Predator of the Seas: A History of the Slaveship that Fought for Emancipation
Stephen Taylor
Sep 2024 · Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Mike Cooper
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9 hr 45 min
Unabridged
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About this audiobook
The dramatic biography of a slaveship turned freedom-fighter-which brings new insights into Britain's involvement in the end of the trade in enslaved people In 1827 the Royal Navy purchased a Baltimore clipper and renamed her the Black Joke. Assigned to the Preventative Squadron, she patrolled the west coast of Africa and freed 3,692 captives from enslavement. Beloved by seafarers and celebrated by the public, the Black Joke would become the most famous weapon in the campaign for abolition. But in her previous life as the Henriqueta, the Black Joke had been a slave ship. Through the experiences of slavers and abolitionists, captives and crew, Stephen Taylor charts the vessel's extraordinary double life. As the Henriqueta she operated as an engine of atrocity, trafficking over 3,000 captives to plantations in Brazil. But subsequently manned by British seamen and Liberian Kru, the Black Joke became the scourge of Spanish and Brazilian slavers. She did so despite limited resources, neglect, and even obstruction by the authorities at home. Taylor offers a gripping account of the world of the transatlantic trade, through the eyes of its perpetrators-and those who sought its end.
About the author
Stephen Taylor is a writer of maritime history, biography, and travel. He has worked as a foreign correspondent for the Times, the Observer, and the Economist, and is the author of The Caliban Shore, Storm and Conquest, and Commander.
Mike Cooper is a British voice talent who left big-city life in London for a log cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Mike is recognizable from his years with the BBC World Service, and as the narrator of countless television documentaries.
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