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Over the course of 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 individuals died during the voyage, subjected to scarcely imaginable conditions of overcrowding, squalor, and disease. Some chose to end their suffering by throwing themselves overboard, whereas others were forcibly cast into the sea.

Two Interwoven Narratives

In The Zorg, author Siddharth Kara presents two parallel narratives. The first details a horrific incident aboard the namesake slave ship—the systematic drowning of 132 captive individuals by its British crew. The second story explores how this atrocity came to influence the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade in 1807, thanks largely by the relentless efforts of a coalition of abolitionist activists. Among them was Olaudah Equiano, who wrote one of the few surviving first-person accounts of the Middle Passage, calling it “a scene of horror almost inconceivable”.

The Roots in Liverpool

The tale originates in Liverpool, a port city that at the height of its prosperity was responsible for 40% of Europe's slave trafficking. Investing in slavery was a lucrative venture for everyone from the elites to the common people. One such investor, William Gregson, accumulated his wages from his trade, invested them into the slave trade, and rose to become a prominent citizen 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 filled with trade goods like tobacco, firearms, knives, and various “India goods” such as chintz and cowrie shells—the shells being a common currency in the purchase of enslaved people.

The Capture of the Zorg

Concurrently, a Dutch slave vessel named the Zorg (later anglicized by the British as the Zong) had left the Netherlands. With Britain declaring war on the Dutch in late 1780, the Royal Navy granted British ships permission to seize Dutch ships at sea—a de facto license for piracy. The Zorg was subsequently taken by a British captain and held off the Gold Coast. Meanwhile, Captain Hanley, during one of his voyages, picked up a fleeing British governor named Robert Stubbs, who had been expelled for graft.

A Voyage into Hell

When Hanley arrived at Cape Coast Castle—a fortress with a vast holding cell beneath it—he assumed control of the captured Zorg. He then severely overcrowd it with enslaved people, placed a dozen of his own crew on board, and appointed Luke Collingwood, a ship's surgeon of questionable seamanship, its captain. In August 1781, the Zorg left Accra carrying 442 enslaved Africans, 17 crew members, and one notorious passenger: the former governor, Robert Stubbs.

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

The Zorg's journey was fraught with calamity. Dysentery ravaged the vessel, and then scurvy. The captain succumbed to sickness, lost his senses, and handed command over to Stubbs. Thus, “a ship full of decay and death was being commanded by a passenger.” Kara masterfully utilizes eyewitness accounts to paint a picture of the unmitigated terror. The powerful testimony of Alexander Falconbridge, a doctor who became an activist, describes how the captives' skin was frequently worn down to the bone from lying on bare wood, their flesh pinched and torn between the planks.

A Calculated Atrocity

By late November 1781, the Zorg was far from Jamaica and critically short on water. The crew made the decision to throw overboard a number of the captives, who had already endured months of appalling conditions below deck. This monstrous act was not motivated by preserving life—the Africans had pleaded to be allowed to live, even without water rations—but by pure economic greed. Ship insurance policies did not cover deaths from disease, but they would pay for cargo jettisoned out of “necessity” for the ship's safety. Over a period of days, the crew drowned “those Africans who would be worth less at auction”—the infirm, the sick, including 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 filed an insurance claim for £30 per drowned captive—a substantial sum in today's money. The insurers declined to pay. In March 1783, Gregson took them to court and was awarded a trial by jury, with his lawyers arguing 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 anonymous letter appeared in a widely read English newspaper. The author, who claimed to have attended the court proceedings, made a powerful case against slavery, citing the Zorg case as a prime example of its inherent evil. Olaudah Equiano saw the letter and took it to the activist Granville Sharp, who filed a motion for a new trial. At the subsequent hearing, the events on the Zorg were reviewed in meticulous detail, exactly what the abolitionists had hoped for.

A Sustained Campaign

In the spring of 1787, the founding members of the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade convened. Over the subsequent years, they petitioned, made speeches, lobbied tirelessly, 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 finally passed in 1807.

An Enduring Impact

The question of who or what deserves credit for abolition remains a matter of debate. The Zorg's legacy, however, is visibly captured by J.M.W. Turner's famous painting, The Slave Ship, which was based on the events of 1781. While slavery has been widespread in human history, its abolition following a sustained mass campaign was historic, serving as an testament to the power of persistent activism, the pen, and unwavering persistence.

Kara's Narrative Method

Unlike his previous books—such as the Pulitzer finalist Cobalt Red—Kara has had to fill in certain lacunae in the historical record. At times, imaginative flourishes sit awkwardly next to scrupulously factual accounts, giving the book a slightly chimeric feel. Part thriller and part serious nonfiction, The Zorg ultimately manages to illuminating one of history's darkest chapters, using powerful storytelling and meticulous research to assemble a portrait that haunts the reader long after the final page.