The Zorg

A Tale of Greed and Murder That Inspired the Abolition of Slavery

Siddharth Kara

$62.95

Hardback

Not in-store but you can order this
How long will it take?

Availability Information

We source books from suppliers in Australia and overseas. For books we don't currently have in stock, the time it takes to get them from our suppliers can vary widely - from a few days to a few months - so we check each book with each supplier to determine the expected time it will take to be supplied to us.

We then advise you accordingly. If the time taken to get any book is too long for you, you can let us know and we will cancel or adjust your order, and refund as required.

To find out the anticipated arrival time for specific items prior to ordering, please contact us by phone or email:

Phone +61 2 9264 3111, or 1800 4 BOOKS (1800 4 26657) if outside Sydney:
option 1 Abbey's Bookshop (Crime, History, Science, Kids & more) • info@abbeys.com.au
option 2 Language Book Centre (ESL & Foreign Languages) • language@abbeys.com.au
option 3 Galaxy Bookshop (Sci-fi, Fantasy, Romance, Graphic Novels) • sf@galaxybooks.com.au

QTY:

English

St Martin's Press
14 October 2025

History; British & Irish history; Modern history to 20th century: c 1700 to c 1900; Maritime history; Slavery & abolition of slavery

""A book of great importance and one that will likely become a classic."" - New York Times Book Review

One of The New York Times' 100 Most Notable Books of 2025

A Time Magazine Must-Read Book of 2025

A New Yorker Essential Read

From the Pulitzer Finalist and New York Times bestselling author of Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

Perfect for fans of David Grann's The Wager and The Wide, Wide Sea by Hampton Sides

In late October 1780, a slave ship set sail from the Netherlands, bound for Africa's Windward and Gold Coasts, where it would take on its human cargo. The Zorg (a Dutch word meaning ""care"") was one of thousands of such ships, but the harrowing events that ensued on its doomed journey were unique.

By the time its journey ends, the Zorg would become the first undeniable argument against slavery.

When a series of unpredictable weather events and navigational errors led to the Zorg sailing off course and running low on supplies, the ship's captain threw more than a hundred slaves overboard in order to save the crew and the most valuable slaves. The ship's owners then claimed their loss on insurance, a first for slaves who had not been killed due to insurrection or died of natural causes.

The insurers refused to pay due to the higher than usual mortality rate of the slaves on board, leading to a trial which initially found in their favor, in which the Chief Justice compared the slaves to horses. Thanks to the outrage of one man present in court that day, a retrial was held. For the first time, concepts such as human rights and morality entered the discourse on slavery in a courtroom case that boiled down to a simple yet profound question: Were the Africans on board people or cargo?

What followed was a fascinating legal drama in England's highest court that turned the brutal calculus of slavery into front-page news. The case of the Zorg catapulted the nascent anti-slavery movement from a minor evangelical cause to one of the most consequential moral campaigns in history―sparking the abolitionist movement in both England and the young United States.

The Zorg is the astonishing yet little-known true story of the most consequential ship that ever crossed the Atlantic.

By: Siddharth Kara
Imprint: St Martin's Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 239mm, Width: 166mm, Spine: 27mm
Weight: 499g
ISBN: 9781250348227
ISBN 10: 1250348226
Pages: 304
Publication Date: 14 October 2025
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

SIDDHARTH KARA is an author, researcher, and activist on modern slavery. Kara has written several books and reports on slavery and child labor, including the New York Times bestseller and Pulitzer Prize finalist, Cobalt Red. Kara also won the Frederick Douglass Book Prize. He has lectured at Harvard University and held a professorship at the University of Nottingham. He divides his time between Los Angeles and London.

Reviews for The Zorg: A Tale of Greed and Murder That Inspired the Abolition of Slavery

""This remarkable, riveting book about a famous event of nearly two and a half centuries ago finds a raft of new information that generations of historians (myself included) have missed. And the episode involved was not just one more atrocity onboard a slave ship at sea; it was the spark that helped ignite the greatest human rights movement of all time."" --Adam Hochschild, author of King Leopold's Ghost