 1797 the Governor of Jamaica generalized that the newly arrived African came off the ship 'with only a rag around him' (Balcarres, quoted in Buckley, Slaves in Red Coats, 48). Describing the Portuguese slave-trade in Central Africa, Miller's detailed and vivid description notes that captives held in the coastal barracoons received 'no clothing' and those taken from the barracoons to the embarkation points were 'dressed in loincloths (tangas) or crude camisoles made … of burlap wrappings' (Way of Death, 398, 402–403n92). There are many contemporary images/illustrations of captive Africans in coffles, embarking on the slave ships, and on the slave ships themselves; these invariably show them with some kind of covering over the genital area, never completely devoid of any covering. Even the few illustrations based on eye-witness drawings fall into this pattern. It seems that these illustrations are more a reflection of European artistic conventions than an absolutely accurate portrayal of actual conditions (Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade, passim). European clothing was sometimes given as a reward to captives, such as 'guardians' (slaves who policed other slaves during the Middle Passage) who performed special services for the European slavers (Smallwood, 'African Guardians', 683, 685). Types of metal (and other) jewelry worn by West and West Central Africans during the era of the Atlantic slave trade are shown in Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade; search category, 'jewelry'. The Barbados jewelry is shown in colour in Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade; image references 'B72_coiledbracelet', 'B72_flangedbracelet', 'B72_simplebracelet'. The jewelry is described and illustrated in black/white in Handler, 'African-Type Healer/Diviner', 105–106, 107, 111–112 and Handler and Lange, Plantation Slavery in Barbados, 153–158; see also, Bianco et al., 'Beads and Other Adornment', 382–417. A few finger rings of wood and bone/horn, of possible African origin, have also been found in North American sites (Singleton, 'Archaeology of Slave Life', 158, 188n11, 12). For example, Handler and Lange, Plantation Slavery in Barbados; Armstrong, Old Village; Stine et al., 'Blue Beads'; Higman, Montpelier, 252–257; Heath, 'Buttons, Beads, and Buckles'; Reeves, 'Profusion of Beads'; Wilkie and Farnsworth, Sampling Many Pots; Bianco et al., 'Beads and Other Adornment'; cf. Karklins and Barka, 'Beads of St. Eustatius'; DeCorse, 'Oceans Apart'. A colour illustration of the Barbados necklace and its distinctive carnelian bead is shown in Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade; image references, 'B72_necklace', 'Carnelbead'; the latter and a similar one, both originating in Western India, are discussed in Handler, 'From Cambay in India to Barbados'. For the burial with which it was found, see Handler, 'African-Type Healer/Diviner'; cf. Handler, 'Slave Medicine and Obeah'; Bilby and Handler, 'Obeah'. An early eighteenth-century 'sub-adult' interment in Virginia was buried 'with a string of glass beads around the neck'; although the function of this bead necklace is uncertain, according to the investigator it may have served some 'protective function' (Fesler, 'From Houses to Homes', 172, 207 [fig. 5.31]). Bianco et al., 'Beads and Other Adornment', 153–154, 387; cf. LaRoche, 'Beads'. Only a handful of money cowries (Cyprea moneta) have been recovered from African descendant sites in the Americas, and most of these have been found singly and not as part of larger bead units such as necklaces or bracelets (Singleton,' Archaeology of Slave Life', 157, 188n9; Yakubik and Mendez, Beyond the Great House; Gordon et al., Report of Two Seasons of Excavation; Brown, Fairfield Quarter). Cowry shells are absent from early African descendant sites in South Carolina (as reported by Chris Espenshade, personal communication, 13 March 2007), and one to three cowries have been found in about five sites in the Chesapeake, as reported on the Digital Archaeological Archive of Comparative Slavery (www.daccs.org). There are, however, two major exceptions: Seven money cowries were recovered at Newton cemetery in Barbados, and all of these were found in one necklace; and as a matter of coincidence with respect to the number seven (?), all of the seven cowries recovered from the African Burial Ground in New York City were also found with one burial, on the strand of hip beads (Handler and Lange, Plantation Slavery in Barbados, 125–130; Bianco et al., "Beads and Other Adornment', 387). It is most likely that all of the New World cowries arrived via the Middle Passage, but it is impossible to determine if they were worn or brought by the enslaved. E.g., DeCorse, 'Beads as Chronological Indicators'; Stine et al., 'Blue Beads', 53–56; Handler. 'African-Type Healer/Diviner'; Ogundiran, 'Small Things Remembered'; DeCorse et al., 'Toward a Systematic Bead Description System'; Bianco et al., 'Beads and Other Adornment' (and sources cited in these publications). Bead usage among West and West Central Africans during the era of the Atlantic slave trade is shown in contemporary illustrations; see Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade; search category, 'bead'. For example, Adams, Sketches Taken During Ten Voyages, 104–05; Alpern, 'What Africans Got for Their Slaves'; Davies, Royal African Company: passim; Barbot, Barbot on Guinea, Vol. 1, 105–06; Yacou, Journaux de Bord, 50; Robinson, Sailor Boy's Experiences, 37; DeCorse, Archaeology of Elmina, 149. Clarkson, Essay on the Slavery and Commerce, 28. John Barnes, a British trader who had lived in West Africa for thirteen years, also expressed the variability of demands for beads in the region (in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1788 and 1789', 100). The very limited direct evidence for amulets is nonetheless quite suggestive of a wider pattern. A slave ship from Angola was blown off course near Cuba in 1857; captured by a British naval vessel, it was taken to Port Royal, Jamaica. The incident was described in a letter to the editor of the Illustrated London News. Accompanying this letter were photographs of the 370 survivors sent by the letter writer. These photographs, in turn, were used to make the engravings of the ship and its survivors that were published in the Illustrated London News in 1857. The engravings show many of the captives wearing amulets hanging around their necks by leather (?) cords (see Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade, image references 'iln595b, c, d, e'). In another case, Rediker (Slave Ship, 307) describes an incident involving three young girls on a slave ship that docked at Charleston, South Carolina in 1804. A strong bond of friendship had developed among them, and when one of the girls was to be separated from the other two, amidst the anguish of the scene 'one of the girls took "a string of beads with an amulet from her neck, kissed it, and hung it on her friend's"'. There is no way of telling where these beads came from but the fact that they were part of a necklace with an amulet suggests the whole ensemble was brought on board the ship itself in Africa. Also suggestive are the two distinctive animal bones recovered from the wreck of the Danish slave ship, the Fredensborg. Svalesen reasonably speculates they may have come from some type of protective amulet and 'it is not inconceivable … that such an object could have been smuggled aboard' (Slave Ship Fredensborg, 185–186). During the Middle Passage in 1750, John Newton reported an incident aboard the ship wherein 'some of the men slaves' were alleged to have poisoned the water in the 'scuttle casks'; upon inquiry, however, it was found that 'they had only conveyed some of their country fetishes, as they call them, or talismans into one of them, which they had the credulity to suppose must inevitably kill all who drank of it' (Thoughts, 56). This quote does not make clear if the 'country fetish' was imbued with its magical properties on board the ship itself, or if it had been brought aboard by the enslaved. Whatever the case, the incident also reflects the possession of small, personal objects aboard the ship. Rediker, Slave Ship, 237, 280, 293, 295, 296; cf. Taylor, "If We Must Die", 69, 76, 95; Harms, Diligent, 311; Smallwood, 'African Guardians', 681–682. The Dane, Ludvig Romer, who spent ten years in West Africa, primarily on the Gold Coast, cautioned his slave trading countrymen, while implying that such events had occurred, 'you must be constantly on guard that no slave gets hold of a knife or any other type of tool, in the fort as well as on board the ship' (Winsnes, Reliable Account, 226). I have little information for other national carriers, although this practice may have taken place on some French ships; e.g. Villiers, Traite des Noirs, 97. Finds from the wreck of the 'Henrietta Marie' suggest this practice may have started much earlier. This English slave ship sunk near the Florida Keys in 1700 on its return voyage to England after selling its slaves in Jamaica. Over 11,000 beads of a variety of types and colors were recovered from the wreck (Moore and Malcolm, 'Seventeenth-Century Vehicle'; cf. Moore, Site Report, App. F, note 1). These beads were undoubtedly the residues of trade goods used in West Africa, but some may have been distributed to slaves during the Middle Passage. Moreover, there are other indications that slave ships did not dispose of all of their beads along the African coast, and instead carried them back to Britain from the New World. For example, the British slave ship, Judith, arriving at Barbados from Africa in 1729, still had a large quantity of beads aboard (Donnan, Documents, Vol. 2, 380). Philip Morgan has raised the question, for which I cannot provide an answer: 'Could it be that a portion of the beads … put on board a [slaving] ship and assumed [by scholars] to be for trading purposes on the African coast … [was] in fact aimed for the Middle Passage leg of the voyage'? (personal communication, 17 Jan. 2007). Falconbridge, Account of the Slave Trade, 210. See also Africanus, 'To the Editor' [and Riland, Memoirs, 58, 59]. Leo Africanus was a pseudonym used by the abolitionist Zachary Macaulay. He sailed aboard a slave ship from West Africa to Jamaica in 1795, and published his observations in The Christian Observer, a magazine founded in London in 1802 and edited by Macaulay at the time. James Riland (Memoirs) plagiarized large sections of Macaulay's account, including sections referenced in the present paper, in his edited account of an unidentified Jamaican Creole who reported on his return to Jamaica from England aboard a slaving vessel in 1801. For details, see Ragatz, Guide for the Study, 232-233, 306, 383; and Hochschild, Bury the Chains, 253–254, 398n254. Norris and Penny, in Lambert, 'Report of the Lords of Trade on the Slave Trade, 1789', 117, 118–119. Willyams, Account of the Campaign, 12–13; Jeffery, Dyott's Diary, Vol. 1, 93–94. On the Mattaponi River in Virginia in 1732, William Grove, a visiting Englishman, observed recently arrived captives aboard two slave ships: 'The boyes and girles all stark naked; so were the greatest part of the men and women. Some had beads about their necks, arms, and wasts [sic], and a ragg or piece of leather the bigness of a figg leafe.' Another traveler to Virginia in 1701 also observed the complete nudity of newly arrived Africans, except for the 'corals of different colors around their neck and arms'. Neither observer mentions if the beads were acquired on board the slave ships or belonged to the captives before they left Africa (Stiverson and Butler, 'Virginia in 1732', 31; Hinke, 'Report of the Journey', 116). Higman. Montpelier, 241; cf. Handler and Lange, Plantation Slavery in Barbados, passim. On shipboard revolts and European fears of them, see Newton, Thoughts, 103–104; also, Taylor, "If We Must Die", passim; Christopher, Slave Ship Sailors, passim; Rediker, Slave Ship, passim; Smallwood, 'African Guardians'. Hill, 'Archaeological Smoking Pipes', 115; Jones, German Sources, 61 and note 97; cf. Heywood and Thornton, Central Africans, Atlantic Creoles, 216–217. DeCorse (Archaeology of Elmina, 163, 240n56), McIntosh et al. ('Tobacco Pipes'), and Philips ('African Smoking Pipes') have summarized some of the major issues on the introduction of tobacco to Africa. E.g., Robinson, Sailor Boy's Experiences, 37; Labarthe, Voyage, 77, 112, 143; Hernaes, Slaves, Danes, 351; Plasse, Journal de Bord D'un Négrier, 72. Cf. Eltis, Rise of African Slavery, 174, 184; Heywood and Thornton, Central Africans, Atlantic Creoles, 216–217; Metcalf, 'Microcosm', 379, 380, 382, 389; Verger, Trade Relations, 12–17. Verger, Trade Relations, 13; Villiers, Traite des Noirs, 104. Verger, Trade Relations, 12–17; Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1788–1790', 8–9, 13–19; Labarthe, Voyage, 83, 112, 140–141, 145; Mettas, Repértoire des Expéditions, Vol. 1, 423, 649; Vol. 2, 363, 379, 765. Cf. Eltis, Rise of African Slavery, 174, 184; Roberts, 'Smoking in Sub-Saharan Africa', 46–47; Villiers, Traite des Noirs, 97, 104; Metcalf, 'Microcosm', 382, 388, 394. For contemporary images of 'elbow bend' pipes used by West and West Central Africans during the era of the Atlantic slave trade, see Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade; search category, 'pipe'. Only one example of such a pipe has been reported from an African descendant site in the New World. It was discovered at Newton plantation cemetery in Barbados and is illustrated and described in Handler and Norman, 'From West Africa to Barbados'; see also Handler and Tuite, Atlantic Slave Trade, image reference, 'B72_pipe'. For tobacco and pipes in Africa, see, for example, Hill, 'Archaeological Smoking Pipes'; Philips, 'African Smoking Pipes'; Jones, German Sources, 117, 255; DeCorse, Archaeology of Elmina, 149, 165–67; Kelly, 'Change and Continuity in Coastal Benin', 92–95; McIntosh et al., 'Tobacco Pipes', 192; Ozanne, 'Notes on the Early Historic Archaeology of Accra', and Tobacco-pipes of Accra and Shai; Shaw, 'Early Smoking Pipes', 274; York, 'Excavations at New Buipe'. Given that Africans were generally stripped of clothing and, presumably, other personal belongings before they even boarded the slave ships, it is highly unlikely that they brought their own pipes on board, although this may have happened occasionally (Handler and Norman, 'From West Africa to Barbados'). Robinson, Sailor Boy's Experiences, 38; Labarthe, Voyage, 77, 83, 88, 250; Hernaes, Slaves, Danes, 351; Yacou, Journaux de Bord, 48–49; cf. Metcalf, 'Microcosm', 380, 382. Archaeological research at seventeenth and eighteenth century deposits at Elmina, Gold Coast, yielded evidence for about 400 times more European, primarily Dutch, pipes than those produced locally (DeCorse, Archaeology of Elmina). For French pipes used in the African trade during the eighteenth century, see Walker, 'Potential Use of European Clay Tobacco Pipes', 186–187. Pipes may not have been a common trade item in the English/British trade until the eighteenth century; in any case, pipes are singularly absent from the many trade goods mentioned in the large correspondence of the Royal African Company, 1681–1699 (Law, English in West Africa, passim; Robin Law, personal communication, 30 Oct. 2008). For example, Walker, 'Potential Use of European Clay Tobacco Pipes'. Sometimes captains may have used these items for slave purchase while on the coast, rather than saving them for distribution on the Atlantic crossing. Unpublished data on the Dutch trade has been provided by Jelmer Vos, and is derived from his on-going research into the records of the Middelburgsche [Middelburg] Commercie Compagnie. Around 1740, this Dutch firm became involved in the slave trade, transporting captives to Surinam and other Dutch colonies in the Caribbean (personal communication, 4, 5 Sept. 2007). For data on tobacco distributions also derived from these records by W. S. Unger, see Emmer, 'History of the Dutch Slave Trade', 743. Hernaes, Slaves, Danes, 352; Barbot, Barbot on Guinea, Vol. 2,780. Tobacco and European manufactured white clay pipes were occasionally distributed to the enslaved on Barbados plantations. The pipes were usually long-stemmed, but in 1796 an island visitor reported how plantation slaves would 'carry in their breeches pocket a short pipe, about an inch in length from the bowl' (Pinckard, Notes, Vol. 2, 115). These 'short' pipes may not have been distinct types, but merely white clay pipes whose fragile stems had broken off. Because they were so poor, slaves probably used their pipes, even with broken stems. In more modern times, according to elderly Barbadians I interviewed in the early 1970s, the white clay pipes commonly smoked by the working class were frequently smoked very close to the bowls after the stems had broken. On the other hand, the 'short' pipes may have been distinctive types: a 1789 Jamaican source, for example, mentions that some planters on that island furnished their slaves with, among other goods, 'short tobacco pipes' (quoted in Brathwaite, Development of Creole Society, 232). Walker, 'Potential Use of European Clay Tobacco Pipes', 188–189; Walker, Clay Tobacco Pipes, 415. cf. DeCorse, Archaeology of Elmina, 165. A large number of 'so-called Negro pipes' was recovered from the wreck of the Fredensborg, whose voyage to the West Indies took place in 1768; these undescribed pipes were 'of a cheap quality' and many were apparently made by a Norwegian pipe manufacturer (Svalesen, Slave Ship Fredensborg, 186). Quoted in Smallwood, Saltwater Slavery, 159–160. Quoted in Donnan, Documents, Vol. 1, 204 (for the original see PRO/The National Archives T70/1211). In the late 1670s, the Arthur, another Royal African Company ship, sailed from Calabar to Barbados in almost two months. During the voyage, according to the journal kept by the RAC's agent, two distributions of tobacco took place; pipes are not mentioned. At the end of the voyage, 'about 10 lb of tobacco' remained of the various provisions that had been brought from England and which had been specifically intended for the captives on the Middle Passage (for the original see PRO/The National Archives T70/1213; on-line http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/slavery/pdf/Arthur_Transcript.pdf. Excerpts are published in Donnan, Documents, Vol. 1, 226–234). Public Record Office/The National Archives, T70/1222, f. 8 (thanks to David Eltis for this reference). Snelgrave, New Account of Some Parts of Guinea, 163; Svalesen, 'Slave Ship Fredensborg: History', 456, 458n14; Svalesen, Slave Ship Fredensborg, 107, 112, 186; see also Barbot, Barbot on Guinea, Vol. 2, 780; Oldendorp, History of the Mission, 216, 219. Yacou, Journaux de Bord, 49, 192–193; also, Plasse, Journal de Bord D'un Négrier, 140; Harms, Diligent, 311. As for pipes on French vessels, in the late eighteenth century a French slave ship captain advised that only tobacco, not pipes, be permitted on board. 'One must never permit the Negroes the use of pipes,' he cautioned, 'for fear of fire; tobacco should be grated and given as a powder' ('Il ne faut jamais permettre aux negres ni negresses aucun usage de pipes. Quand on leur donne du tabac, a eux le soin de le raper pur le prendre en poudre… mais jamais de pipes, crainte de feu'; Brugevin, 'Observations Touchant le Soin des Negres', 97). Yet, other primary sources are quite clear that smoking pipes were sometimes distributed on French vessels (e.g.. Barbot, 'Description of the Coasts', 547; Yacou, Journaux de Bord, 192-193; Plasse, Journal de Bord D'un Négrier, 140). There was probably no hard and fast rule and captains followed different practices; the same variability surely took place on the ships of other nations. There is also some indication that pipes and tobacco were occasionally given to captives while they were kept in the coastal forts, awaiting shipment overseas (St. Clair, History of Cape Coast Castle, 220). Penny, in Lambert, 'Report of the Lords of Trade on the Slave Trade, 1789', 117; Heatley, ibid.,123; Norris [who specified that only men were 'supplied with pipes and tobacco'], in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1788 and 1789', 3–4; cf. Walker, 'Potential Use of European Clay Tobacco Pipes', 179; Villiers, Traite des Noirs, 97. For example, Svalesen, Slave Ship Fredensborg, 112. Aboard a Spanish slaver bound for Cuba in 1827, Theophile Conneau wrote: 'Pipes and tobacco are … distributed with some economy, as they cannot all be allowed a pipe. Half a dozen boys light a pipe each, and they go round the decks giving so many whiffs each person' (Slaver's Log Book, 83). For example, archaeological recoveries in Barbados, the Bahamas, Jamaica (including Maroon sites), New York City, South Carolina, and Virginia (Blakeman and Riordan, 'Appendix B'; Armstrong, Old Village, 187–191; Higman, Montpelier, 241–242; Wilkie, 'Methodist Intentions', 292–297; Perry and Woodruff, 'Coins, Shells, and Other Items', 429–430; Agorsah, 'Scars of Brutality', 345; Digital Archaeological Archive of Comparative Slavery (www.daacs.org). Phillips, 'Journal of a Voyage', 246. For practices on French ships, see Barbot, Barbot on Guinea, Vol. 2,780; Plasse, Journal de Bord D'un Négrier, 134–135, 140; Munford, Black Ordeal, Vol. 2, 299; Yacou, Journaux de Bord, 196; Brugevin, 'Observations Touchant le Soin des Negres', 97; Harms, Diligent, 295-298; Stein, French Slave Trade, 103. For Danish and Dutch ships, see Svalesen, Slave Ship Fredensborg, 108–09; Winsnes, Reliable Account, 226; Emmer, 'History of the Dutch Slave Trade', 743 (relying on the work of W. S. Unger); and Goslinga, Dutch in the Caribbean, 350. 'Dancing' may have been absent on Portuguese/Brazilian ships; in any case, it is not mentioned in well-known secondary sources (e.g., Miller, Way of Death, 408–37 and passim; accounts in Conrad, Children of God's Fire, 15–23, 35, 39). Arnold, in Lambert, 'Report of the Lords on the Slave Trade, 1789', 125–126. See also, British Parliamentary Papers, 'Report from a Select Committee', 187; Falconbridge, Account of the Slave Trade, 209–210; testimony of John Hall, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1790', Vol. 72, 519. Falconbridge, Account of the Slave Trade, 209–210; also, Arnold, in Lambert, 'Report of the Lords of Trade on the Slave Trade, 1789', 125–126; Phillips, 'Journal of a Voyage', 246; British Parliamentary Papers,'Report from a Select Committee', 188; cf. Harms, Diligent, 296–297. Chambers, Cyclopaedia, Vol. 2, 623; Norris, in Lambert, 'Report of the Lords of Trade on the Slave Trade, 1789', 118–119. African instruments were probably played by Africans themselves perhaps, although direct evidence is lacking, shipboard captives who were drafted for this purpose (including the 'African Guardians'), or African-born sailors aboard the ships (Norris, in Lambert, 'Report of the Lords of Trade on the Slave Trade, 1789', 118–119; Rediker, Slave Ship, 105–106, 216; Christopher, Slave Ship Sailors, 51–90, passim; Smallwood, 'African Guardians'). Arnold and Penny, in Lambert, 'Report of the Lords of Trade on the Slave Trade, 1789', 117, 118–119, 125–126; Fraser, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1790', Vol. 71, 28; Hall, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1790', Vol. 72, 519; Arnold, in Lambert, 'Report on the Lords of Trade on the Slave Trade, 1789', 125–126; Pinckard, Notes, Vol. 1, 230; Falconbridge, Account of the Slave Trade, 209–210; Conneau, Slaver's Log Book, 83; Africanus, 'To the Editor' [Riland, Memoirs, 52, 54, 58; see note 23]; Stein, French Slave Trade, 103; Brugevin, 'Observations Touchant le Soin des Negres', 97; Winsnes, Reliable Account, 226. There is ample evidence for the presence of drums aboard the slave ships, but there is no evidence that any of these drums were brought on board by the enslaved themselves. An example of a 'country drum' is today housed in the British Museum where it is identified as an 'Asante-style drum'. This wooden drum originated in West Africa, but was acquired in Virginia, probably between 1730 and 1745, for Hans Sloane, founder of the British Museum. The drum was probably brought to Virginia aboard a slave ship (see http://www.thebritishmuseum.ac.uk/compass). Romer (note 20) also mentions drums, but he is the only source to mention 'pipes' (flutes?) as one type of African instrument taken on board the ships (Winsnes, Reliable Account, 226, 246). Edwards, History, Civil and Commercial, Vol. 2, 329. Although African instruments, particularly drums, were the most common musical instruments, European instruments were occasionally used. In the 1690s, Captain Thomas Phillips reported that captives were made to 'jump and dance … to our bag-pipes, harp, and fiddle' ('Journal of a Voyage', 246; my emphasis), and referring to the 1740s, Romer (note 20) wrote that aside from African instruments the slave ship "officers bring hurdy-gurdies and music boxes with them from Europe' (Winsnes, Reliable Account, 226, 246). The drum was also used on French ships, but the accordion may have been a popular instrument during the eighteenth century; however, the statement by Robert Harms, citing only Phillips (above), that 'many English ships used bagpipes' cannot be supported by the evidence (Munford, Black Ordeal, Vol. 2, 299; Harms, Diligent, 295, my emphasis). Pinckard, Notes, Vol. 1, 230. Pinckard does not state what agency brought this instrument on board. For early references to the banjo and other African-derived instruments in early New World slave societies, see, for example, Epstein, Sinful Tunes, 21–58; Handler and Frisbie, "Aspects of Slave Life in Barbados"; Price and Price, Afro-American Arts, 252; Schopf, Travels in the Confederation, Vol. 2, 260–262. Edwards, History, Civil and Commercial, Vol. 2, 329; Fraser, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1790', Vol. 71, 28; see also testimonies of Matthews, in Lambert, 'Minutes of the Evidence on the Slave Trade, 1788 and 1789', 19; and Penny and Norris, in Lambert, 'Report of the Lords of Trade on the Slave Trade', 117, 118-119. Romer (note 20) also mentions that Europeans in their efforts to 'keep their slaves in good humour' brought 'games, whistles, and music boxes' on board the ships, but he provides no details on these games (Winsnes, Reliable Account, 245–246). Cheska, Traditional Games and Dances, 44–46; Herskovits, 'Wari'. Posnansky, 'West Africanist Reflections', 29; Posnansky, 'Towards an Archaeology', 198. Mintz and Price, Birth of African-American Culture, 18–19; Mintz, 'Foreward', 1970:7–8. In this context, one can also consider the incorporation of European manufactured goods within African-like or African-derived cultural practices. For example, white clay pipes as grave goods accompanying burials at Newton cemetery in Barbados, among enslaved Jamaicans, and some early eighteenth-century Virginians, or the incorporation of glass containers or bottles, metal nails and other objects of European origin into various spiritual contexts such as grave site rituals, Obeah practices, and, possibly, shrines (e.g., Handler and Lange, Plantation Slavery in Barbados, 199–203; Armstrong and Fleischman, 'House-Yard Burials', 46–49; Bilby and Handler, 'Obeah'; Fesler, 'From Houses to Homes', 170–172; Walsh, Calabar to Carter's Grove, 106–107; Samford, Subfloor Pits, passim; Jamieson, 'Material Culture and Social Death', 46–51; Singleton, 'African Diaspora Archaeology', 258–259).