In only a few decades after the discovery of America by Europeans, the native population was so decimated that it was a profitable business to send slave ships into the Atlantic to perform labor intensive agricultural work. The peak time of slave ships to the Atlantic passage was between the 17th and 18th century when large plantations developed in the English colonies of North America.

In order to achieve high profits from the transports, the owners of the ships divided the hull into between decks, so they could transport as many slaves as possible. This led to indescribably unhygienic conditions, and consequently an enormously high mortality rate. Only the most resilient survived the transport. Often the ships transported hundreds of slaves, who were chained tightly to plank beds. For example, the slave ship "Henrietta Marie" carried up to 400 slaves on a single passage, who were confined to two decks, and each slave spent the week long passage chained to the bow of the ship.