The map of mid-nineteenth century Africa was vastly different from what it is today. Scores of tribes and petty kingdoms, which were often at war with one another, dotted the landscape.

Almost every tribe held prisoners captured in battle, or kidnapped, from their rivals as slaves. As a result, human labor was treated and traded like any other commodity. Many of these tribes conducted a lucrative business selling their captives in exchange for rum, textiles, jewelry, tobacco, iron hardware, firearms, and other goods.

Hundreds of European, American and Arab trading posts, called "factories," were found along the fringes of the continent. Many of the merchants were satisfied doing a legitimate business trading for the products of the rain forest, such as palm oil, nuts, ivory, gums, and hardwoods, to sell on the world market.

Some, however, dealt in what they euphemistically called "black ivory." This export was shipped out of isolated coves, usually at night, and in great haste. The trade was profitable. A healthy slave could be purchased in Africa for $50 dollars, and sold to the owners of plantations in Cuba, Brazil or the southern United States at $200 or more.

African natives who were sold into slavery were usually already weakened from the ordeal of their capture and being marched to a rendezvous where they were loaded on board ship. The voyage from Africa to the West Indies could take from 40 to 60 days.

Slave ships were Hell on Earth. Packed below deck in a dense mass, in a space generally only four feet high, they passed day and night in the most miserable conditions. In scorching heat, without ventilation or room enough to sleep, and having to heed the calls of nature in nearby tubs, sickness could spread rapidly.

With daily allowances of food and water barely sufficient to keep them alive, a delay in crossing could result in the already meager rations being exhausted. Starvation and sickness took their toll, and as many as one in five died, and were thrown overboard to the sharks. The suffering was incredible.
 

As the slave trade became a hazardous business for individuals, those engaged formed joint-stock companies. The companies employed men, and some women, from many occupations. Many did so as a sideline to the more respectable pursuits of their professions, and may not have even been aware of what business they were assisting.

Few actually dickered with African tribal leaders or haggled with plantation owners at either end of the process.

Most worked in the middle: as the captains, mates, seamen, cooks, doctors, and supercargoes of ships. There were merchants who shipped goods for trading with the native leaders, and dealers in the rice, boilers and medicines that were used on the ships for feeding and treating the slaves.

There were stevedores who loaded cargo aboard, and ship fitters that made alterations to the vessels. There were shipping agents and brokers who processed the port documents, lawyers who defended those arrested, and even fictitious owners and captains who lent their names to voyages managed by others.

Difficult to distinguish from ships engaged in legitimate business, auxiliaries carried goods used by agents to buy slaves, and returned empty, or with the stranded crews of captured and abandoned slave ships as passengers.
 
 

The slave trade had flourished for centuries, and many English, Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese and American merchants enjoyed its profits. By the 1800s, the world was awakening to the horror, death and misery aboard slave ships. As the dispute over slavery as a labor system edged the United States towards regional conflict, even many of its supporters detested the inhumanity of the trade.

In 1800 it became illegal for American citizens to carry African natives for sale from one country to another. (USSAL, Volume II, Sections 2-3, 70-71)

In 1808 Congress outlawed the importing of slaves from Africa to the United States. (USSAL, Vol. II, Sections 2-3, 451) And in 1820, Congress declared that the transporting of slaves was an act of piracy, and could be punishable by death. (USSAL, Vol. III, Sections 4-5, 690-691)

In 1807 Parliament also legislated the British Empire out of the slave trade, and became the leading advocate for suppressing it. Under British prodding other nations followed. Spain, Portugal and Brazil even allowed the Royal Navy to police their shipping and take the violators before mixed courts.

France and the United States refused to surrender their sovereignty, and directed their own squadrons to protect their legitimate merchantmen, as well as capture slave traders.
 
 

The U.S. Navy was ordered enforce the law against the importation of African slaves, first in the Caribbean Sea. When the United States African Squadron was established in 1843, it expanded the Navy’s role in interdicting the smuggling of slaves to the west coast of Africa from stations off the mouth of the Congo River. For performing this arduous duty, the government paid a bounty of $25 for each slave liberated, and "prize money," the proceeds obtained when the ship was sold at auction, divided among the crew by rank.

On April 20, 1859, Secretary of the Navy Isaac Toucey designated USS Constellation flagship, or headquarters vessel, of the U.S. African Squadron, under the command of Flag Officer William Inman.

The British Consul at St. Helena drew this map of the west coast of Africa in 1858, "showing Portuguese forts and trading posts," for Flag Officer Inman (NARA, Old Navy RG 45).

On 21 December 1859 Commodore Inman reported to Secretary Toucey:

Constellation (right) and her crew contributed to this effort with the capture of three slave ships: the brig Delicia on December 21, 1859, the bark Cora on September 25, 1860, and the brig Triton on May 21, 1861.

When a slaver was seized, African natives found on board were taken to Monrovia, Liberia and set free. The ship's crew was usually landed and released, while the captain and officers were bound and waited for trial in U.S. District Court. The vessels were taken to American ports where they were sold at auction by the government.

While the effectiveness of the overall operation may be debated, Inman proudly reported to the Secretary of the Navy that during its twenty-two months under his command, the squadron rescued 3,754 slaves, nearly half the total freed between 1850 and 1861.
 

The bark Cora was a 405-ton vessel built at Baltimore in 1851. Registered in New York, she became a slaving vessel in 1860, only to be captured carrying 705 slaves by USS Constellation on September 25 of that year off the Congo River.

Cora was sailed to Norfolk by a prize crew from Constellation. John Latham, Morgan Fredericks, John Wilson and Hans Olsen, the Captain, and First, Second and Third Mates, respectively, as well as four seamen of Cora’s crew, were turned over to the U.S. Marshall, and charged with violating the acts of 1800 and 1820. U.S. Attorney James Roosevelt presented "Libel of Information," first page seen at left, in U.S. District Court (NARA, Northeast Region, Judiciary Rcords, RG O-21).

Tried on January 12, 1861 in U.S. District Court, Southern New York district, the records of Criminal Docket I, 245 show that Latham was still in custody in May 1861, but subsequently escaped. Fredericks escaped before trial. Wilson and Olsen pleaded guilty to violating the act of 1800 in November 1861, and were sentenced to ten months in prison and $500 fines each. The government did not prosecute the four sailors. The ship was sold for $8,900, and the cargo for $696.62.