Year 8

History
Workbook
Slavery
Lesson 1- What is an empire?

Key words-
Empire – a country which controls other countries.

Colony – a county controlled by another country

Britain had the biggest empire in the 19th century. They had been building it
up for years.

But why did they want it?

Task- To create a spider diagram explaining all the reasons why

Britain would want a big empire?

Why would
Britain want a
big empire?

Extension- Can you put your reasons into catagories?

1) Social (Peoples lives)

2) Economic (money)
3) Power.

Key Question- Which do believe was the most important reason

why Britain wanted a large empire?

Explain fully using the evidence from your spider diagram.

Lesson 2- The Trade Triangle

Task 1- Analyse the source. What can you see happening in this image?

The slave triangle began with Portuguese, and some Spanish, traders taking African slaves to
the American colonies they had conquered in the 15th century. British sailors became involved
in the slave trade in the 16th century.

The slave triangle lasted 300 years. Altogether, almost 12 million Africans were taken as slaves.
A third of them on British ships.

Task

1. Who were the first European countries to be involved in the slave trade? When did the
British become involved?

2. How many slaves did the British take from Africa?

The Slave Triangle

The process was simple:

• Goods from Britain were sent to the west coast of Africa. They tended to be items such as
pots, pans, cloth, guns, as well as spirits and tobacco.
• In return for these items, places such as Senegal, Gambia and the Gold Coast (Ghana) sold
their slaves. The ships with their new cargo set sail for America (including the West Indies
and parts of South America).
• Once there, the slaves were sold (usually at auction) and paid for in goods as cotton, sugar
and tobacco.
 Lesson 3- Source analysis

Use the writing frame below to help with your writing.

Source A is useful for an enquiry into the capture of slaves in Africa because it
shows….. This makes the source useful because…..The source was created in
______ and it is a…... This makes the source useful because….. However, it also
causes limitations because…..My own knowledge backs up the source/highlights
limitations in the source because…..

Source B is useful for an enquiry into the capture of slaves in Africa because it
tells us….. This makes the source useful because…..The source was written in
_______ and it is …... This makes the source useful because….. However, it also
causes limitations because…..My own knowledge backs up the source/highlights
limitations in the source because…..

I think Source A/B is most useful because…..

Lesson 4- Slave Auctions

When a slave ship docked in America, the slaves were taken to a holding block
and cleaned up ready for auction.

Male slaves were worth the most because they could be used for physical labour.

Female slaves were bought for breeding future slaves.

Children were bought as a future investment and because they were cheaper.

Task- What would each one of these people be thinking?

TASK- Complete the source analysis below- (Use the writing frame
from the previous lesson if you need help.)
 Lesson 5- Life on a slave plantation

Plantation hierarchy-

• The owner of the plantation was known as the Planter.

• Beneath him would be one or two managers.
• The Overseers were in charge of the field hands. They would
always carry a whip.
• Then there were slaves with positions of responsibility e.g.
coachmen, nannies, butlers and cooks.
• Field hands were the slaves who worked in the fields. A slave
just arrived from Africa would be given this job.

Task- Why was it important to have a hierarchy structure on a

plantation

Task- One of the key skills you need to develop as an historian is

describing features accurately.

Use the information to answer this question:

Describe the key features of life on a plantation. Use the writing

frame below to help you!

You may include:

• Type of work
• Food
• Clothing
• Housing conditions
• Free time

One feature of life on plantations was the type of work. Slaves were made to….

Another feature was the food….

Slaves were given one outfit a year….

Slaves built their own houses….

During their free time….

Life on a plantation information

A slave’s Day

Time Activity
5.30 am Go straight to fields. Take breakfast with you. Work until 8.00
am. Latecomers are whipped.

8.00 am Stop work for breakfast: boiled yam and okra seasoned with
salt and pepper.

8.30 Continue with work.

12.00pm Rest and lunch: salted meat or pickled fish

2.00 pm Start work again.

6.00 pm Return to huts

Clothing
Slaves would be given one pair of shoes and three items of underwear a
year. Although these and other clothing would be provided by their owner,
they were often ill-fitting and made of rough material

Free Time
Most slaves had to work from sunrise to sunset. Some owners made their
slaves work every day, others allowed slaves one day a month off and
some allowed their slaves to have Sundays as a rest-day.

Slaves would spend their free time mending their huts, making pots and
pans and relaxing. Some plantation owners allowed their slaves a small
plot of land to grow things to supplement their diet.

Slaves were not allowed to read or write, but some were allowed to go to
church
 Housing

Slaves were allocated an area of the plantation for their living quarters.
On some plantations the owners would provide the slaves with
housing, on others the slaves had to build their own homes. Slaves
that had to build their own houses tended to make them like the
houses they had had in Africa and they all had thatched roofs. Living
conditions were cramped with sometimes as many as ten people
sharing a hut.

They had little in the way of furniture and their beds usually made of
straw or old rags.
Slaves who worked in the plantation house generally had slightly
better housing nearer to the house and were given better food and
clothing than those slaves that worked in the fields.

Food
Sometimes they were given pots and pans for cooking, but
more often they had to make their own. The long hours
they had to work in the fields meant that they had little free
time for making things to improve their living conditions.
Some slaves used a hollowed out pumpkin shell called a
calabash, to cook their food in.

Most plantation owners did not spend more money on food

for their slaves than they had to and so the slaves lived on
a diet of fatty meat and cornbread.