This illustration shows two enslaved men transporting a large barrel on their shoulders using a pole in Brazil. The oil is not identified. Ewbank reported how "two Negroes passed me one day with a huge cask of oil suspended from a pole resting on their shoulders" (p. 728). Thomas Ewbank (1792–1870) was an English writer on practical mechanics. In 1845–1846, he traveled to Brazil and on his return published an account of his travels. He was then appointed United States Commissioner of Patents by President Taylor in 1849. Harper's Magazine (also called Harper's) is a monthly magazine of literature, politics, culture, finance and the arts.

Thomas Ewbank, "A Visit to the Land of the Cocoa and Palm," Harper's New Monthly Magazine (1853), vol. 7, p. 728. Copy in Special Collections Department, University of Virginia Library.

English

Image is in the public domain. Metadata is available under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International.

HW9-728c

South America--Brazil

"Bearing an Oil Cask", Slavery Images: A Visual Record of the African Slave Trade and Slave Life in the Early African Diaspora, accessed January 18, 2021, http://slaveryimages.org/s/slaveryimages/item/893