The Africans were treated like cattle. They were chained together under the deck and left there for most of the trip. There was no privacy, they were not allowed a bathroom break. The smell under the deck was almost unbearable. They didn't have much ventilation under the decks, many Africans suffocated. The captives would commit suicide every chance they could get.

The Middle Passage was called a triangular trade because the ships stopped at 3 different locations. A ship started in England, then went to Africa to pick up slaves. Then the ships would go through the Middle Passage to get to the New World to sell the slaves. Then it was back to England to sell the stuff gotten in the New World.

There is no way to tell exactly how many people were taken from Africa, it has been estimated that between 30 and 60 million Africans were taken. About 1/3 of those died on the trip. The Africans died from the food and the horrible conditions. Often the living were chained to the dead.

If a slave had a catching disease, he or she was thrown overboard alive to drown. This was to prevent the other slaves from catching the disease. The slavers also did this to collect insurance. They did not get money for a slave that died to disease, drowned slaves collected insurance however. Sharks would follow these ships in hopes that they could get a bite of the unfortunate slave. If the Atlantic Sea was drained there could be a trail of human bones marking the trail of the middle passage.

Under good sailing conditions, the trip could take a month, the conditions were never good. The trip usually took from 5 to 12 weeks.

The dark hold was about 5 feet high, each captive was allowed the space that you find in coffins. In some of the bigger ships a horizontal platform was added to allow another row of slaves, further restricting the passengers.