The Middle Passage

The Middle Passage was the phase of the triangular trade in which millions of people from Africa were taken by ship to the New World, during the Atlantic slave trade. Ships sailed from Europe towards Africa with manufactured goods, which were traded for Africans, who were enslaved by restraints and transported across the Atlantic as slaves; the slaves were then auctioned or traded for raw materials, which would be shipped back to Europe to complete the voyage. A single voyage on the Middle Passage was a large financial undertaking, and they were generally organized by companies or groups of investors.