The African freedom movement. They resisted capture and imprisonment, attacked slave ships from the shore and engaged in shipboard revolts, fighting to free themselves and others. Sometimes pregnant women preferred abortion to bringing a child into slavery. On the plantations, resistance reduced profitability. Enslaved Africans tried to slow down the pace of work through pretending illness or breaking tools and they ran away whenever possible, escaping to South America, England or North America. No matter what punishments were carried out, or how many harsh laws were passed to control them, enslaved Africans still rebelled. Many former slaves also worked with the abolitionists in Britain and elsewhere;
