Slave Trade

Seeing is of course very much a matter of verbalization. Unless I call my attention to what passes before my eyes, I simply will not see it. It is, as Ruskin says, “not merely unnoticed, but in the full, clear sense of the word, unseen.”

—Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (Dillard 1974, p. 33).

Sailing ships brought many African men, women and children as enslaved people from their homes in Africa to the Americas. In our cruise on Insignia, we have done the journey in reverse, starting in the Americas, crossing the Atlantic Ocean, and visiting several of the ports in Africa from which the enslaved people were transported.

This reverse circle is one of the names I found for a journey to retrace the historic slave trade routes in reverse order. Calling our cruise a reverse circle pilgrimage, however, feels very far from true. We are going by sea and we are visiting the historic ports in that agonizingly sad part of our shared world history. However, there has been little verbalization of the meaning on this ship or its excursions. So, to take Annie Dillard seriously, I’ll try to at least begin to call attention to some of what passes before my eyes.

Our cruise’s “reverse journey” started in Brazil. More slaves were transported to Brazil than any other place. This was evident in many of the ports we visited. Today over 80% of the population in Salvador de Bahia (visited on March 7, Day 52) is of African decent. This was mentioned and clearly part of the culture there, but was not really explored by guides or the places we visited.

As we crossed the Atlantic from Brazil heading for Africa, we stopped in Cape Verde, a set of bleak volcanic islands in the Atlantic. The Cape Verde islands were a stopping point for the slave trade. Again, not much was offered from guides on the tours about this, so I’m left with more questions than depth, but we did go there on March 16 (Day 61).

Our first stop on the West African mainland was Dakar, Senegal. There I was able to get an excursion to Goree Inland.

Goree Island harbor

Slave house Goree Island

More African enslaved people were transported from Goree Island than any other African port. Today it is a tourist destination and I really don’t have many words to describe the complex feelings of the place.

I would instead offer the words I found of a Senegalese author, Dalla Male Fofana. Fofana describes the history of Goree Island. More importantly, he offers a Senegalese perspective on the challenges of the legacy left by this history. Fofana provided the Annie Dillard quote that I then used to lead this post.

After visiting several other West African ports, we arrived on March 23 (Day 68) in the port of Sekondi_Takoradi, Ghana.

Ghana has made an effort to encourage the return of blacks in this kind of reverse circle pilgrimage. Here is one of the news reports of these efforts.

In my experience of West Africa, the stop in Ghana was the first time If felt that narrative to make meaning of this legacy of slavery was offered to the tourists.

I was able to take an excursion to visit two of the castles. These “castles” are forts that were built for defense by Portuguese colonizers and later by British. They were used as prisons for enslaved Africans prior to their forced transport to the Americas.

Cape Coast Castle left the biggest impression.

It is a huge fortress on the ocean.

I don’t have good pictures of the many cramped dark dungeons where the enslaved men, women, and children were held. For example:

The experience that stays with me most was a visceral one. In touring the dungeons, we could see that over a hundred people were kept in a very small dark space with no toilet. As we looked down, we were standing on a thick black substance that looked like dried tar. The guide explained that the floor of the cells were made of bricks and the substance we were standing on was long impacted excrement from the times the past.

In the dungeons, were also signs that they were places where people were seeking to remember and perhaps heal. This took the form of numerous commemorative memorials that had been left.

And a traditional African altar also set up in one of the dungeons.

American politicians have visited the castle. My sister Carol shared a March 28 New York Times article highlighting Vice President Kamela Harris‘s as the most recent example of high profile visitors to the Cape Coast Castle in Ghana. (Harris visited several days after I was there.)

Harris is not the first, as the picture of this plaque commemorating the visit of Barack and Michelle Obama in 2009 to the same place shows.

The guides in this castle were some of the best I’ve encountered. They were clear about the history. they did not flinch from describing the role of colonizers in the brutal commercial activity that led to the death and torture of millions of Africans. They were also clear that slavery was a part of the history of this region among African tribes before the colonizers arrived. They offered a sense of the purpose of the Coast Castle as one of needed reconciliation. I left with appreciation for the work many Africans are doing to come to terms with this shared history.

During this whole “reverse journey,” I kept noticing that guides on our visits weren’t talking about the things I knew must be below the surface. I kept thinking that this must be due to the fact that they have learned that the tourists (us) find it too controversial and so they just have learned to avoid bringing it up.

The Fofana article I cited earlier, has led me to consider a second (additional) explanation. Fofana describes that as a Senegalese youth, he had not wanted to hear about, talk about or see the realities of enslavement in his country: “Borne in part of confusion but also of shame, that silence on my part seems to reflect a similar reticence on the part of my culture at that time—as if the wound were too big and it were best not to talk about it.”

To come full circle, I now have a new lens to apply to situations when I’m frustrated with what is not talked about. I need to be more intentional in noticing those times when those doing the guiding are perhaps reflecting their culture that has wounds still too big for them to talk about.