February 1638 (1637/38 Old Style)
EnslavementBook sources
The Desire brings captive Africans to Massachusetts
Massachusetts and the Caribbean
John Winthrop recorded the return of the Desire from a seven-month West Indies voyage on 26 February 1638. It brought Africans, cotton and tobacco from Providence Island, connecting Massachusetts shipping to Caribbean enslavement.
Dates preserve the source’s precision. This entry is part of a selected historical record; its qualifications and sources are retained below.
Context / qualification
Providence here is the Caribbean island, not Rhode Island. The journal’s brief cargo notice does not establish the captives’ names, number or individual experiences, and the voyage should not be called the first slave voyage anywhere in America.
Sources
- Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States, chapter 2, p. 29; supplied print pages, edition/year unidentified
- John Winthrop, Journal, ed. Hosmer (1908), vol. 1, p. 260, February 26 entry and Providence note ↗