When the slave ship docked, the slaves would be taken off the ship and placed in a small room. They would be branded with a hot iron to identify that they were slaves. To prepare them for auction day, they would be washed and rub their skin with grease, or sometimes tar, to make them look healthier. This was done so that the Americans would fetch as much money as possible. The buyers would inspect the slaves they were interested in before they would bid for them, by opening their mouths to check their teeth, pinching their limbs to find how muscular they were, walk them up and down to observe how they walk and would also make them bend in different ways to detect and wounds or breaks. Slaves are not animals or toys to play around with, they are human beings just like me and you! Human beings with families and friends that they love and care about, no one should ever be split apart from their loved ones. It is very wrong for people to be treated differently because of the colour of their skin and the language they speak.
Slave ships
Charles I Triple Portrait
Charles I in Three Positions, also known as the Triple portrait of Charles I, is an oil painting of Charles I of England by Flemish artist Sir Anthony Van Dyck, showing the King from three viewpoints: left full profile, face on, and right three quarter profile. [more]
The Shrimp Girl
The Shrimp Girl is a painting by the English artist William Hogarth. It was painted around 1740–45, and is held by the National Gallery, London. [more]
Mr. and Mrs. Andrews
Mr and Mrs Andrews is an oil on canvas portrait of about 1750 by Thomas Gainsborough, now in the National Gallery, London. [more]
Flatford Mill
Flatford Mill (Scene on a Navigable River) is an oil painting by English artist John Constable, painted in 1816. It is Constable's largest exhibition canvas to be painted mainly outdoors, the first of his large "six-foot" paintings [more]
The Fighting Temeraire
The Fighting Temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken up, 1838 is an oil painting by the English artist J. M. W. Turner. HMS Temeraire was one of the last second-rate ships of the line to have played a distinguished role in the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. [more]
Liberty Leading the People
Liberty Leading the People is a painting by Eugène Delacroix commemorating the July Revolution of 1830, which toppled King Charles X of France. [more]
Ophelia
Ophelia is a painting by British artist Sir John Everett Millais, completed between 1851 and 1852. It depicts Ophelia, a character from Hamlet, singing before she drowns in a river in Denmark. [more]
The Music Lesson
The Music Lesson or Lady at the Virginals with a Gentleman by Jan Vermeer, is a painting of young female pupil receiving the titular music lesson. [more]
