Database of slaves’ voyages sheds a new light on history

LatinaLista — In yet another example of how the internet can make history come alive for us is the launch of a new database that contains the records of a period of time in our nation’s history that most people would like to forget but none can deny that it helped shape the nation we have today — the slave trade.

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database contains information on almost 35,000 slave voyages which accounted for the forced movement of more than 10 million Africans to the Americas.
Three databases contain information on the ships themselves — names of the ships, their captains, countries they originated from, their cargo and their final destinations; the voyage database that allows users to look for particular slave expedition voyages and finally the African Names Database which “identifies over 67,000 Africans aboard slave ships, using name, age, gender, origin, and place of embarkation.”
While it’s certainly disturbing to read, it’s also fascinating to read and get a feel for what life was like in one of the darkest periods of American history.