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Over the spanning nearly four centuries, the Atlantic slave trafficking system saw 12.5 million Africans trafficked from their continent to the Americas. A devastating 1.8 million of those souls perished during the voyage, subjected to unfathomable conditions of overcrowding, filth, and disease. Some took their own lives by throwing themselves overboard, while still more were callously thrown into the sea.

A Tale of Two Stories

In The Zorg, author Siddharth Kara weaves together two interconnected narratives. The first details a harrowing incident aboard the namesake slave ship—the deliberate murder of 132 enslaved Africans by its British crew. The second story explores how this atrocity played a pivotal role in the ending of the Atlantic slave trade in 1807, thanks largely by the dedicated work of a dazzling array of abolitionist activists. Among them was Olaudah Equiano, who authored one of the rare first-person accounts of the Middle Passage, calling it “a scene of horror almost inconceivable”.

The Roots in Liverpool

The account originates in Liverpool, a port city that at the height of its prosperity was accountable for 40% of Europe's slave trade. Investing in slavery was a lucrative venture for everyone from the wealthy but also the working classes. One such entrepreneur, William Gregson, accumulated his wages from rope-making, ploughed them into the slave trade, and eventually became a wealthy burgher and later mayor. Gregson provided the funds for the slave ship The William, which departed from Liverpool for West Africa in October 1780 under Captain Richard Hanley. Its cargo was loaded with commodities like tobacco, firearms, knives, and various “India goods” such as chintz and cowrie shells—the latter being a standard rate in the purchase of enslaved people.

The Capture of the Zorg

Around the same time, a Dutch slave vessel named the Zorg (later anglicized by the British as the Zong) had departed the Netherlands. With Britain at war with the Dutch in late 1780, the Royal Navy granted British ships authority to seize Dutch property at sea—a de facto sanctioning of privateering. The Zorg was soon captured by a British captain and anchored off the Gold Coast. Meanwhile, Captain Hanley, during one of his voyages, picked up a fleeing British governor named Robert Stubbs, who had been removed for corruption.

The Nightmare Passage

When Hanley arrived at Cape Coast Castle—a stronghold with a vast slave dungeon beneath it—he took command of the captured Zorg. He proceeded to severely overcrowd it with captives, placed a dozen of his own crew on board, and appointed Luke Collingwood, a ship's surgeon of dubious seamanship, its captain. In August 1781, the Zorg left Accra carrying 442 captives, 17 crew members, and one notorious passenger: the former governor, Robert Stubbs.

Kara excels in using contemporaneous sources to bring to life the collective nightmare of being trafficked on a slave ship.

The Zorg's journey was plagued with calamity. Dysentery ravaged the vessel, followed by scurvy. The captain fell ill, lost his senses, and handed command over to Stubbs. Thus, “a ship full of decay and death was being commanded by a passenger.” Kara effectively employs eyewitness accounts to illustrate of the sheer horror. The graphic testimony of Alexander Falconbridge, a doctor who became an activist, details how the enslaved people's skin was often rubbed raw to the bone from being packed on bare wood, their flesh pinched and torn between the planks.

The Unspeakable Decision

By late November 1781, the Zorg was still miles from Jamaica and dangerously short on water. The crew made the decision to throw overboard a number of the enslaved Africans, who had already endured months of appalling conditions below deck. This unspeakable act was not motivated by ensuring survival—the Africans had pleaded to be spared, even without water rations—but by cold economic greed. Ship insurance policies did not cover deaths from disease, but they would pay for cargo discarded out of “necessity” for the ship's safety. Over several days, the crew murdered “those Africans who would be worth less at auction”—the weak, the sick, along with women and children, even a baby born during the voyage.

Insurance and Injustice

Back in Liverpool, investor William Gregson was unhappy about the financial return on his venture. He submitted an insurance claim for £30 per lost slave—a substantial sum in today's money. The insurers declined to pay. In March 1783, Gregson sued and won a trial by jury, with his lawyers claiming that throwing the enslaved people overboard had been “necessary.”

The Spark for Abolition

According to Kara, “there is a direct line of causality between the public exposure of the Zorg murders and the first movement to abolish slavery in England.” Just twelve days after the trial, an published essay appeared in a prominent English newspaper. The author, who claimed to have been present the court proceedings, made a powerful case against slavery, using the Zorg case as a prime example of its brutality. Olaudah Equiano read the letter and took it to the abolitionist Granville Sharp, who petitioned for a new trial. At the subsequent hearing, the events on the Zorg were reviewed in forensic detail, precisely what the abolitionists had hoped for.

A Sustained Campaign

In the spring of 1787, the initial group of the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade first met. Over the subsequent years, they wrote letters, made speeches, organized campaigns, and meticulously documented the particulars of the slave trade. “Their efforts,” Kara writes, “would lay a blueprint for the pursuit of social justice.” After years of struggles, the Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade was enacted in 1807.

A Lasting Legacy

The debate over who or what should be credited for abolition is a matter of debate. The Zorg's influence, however, is powerfully captured by J.M.W. Turner's famous painting, The Slave Ship, which was based on the events of 1781. While slavery has been near-universal in human history, its abolition following a sustained mass campaign was historic, serving as an affirmation to the power of moral courage, the pen, and relentless determination.

The Author's Approach

In contrast to his other work—such as the acclaimed Cobalt Red—Kara has had to fill in certain lacunae in the historical record. At times, speculative passages sit awkwardly next to scrupulously factual accounts, giving the book a slightly hybrid feel. A blend of narrative suspense and part historical analysis, The Zorg ultimately succeeds in shedding light on one of history's darkest chapters, using compelling prose and meticulous research to assemble a account that haunts the reader long after the final page.