Over the course of nearly four centuries, the transatlantic slave trade resulted in 12.5 million Africans trafficked from their continent to the Americas. A devastating 1.8 million of those souls perished during the Middle Passage, subjected to unfathomable conditions of overcrowding, filth, and disease. Many chose to end their suffering by leaping overboard, whereas still more were callously thrown into the sea.
A Tale of Two Stories
In The Zorg, author Siddharth Kara weaves together two parallel narratives. The first details a horrific incident aboard the eponymous slave ship—the systematic drowning of 132 captive individuals by its British crew. The second story examines how this atrocity came to influence the ending of the Atlantic slave trade in 1807, driven in large part by the relentless efforts of a dazzling array of committed campaigners. Among them was Olaudah Equiano, who authored one of the few surviving first-person narratives of the Middle Passage, describing it as “a scene of horror almost inconceivable”.
The Roots in Liverpool
The account originates in Liverpool, a port city that at the peak of its economic power was responsible for 40% of Europe's slave trade. Financing slavery was a highly profitable venture for everyone from the wealthy but also the common people. One such investor, William Gregson, saved up his wages from rope-making, ploughed them into the slave trade, and rose to become a wealthy burgher and later mayor. Gregson financed the slave ship The William, which departed from Liverpool for West Africa in October 1780 under Captain Richard Hanley. Its cargo was loaded with commodities like tobacco, firearms, knives, and so-called “India goods” such as chintz and cowrie shells—the latter being a common currency in the acquisition of human beings.
The Capture of the Zorg
Concurrently, a Dutch slave vessel named the Zorg (later referred to by the British as the Zong) had left the Netherlands. With Britain declaring war on the Dutch in late 1780, the Royal Navy gave British ships permission to capture Dutch ships at sea—a virtual sanctioning of privateering. The Zorg was subsequently taken by a British captain and anchored off the Gold Coast. Meanwhile, Captain Hanley, on a slaving expedition, took aboard a fleeing British governor named Robert Stubbs, who had been removed for graft.
A Voyage into Hell
When Hanley arrived at Cape Coast Castle—a fortress with a notorious slave dungeon beneath it—he took command of the captured Zorg. He proceeded to grossly overload it with enslaved people, placed a dozen of his own crew on board, and made Luke Collingwood, a ship's surgeon of questionable seamanship, its captain. In August 1781, the Zorg left Accra carrying 442 captives, 17 crew members, and one notorious passenger: the former governor, Robert Stubbs.
Kara excels in using contemporaneous sources to vividly reconstruct the general hell of being trafficked on a slave ship.
The Zorg's journey was fraught with calamity. Dysentery ravaged the vessel, followed by scurvy. The captain succumbed to sickness, became delirious, and handed command over to Stubbs. Thus, “a ship full of decay and death was being commanded by a passenger.” Kara effectively employs period testimonies to paint a picture of the sheer horror. The graphic testimony of Alexander Falconbridge, a doctor who became an activist, describes how the enslaved people's skin was often worn down to the bone from lying on bare wood, their flesh pinched and torn between the planks.
A Calculated Atrocity
By late November 1781, the Zorg was miles from Jamaica and critically short on water. The crew made the decision to throw overboard a number of the enslaved Africans, who had already endured months of obscene conditions below deck. This unspeakable act was not motivated by ensuring survival—the Africans had begged to be allowed to live, even without water rations—but by pure economic greed. Ship insurance policies did not cover deaths from natural causes, but they would pay for cargo jettisoned out of “necessity” for the ship's safety. Over several days, the crew murdered “those Africans who would be worth less at auction”—the weak, the sick, along with women and children, even a baby born during the voyage.
Insurance and Injustice
Back in Liverpool, investor William Gregson was dissatisfied with the financial return on his venture. He filed an insurance claim for £30 per lost slave—a substantial sum in today's money. The insurers refused to pay. In March 1783, Gregson took them to court and was awarded a trial by jury, with his lawyers arguing that throwing the enslaved people overboard had been “necessary.”
Catalyzing the Movement
According to Kara, “there is a direct line of causality between the public exposure of the Zorg murders and the first movement to abolish slavery in England.” Just twelve days after the trial, an published essay appeared in a prominent English newspaper. The author, who claimed to have been present the court proceedings, made a powerful case against slavery, using the Zorg case as a prime example of its brutality. Olaudah Equiano saw the letter and took it to the activist Granville Sharp, who petitioned for a new trial. At the subsequent hearing, the events on the Zorg were examined in forensic detail, exactly what the abolitionists had wanted.
The Road to 1807
In the spring of 1787, the initial group of the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade convened. Over the following years, they wrote letters, made speeches, lobbied tirelessly, and meticulously documented the realities of the slave trade. “Their efforts,” Kara writes, “would lay a blueprint for the pursuit of social justice.” After years of setbacks, the Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade was finally passed in 1807.
An Enduring Impact
The debate over who or what should be credited for abolition is contentious. The Zorg's influence, however, is powerfully evident in J.M.W. Turner's famous painting, The Slave Ship, which was inspired by the events of 1781. While slavery has been near-universal in human history, its abolition following a prolonged public movement was historic, serving as an testament to the power of persistent activism, the pen, and unwavering determination.
Kara's Narrative Method
In contrast to his other work—such as the Pulitzer finalist Cobalt Red—Kara has had to fill in certain lacunae in the historical record. At times, imaginative flourishes contrast with rigorously researched accounts, giving the book a somewhat chimeric feel. A blend of narrative suspense and part historical analysis, The Zorg nevertheless manages to illuminating one of history's darkest chapters, using compelling prose and documented fact to assemble a account that stays with the reader well after the final page.
