Brooks (1781 ship)

The Brooks was a British slave ship active in the transatlantic slave trade during the late 18th century. Built in Liverpool, England, in 1781, the Brooks became infamous for its role in transporting enslaved Africans to the Americas, particularly the West Indies. The ship is most notable for a widely circulated diagram, created by abolitionist Thomas Clarkson, depicting the tightly packed conditions in which enslaved people were forced to endure during the Middle Passage. This diagram, published in 1789, became a powerful visual tool in the anti-slavery movement, effectively illustrating the inhumane treatment and horrific suffering endured by enslaved Africans aboard such vessels. The diagram showed rows of bodies packed tightly together on shelves within the ship's hold, highlighting the ship's intended capacity for human cargo.

The Brooks reportedly carried upwards of 600 enslaved people on a single voyage, although records vary, and this number often exceeded what the ship could safely and humanely accommodate. The conditions on board were extremely unsanitary, with disease, starvation, and violence rampant. The ship itself was later refitted to carry fewer enslaved people in response to the Slave Trade Act of 1788, which aimed to regulate the conditions on slave ships. Despite this modification, the Brooks remained a symbol of the cruelty and injustice inherent in the transatlantic slave trade.