In 1845 British citizens and companies were already legally prohibited from owning or buying enslaved people overseas, yet that year 385 captives were “transferred” to a British mining company in Brazil named... Read more »
In many cases, Indigenous enslavement adds new dimensions to familiar histories of the Americas—and to some of their most famous actors. Christopher Columbus sold hundreds of Indians into slavery in Europe. Hernán... Read more »
‘I am painting a historical landscape,” writes Carrie Gibson – “one that stretches the entire length and breadth of the Americas.” The story she applies this panoramic approach to is that of... Read more »
The British crown and the navy expanded and protected the trade in enslaved African people for hundreds of years, unprecedented research into the monarchy’s historical ties to slavery has found. The Crown’s... Read more »
It is nighttime. There are black-and-white shots of blurry torches, dim outlines of crowds shuffling. Against these backdrops, the 2022 film I’ll Be Back! displays five intertitles, telling the story of François... Read more »
I Have Avenged America: Jean-Jacques Dessalines and Haiti’s Fight for Freedom is a new biography by Professor Julia Gaffield of William & Mary. The book sheds light on the life and legacy of... Read more »
Scholars of slavery have long confronted the inherent politics of the archive. We often rely on documents that were produced by slaveholders or institutions that supported slavery, which have narrowed our historical... Read more »
On an elegant residential block in Brooklyn Heights stands what once may have been the most famous church in America. Plymouth Church, on Orange Street, was founded in 1847 with just twenty-one... Read more »
The small town of Ours is a haven for freed slaves. It’s tucked away in the woods a few miles north of St Louis, but it isn’t marked on the map and... Read more »