Jesus of Lubeck: How Africans Were Lured into the First Slave Ship

In the annals of history, few ships have come to embody the horrors and inhumanity of the transatlantic slave trade as vividly as the Jesus of Lübeck. A 16th-century English ship leased by Queen Elizabeth I to John Hawkins, one of the pioneering figures in the English slave trade, the Jesus of Lübeck stands as a dark symbol of the beginning of England’s engagement in the trafficking of human souls across the Atlantic Ocean.

The Jesus of Lübeck, also known simply as “The Jesus,” was not originally built for the slave trade. This vessel, constructed in the shipyards of Lübeck, a prominent Hanseatic city in what is now Germany, began its life as a cargo ship. Its conversion into a carrier of enslaved Africans marks a pivotal moment in history, illustrating the shift in European trade interests towards the lucrative and morally reprehensible trade in human lives.