The Blandford Frigate, of 1760, illustrates the narrative of the transatlantic slave trade through the border drawings depicting the ship: 'ON THE PASSAGE TO THE WEST INDIES' on the left, and on the right 'ON THE COAST OF AFRICA TRADING'. Little is known of Pocock's experience of the slave trade, but as a traveller in the West Indies he would certainly have been aware of it. In the drawings he shows two distinct groups of African figures, the enslaved and manacled men, but also those trading goods, including guns, in exchange for their fellow Africans. The activity is drawn without emotion or censure, the trading of people treated very much as a matter of fact. The depiction of Africans in positions of power, colluding in the trade, offers a complex perspective on the actualities of the transatlantic slave trade. The deadpan depiction reveals something of the contemporary attitude towards the trade.