Premium Essay

Gustavas Vassas

In:

Submitted By gabbug
Words 468
Pages 2
Gustavas Vassa was an African man was shipped to the Americas in shackles from Africa only to experience a more brutal form of slavery when he arrived. Gustavas Vassa did the best he could as a slave but often wished he would die, or be put to death rather than live in the condition in which he found himself. With the dream of being free, he believed it was never going to happen. At times he wished he could return to Africa, and be near his family, and the treatment of slaves wasn’t so brutal. He was fascinated by the way his captors did things and paid very close attention to their ways even though he disliked them.
Gustavas Vassa had a hard time adjusting to slavery in America, the slave owners were hypocrites in his opinion and had no remorse for what they did. Yet they continued to treat them in an inhumane way. They pushed Christianity and in the next action, beat them within inches of death for no reason. Gustavas knew no other way of life except to be enslaved.
The natives were impressed with the weapons the Europeans had they had never seen anything like it. They were very naive to what the Europeans were about and were not expecting what they did to them. The Europeans took complete advantage of the peaceful and calm nature of the natives. The Europeans took complete advantage and gained land, crops, slaves and animals, and left the natives completely bare. The only negative outcome for the Europeans that was bad was they were exposed to Syphilis.

The Columbian Exchange was a great resource; it allowed trades of good both to and from the Americas. The only problem is that along with the great resources it brought illnesses that eventually killed a lot of the natives, and Americans also. The Columbian exchange was good in many aspects, but many natives and Africans were used to being treated poorly but were treated way worse than in their own

Similar Documents

Free Essay

Why It Matters?

...Why it matters? It's a mystery of literature involving a man of words. Words which caused uproar back in 1789. The British readers were captivated by his personal experience of being enslaved at age 11, kidnapped from Nigeria, and brought into slavery of a New World in a terror-filled ship. Equiano's tale is viewed as an authoritative description of the villainous Middle Passage, one of the very first narratives from a slave, a story that gave the hatchling abolitionist movement a buzzing moral influence; except it may not be exact. Therein lays the mystery: Because if the gentleman who penned "The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavas Vassa, the African" was not born in Africa, but rather born into slavery in South Carolina -- as Vincent Carretta suggests -- then who was he? Where did he learn to speak fluent Igbo? And how did he obtain such agonizing details about life aboard an 18th-century slave vessel? The air soon became unfit for respiration, from a variety of loathsome smells, and brought on a sickness among the slaves, of which many died, thus falling victims to the improvident avarice, as I may call it, of their purchasers. This wretched situation was again aggravated by the galling of the chains. . . . The shrieks of the women, and the groans of the dying, rendered the whole a scene of horror almost inconceivable. (Equiano, 1789) In that lies the controversy: Carretta's findings, detailed in his biography of Equiano, have ignited a blaze...

Words: 1148 - Pages: 5

Premium Essay

Olaudah Equiano Essay

...slave ship bound for the New World. Equiano was then shipped to Virginia to work weeding grass and gathering stones after a short time working in Barbados. Equiano was eventually bought by a naval captain for about £40 named Gustavas Vassa. Equiano was 12 when the captain brought him to England, and While he was there he stayed at Blackheath located in London with the Guerin family who was relatives to the naval captain. While he was there...

Words: 411 - Pages: 2

Premium Essay

Olaudah Equiano Research Paper

...Olaudah Equiano, was a former enslaved African, seaman and merchant who wrote an autobiography depicting the horrors of slavery and lobbied Parliament for its abolition. In his biography, he records he was born in what is now Nigeria, kidnapped and sold into slavery as a child. He then endured the middle passage on a slave ship bound for the New World. After a short period of time in Barbados, Equiano was shipped to Virginia and put to work weeding grass and gathering stones. In 1757, he was bought by a naval captain (Captain Pascal) for about £40, who named him Gustavas Vassa. Equiano was about 12 when he first arrived in England. For part of that time he stayed at Blackheath in London with the Guerin family (relatives of Pascal). It...

Words: 893 - Pages: 4