Conquest and slavery have always gone hand and hand.

During the 1500’s and 1600’s, as

Europe began expanding into Northern America, the encomienda system became to stop

working. The encomienda system, was a system in which Native Americans were forced into

labor under the assumption that the Spanish would protect them. One of the main reasons why

this system began to die out was because with more and more countries taking hold of different

parts of North America, Native Americans were being pushed out of their homes and forced to

move west. As workers started moving west, a replacement was needed, and Europe turned to

Africa for that.

Africa was no stranger to slavery, with so many counties, each with different beliefs, and

societies, wars caused a good supply of slaves. Coastal areas like West Africa were huge

providers of slaves. Europe would buy these slaves and transport them to America for money and

supplies. This system would continually circle, with European countries like Portugal and Spain

acting as middle men.

The Americas would use the slaves to produce corn, cotton, tobacco, and sugar, then

trade those supplies for more slaves from European traders. Those traders would then sell those

goods along with guns and gunpowder to African Countries for slaves. The African Countries

would then use these supplies and more advanced weaponry to conquer other countries, creating

more slaves.

This caused a huge change in the power system, soldiers and merchants who participated

in slave trade were impowered, while regular citizens wilted away. Port cities began to flourish

while small inland villages started to lose resources and were at risk of invasion. Entire provinces

would be erased, reduced down to slaves. For example, the Kingdom of Kongo. Kongo suffered

immensely due to the rapid growth of slave trade. They had massive civil wars that lasted for
years. Even past wars, kidnapping became more and more common. Field workers were forced

to bring weapons while working, and kept their children inside of guarded buildings. From this

turmoil, many revolts came to be with powerful leaders, such as Queen Nzinga, the leader of the

Mbundu. She ruled from 1583 to 1663, where she implemented guerrilla warfare tactics in order

to fight against Portugal enslavers.

As slave merchants and conquerors grew in power, they began to shift the political scale

in their favor. With the addition of firearms, they began to control neighboring lands and

spreading their control. One example was the Asante State, a small state in the African rain forest

that grew in power from 1701 to 1750. With its source of gold, Asante traded with Europe for

firearms take control of neighboring towns. It quickly spread its power to take over most of

Ghana region. Asante, using its new trading networks, bought more firearms for more slaves to

European merchants, ready to take them to the Americas.

African slaves were loaded onto ships with little to no room. They were chained up and

forced to go through months of suffering on the boat, with little water, even less food, and

without care. They were stuck together, regardless of sickness, excrement, or death. If to make it

worse, the first slave ships didn’t have nearly the correct number of resources, causing the crew

to kill slaves in order to survive. To slaves, this was sacrifice, but to slave traders, it was simply a

lose of merchandise. Roughly 4 million slaves died before even stepping on the ship, and 1.5

million died whilst on the boat to the Americas.

If these slaves survived the voyage, they were then they were made to work on

plantations. They were forced into back breaking labor to create resources to buy more slaves.

Slaves were either sent to the States, or the Caribbean. If they were sent to the states, they grew
items like corn and cotton. If the slaves were in the Caribbeans, they were sent to work growing

tobacco and sugar. This went on from the 16th century to the 19th century.

The first signs of the end of slavery started in the late 18th century as America departed

from England to become a separate country in 1776 starting the Revolutionary War. America

created its own system of government with the ideals of freedom to all. Unfortunately, that did

not include slaves. Slaves actually sided with the British as they were promised freedom in

exchange for military service.

After the war was over, slaves, women, and other people began to question if America’s

freedom was truly meant for all. Seeing this the government created the bill of rights in 1791, a

document that would describe the rights of every citizen of the United States of America. This

only fueled the fire, as people began to question if a country that says all men are equal, should

have slaves, a lesser being. The southern states, who’s main source of income was due to slavery

refused the idea of the end of slavery with northern states reluctantly agreeing. Southern states

continued to keep slaves while northern states freed slaves, but still allowed the south to do as

they please for the sake of unity.

This truce, after many years became undone, as the United States began to expand to the

West. With new states coming, both the South and the North began to argue if these states should

allow slavery or not. In 1861, the American Civil War started between the Northern States and

the Southern States for the total annihilation of the slave system in the United States.

During the war, Abraham Lincoln signed the emancipation proclamation in 1863, setting

slaves legally free in Southern states. And finally, in 1865 the war was over with the Northern
states winning. With this victory, slaves were announced free in America, although for

generations to come, African Americans were still not treated as equals.