Task: Based on the documents below, and your knowledge of social studies, write a short essay of two or three paragraphs in which you:
• Describe the historical context surrounding the documents
• Explain how audience, or purpose, or bias, or point of view affects this document's use as a reliable
source of evidence
Document 1: African account on the Middle Passage voyage to America on a slave ship.
I was soon put down under the decks, where I was met with the most terrible odor. With the stench
and crying together, I became so sick and Low that I was unable to eat. I refused to eat until two
men tied my hands and feet. While being tied up I was whipped and ordered to eat. I have never
experienced anything like that before. I feared the water but if I could get over to the netting, I
would jump over the side. One day it was smooth at sea. Two of my worried countrymen who were
chained together, preferring death to a life of misery made it to the side and jumped in. Another
African saw the incident and followed the men over the side. Most Africans preferred death to
slavery.
Document 2: Description of the Home of a Slave.
"We lodged in log huts on the bare ground. Wooden floors were an unknown luxury. Our beds were
collections of straw and old rags, thrown down in the corners and boxed with boards, a single
blanket the only covering ---The wind whistled and the rain and snow blew in through the cracks,
until the damp earth soaked in the moisture till the floor was a miry as a pigsty. Such were the
houses