Mutiny on the Black Prince by James H. Sweet

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Mutiny on the Black Prince by James H. Sweet

'Mutiny on the Black Prince' by James H. Sweet

Although focused on a particular slave ship, Mutiny on the Black Prince encompasses so many aspects of the slave trade that it can serve as an introduction to the entire trans-Atlantic trafficking system of the 18th century.

That slavery was murderous and profitable is no surprise, but the details can be astonishing. UW-Madison history professor James H. Sweet poured over court records as well as manifests and ledgers, finding that some slave ship captains made Ahab seem agreeable in comparison. Their cruel and sometimes sadistic discipline resulted in the deaths of crew members as well as the enslaved—and sometimes the crew and occasionally the cargo struck back.

Buying shares in a slave ship was a high-risk investment. Success yielded great fortunes to the mostly middle-class investors, but bankruptcy was failure’s reward. Crossing the ocean could be easier than navigating the politics of West African rulers and rebels who sometimes put European traders in their crossfire. Once loaded, slave ships faced storms and pirates—and if the captains were unwise, mutiny and uprising. The smarter captains balanced discipline with consideration for their crews as well as the enslaved. Usually paid a wage plus commission, the captains were well advised to deliver their captives in good condition to ensure higher sale prices.

Sweet’s findings complicate simplistic views of history. Some crew members were of African descent, escaping the same poverty that sent many whites to sea. In at least one case, when longshoremen struck for better wages, the sailors fought them, fearing loss of work. Britain’s urban lower class was entrapped in a system of exploitation and cruelty, and its members often directed their frustrated violence against each other.

The particular mutiny aboard a slave ship called the Black Prince gives Sweet opportunity to comment on “maritime republicanism,” a trend through the era of the American and French revolutions of sailors overthrowing their masters and running their ships with rude democracy. However, some historians, he argues, have woven false flags of revolution from patchy material. The Black Prince’s “ultimate fate in the Caribbean was a testament to the failure of the crew members’ solidarity, dashed on the shoals of individual greed and self-interest.” Meanwhile, the “titans of human trafficking” wielded the full force of their economic and political power to track and punish the mutineers to set an example.

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