African Economic History Special Issue o

SPECIAL ISSUE:
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

and African Economic History
CONTENTS
Preface
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Voyage Database and the 1–28

History of the Upper Guinea Coast
Paul E. Lovejoy
The Slave Trade from the Windward Coast: The Case 29–52
of the Dutch, 1740–1805
Jelmer Vos
The Supply of Slaves from Luanda, 1768–1806: 53–76

Records of Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho
Daniel B. Domingues da Silva
Reexamining the Geography and Merchants of the 77–106

West Central African Slave Trade: Looking Behind
the Numbers
Filipa Ribeiro da Silva and Stacey Sommerdyk
The Shipping Registries of the Havana Slave Trade 107–136

Commission: Transcription Methodology and Statistical
Analysis
Henry B. Lovejoy
Extending the African Names Database: New Evidence 137–162

from Sierra Leone
Suzanne Schwarz
Contributors 163
PREFACE
Under the leadership of David Eltis, and including Herbert Klein,

Stephen Behrendt, David Richardson, Manolo Florentino, Paul
Lachance, and many other scholars, the records of over 35,000 voyages
have been assembled into a user friendly, open source, on-line database,
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database (www.slavevoyages.org). The
database, which is hosted at Emory University, builds on the pioneering
work of Philip D. Curtin (The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census, Madison,
WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1969). Subsequent demographic
analysis of the forced migration of African peoples under slavery
resulted in a more elaborate database, viz., David Eltis, David
Richardson, Stephen Behrendt, and Herbert S. Klein, The Atlantic Slave
Trade: A Database on CD-ROM (New York: Cambridge University
Press, 1999). The current version greatly expands the database as a result
of extensive collaboration among scholars whose research has been
incorporated to generate the on-line database. The great debt that
scholars owe to the editors and compilers of this database is enormous.
Their work has challenged scholars to reconsider the impact of the slave
trade on the Atlantic world.
In May 2010, the Harriet Tubman Institute for Research on the
Global Migrations of African Peoples, York University, provided a
forum for discussion of the relevance of the database in understanding
African economic history. The workshop specifically challenged some of
the achievements of this monumental collaboration and offered new
insights into how the impact of slavery on Africa can be assessed. It
should be noted that there is no standardized way to refer to the on-line
database. In the essays that follow, the database is sometimes referred to
under the names of the principal compilers, David Eltis, David
Richardson, Stephen Behrendt and Manolo Florentino; sometimes
simply as Slave Voyages Database or the Voyages database, and
sometimes among specialists as the Transatlantic Slave Trade Database,
and to distinguish the on-line version from 1999 CD-ROM publication,
as TSTD2. The Web site is not entirely clear on this matter, although
generally Web sites are not cited with their author(s).
In addition to the support of the Harriet Tubman Institute, the
Workshop was funded by the Canada Research Chair in African
Diaspora History and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research
Council of Canada through its Major Collaborative Research Initiatives
Programme.
Paul E. Lovejoy
José C. Curto
Editors
THE UPPER GUINEA COAST AND
THE TRANS-ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE DATABASE
Paul E. Lovejoy
York University
W
e are now better able to understand the impact of the slave
trade on the evolution of the Atlantic world to a degree that
could not have been imagined a generation ago, in a manner
that might well fulfill the visions of Thomas Clarkson, W.E.B. Du Bois
and other commentators.1 Thus there is a long tradition of assessing
patterns of the slave trade. Clarkson was using muster lists to determine
voyage information, and at the same time abolitionists were gathering
testimony on pathways of enslavement in Sierra Leone and elsewhere.
Du Bois searched for comparable information a century later, but all this
evidence is patchy. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database represents
the culmination of inputting data into a common format that was collated
by a team of scholars under the leadership of David Eltis, David
Richardson and Paul Lachance. The first version of the database
accounted for approximately 27,233 voyages and was published as a CD-
ROM by Cambridge University Press in 1999, thirty years after the
pioneering census by Philip D. Curtin that launched the modern study of
the slave trade in 1969.2 The current version accounts for more than
35,000 slaving voyages and has been available online
(www.slavevoyages.org) since 2009.3 This version accounts for the
overwhelming majority of voyages that carried enslaved Africans across
the Atlantic. Its construction is an example of collaborative research at its
best, drawing on the collective research of more than a dozen scholars
over the past several decades.
The attempt to identify all voyages carrying Africans on ships
across the Atlantic world is essential in determining where people came
from in Africa and where they went, although tracking the ships is only
one part of these much bigger questions of the types of research
approaches that are necessary. In the case of the Trans-Atlantic Slave
Trade Database, unprecedented recognition has almost given this
African Economic History v.38(2010):1–27
2 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
database an identity of its own as “TSTD2,” that is the “transatlantic

slave trade database 2,” although the title of the project significantly now
emphasizes “voyages” and not “trade.” Nonetheless, TSTD2 has
emerged as if it is a primary document(s) or a new persona of scholarship
representing the collective input of many scholars, rather than a series of
imputed variables. Inevitably, scholars will be examining the primary
documentation behind TSTD2 and not rely on the imputed variables that
underlay its construction. The Database has stimulated debate on a whole
range of research issues, but in many ways the organisation of the data
reflects the original priorities of the authors and the nature of the source
material. A database is a tool that is used to organize data for purposes of
analysis and is only as good as the imputations that underlay, which
requires careful examination. This raises the issue of how to re-organise
material, given that people with different interests will raise questions
which are different to those originally raised by the compilers. In many
ways, the existence of the Database has helped to frame new questions
and identify new priorities.
This critique assesses some of the claims, methods, contributions,
and also lapses of the Slave Trade Database from the perspective of
African economic and social history and therefore addresses one of the
issues that the Slave Trade Database addresses – the origins of people in
Africa. There are alternate ways of organizing data, and inevitably in the
digital age alternate approaches to identifying, searching and structuring
data are being explored, partly in response to the collaborative effort
behind the TSTD2, which has become the reference. My critique arises
from a workshop that was held at the Harriet Tubman Institute, York
University in 2010, and whose essays are the basis of this special edition
of African Economic History. This essay is intended to explore and
critique the interface between the Slave Trade Database and African
economic history, and by implication, African social history. What can
and what cannot be said in relation to the trans-Atlantic migration under
slavery is crucial to the reconstruction of African history and the history
of the African diaspora in the Americas and elsewhere. Following on the
intention of the Workshop, this essay raises issues that have to be
THE UPPER EAST GUINEA COAST AND TDSD2 3
considered in the extrapolations that invariably will be attempted on the

basis of the Slave Trade Database, which my own work on the history of
slavery in Africa and the diaspora demonstrates. The numbers and the
corresponding demographic implications in studying both Africa and the
Americas are major historical issues.
Most especially, I used much of the material that went into the first
version of database, and subsequently used the CD-ROM version, in my
overview history of slavery in Africa, Transformations in Slavery,
originally published in 1983, revised in 2000 and again in 2011.4 In each
version, I attempted to correlate the projected numbers of departures of
slaves from different regions and places along the Atlantic coast and
southeast Africa, and from these correlations projections were made to
identify historical circumstances that could explain the scale of
departures. The inadequacies of a European “regional” approach to the
division of Africa for purposes of analysis became increasingly apparent
in the revisions of the history of slavery in Africa. While the possibility
of correlating slave departures with the contours of African history
appear to be considerable, the way in which the database is constructed
raises many problems. Elemental questions about how to interpret
inputted data might well change any assessment of the materials that
underpin the database, and it is difficult even for specialists to understand
the implications of questioning the imputations. Any attempt to correlate
migration with African history depends on some assessment of ethnicity,
religion, and other factors in historical context. Transformations in
Slavery presented a model of how historical change occurred in the
context of slavery and should be treated as a first approximation only.
The forced-migration data have to be connected with what is known
about the history of specific places and peoples, and the attempts to
correlate information have to be continually updated as demographic
estimates are improved.5 There is now an extensive literature that
attempts to understand this correlation, including publications in
Portuguese and Spanish.6
Moreover, the considerable knowledge that has been achieved, some
of which is reflected in the Slave Trade Database affords about the
4 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
migration of Africans will surely increase even more because of the

documentation still to come. The database has become an innovative
institution in its own right. Having spawned an editorial review board to
permit new data to be entered on a periodic basis, it promises to affect
research and the dissemination of information on slavery and the slave
trade for a long time. From the perspective of African history, however,
certain questions and problems have to be addressed. TSTD2 is a
database about slave traders and where they came from in Europe and the
Americas and not about the enslaved, except as they figure as items of
commerce, and hence TSTD2 does not take into consideration an African
historical perspective on the slave trade. The advances in the
reconstruction of African history, particularly arising from research at
universities in Africa, suggest that it is no longer possible to rely on
European categories of designation. And the ones in the Slave Trade
Database are no exception.
The Problem of Choosing National Carriers

to Organize the Database
The TSTD2 data are almost exclusively derived from the “national”
carriers responsible for the movement of enslaved Africans throughout
the Atlantic world. The legitimacy of the database depends upon the
input of voyage records and the effort to assess the significance of the
combined data. As the compilers clearly state, the database cannot
demonstrate where Africans originally lived in Africa or where they
eventually found themselves in the Americas. To determine the origins
of enslaved Africans requires extrapolation and synthesis from the
known details of African history, and the determination of their ultimate
destinations depends on the ability to trace their subsequent movement
after ships arrived in the Americas. Although we now know more about
such topics as the intra-Caribbean enslaved migration than ever before,
we have barely begun to understand the actual origins of the enslaved in
Africa. Thus it can be seen that 42.4 percent of all slaves transported in
the period 1700 to British abolition in 1807 went on British and North
American ships, while Brazil and Portugal appear to have accounted for
34.6 percent and ships from France accounted for approximately 16

percent of all slave departures (see Table 1).
The problems arising from the organization of TSTD2 data by
national carrier relate to false assumptions about the majority of slaving
voyages originated in Europe, which is clearly true in some periods but
not in others. In fact references to Portugal could well mean Brazil and
Angola, as well as Portugal, and in the nineteenth century really referred
only Brazil, which is complicated by the fact the Portuguese monarchy
was there for part of the period. Geography and politics become
confused, and the impression acquired by students and non specialists is
that “Portugal” means Lisbon, and not the whole kingdom let alone the
empire. Rio de Janeiro and Bahia were major cities of empire but not of
the kingdom. Similarly, “Spain” was not a factor in the trade until the
nineteenth century, although in fact Spanish merchants were heavily
involved in slaving ventures throughout the period of the trade, as
revealed in archives across Spain. Moreover, the “Spain” of the
nineteenth century was really Cuba, in terms of where ships operated
from. In fact, Rio de Janeiro and Havana were more important as the
home ports from where ships involved in the trade operated than
Liverpool, Lisbon or Nantes. The trade was heavily concentrated in the
Americas, not just Europe, especially by the nineteenth century. The
assumption that the major ports of origin for slave ships were in
Europe—London, Bristol, and Liverpool in Britain; Amsterdam and
Middleburg in the Netherlands; Nantes and Rochelle in France; Lisbon in
Portugal; and even Cadiz in Spain—is complicated by the fact that Rio
de Janeiro, Salvador (Bahia) in Brazil, and Havana accounted for half of
the slave traffic.7 Likewise, Newport and Charleston in North America
were significant points of origin for slave voyages but not the only ones
in the Americas.
Adam Jones and Marion Johnson questioned the way in which
French shipping data was being interpreted, arguing that French records
of shipping in West Africa mostly targeted the Bight of Benin and to a
lesser extent Senegambia.8 In 1997, Hernaes offered a critique of the
Table 1: Slave Departures by Nationality of Slave Ships, 1700–1807
North
Spain Portugal/ Britain America Netherlands France Denmark/ Totals
Brazil Baltic
1700– 16,000 2,497,000 2,845,000 288,000 334,000 1,152,000 85,000 7,217,000
1807
Percent 0.2 34.6 39.4 4.0 4.6 16.0 1.2
Source : Eltis et al., Transatlantic Slave Trade Database
Table 2: Region of Origin of Africans Destined for the Americas, 1500–1867
Bight of Bight of West South

Sierra Windward Benin Biafra Central
Senegambia Gold Coast East Total
Leone Coast Africa Africa
755,500 388,700 336,900 1,209,300 1,999,100 1,594,600 5,694,600 542,600 12,521,300
6.0% 3.1% 2.9% 9.7% 16.0% 12.7% 45.5% 4.3%
Source: Eltis et al., Transatlantic Slave Trade Database.

European regional approach that also questioned Curtin’s schema. He

doubted the accuracy of projections based on the complicated
assumptions behind the imputed variables that are often employed to “fill
in” missing data, such as when the number of people on board a ship is
not known but the size of the ship is known.9 Patrick Manning has also
demonstrated the difficulties of following the regional designations of
the Slave Trade Database in terms of how French shipping records were
to be understood for the Bight of Benin. Manning has tried to assess the
impact of trans-Atlantic slavery through demographic simulation, and his
analysis is invariably tied to the Slave Trade Database and hence his
projections are as robust as the basic assumptions of how data have been
assigned to regional origins that are based on shifting European
nomenclature.10 As David Wheat has demonstrated, there are similar
problems with respect to missing data on the upper Guinea coast.11
Another problem in using Europe as the central parameter of
analysis is they do not indicated that some slave traders who owned ships
were based in Africa. And many crucial merchants in the trade were
based in African ports of embarkation, although the links between these
merchants and the ships is not a factor of analysis. The focus is on the
owners and captains of ships from Europe and the Americas, not their
partners on the coast of Africa. Moreover, people of Igbo, Kongo or
Yoruba background became more numerous in the Americas than
English, French, Spanish, or Portuguese, and hence neither the Africans
involved in the trade nor the victims of the trade are part of the database.
The on-line Slave Voyage Database does have a section on the names of
those taken off slave ships, but this preliminary effort to understand the
origins of individuals through the identification of names is seriously
flawed, as is discussed in essays in this special issue.12 Although efforts
are underway to improve this feature of the database, what has been
available since 2009 lacks an adequate perspective that focuses on the
people who were enslaved.
8 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
The Problem of the Regional Organization

of TSTD2 Data for Embarkations
Which “regions” are relevant to the study of trans-Atlantic slavery, both

in the Americas and in Africa? The Slave Trade Database provides a list
of six regions in which the African coast is divided, including
Senegambia and off-shore Atlantic (i.e., Cape Verde Islands); Sierra
Leone; Windward Coast, Gold Coast, Bight of Benin, Bight of Biafra,
West Central Africa and St. Helena; Southeast Africa and Indian Ocean
Islands. The “regions” actually refer to places of embarkation or groups
of ports along the coast and not geographical regions of the interior.
Despite the difficulty of interpreting the historical significance of
these regional categories, it is clear about half of all Africans entering the
Atlantic world came from Bantu-speaking backgrounds and largely
matrilineal social structures, sometimes influenced by the presence of
Christianity. The importance of this pattern is evident in the study of
Brazil, a pattern that Goulart and Curtin already recognized and
confirming what Heywood and Thornton have maintained for some
time.13 The database also confirms that more than 45 percent of Africans
went to Brazil and that about 50 percent of all Africans came from the
Bantu speaking regions of Angola and other parts of west central Africa,
as well as Mozambique (Table 2). The South Atlantic route between
Africa and Brazil emerges as singularly important avenue of migration,
distinct from the North Atlantic routes above the Equator to the
Caribbean and its hinterland on the Spanish mainland and North
America. This finding alters our understanding of the cultural transfer
from Africa to the Americas. The relationship between Brazil and west
central Africa, especially Luanda, Benguela, Cabinda, Loango and their
hinterlands, highlights the extent to which cultural factors mattered in the
migration; the overwhelming majority of people from these areas
brought a shared heritage of language and custom to the Americas,
particularly noticeable in Brazil. The problem of determining the
significance of cultural differences, similarity in language and such
commonly held cultural features as matrilineality is beyond the scope of

this paper.14
The false sense of precision in defining the coastal regions from
where people came from results in considerable confusion in
understanding how to interpret TSTD2. What is called a region is
actually the coast line, from one port to another, ignoring the African
routes from the hinterland to the coast. While “Windward Coast” was
used by ship captains to designate the area to the windward of the Gold
Coast, but the term has little if any meaning in Africa. Similarly,
mainland Hispanic America is combined into an amorphous area called
“Central America” that no Latin American historian would recognize.
The reference to questionable regional designations raises
methodological issues. How can we be sure that these artificial,
European-determined, concepts reflect what actually happened from an
African perspective? Much of the way in which the database is
constructed is based on basic assumptions of the regional designations of
coastal origins that are not sustainable upon close study.
Another issue to be considered is the ways that differing levels of
knowledge of those who compiled the data might have affected how the
data were organized. Unfortunately, the artificial “regions” that Curtin
initially used in 1969 to contrast departure and arrival data predominate
in the expanded database without addressing criticisms that have been in
the literature since the 1980s. The designations “Senegambia,” “Sierra
Leone,” “Windward Coast,” “Gold Coast,” etc. are fundamental to the
structure of the database, but these “pseudo-Atlantic” terms are
meaningful only from an “European” (and “American”) point of view.
The problems with Curtin’s categories have been well known for thirty
years. There was no “windward” coast from the perspective of the
western Sudan; nor was “Sierra Leone” a clearly defined region and
often only referred to a single river. Although the “Gold Coast” and the
Bights of Benin and Biafra might comply with regional logic, there are
overlapping connections that cannot easily be delimited. The designation
“West Central Africa” conceals major differences between one side of
the Congo River and the other. The presence of a kingdom of Kongo and
10 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
a Portuguese colony of Angola at Luanda certainly were different than

the trade at Loango and Cabinda, and distinctly different from the trade
of all parts of West Africa. Muslim areas in the interior of West Africa
and extending to Senegambia were relatively self-defined as well, further
identifying regional designations from the perspective of African history,
not European naval guides and western scholarly homogenization.
“European” and “American” designations matter from an African
perspective. It is important to understand how slave traders on the
Atlantic delimited the African coast and for what purposes. The problem
is that African regions that Europeans may have defined for purposes of
the trans-Atlantic slave trade do not correspond with the designations of
TSTD2. In determining coastal designations, consequently, the Slave
Trade database has to be used with extreme care. The attempts to apply
TSTD2 to historical contexts in Africa require projections that involve
imputations on top of the imputations of the database. If it were possible
to reorganize the Slave Trade Database to dispense with the European
derived regional designations and instead use historical African
designations of regions, it is likely that the structure of the database
about the migration of Africans across the Atlantic would be completely
altered. There have been various attempts to use the database for
purposes of estimating the demographic impact of the migration in the
Americas, and to a lesser extent in trying to figure out where people
came from in Africa, but these attempts are limited by the structure of the
database.
St. Helena and the Cape Verde Islands (the offshore islands of
Senegambia) figure prominently in all tables in the Slave Trade database
for reasons that are curious. In both cases, students and non-specialists
will see west central African and St. Helena as part of the same category,
but this is a TSTD2 design mistake. St. Helena was only involved in the
trade as a receiving point for slaves taken off ships by the British navy
only in the mid nineteenth century. Slaves came from southeast Africa as
well as west central Africa, and hence the St. Helena data reflects trade
in the South Atlantic but only between c. 1840 and 1860.15 Similarly,
Cape Verde was closely connected to the upper Guinea coast for the
Portuguese and Brazilian trades, and was really a reflection of trade

mostly with Bissau and Cacheo and other areas on the upper Guinea
coast, which otherwise in the database is identified as “Senegambia,”
even though located to the south the Gambia River, and really more
connected with the region that is designated as “Sierra Leone,” which
included the rivers and islands immediately south of Bissau and Cacheo
as far as Cape Mount. Yet, the offshore islands of Cape Verde are
prominent as part of “Senegambia,” although the islands were tied to the
rivers south of Senegambia. Uruguay, St. Helena, and other obscure
“slaving” areas also enter prominently, and misleadingly, into the online
database, but the fact that some ship owners were resident in Africa
virtually slips by unnoticed. Francisco Felix de Souza, the leading slave
trader in Ouidah in the early nineteenth century, invested in many slave
ships during the 1820s, and is mentioned thirteen times, although
identified with his place of residence in West Africa.16 The online
TSTD2 database does not attempt to explore the subject of African-based
merchants who were slave shippers, despite what is known about Lagos
and Ouidah in the nineteenth century, or indeed about Luanda even
earlier. Given that the great strength of the volume and the database is
supposed to be its focus on voyage data, this is a curious oversight or
omission. Could merchants based in Africa own ships? Could they be
partners in Atlantic contracts?
In the interpretation of the Slave Trade Database, what is often
referred to as place of origin generally refers to regions of departure from
the African coast, and often the search ends there, despite the continuous
expansion of the frontiers of knowledge about the African past. This can
be explained by the fact that it is a slave trading voyage database and not
a slave migration database, even though most users read it like this. For
more than thirty years, there has been criticism about the regional
organization of the data, but the compliers of the database have preferred
to retain the inaccuracies of a Eurocentric approach, which can lead to
naïve and ahistorical assumptions about the African background. From
the perspective of specialists of African history, these regional
designations are not rooted in African historical reality, with the result
12 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
that there is limited explanatory power in the use of these designations.

Somewhere along the way, the database project became more concerned
with the ships and the language of ship captains rather than with focusing
on the people and what we need to know to decipher historical context.
TSTD2 is based on imputed variables and otherwise requires
sophisticated interaction and knowledge of SPSS programming to
decipher its codes. Nonetheless, despite the complex layers of storage
and imputation, to the credit of the compilers, the database has taken on
an identity. I am suggesting here, however, that the reliance on shipping
data has shaped the organization of data in a way that raises problems for
those interested in the reconstruction of African history and the influence
of Africans in the Americas and Europe, as well as in Africa. In
considering the links to Africa, the Slave Trade Database is implicitly
Eurocentric and therefore raises serious problems with respect to how the
database can be applied in the reconstruction of African history. Because
the data are derived from ship registers, commercial documentation, and
slave traders, the sources are dangerously biased. The problem with the
construction of the database is that this factor has not always been
recognized. As a result, the Slave Trade Database has an implicit
weakness that prompts discussion of some of the uses to which it can be
put in the reconstruction of trans-Atlantic migration. Inevitably, despite
the overwhelming amount of shipping data that is available, it is often
difficult to trace where individuals who were enslaved actually came
from and how they had become enslaved, but the database makes it even
more difficult to trace origins. The distillation of information into a form
that can be plugged into a database complicates the effort to get from
ship to shore, and from shore inland, and thereby understand the
historical context of enslavement. The European perspective is in the
construction of the database and also in the documentation behind the
database, and compilers have not made it easy to discern differences
between them or attempt to confront this bias with an “African”
perspective that was changing over time.
Why Look at a Database About the Enslavement of Africans

from an “African” Perspective?
The simple answer is, “because Africans were the ones who were
enslaved.” The organization of data from the perspective of the slave
ship has certain advantages since the nature of commercial records has
led to the preservation of considerable amounts of documentation. The
maritime destinations of passengers have considerable value, but the
ports of disembarkation were not where most people ended up. We also
have to understand the data in light of where the enslaved originally
lived, not only their port of departure, defined by regions that have little
historical meaning. This can only be done through careful analysis of
primary data in the context of known African history. We have to assess
available documentation with reference to local African conditions with
a degree of specificity that is not always discernible from an uninformed
reading of documentation derived from the slave ship. The danger is that
historical clues are reduced to categories that obfuscate rather than
clarify. The reconstruction of how the development of the African
diaspora had an impact on slavery and society in Africa are intimately
related to the path-breaking contribution of Curtin’s Census and the
subsequent efforts of Eltis, Richardson and many others in generating a
mechanism of historical analysis through the construction of databases
that can be revealing of trends and can raise new questions of enquiry.
Nonetheless, certain problems arise in the use of the Slave Trade
Database that have to be examined or there is danger that trends and
patterns will be misunderstood, or that some things that might seem clear
and decisive are in fact more apparent than real.
The Slave Trade Database needs to be placed in context of the
historiography of African history and the slave trade. Unfortunately, the
TSTD2 contains only a superficial introduction that provides no context
for the database and its construction. Anyone wanting to know the
history of the project and what the aims of the project might be has to go
elsewhere. Clearly, the online database would benefit from a fuller
explanation of categories and some of the decision-making processes
14 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
underlying the identification of categories. The presentation of the

background to the project ignores a long trajectory of efforts to quantify
the slave trade, dating at least to the late eighteenth century. Thomas
Clarkson, and perhaps Bryan Edwards of Jamaica, made the first serious
quantitative attempts to analyze the scale of the traffic in slavery. Some
appreciation of the magnitude of the trade underlay the anti–slave trade
movement of the 1780s and 1790s, which culminated in British abolition
(1807), although Clarkson could only estimate a portion of trade before
British abolition.17 There were various subsequent efforts to address the
scale of the trade in the 1850s which had little basis in statistical data. As
Philip D. Curtin discovered, a little known publicist for the Mexican
government, the American, Edward E. Dunbar, published an overview of
the slave trade in The Mexican Papers in 1861, which nonetheless was
only based on estimates of the migration.18 In 1896, W.E.B. Du Bois
completed his doctoral dissertation at Harvard on the slave trade, in
which he attempted to quantify the migration, although as Curtin has
argued, Du Bois probably relied on Dunbar for his own estimates.19
Other efforts to document the migration included the work of Mauricio
Goulart, who in 1950 attempted to summarize the research that had been
done on the number of Africans arriving in Brazil.20 Curtin provided an
overview of this historiography, and his preliminary census of 1969
launched what has become known as the “numbers game,” which has
raised scholarship on slavery to a new plateau. In comparing
demographic data on the estimated size of slave populations in the
Americas with available shipping data for departures in different places
in Africa and arrivals at specific places in the Americas, Curtin tried to
determine the relative scale and direction of the migration and how the
migration changed over time. The present Slave Trade Database is the
latest version of this scholarship.
Curtin identified the key problem in any demographic analysis of
the enforced migration of Africans to the Americas—the apparent
discrepancy between the known demographic profile of the enslaved
population in the Americas and data derived from the shipping records
for the numbers of Africans leaving Africa and arriving in the Americas.
Curtin’s analysis revealed that records from some parts of Africa yielded
a reasonable estimation of departures in some periods, and that data on
arrivals in the Americas could be used to fill in some gaps in data. He
divided Africa into several “regions” to aggregate data that sometimes
depended upon fuzzy assumptions because of gaps in data, and then he
compared his results with what was known about the size of the enslaved
population in the various colonies of the Americas.
The accumulation of extensive new data has reduced the
discrepancy in what Eltis and Richardson have labelled the “Curtin
dilemma”—the aforementioned problem of reconciling African shipping
records with demographic data from the Americas. There is now much
more shipping data available, so that voyages are now the focus of
analysing demographic movements. Hence the discourse has changed
and gives the appearance of greater accuracy in determining the origins
of people. However, any attempt to assess population flows relies on
assumptions that are not directly observable in the database. How data
have been entered into the database requires explanations that are not
easily discernible. The designations in the sources are sometimes very
specific and other times are often confusing. For example, a ship leaving
the coast of the Galinhas, often considered part of the “Windward” coast
but which was clearly tied to a specific commercial network on the upper
Guinea coast in what is now southern Sierra Leone. Similarly, the term
Mina, which derived from the Portuguese trading fort at Elmina on the
Gold Coast, had different meanings for Portuguese, Dutch, and French
traders and frequently included slaves leaving from Ouidah and other
ports in the Bight of Benin. These problems are not adequately addressed
in the Slave Trade Database or in the publications that so far derive from
the database.21 This weakness in regional descriptions raises questions as
to the extent to which the database can be used to assess the social,
economic, political and cultural impact of the slave trade on Africa. In its
categorization, TSTD2 does not allow for change over time. The use of
Guinea for the Atlantic coast of Africa is acceptable; its use dates to the
fifteenth century, but the analysis has to relate to specific places on the
African coast that were important rather than larger coastal categories
16 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
that have little correspondence to African history. The different meanings

of the Mina coast demonstrate the risks of relying on ahistorical
categories.
The Case of the Upper Guinea Coast
The earliest European designations of the Atlantic coast referred to the

upper Guinea coast and, correspondingly, to the lower Guinea coast,
“Guinea” being a term applied to the Atlantic coast of Africa at least as
far south as the Bight of Biafra. The TSTD2 does not use the term
Guinea, but rather identifies Senegambia as a region that incorporates
modern Senegal, Gambia and Guinea-Bissau. In fact the region of
Senegambia was historically part of the upper Guinea coast, which the
Slave Trade Database divides between Senegambia, Sierra Leone and
parts of an uncertain region that is referred to as the Windward Coast,
which seems to lie between Cape Mount and the Gold Coast. The regions
in fact overlap, and the distinctions are questionable. Far more useful for
analysis is the identification of specific places on the upper Guinea coast,
especially the Senegal River, the Gambia River, and the various rivers
and islands to the south, including, Bissau, Cacheo, Rio Pongo, Isles des
Los, the Sierra Leone River, Sherbro Island, the Galinhas, and similar
points of departure. As the terms have been used by historians of West
Africa, the interior includes the region of the western Sudan and the
basins of the Senegal, Gambia and upper Niger. The coastal zone is in
fact the frontier of the western Sudan.22
The calculation of the number of Africans departing from the
database regions of Senegambia, Sierra Leone and the Windward Coast
has increased the figure from 689,000 in the 1999 database to 854,800 in
the on-line version of 2009, an increase of 24 percent (See Appendix).
Yet the relative proportions of the designated sub-regions did not
increase in the same proportion; the number of departures registered for
Senegambia came mostly from St. Louis, the Gambia and Bissau. The
estimated departures increased 15.3 percent from 314,900 to 363,200,
while the number of those from “Sierra Leone,” i.e., the region of
modern Guinée and Sierra Leone, actually decreased from 230,900 to
202,000, a drop of 12.5 percent. Astonishingly, the region that has been
most criticized as a concept, the so-called Windward Coast registered a
remarkable 102.2 percent increase, rising from 143,200 in the 1999
calculations to 289,000 in 2009. One asks, is this an increase in the
uncertainty of the categories of ascription, since the Windward Coast is a
dubious concept? Why in the one sub-region where there is most
evidence of slave trading is there a decline in perceivable departures?
More recently, Eltis and Richardson have calculated that 69.6 percent of
Africans left upper Guinea coast after 1740, and 20.9 percent came from
Iles de Los, Sierra Leone estuary and the Galinhas, largely in the
nineteenth century (Table 3).23
Table 3: Departures from Upper Guinea Coast
Departures Percent
Upper Guinea 1501–1641 185,000 12.5
Upper Guinea 1642–1740 266,000 18.0
Upper Guinea 1741–1807 804,000 54.3
Upper Guinea 1808–1856 226,000 15.3
TOTAL 1501–1856 1,481,000
St. Louis 1668–1829 145,000 9.8

Gambia 1644–1816 258,000 17.4
Bissau 1686–1843 126,000 8.5
Iles de Los 1759–1820 64,000 4.3
Sierra Leone River 1563–1808 148,000 10.0
Galinhas 1731–1856 98,000 6.6
SUB-TOTAL 839,000 56.7
Source: Eltis and Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, 96-108.
The problem arises from the TSTD2 confusion of coastal categories

with regions that make sense in terms of African history. The dominant
regional classification in western Africa during the era of the trans-
Atlantic slave trade was the western Sudan, whose relationship to the
18 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
voyage database is missing. Why the architecture of the Slave Trade

Database could not be developed to conform to the outlines of this
scholarship is not clear. Historians of West Africa continue to trace the
continuities and disjuncture for the vast region that stretched southward
from the Sahara to the Atlantic shores from the Senegal River to the
Bights of Benin and Biafra, both of which are located in the Gulf of
Guinea. The Slave Trade Database, for purposes that have more to do
with European shipping patterns than to African history, reduces this
region basically into six zones, Senegambia and Cape Verde Islands,
Sierra Leone, the Windward Coast, the Gold Coast, and the Bights of
Benin and Biafra. The boundaries between these zones may give the
impression of being precise. They have the dubious advantage of
corresponding to the modern political boundaries of Senegal/Guinée-
Bissau, and from there to the boundary between Sierra Leone and
Liberia. Liberia and Cote d’Ivoire conform exactly to the Windward
Coast, which conveniently extends to the border with Ghana, the “Gold
Coast.” Togo, Bénin and southwestern Nigeria form the Bight of Benin,
and finally the Bight of Biafra essentially incorporates the ports in the
central and eastern Niger delta, as well as the Cross River. This was a
schema imposed by Philip Curtin, whose pioneering census relied on far
less documentation than has been assembled in the Slave Trade
Database. Without adequate explanation, the Slave Trade Database
retains the preliminary delineations of the coast and ignores the
criticisms of scholars of this regionalization profile.
A comparison of figures from the earlier version with the latest
version also presents problems that should be discussed. Overall figures
for the number of Africans leaving what I would call the upper Guinea
coast, vary considerably between the 1999 version of the Slave Trade
Database and the current on-line 2009 version. Without question, the
overwhelming number of African departures left from the region
stretching from the River Gambia to Sherbro Island, at least in the
eighteenth century. The region “Senegambia” is euphemism for the
stretch of coast from the Senegal River to the Gambia River, but in terms
of departures, the overwhelming majority of captives leaving from the
“region” left from the Gambia River or immediately to the south, and
indeed connecting with the many rivers as far south as Sherbro Island.
This is the region of upper Guinea. The logical geographic organization
would include this region as one, with the Senegal a distant and northern
tributary, as was the region to the leeward of Sherbro Island. In this
configuration, the revisions in the database raise more questions than
provide answers.24
It is well known that “Portuguese” slavers who were very active on
the upper Guinea coast in the eighteenth century, especially at Cacheo
and Bissau, came largely from Brazil. Research on the “creole” culture
of the islands, estuaries and lagoons of this region is now extensive. The
names of the commercial households that are known attest to a close
connection with the slave trade. Moreover, the routes to the interior were
extensive, following the Senegal River in the far north, and then the
heavily travelled Gambia, before following the many rivers that extended
from Casamance to Sherbro, including the Sierra Leone River and Bunce
Island, which have the ignominy of giving their name to a regional
category in the database, a designation that has no historical context.
How is it that Brazilian traders only account for less than 10 percent of
slave departures from this broad region, which was less than the Dutch as
being recorded to have transported from this broad region in the same
period. The Dutch maintained no shore facilities on the coast, while the
Brazilians did establish partnerships in both Cacheo and Bissau. Where
is the Cape Verde connection, which lends its name to a category of the
database? Britain is credited with transporting the overwhelming
majority of Africans from the whole of the upper Guinea coast, 503,400
of a total of 854,800, or almost 60 percent. North American ships
accounted for 65,800 people, or another 10 percent, which suggests that
the regional categories disguise changes over time.
Most obviously, why are there such significant variations between
the two editions of the Slave Trade Database, the CD-ROM of 1999 and
the online version of 2009? The new findings do not seem to correspond
to events in Africa, or at least raise questions of earlier interpretations.
What does this mean in terms of African history? The current version
20 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
compounds the problem of correlation with African history. This

problem alone demonstrates that the model of trans-Atlantic history
proposed by Eltis and Richardson has to be challenged because it is
based on questionable data imputations. The Gambia trade had links to
the western Sudan that were comparable to the trade inland from most
parts of the region that is designated as Sierra Leone. Perhaps it is
possible that the Gold Coast can be divided from the Bight of Benin, at
least with the justification of being separated by the Volta River, but
much of what is identified with the “Windward Coast” was contiguous to
the Gold Coast—there was no geographical feature in the west that
demarcated these regions, not even for ship captains. Moreover,
Portuguese sources often referred to the coast east of Elmina as the Mina
coast, which was an equally “foreign” nomenclature, just as Onim was
the Portuguese name for Lagos, while Yoruba and Hausa called the town
Eko. For some reason not discussed, the Slave Trade Database tries to
reorganize the geography, thereby missing crucial historical and
environmental contexts. The geography distinguishes the Gold Coast
from the area the east of the Volta River because of the lagoons behind
the Bight of Benin, which run parallel to the sea and extend all the way
to the Niger River delta as far as the Cross River estuary in the Bight of
Biafra. For our purposes here, we need not venture further south to
critique the category, West Central Africa. The point is that the regional
designations make sense in some cases but not at all for the upper Guinea
coast as used as categories in the Slave Trade Database. And by
extension, neither do the other regional designations make sense, but for
different reasons.
The context for this critique is the debate over the impact of the
slave trade on African societies and economies, represented in its
extremes by David Eltis, Philip Morgan and David Richardson, who
minimize the impact and dismiss the evidential discourse of Africanist
specialists, on the one hand, and Joseph Inikori, whose attempt at
relabeling historic events, processes, and terminology has led to an
exaggeration of the impact of slavery on Europe, on the other hand.25
According to the transformation thesis that I have proposed for
understanding the African past attempts to understand the process of

change, slavery was an integral part of African history, so the institution
of slavery and its localized implementation changed over time. The
incidence of slavery seems to have increased dramatically over time,
especially from the sixteenth century, and its demise only occurred under
colonial transformations, and then has not entirely disappeared.
In conclusion, the TSTD2 as it is presented allows virtually no
critique of the problems that have been raised here, despite the
establishment of a scholarly review board. The “Old World” for Eltis and
Richardson, and apparently conceptually implicit in the construction of
the database, really means where ships came from in Europe, and by
extension Brazil, Cuba and North America. The focus is not on where
people came from. There is disjuncture between the generators of the
database and historians who are attempting to analyze the database in the
context of specific research projects and questions that relate to African
provenance. Despite these weaknesses, the data that are beneath the
surface of the population “estimates” that are most easily accessible in
the online database offer the promise of a truly innovative analysis of
African ports and places of origin that does not take the Eurocentric
tradition at face value. The raw data should allow researchers to
compensate for any unrecognized or accidental biases of the compilers,
particularly when caused by the need to stay abreast of the ever
increasing knowledge about African history.
22 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
Appendix: Comparison of 1999 and 2009 versions of Slave Trade

Database
Table 1: Regional Origins of Slaves in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic

Trade: 1999
Senegambia Sierra Leone Windward Coast Total
1701–10 7,600 700 2,100 10,400
1711–20 17,100 3,800 300 21,200
1721–30 26,900 2,200 3,500 32,600
1731–40 41,500 3,800 4,600 49,900
1741–50 16,700 9,500 8,000 34,200
1751–60 47,600 28,400 30,900 106,900
1761–70 51,200 63,600 49,300 164,100
1771–80 50,600 20,400 30,000 101,000
1781–90 30,100 57,500 7,300 94,900
1791–1800 25,600 41,000 7,200 73,800
Total 314,900 230,900 143,200 689,000
Source: Eltis et al., Slave Trade Database (1999)
Table 2: Regional Origins of Slaves in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic

Trade: 2009
Senegambia Sierra Leone Windward Coast Total
1701–10 16,300 1,200 3,100 20,600
1711–20 22,700 3,100 4,400 23,800
1721–30 34,900 9,400 4,500 48,800
1731–40 44,800 1,500 9,400 55,700

1741–50 24,200 8,000 25,200 57,400
1751–60 50,600 17,400 44,100 112,100
1761–70 52,400 42,300 76,500 171,200
1771–80 51,300 36,600 65,200 153,100
1781–90 37,900 31,400 36,100 105,400
1791–1800 28,000 51,100 21,200 100,300
Total 363,200 202,000 289,600 854,800
Source : Eltis et al., Slave Trade Database (2009)
Summary of Discrepancies Between Slave Trade Database 1999 and

2009
Senegambia increase: 48,300 + 15.3 percent
Sierra Leone decrease: 28,900 – 12.5 percent
Windward Coast increase: 146,400 + 102.2 percent
Total increase: 165,800 + 24.0 percent
24 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
1
The research for this paper was funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities
Research Council of Canada and the Canada Research Chair in African
Diaspora History. I wish to thank Mariza Soares, José C. Curto and the
anonymous readers for their comments, although I accept full responsibility for
the interpretation presented here.
2
Philip D. Curtin, The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census (Madison, WI:
University of Wisconsin Press, 1969); and David Eltis, David Richardson,
Stephen Behrendt, and Herbert S. Klein, The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Database
on CD-ROM (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999).
3
David Eltis and David Richardson, eds., Extending the Frontiers: Essays on
the New Transatlantic Slave Trade Database (New Haven, CN: Yale University
Press, 2008) and Eltis and Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade
(New Haven, CN: Yale University Press, 2010). To the best of my knowledge,
there are no reviews of the online database, although there are reviews of
publications arising from the database; see Lovejoy, “Extending the Frontiers of
Transatlantic Slavery, Partially,” Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies 11:1
(2009), 57-70, which is a review of Eltis and Richardson, Extending the
Frontiers; and Joseph C. Miller’s review of Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave
Trade, in Slavery and Abolition 32:4 (2011), 589-92, neither of which is a
review of the dababase itself.
4
Paul E. Lovejoy, Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 3rd ed., 2011).
5
For a discussion of the methodological issues in analyzing ethnicity, ethnic
transfer and transformations, see, for example, Paul E. Lovejoy, “Methodology
through the Ethnic Lens: The Study of Atlantic Africa,” in Toyin Falola and
Christian Jennings (eds.), African Historical Research: Sources and Methods
(Rochester, 2002). Also see Robin Law and Kristin Mann, “West Africa in the
Atlantic Community: The Case of the Slave Coast,” William and Mary
Quarterly 56 (1999), 307-34; Lovejoy, Identity in the Shadow of Slavery
(London: Continuum, 2000); Kristin Mann and Edna G. Bay, eds., Rethinking
the African Diaspora: The Making of a Black Atlantic World in the Bight of
Benin and Brazil (London: Frank Cass, 2001); Lovejoy and David V. Trotman
(eds.), Trans-Atlantic Dimensions of Ethnicity in the African Diaspora (London:
Continuum, 2003); José C. Curto and Lovejoy (eds.), Enslaving Connections:
Changing Cultures of Africa and Brazil during the Era of Slavery (Amherst,
N.Y.: Humanities Press, 2004); Lovejoy, ed., Slavery on the Frontiers of Islam
(Princeton, NJ: Markus Wiener, 2004); Matt Childs and Falola (eds.), The
Yoruba Diaspora in the Atlantic World (Bloomington, IN: University of Indiana
Press, 2005); Curto and Renée Soulodre-La France (eds.), Africa and the
Americas: Interconnections during the Slave Trade (Trenton, NJ: Africa World
Press, 2005); Gwendolyn Midlo Hall, Slavery and African Ethnicities in the
Americas: Restoring the Links (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina
Press, 2005). The publications since 2005 are extensive, and their influence is
not adequately reflected in modification and elaboration of the database.
6
Mariza de Carvalho Soares, Devotos da cor: Identidade étnica, religiosidade e
escravidão no Rio de Janeiro, século XVIII (Rio de Janeiro, 2000), now
available in English, People of Faith: Slavery and African Catholics in
Eighteenth-Century Rio de Janeiro (Durham, NC: Duke University Press,
2011); Rina Cáceres (ed.), Rutas de la Esclavitud en África y América Latina
(San José: Editorial de la Universidad de Costa Rica, 2001); Claudia Mosquera,
Mauricio Pardo, and Odile Hoffmann (eds.), Afrodescendientes en las América:
Trayectorias socials e identitarias (Bogota: Universidad de Colombia, 2002);
Juliana Barreto Farias et al., No labirinto das nações: africanos e identidades no
Rio de Janeiro, do século XIX (Rio de Janeiro: Arquivo Nacional, 2005);
Manolo Florentino, Alexandre Vieira Ribeiro adn Daniel Domingues da Silva,
“Aspectos Comparativos do Tráfico de Africanos Para o Brasil (Séculos XVIII e
XIX),” Afro-Ásia 31 (2004), 83-126; and João José Reis, Rebelião escrava no
Brasil (2a edição revista e ampliada. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2003).
7
Luís Henrique Dias Tavares, Comércio proibido de escravos (São Paulo:
Ática, 1988); Tavares, Desembarque da pontinha (Salvador: CEB, 1971); Jaime
Rodrigues, O infame comércio. Propostas e experiências no final do tráfico de
africanos para o Brasil (1808-1850) (Campinas, SP: Unicamp/Cecult, 2000).
8
Adam Jones and Marion Johnson, “Slaves from the Windward Coast,” Journal of
African History 21:1 (1980), 17-34.
9
Per O. Hernaes, Slaves, Danes, and African Coast and Society: The Danish
Slave Trade from
West Africa and Afro-Danish Relations in the Eighteenth-Century Gold Coast
(Trondheim: University of Trondheim Press, 1997). See also Lovejoy, “The
Impact of the Atlantic Slave Trade on Africa: A Review of the Literature,”
Journal of African History 30 (1989), 365-94.
10
Patrick Manning, Slavery and African Life: Occidental, Oriental, and African
Slave Trades
(New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990).
11
For the most critical evaluation of estimates of departures from the upper
Guinea coast, see David Wheat, “The First Great Waves: African Provenance
Zones for the Transatlantic Slave Trade to Cartagena de Indias, 1570-1640,
Journal of African History 52 (2011), 1-22, whose assessment largely replaces
the earlier work of Enriqueta Vila Vilar, Hispanoamerica y el comerico de
esclavos: Los Asientos Portugueses (Seville, 1977). Also see Walter Hawthorne,
From Africa to Brazil. Culture, Identity, and an Atlantic Slave Trade, 1600-1830
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010).
12
The names of Africans taken off slaving vessels are in a separate database; see
G. Ugo Nwokeji and Eltis, “The Roots of the African Diaspora: Methodological
Considerations in the Analysis of Names in the Liberated African Registers of
26 PAUL E. LOVEJOY
Sierra Leone and Havana,” History in Africa 29, (2002), 365-79. Also see The
African Origins Project, www.african-origins.org/about.
13
Linda M. Heywood (ed.), Central Africans and Cultural Transformations in
the American Diaspora (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002);
Heywood and John K. Thornton, Central Africans, Atlantic Creoles, and the
Foundation of the Americas, 1585–1600 (New York: Cambridge University
Press, 2007); Thornton, Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World,
1400–1800 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998; orig. pub. 1992);
Livio Sansone, Eliseé Soumonni and Boubacar Barry, eds., Africa, Brazil and
the Construction of Trans Atlantic Black Identities (Trenton, NJ: Africa World
Press, 2008); and José C. Curto and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds., Enslaving
Connections: Changing Cultures of Africa and Brazil during the Era of Slavery
(New York: Humanity Books, 2003). Also see Mauricio Goulart, Escravidão
Africana no Brasil (São Paulo, 1950); and Curtin, Atlantic Slave Trade, 47-49.
14
The meaning of ethnicity in this region differed from other parts of Africa, as
reflected in cultural practices such as scarification and tattooing; see Paul E.
Lovejoy, “Scarification and the Loss of History in the African Diaspora,” in
Andrew Apter and Lauren Derry, eds., Activating the Past Historical Memory in
the Black Atlantic (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholarly Publishing, 2009).
15
Andrew Pearson, Ben Jeffs, Annsofie Witkin and Helen MacQuarrie, Infernal
Traffic: Excavation of a Liberated African Graveyard in Rupert’s Valley, St
Helena (York: Council for British Archaeology, 2011).
16
Robin Law, “Francisco Felix de Souza in West Africa, 1820-1849,” in José C.
Curto and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds., Enslaving Connections: Changing Cultures of
Africa and Brazil During the Era of Slavery (New York: Humanity Books,
2004); Law, Ouidah: The Social History of a West African Slaving ‘Port’ 1727-
1892 (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2004), 165-71; and Alberto da Costa
e Silva, Francisco Felix de Souza, Mercador de Escravos (Rio de Janeiro:
Eduerj/Editora Nova Fronteira, 2004). For da Souza’s ships, see Jamie Bruce
Lockhart and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds., Hugh Clapperton into the Interior of Africa:
Records of the Second Expedition 1825-1827 (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 35, 90.
17
Thomas Clarkson, The Substance of Evidence of Sundry Persons on the Slave-
Trade Collected in the Course of a Tour made in the Autumn of the Year 1788
(London: James Phillips, 1779); and Clarkson, History of the Rise, Progress,
and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British
Parliament (London: John W. Parker, 1839). In addition to collecting extensive
data on the British slave trade, Clarkson also tried to synthesize the data. See,
for example, Thomas Clarkson Manuscript CN 33, c. 1823, Huntington Library.
18
Curtin, Atlantic Slave Trade, 6-8, citing Edward E. Dunbar, “Commercial
Slavery,” in The Mexican Papers 1:5 (April, 1861), 269-70.
19
W.E.B. DuBois, The Suppression of the African Slave-Trade to teh United
States of America, 1638-1870 (Ph.D. thesis, Harvard University, 1896); also see
Curtin, Atlantic Slave Trade, 6, citing DuBois, “The Negro Race in the United
States of America,” in Papers on Inter-Racial Problems Communicated to the
First Universal Races Congress (London, 1911), 349.
20
Goulart, Escravidão Africana no Brasil. Also see Curtin, Atlantic Slave
Trade, 47-49.
21
See Eltis and Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, and Eltis and
Richardson, Extending the Frontiers.
22
Virginia Rau, Walter Rodney, P.E.H. Hair, Yves Person, and other historians
clearly established the historical context for this broad region. See especially
Virginia Rau, Uma tentative de colonização da Serra Leoa no Século XVII
(Madrid: C. Bermejo, 1946); P.E.H. Hair, “The Spelling and Connotation of the
Toponym ‘Sierra Leone’ since 1461,” Sierra Leone Studies 18 (1966), 43-58;
Walter Rodney, “Slavery and Other Forms of Social Oppression on the Upper
Guinea Coast in the Context of the Atlantic Slave Trade,” Journal of African
History 7:4 (1966), 431-43; Rodney, A History of the Upper Guinea Coast 1545
to 1800 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1970), P.E.H. Hair, “Ethnolinguistic Continuity on
the Upper Guinea Coast,” Journal of African History 8 (1967), 247-68; and Yves
Person, Samori: une revolution Dyula (Dakar: IFAN, 1968-1975), 3 vols. Also
see P.E.H. Hair, Africa Encountered: European Contacts and Evidence 1450-
1700 (Aldershot, 1997). More recently, see Toby Green, The Rise of the Trans-
Atlantic Trade in Western Africa, 1300-1589 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2012).
23
Eltis and Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, 96-108.
24
For recent studies of the slave trade along the upper Guinea coast, see
Suzanne Schwarz and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds., Slavery, Abolition and the
Transition to Colonialism in Sierra Leone (Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press,
2012).
25
David Eltis, Philip Morgan and David Richardson, “Agency and Diaspora in
Atlantic History: Reassessing the African Contribution to Rice Cultivation in the
Americas,” American Historical Review 112 (2007), 1329-58; and the
corresponding exchange with Walter Hawthorne and Gwendolyn Midlo Hall.
For Inikori’s perspective, as stated at the conference, “Ending the International
Slave Trade: A Bicentenary Inquiry,” College of Charleston, March 25, 2008.
THE SLAVE TRADE FROM THE WINDWARD COAST:
THE CASE OF THE DUTCH, 1740–18051
Jelmer Vos
Old Dominion University
I
n the rapidly advancing scholarship on African coastal societies in
the Atlantic slave trade, the Windward Coast remains a much
neglected area.2 The only study fully devoted to the slave trade from
this region is an article published in 1980 by Adam Jones and Marion
Johnson, which critiqued the census data produced by Philip Curtin.3
Jones’s and Johnson’s commentary ended with a warning that, for lack of
historical knowledge of the trade from this part of West Africa, it was
still far too early for scholars to produce a meaningful census. “What is
needed now is not a slanging match over the totals which Curtin
proposed, but detailed analysis of individual regions and indeed of
individual ships.”4 Using the ship records of the Middelburgse
Commercie Compagnie (MCC), this paper examines regional patterns of
trade between Dutch buyers and African suppliers on the Windward
Coast in the second half of the eighteenth century. After losing access to
West Africa’s more productive slaving zones, around 1740 the Dutch
found new markets for slaves on the Windward Coast, where conditions
for trade were far less favorable. The archives of the MCC, the largest
private slave trading firm in the eighteenth-century Netherlands,
document unusual methods of trading in this part of Africa. In most
African regions slave trading was concentrated in a limited number of
ports, but trade on the Windward Coast was spread out over numerous
small embarkation points. Through systematic analysis of the MCC
records, this paper highlights the most significant features of this trade
and doing so addresses a number of enduring misunderstandings about
the economic history of the Windward Coast. First, Kru-speakers formed
a considerable part of the slaves the Dutch carried from Africa after
1740, despite the absence of major embarkation points on the Kru Coast.
Second, among the Kru slaves were disproportionally high numbers of

30 JELMER VOS
women and children, although the overall ratio of children on board

Dutch slave ships was drastically reduced by selective purchasing on the
Ivory and Gold Coasts. Third, Cape Lahou, on the eastern Ivory Coast,
was by far the most important slaving port for Dutch free traders in West
Africa and was, in this period, rivaled only by Malembo on the northern
Angolan coast.
The significance of the Windward Coast for eighteenth-century slavers

from the Netherlands was first acknowledged by Johannes Postma in his
pioneering work on the Dutch Atlantic slave trade.5 Postma calculated
that after 1740, when the West India Company (WIC) had lost its
monopoly on the African trade and disengaged from Atlantic slaving,
Dutch free traders on the coast of West Africa obtained roughly 70
percent of their slave cargoes on the Windward Coast, while the
remaining purchases were completed on the Gold Coast. He further
estimated that, overall, the Dutch colonies in the Americas drew roughly
40 percent of their slave labor force from the Windward Coast. Recent
calculations based on Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
Database (TSTD2) as well as the data presented in this paper indicate
that Postma’s findings were largely correct.6 However few scholars have
thus far recognized the implications of these results for the history of
slavery in the Atlantic world, in particular the ascendancy of Kru-
speaking groups and Cape Lahou among the African suppliers of slaves
to the Dutch Americas.
Postma highlighted the prime position of Lahou on the Windward
Coast, an issue taken up by Philip Curtin in his 1975 re-assessment of the
volume of the Atlantic slave trade. According to Curtin, the pre-
eminence of Lahou was due, first, to its location at the mouth of the
partly navigable Bandama River, which gave local trade brokers access
to Juula merchant networks in the interior; and, second, to the eighteenth
century migration of the Baule (an Akan sub-group), towards the lower
Bandama, which by provoking warfare with established Senufo and Guro
THE SLAVE TRADE FROM THE WINDWARD COAST 31
communities created a supply of captives for export.7 In later years,

Curtin linked the Akan expansion into modern Ivory Coast to the
creation around 1750 of a new trade route connecting Lahou to Jenne in
the Sudan.8
Adam Jones and Marion Johnson criticized these explanations.
Although they primarily questioned the foundations of Curtin’s
measurements of eighteenth-century slave exports from the region, they
also hinted at flaws in Curtin’s historical account of the prominent role of
Lahou in the Atlantic trade. Jones and Johnson doubted that a trade route
connecting the lower Bandama with the Sudan still existed in the middle
of the eighteenth century. By contrast, they reasoned that this route had
probably been closed due to the disruptive impact of the Akan
migrations. More fundamentally, in their view, there was too little
evidence available at the time to sustain the theory that increasing slave
exports from the Ivory Coast were the result of state expansion and
warfare. “The real origins of slaves were far more complex and varied,”
they suggested, cheekily referring to the slave narratives collected in
Curtin’s own Africa Remembered.9
It will be clear from this paper that the growth of Cape Lahou as a
major port in the Atlantic slave trade is a subject in need of further
study.10 The origins of the slaves exported from Lahou may as yet be
unknown, but very likely local merchants were able to tap into slave
supply networks that were non-existent elsewhere on the Windward
Coast. Paradoxically, Curtin, as well as Jones and Johnson, borrowed
their views on Juula commerce to the lower Bandama River from the
seminal work of Yves Person on the southern savanna region of West
Africa.11 Supporting the position taken by Jones and Johnson, Person
postulated that the Akan migrations cut off Lahou from access to
Sudanese markets deeper inland. However, as pointed out in the final
section of this paper, other studies suggest that even if the Baule
excluded the Juula merchants from their realm, the former continued the
north-south trade connecting the Sudan with the Atlantic coast.
32 JELMER VOS
II
The Windward Coast stretched from Cape Mount in the northern corner
of modern-day Liberia to Assinie on the eastern border of modern Côte
d’Ivoire. This definition of the Windward Coast is the one used in
TSTD2 and was first employed by Curtin in his 1969 Census.12 The
name refers to the coast’s location west, or windward, of the Gold Coast
and thus originated from a European outlook on the African coast; for the
British and the Dutch on the Gold Coast, windward started where the
coastal forts ended.13 Paul Lovejoy has recently argued that such a
definition has little meaning from an African perspective – and there is
no point in denying that – although the Atlantic slave trade was of course
created by Europeans and Africans alike.14 From the perspective of both
African and European merchants it would make sense to consider the
area around Cape Lahou, the so-called Quaqua Coast, as part of the Gold
Coast. The MCC records and other primary sources indicate that, besides
slaving, Lahou also participated in the gold trade and Lahou was
probably connected to the same commercial networks that supplied the
Gold Coast with commodities for export.15 As this paper will point out,
however, trade on the coast west of Lahou was in a number of ways
significantly different from other slaving areas in Africa. To facilitate
comparison with Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, the
regional demarcations originally used by Philip Curtin are maintained.
Much like Sierra Leone to the north, the Windward Coast was an
area for which slave traders showed little interest before the eighteenth
century. European visitors to West Africa around 1700 observed that
exports from the region centered on ivory and did not include slaves.
Along the coast from Cape Mount to Cape Palmas, Kru-speaking
communities also still exported pepper grains (Aframomum melegueta).
This region, hence known to Europeans as the Malaguetta or Grain
Coast, was furthermore frequented by Atlantic traders in transit to lower
Guinea to buy provisions, notably rice, water and firewood. Avoiding the
controlled monopoly zones of Britain and the Netherlands on the Gold
Coast, interlopers of different nationalities targeted the coast between
Cape Lahou and Assinie to purchase ivory and small amounts of gold
dust.16 These interlopers may have purchased small numbers of slaves as
well.17
Throughout the history of the Atlantic slave trade, no region in
Africa supplied fewer slaves to the Americas than the Windward Coast.
According to the TSTD2, an estimated total of 337,000 slaves were
carried from the Windward Coast, of which 290,000 embarked in the
eighteenth century alone. These estimates are much lower than those
previously calculated by Curtin, whose latest figure was 530,000 for the
period 1711-1800,18 but much higher than the 143,000 suggested for the
eighteenth century by the 1999 slave trade database on CD-ROM.19
Furthermore, the Windward Coast was the last region in Africa which
European merchants opened for transatlantic slaving, although it already
had exported pepper to European markets since the late fifteenth century.
In the sixteenth century, a small number of slaves were sold to the
Portuguese, who also used to carry slaves from the Windward Coast to
Elmina.20 During the seventeenth century, just a few European ships
appear to have loaded slaves there.21 The Windward Coast only started to
supply slaves on a significant scale for the Atlantic market after 1700.
Slave exports increased in the second quarter of the eighteenth century,
while a peak was attained in the third quarter, which was largely due to
British activities. Liverpool merchants in particular traded heavily on the
northern part of the coast (especially at Cape Mount), often to
complement a trade that started in Sierra Leone. As the British withdrew
from the trade after 1807, the Windward Coast’s function in Atlantic
slavery was severely cut. Adding to declining British demand for slaves,
another nation with a major stake in the region, the Netherlands, also
abandoned the slave trade shortly after 1800.
The Netherlands were, after Britain, the second largest national
carrier of slaves from the Windward Coast. In the eighteenth century,
Dutch vessels shipped roughly 90,000 slaves from the region, almost all
of them destined for the Guyanas. But it is remarkable that the Dutch
only began trading slaves on the Windward Coast after 1740, that is,
after the WIC had largely withdrawn from the Atlantic trade.22 Whereas
34 JELMER VOS
the WIC never had a strong commercial interest in the region, interlopers
from Zeeland frequented the Windward Coast when the WIC held a
monopoly over the West African trade (which effectively ended in
1734), thereby setting a pattern for the later free traders.23 The directors
of the Zeeland-based MCC were well informed about the interloping
activities of the Middelburg and Vlissingen merchants and the African
markets in which they operated; in the 1720s they even participated in an
illegal trade expedition to the Loango Coast.24
Although Dutch purchases fell far behind those of Britain in terms
of volume, no other slave trading nation relied more on the Windward
Coast than the Netherlands. Whereas British vessels loaded 6 percent of
all slaves they carried across the Atlantic on the Windward Coast, Dutch
traders obtained 16 percent of their slave cargoes from this region. In the
eighteenth century alone, the Windward Coast accounted for nearly a
quarter of all Dutch slave exports from Africa. For Dutch free traders the
Windward Coast gained particular importance as by the middle of the
eighteenth century British, Portuguese and French merchants had
squeezed the Dutch out of the Bight of Biafra and then the Bight of
Benin, where some of Africa’s most productive slaving ports were
located. In places like Old Calabar and Ouidah, large numbers of slaves
could be obtained in short spans of time. As business in these regions
proved more cost-effective for European traders, it also became
competitive, and the Dutch were eventually boxed out.25 Dutch exports
from the Bight of Biafra dropped from six thousand slaves in the decade
prior to 1670 to two thousand slaves in the decade after; in subsequent
years these numbers dwindled even further. For some time the Dutch still
maintained a foothold in the Bight of Benin, but after 1740 their slave
purchases in this region also collapsed. Seeking new alternatives for the
growing plantation colonies in the Guyanas, Dutch traders migrated to
the Windward Coast while they also increased their dependence on the
Loango Coast and the Gold Coast.
In each of these areas, the Dutch slave trade always centered on a
single port. Thus, as the eighteenth century progressed, on the Loango
Coast Dutch slavers increasingly concentrated in Malembo. On the Gold
Coast, Elmina emerged as the major center of trade, while on the

Windward Coast Cape Lahou was the only major supplier of slaves to
the Dutch. Together these three ports accounted for roughly two-thirds of
the Dutch slave trade out of Africa between 1730 and 1800.26 It should
be emphasized, however, that Lahou and the Gold Coast were part of the
same trade route, commonly described as the Dutch “Guinea trade.” On
this route, ship captains (or their supercargoes) typically started
purchasing slaves on the upper Windward Coast, most often near Cape
Mesurado. Then they sailed down along the coast, all the while trading
slaves, until they reached Lahou on the Ivory Coast, where most of the
purchases were done. Ultimately, the ship’s hold was “filled up” in one
or more of the Gold Coast ports. In the 1740s, Axim was often the final
port of slave embarkation, followed in the 1750s by Anamabo and
Apam, and by Elmina from the 1760s onward. By contrast, Malembo
was part of the so-called “Angola trade,” which also included Loango
and Cabinda, although in the latter ports the Dutch had far less
purchasing power as the century wore on.
III
This study is based on a database of 72 slaving voyages undertaken by

the MCC between 1740 and 1802. For each voyage, the database
provides the number of slaves purchased at every single embarkation
point, with breakdowns for the age and gender characteristics of the
slaves. The database also indicates the time vessels spent on the African
coast purchasing slaves, as well as slave mortality rates on the coast,
during the Middle Passage and after arrival in the Americas. As the
largest private slave trading firm in the Netherlands, the MCC organized
a total of 114 slaving voyages between 1732 and 1802, all but two of
which were carried out between 1740 and 1794.27 Eighty voyages were
destined to the Guinea Coast, three to Gabon, and thirty-one to the
Loango Coast. The database builds on information taken from the
surviving log and/or trade books of 69 Guinea voyages and the three
36 JELMER VOS
voyages to Gabon, all located in the provincial archives of Zeeland in

Middelburg.28
The database lists 88 different places on the West African coast
where MCC vessels purchased slaves. For the purpose of analysis, these
ports have been divided into five groups.
Table 1: Regional Distribution of Slave Purchases in the MCC

Guinea Trade, 1740–1803 (72 voyages)
Region Ports Slaves Percent Total TSTD2
Dutch estimates
Guinea
trade,
1741–1803
Senegambia &
off-shore – – – – 426
Atlantic
Sierra Leone 5 97 0.5 679 829
Windward Coast
west of Lahou 44 4,520 23.9 31,638
(Kru Coast)
Cape Lahou 1 7,179 38.0 50,249
Windward Coast 77,867
east of Lahou 9 1,039 5.5 7,272
(Quaqua Coast)
Gold Coast 21 5,339 28.2 37,370 48,942
East of Gold
8 735 3.9 5,145 4,715
Coast
All regions 88 18,909 100 132,353 132,353
Source: MCC database and David Eltis, David Richardson, Manolo Florentino, and
Stephen D. Behrendt, Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database
(www.slavevoyages.org).
The first group includes five ports in the Sierra Leone region, north
of Cape Mount, which accounted for less than one percent of the MCC’s
slave trade in West Africa. The second group comprises 44 ports on the
Windward Coast from Cape Mount to Little Lahou, a long stretch of
coast inhabited by Kru-speaking groups and also known as the Kru coast.
Cape Lahou (aka Grand Lahou), which alone accounted for nearly 40
percent of the MCC’s slave trade in West Africa, constitutes the third
group. The fourth group includes nine ports on the Windward Coast east
of Lahou. European merchants named this region the Quaqua coast,
which also included Lahou and was famed for its exports of striped
cloth.29 The Gold Coast, with 21 ports from Newton to Accra, makes up
the fifth group, while eight ports located east of the Volta River form the
final group (better known among historians as the Bight of Benin and the
Bight of Biafra). None of the MCC vessels in the database purchased
slaves in Senegambia.
Table 1 shows the regional distribution of the total number of slaves
purchased by the MCC in West Africa. As is clear from this table, the
Windward Coast accounted for two-thirds of the MCC’s slave exports
from Guinea. This figure is representative of the total Dutch slave trade
in the free trade era. Extensive consultation of MCC ship journals proves
that vessels from Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Vlissingen followed the
same trading pattern as the MCC ships. We can, therefore, confidently
project the regional percentages calculated from the MCC database onto
the TSTD2 estimate for the total Dutch slave trade in West Africa
between 1741 and 1805. The result, as shown in Table 1, is that the
Windward Coast supplied approximately 89,000 slaves to the Dutch in
this period, which means 11,000 more slaves than the Transatlantic
Slave Trade Database suggests.
The difference between the MCC database and TSTD2 stems from
the fact that the former has not yet been fully integrated in the latter. The
Transatlantic Slave Trade Database consequently underrates the size of
the slave trade from Cape Lahou, for which it suggests an estimated total
of nearly 15,000 slaves embarked by all national carriers between 1709
and 1820. At the same time, TSTD2 is biased towards Elmina, which in
the absence of contrary evidence has been viewed as the main location of
slave embarkation in case it was the last port of call on the African coast,
38 JELMER VOS
which it often was for Dutch vessels. As a result, the Transatlantic Slave
Trade Database inflates the number of slaves carried from the Gold
Coast at the cost of the Windward Coast, where in most cases the
majority of slaves was really purchased.
The method of slave procurement proves as important as the
numbers. Compared to other regions in Africa, trade on the Windward
Coast was following an unusual pattern. Ship captains generally called at
different places along the coast (of the 54 identified places of purchase
on the Windward Coast, some were almost standard ports of call,
whereas others were visited on a less frequent basis) but at most they
purchased only small numbers of slaves. Table 2 shows that, except for
Cape Lahou, not a single place on the Windward Coast supplied more
than seven slaves per voyage. One reason for this seemingly haphazard
nature of the trade can be found in the region’s geography. This part of
the West African coast is characterized by steep beaches, heavy surf, few
decent river inlets and a shortage of good anchorages throughout. “For
lack of natural harbors,” Curtin explains, “trade along this coast was
fragmented, divided among many small ports or shipping points.”30 Due
to the absence of good landing spots, maritime trade had to be ship-
based.
The MCC logbooks describe in detail how captains used to stop at
several points along the coast, often sailing back and forth, waiting for
African traders to come out by canoe or for a smoke signal from land
telling there was an opportunity to barter. Alternatively, captains sent
boats ashore to collect information about the possibilities of trade. In this
“troque au vol” style of trade, Dutch captains sometimes bought a
handful of slaves at a single place, but quite often they bought no slaves
at all. In exploiting practically all the markets for slaves that existed on
the Windward Coast, the Dutch distinguished themselves from British
and French buyers, who generally focused on the northern part of the
coast (especially Cape Mount and Bassa). The fact that, according to
TSTD2, only twenty-four British and eighteen French vessels traded
slaves at Cape Lahou throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth
centuries is astounding, especially since this port had the capacity to

supply the Dutch with an average of 800 slaves per year.
Table 2: Ten Most Important Places of Purchase in the MCC Guinea

Trade, 1740–1803 (72 voyages)
Place Region Slaves Slaves/voyage % of
total
trade
Cape Lahou Quaqua coast 7,179 100 38.0
Elmina Gold Coast 1,996 28 10.6
Axim Gold Coast 1,111 15 5.9
Anamabo Gold Coast 554 8 2.9
Kru Settra Kru coast 501 7 2.6
Apam Gold Coast 458 6 2.4
Sassandra Kru coast 451 6 2.4
Cape Mount Kru coast 416 6 2.2
Grand Bassam Quaqua coast 408 6 2.2
Rio Cavaly Kru coast 360 5 1.9
Total 13,434 71.0
Source: MCC database
Equally striking are the irregular age and gender distributions in the
different port groups. As Table 3 demonstrates, the share of males among
the slaves purchased on the coast west of Lahou was a mere 52 percent;
meanwhile children formed an extraordinarily large fraction of the slaves
taken from the Kru coast (42 percent). Cape Lahou exported relatively
few children, but the female share was still exceptionally high (45
percent). East of Lahou, slave purchases focused increasingly on males
and included very few children. Compared to the Atlantic slave trade in
general, females were overrepresented in the Guinea trade and children
underrepresented, despite the large numerical presence of the latter
among the slaves carried from the coast west of Lahou.
On average, the MCC vessels spent 222 days on the African coast
buying slaves. The average number of slaves carried per voyage was
40 JELMER VOS
269, which translates to a purchase rate of 1.2 slaves per day (which was
similar to daily loading rates of Liverpool ships trading on the Windward
Coast). One would expect that the long trading time in Africa raised not
only the costs of outfitting a slaving voyage, but also the mortality rates
among crew and slaves.31 The MCC data on slave mortality, however,
run contrary to expectations. First, the overall death rate of 12.9 percent
was low by Dutch standards. TSTD2 indicates that of all slaves shipped
by the WIC from West Africa, 16.8 percent had died before sale in the
Americas. Furthermore, mortality rates were higher during the Middle
Passage, which on average lasted about seventy days, than during the
seven or eight months that MCC vessels spent loading slaves on the
coast. The number of slaves who died on board ship in Africa was 4.3
percent of the total purchased, while the death rate during the Atlantic
crossing amounted to 7.7 percent. The reason for this comes from the
fact that the vast majority of slaves embarked during the latter part of the
loading period, whereas the impact of disease factors rose as the voyage
progressed.
Table 3: Age and Gender Distribution of Slaves in the MCC Guinea

Trade, 1740–1803 (72 voyages)
Region Percent male Percent children
Windward Coast west of
51.9 42.1
Lahou
Cape Lahou 54.4 11.3
Windward Coast east of Lahou 58.2 7.4
Gold Coast 65.8 8.7
Total Guinea Coast 57.1 18.5
Total Africa (TSTD2) 64.6 20.9
Source: MCC database and TSTD2
Although the study of slave mortality falls largely outside the

boundaries of this paper, it touches directly upon questions about
regional differences in slave supplies. Using a sample of 39 MCC slaving
voyages, Simon Hogerzeil and David Richardson have recently linked
shipboard mortality data to differing “purchasing strategies” in the Dutch

Guinea trade.32 They demonstrate that the number of slaves obtained per
week by the MCC vessels rose as time progressed. “During most of the
purchase period, [the] pattern of acquisitions was fairly homogeneous or
constant... with slaves being acquired at the rate of up to five a week up
to 20 weeks before departure from Africa, and rising to about eight a
week... between 20 and six weeks before departure.”33 During the last
month acquisition patterns changed radically, as the vessels used to
complete their purchases at one of the Gold Coast forts, often by placing
an order in advance. Indeed, 22 percent of the slaves were bought in the
last of the seven or eight months spent on the African coast, and 15
percent during the final week before sailing. Unfortunately, Hogerzeil
and Richardson fail to recognize the importance of Lahou as a supplier to
the MCC vessels. “Slaves were acquired at the Windward Coast at
various places, with no single location predominating,” they state.34
However, the small increment in the purchase rate between twenty and
six weeks before departure came from the vessels’ stay at Lahou in this
period.
Nevertheless, the implication of these findings for the analysis of
shipboard mortality is that, although MCC vessels spent an exceptionally
long time on the African coast, the time during which slaves were
exposed to risk factors on board ship was on average significantly
shorter. Hogerzeil and Richardson also underline that “the last minute
surge in purchases… centered disproportionately on adults, especially
men.”35 Mortality normally increased for all slaves throughout the
loading phase, as well the Middle Passage, but death rates of children
and women usually remained lower than those of men. The fact that most
men embarked during the last part of the loading phase helped to keep
mortality rates down.
Examining the peculiar age and gender ratios of the MCC slave
acquisitions, Hogerzeil and Richardson introduce the concept of
“purchasing strategies.” In their view, the disproportionately high
number of women and children loaded on the Windward Coast was the
result of a deliberate choice of the MCC captains. “As time spent on
42 JELMER VOS
board ship was widely considered a health hazard for slaves, a deferral in
purchasing high-value adult males was perhaps to be expected. In other
words, it reflected a policy adjustment by MCC shippers to coastal price
differentials among categories of slaves largely dictated, it seems, by
planter preferences for adult males in the Americas.”36 In addition, the
comparatively high propensity of slaves from the Windward Coast to
rebel on board ship might also have influenced regional patterns of slave
exports.37 “The relative lateness in finalizing the loading of adult males
may… have been just as much an adjustment to fears of slave rebellion
as to the price premium on adult male slaves.”38
This study argues for a more Afrocentric explanation of the regional
differences in the MCC’s Guinea trade. Hogerzeil and Richardson do not
exclude the possibility that African factors influenced Dutch “purchasing
strategies” on the Windward Coast. The rising demand for African
workers in Dutch Guyana after 1750, combined with a strong
competition for slaves in other regions of Atlantic Africa, “brought MCC
shippers… into contact with emergent slave supply systems that were
perhaps less efficient than the well-established systems of the Gold Coast
in satisfying shippers’ preferences for slaves.”39 Indeed, the picture that
emerges from the MCC ship journals is that, on the Windward Coast
west of Lahou, Dutch captains had little choice in their purchases. The
slaves offered for sale were small in number and were mainly women
and children.
IV
We now return to the origins of the slaves exported from the Windward
Coast, analytically divided in three port groups. Cape Lahou was by far
the largest slaving port on the Windward Coast, and it was
predominantly trading with vessels coming from the Netherlands.
Between 1740 and 1805, when Lahou exported an estimated 50,000
slaves via Dutch vessels (Table 1), it stood out as the most important
supplier of African labor to the Dutch Americas after Malembo, the
center of the Dutch slave trade on the Loango Coast. Local brokers and
small independent traders sold on average 100 slaves per voyage to the
MCC (Table 3). Although prices were much higher here than on the
coast further windward, Lahou was attractive because it was able to
supply slaves in much larger numbers and more swiftly. With average
annual sales of more than 800 slaves after 1740, there can be little doubt
that Lahou merchants tapped into hinterland markets that were
unavailable to most other ports on the Windward Coast. The historical
literature provides a few, though contradictory, clues about the
commercial networks that connected Lahou with the interior and,
therefore, about the possible origins of the exported slaves. The work of
Yves Person suggests that by the time the Dutch intensified their
commercial relations with Lahou, the latter was already cut off from a
direct north-south connection with the Sudan. This route, which linked
the lower Bandama River via Kong and Old Boron to the Sudanese
centre of Jenne, had been established by Malinke and Juula groups in the
early 1600s. When the Baule migrated into the Bandama region in the
early eighteenth century, however, the Juula trade networks were
dismantled. Long-distance trade was replaced by a “system of relays
carrying goods from place to place under the control of local chiefs. Thus
from the first quarter of the eighteenth century the Bandama route was
closed to Sudanese trade… On the coast, Lahou fell into a decline and
ships stopped calling there.”40 Excluded from the trade networks in the
Baule savanna, Juula merchants concentrated on alternative channels to
the Atlantic coast, notably Kumase in the Asante kingdom, but also the
Comoe River that gave access to outlets at Bassam and Assinie.41
The evidence presented in this paper indicates, however, that Lahou
did not fall into decline after 1700 but instead flourished through its
commercial relations with the Dutch. In a number of publications on the
pre-colonial history of the Baule and the hinterland of the Quaqua Coast,
Timothy Weiskel has also failed to recognize the economic vitality of
Lahou in the eighteenth century. “During most of the eighteenth
century,” Weiskel has argued, “the trade arriving at Grand Lahou, the
natural outlet for the Baule southern trade, was never significant enough
to attract sustained European interest.”42 In his view the commercial
44 JELMER VOS
networks of the Baule that replaced the long-distance trade routes of the
Juula were, because of the former’s Akan connection, directed more
towards the east than to the south. It is worth pointing out, in this regard,
that except for three voyages to Gabon, every single MCC vessel in our
database purchased slaves at Lahou, which was moreover the principal
port of embarkation in 48 out of a total of 69 cases.
In contrast to Person and Weiskel, Jean-Piere Chauveau has argued
that the historical north-south trade between Lahou and the Sudan was
not interrupted by the Baule migrations. In his analysis, the Baule
monopolized the transportation of goods within their country while they
traded with foreign merchants at so-called “transit markets” at the
frontiers of their territory. Thus they maintained commercial relations
with the Juula in the north, with the Guro in the west (via Toumodi and
Kokumbo), and with merchants from Lahou in the southern town of
Tiassalé, located at the banks of the lower Bandama (only from here to
the coast was the river navigable). In this the Baule largely followed the
old north-south axis of trade, through which Atlantic imports were
exchanged for products like ivory, gold and slaves.43 As for the origins of
the slaves traded by the Baule, Chauveau suggests that the majority was
purchased from Guro and Juula merchants and probably came from the
north.44 The strong ties between the Baule and the Guro have been
confirmed by the oral traditions Claude Meillassoux collected in Guro
country. According to his informants, European imports reached the
Guro via the port of Bassam and the Baule town of Toumodi. In return,
the Guro supplied the Baule with ivory, war captives as well as slaves
purchased from the northern Malinke.45 Although Lahou is not
mentioned in this context, it seems clear that a substantial part of the
slave imports of the Baule, on whom Lahou merchants relied for their
supplies, stemmed from Sudanese sources.
Exports through ports on the Quaqua Coast east of Lahou,
accounting for a mere 5 percent of the Dutch slave trade in West Africa,
seem to have relied on a north-south trade with the Sudan as well. The
work of Claude Hélène Perrot shows that the two most important ports
on this part of the coast, Grand Bassam (or Bassam) and Assinie, were
outlets for the Mbrasue market in the land of the Anyi of Ndenye.
Founded in the late eighteenth century on the banks of the Comoe River,
Mbrasue obtained its slaves predominantly from Baule suppliers in the
northwest, Kumasi in the east, and Bonduku in the north; from Bonduku
there were connections through Kong and Buna with the Sudanese
commercial hub of Jenne.46 In short, all ports on the Quaqua Coast,
including Lahou, were dependent on Sudanese slave supplies. Even
slaves imported through the Guro and the Asante probably originated in
large part from the northern savannas. Warfare in the Baule and Guro
regions, or at the fringes of the Asante kingdom, might also have
produced captives for the Atlantic trade.
A current trend in the scholarship on African slavery and the slave
trade is to emphasize the production of slaves by means more subtle than
inter-societal warfare or the tapping into far away markets by long-
distance trade caravans.47 It seems that Africans sold into the Atlantic
slave trade from the coast west of Lahou were mostly victims of such
local or internal means of enslavement. Again geography was one of the
underlying factors. The long stretch of coast between Sierra Leone and
the Bandama River was covered by dense, often impenetrable forests.
Overall the region was sparsely populated; although rivers crossed it,
waterside settlements were usually found only at the navigable sections
near the river mouths. According to Person, “this coast, hedged in by the
great forest, made commerce unattractive up to the colonial era.”48 The
expansion of Malinke, or Juula, trade networks that connected the
Atlantic coast of nearby regions with the Sudanese interior, in this region
halted at the forest edges. Thus “the impenetrable wall of the great
forests” cut off local Kru and Mande populations from commercial
connections with the coastal hinterland.49 In the absence of professional
long-distance traders, commodities were carried from place to place
through networks of local big men.
The lack of extensive trade connections with the interior has, in the
historical literature on the Windward Coast, supported the idea that Kru-
speakers were insignificant participants in the Atlantic slave trade.
“These coastal peoples engaged in a good deal of fishing and trading,”
46 JELMER VOS
Person argued, “but the slave trade itself often bypassed these desolate
areas, which rarely saw slaves from the interior.”50 Another scholar
observed that “A few isolated reports of slaving can be found for the
eighteenth century, but by 1750 or so it appears that the Malaguetta
Coast no longer competed seriously with other areas as a source of
slaves.”51 This paper argues the opposite: in the latter half of the
eighteenth century Kru-speaking groups became important suppliers of
slaves especially to traders from Liverpool and the Netherlands. Indeed,
as Table 1 shows, in this period they accounted for nearly a quarter of all
slaves the Dutch carried from West Africa.52
The main features of this trade may be summed up as follows. First,
numerous communities on the coast between Cape Mount and Lahou
consistently provided slaves to Dutch vessels, but they all did so on a
very small scale. Second, more adult women than men were sold into the
Atlantic slave trade, while children formed an exceptionally high portion
of the exported slaves (among the children boys predominated, which
accounts for the overall male-to-female ratio of 52:48). Curtin suggested
that “most of these ports drew on their immediate hinterland within the
forest.”53 The coastal geography prohibited the development of large-
scale embarkation points and of connections with potential supply
networks in the interior. But Kru-speaking groups disposed of criminals
in society by selling them in exchange for European imports, while other
slaves were the victims of violent conflicts between communities.54 Kru
villages also raided their neighbors for slaves. According to the
supercargo of a Dutch slaving vessel, near the Cestos River night-time
marauding was a common means of obtaining slaves.55 Women and
children were of course more vulnerable to village raids than adult males.
The fact that these two groups made up a large portion of the slaves
exported from the region, might indicate that kidnapping was a prime
method of slave production on the Windward Coast.
V
Around 1740, because of a pressing demand for slaves in the Americas

and sturdy competition in the dominant supply regions of West Africa,
Dutch slave traders had a strong incentive to explore new markets on the
Windward Coast. The African response was affirmative, sending many
thousands into slavery, but with the exception of Cape Lahou, local
supply systems were rather inefficient. The time slave ships spent on this
part of the coast was exceptionally long as purchases were spread over
numerous small embarkation points, each of which produced slaves in
only very small numbers. Among the enslaved, moreover, the share of
women and children, who were probably obtained from villages in the
immediate hinterland, was disproportionately large. But as long as prices
and mortality rates in Africa were kept low, while prices in the Americas
remained high—and the composition of the slave cargoes could be
adjusted in Lahou and on the Gold Coast—Dutch slave trading firms saw
the Windward Coast as a creditable market. This paper has shown that,
as a result of these market decisions, in the second half of the eighteenth
century the plantation colonies of Surinam, Demerara and Essequibo
began to receive a fair number of Kru-speaking slaves and an even larger
group of slaves hailing from the hinterland of Cape Lahou.
1
Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the Social Science History
Association Conference in Chicago (2007), the European Social Science History
Conference in Lisbon (2008), the Atlantic History seminar at the University of
Turku (2008), the African Economic History Workshop at the London School of
Economics (2008), and the Centre International de Recherches Esclavages in
Paris (2009). I thank Ann Carlos, Frank Lewis and my colleagues from the
history department at Old Dominion University for their useful comments on the
paper. Of course I assume all responsibility for its contents.
2
Recent monographs include George E. Brooks, Eurafricans in Western Africa.
Commerce, Social Status, Gender, and Religious Observance from the Sixteenth
to the Eighteenth Century (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2003);Walter
Hawthorne, From Africa to Brazil. Culture, Identity, and an Atlantic Slave
Trade (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010); Robin Law, Ouidah.
The Social History of a West African Slaving ‘Port’, 1727-1892 (Athens: Ohio
University Press, 2004); Kristin Mann, Slavery and the Birth of an African City.
Lagos, 1760-1900 (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007); G. Ugo
48 JELMER VOS
Nwokeji, The Slave Trade and Culture in the Bight of Biafra. An African Society
in the Atlantic World (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010); Mariana
Candido, An African Slaving Port on the Atlantic World. Benguela and its
Hinterland (New York: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming); Roquinaldo
Ferreira, Atlantic Microhistory. Slaving, Transatlantic Networks and Cultural
Exchange in Angola (New York: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming).
3
Philip D. Curtin, The Atlantic Slave Trade. A Census (Madison: The University
of Wisconsin Press, 1969); “Measuring the Atlantic Slave Trade,” in Stanley L.
Engerman and Eugene D. Genovese, eds., Race and Slavery in the Western
Hemisphere. Quantitative Studies (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975).
4
Adam Jones and Marion Johnson, “Slaves from the Windward Coast,” Journal
of African History 21 (1980), 34.
5
Johannes Menne Postma, The Dutch in the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1600-1815
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 122-23.
6
Jelmer Vos, David Eltis, and David Richardson, “The Dutch in the Atlantic
World: New Perspectives from the Slave Trade with Particular Reference to the
Origins of the Traffic,” in David Eltis and David Richardson, eds., Extending the
Frontiers. Essays on the New Transatlantic Slave Trade Database (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 2008), Table 8.2.
7
Curtin, “Measuring the Atlantic Slave Trade,” 120-21. Curtin used Postma’s
1970 Ph.D. thesis, which was published as a book in 1990.
8
Phillip D. Curtin et al., African History. From Earliest Times to Independence.
Second Edition (London: Longman, 1995), 199.
9
Jones and Johnson, “Slaves from the Windward Coast,” 30-31. Philip D.
Curtin, ed., Africa Remembered. Narratives by West Africans from the Era of the
Slave Trade (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1967), 145-69,
documents two cases of individuals of Sudanese origin who were sold into
slavery and shipped from ports on the Gold Coast.
10
One recent study of slavery in the forest societies of Côte d’Ivoire ignores
Cape Lahou as a slaving port and instead focuses on places that probably only
became important export outlets in the produce trade of the nineteenth century.
Harris Memel-Fotê, L’esclavage dans les sociétés lignagères de la forêt
ivoirienne, XVIIe-XXe siècle (Paris: les éditions CERAP, IRD, 2007).
11
Yves Person, “Le Soudan nigérien et la Guinée occidentale,” in Hubert
Deschamps, ed., Histoire générale de l’Afrique noire, de Madagascar, et des
archipels, vol. 1 (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1970); “The Atlantic
Coast and the Southern Savannas, 1800-1880,” in J. F. H. Ajayi and Michael
Crowder, eds., History of West Africa. Volume 2, Second Edition (London:
Longman, 1987).
12
Curtin, Atlantic Slave Trade, 128.
13
Only the French attempted settlement on the Windward Coast. They
constructed a fort at Assinie in 1698, which they abandoned in 1704. See Jean-
Michel Deveau, L’Or et les esclaves. Histoire des forts du Ghana du XVIe au
XVIIIe siècle (Paris: UNESCO, 2005), 301.
14
Paul Lovejoy, “Extending the Frontiers of Transatlantic Slavery, Partially,”
Journal of Interdisciplinary History 40, 1 (2009), 63.
15
In 1762, the supercargo of a Dutch merchant ship pointed out that the ounce
was the standard unit of exchange from Lahou eastward, as it was on the Gold
Coast. See Jean Pierre Plasse, Journal de bord d’un négrier (Marseille: Éditions
le mot et le reste, 2005), 79. See also Willem Bosman, A New and Accurate
Description of the Coast of Guinea. Divided into the Gold, the Slave, and the
Ivory Coasts (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1967), 492; P.E.H. Hair et al., eds.,
Barbot on Guinea. The Writings of Jean Barbot on West Africa 1678-1712, 2
vols. (London: Hakluyt Society, 1992), 300-301.
16
Hair, Barbot on Guinea, 234-316, 331-37; Bosman, New and Accurate
Description, 469-93.
17
For instance, a Vlissingen interloper carried slaves from Lahou in 1709
(TSTD2, voyage id 33652).
18
Curtin, “Measuring the Atlantic Slave Trade,” 112.
19
David Eltis et al., The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. A Database on CD-ROM
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).
20
George E. Brooks, Landlords and Strangers. Ecology, Society, and Trade in
Western Africa, 1000-1630 (Boulder, CO: Westview Press), 283.
21
The Transatlantic Slave Trade Database contains only three records of
vessels carrying slaves from the Windward Coast before 1700 (voyage ids
24358, 33752, and 33831).
22
The WIC never withdrew completely from the Atlantic slave trade. According
to the Transatlantic Slave Trade Database, at least fourteen WIC vessels carried
African slaves to the Americas between 1741 and 1793.
23
On the Dutch interloper trade, see Ruud Paesie, Lorrendrayen op Africa. De
illegal goederen- en slavenhandel op West-Afrika tijdens het achttiende-eeuwse
handelsmonopolie van de West-Indische Compagnie, 1700-1734 (Amsterdam:
De Bataafsche Leeuw, 2008).
24
C. Reinders Folmer-van Prooijen, Van goederenhandel naar slavenhandel. De
Middelburgse Commercie Compagnie, 1720-1755 (Middelburg: Koninklijk
Zeeuwsch Genootschap der Wetenschappen, 2000), 76, 89. See also Postma,
Dutch in the Atlantic Slave Trade, 123.
25
David Eltis and David Richardson, “Productivity in the Atlantic Slave Trade,”
Explorations in Economic History 32 (1995), 465-84; Vos et al., “Dutch in the
Atlantic World,” 239.
26
Vos et al., “Dutch in the Atlantic World,” 240-242.
27
For the early MCC slave trade, see Reinders Folmer-van Prooijen, Van
goederenhandel naar slavenhandel.
28
I thank Simon Hogerzeil for sharing his dataset of 39 MCC voyages with me.
50 JELMER VOS
29
Brooks, Landlords and Strangers, 300, 302; Colleen Kriger, “‘Guinea Cloth’.
Production and Consumption of Cotton Textiles in West Africa before and
during the Atlantic Slave Trade,” in Giorgio Riello and Prasannan Parthasarathi,
eds., The Spinning World. A Global History of Cotton Textiles, 1200-1850
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 114, and the literature there cited.
30
Curtin, African History, 198-99; also “Measuring the Atlantic Slave Trade,”
118.
31
For a comparison of crew wages between the commodity trades of the WIC
and the MCC in West Africa, see Henk den Heijer, “The West African Trade of
the Dutch West India Company, 1674-1740,” in Victor Enthoven and Johannes
Postma, eds., Riches from Atlantic Commerce. Dutch Transatlantic Trade and
Shipping, 1585-1817 (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 163.
32
Simon Hogerzeil and David Richardson, “Slave Purchasing Strategies and
Shipboard Mortality: Day-to-Day Evidence from the Dutch African Trade,
1751-1797,” Journal of Economic History 67 (2007), 166-67.
33
Hogerzeil and Richardson, “Slave Purchasing Strategies,” 168.
34
35
36
37
David Richardson, “Shipboard Revolts, African Authority, and the Atlantic
Slave Trade,” William and Mary Quarterly 58 (2001), 69-92.
38
39
Hogerzeil and Richardson, “Slave Purchasing Strategies,” 172. Note that,
because of low productivity, prices for all slave categories were much lower on
the Kru Coast than in Lahou or on the Gold Coast. From this angle, it would
have made sense to buy as many slaves as possible on this part of the coast,
whoever they were.
40
Person, “Atlantic Coast and Southern Savannas,” 265.
41
Person, “Soudan nigérien,” 284-5, 301.
42
Timothy Weiskel, “The Precolonial Baule: A Reconstruction,” Cahiers
d’Études africaines 18 (1978), 511-12; also Weiskel, French Colonial Rule and
the Baule Peoples. Resistance and Collaboration, 1889-1911 (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1980), 8; Weiskel, “L’histoire socio-économique des peoples
baule: problems et perspectives de recherche,” Cahiers d’Études africaines, 16
(1976), 380. Weiskel recognized the special relationship Lahou maintained with
the Dutch, describing it nonetheless as a “feeble participation in the slave trade.”
43
Jean-Pierre Chauveau, “Notes sur les échanges dans le Baule précolonial,”
Cahiers d’Études africaines 16 (1976), 578-84.
44
In the nineteenth century, especially under the rule of Samory, the Baule also
imported large numbers of slaves from the Anyi and Asante in the east; see
Chauveau, “Échanges dans le Baule précolonial,” 578, 591, 596. A fundamental
problem in the reconstruction of Baule trade networks, and hence the origins of
the slaves exported from Lahou, is that the most informative data on trade routes
stems from European sources from the late nineteenth-century.
45
Claude Meillassoux, Anthropologie économique des Gouro de Côte d’Ivoire.
De l’économie de subsistance à l’agriculture commerciale (Paris : Mouton,
1964), 265, 270-71, 274.
46
Claude Hélène Perrot, Les Anyi-Ndenye et le pouvoir aux 18e et 19e siècles
(Paris: Publications CEDA, 1982).
47
See especially the set of articles on the slave trade in decentralized societies in
the Journal of African History 42 (2001).
48
Person, “Soudan nigérien,” 292.
49
Person, “Atlantic Coast and Southern Savannas,” 257. For more details and a
slightly different view, see Brooks, Landlords and Strangers, 72-73, 96, 282-
319.
50
Person, “Atlantic Coast and Southern Savannas,” 258.
51
Ronald W. Davis, Ethnohistorical Studies of the Kru Coast (Newark: Liberian
Studies, 1976), 32.
52
Based on Postma’s figures of slave exports from the African coast, Alex van
Stipriaan has postulated that Mandingos made up about a third of all slaves
arriving in Surinam after 1730, with Kormantins (from the Gold Coast) and
Loangos forming roughly equal shares. His assumption was that all slaves
traded on the Windward Coast were Mandingo, hence of Sudanese origin, and
thus ignored the possibility that many hailed from Kru communities along the
coast itself. See ““Een verre verwijderd trommelen…” Ontwikkeling van Afro-
Surinaamse muziek en dans in de slavernij,” in Ton Bevers et al, eds. De
Kunstwereld.Produktie, distributie en receptive in de wereld van kunst en
cultuur (Hilversum: Verloren, 1993), 144-45.
53
Curtin, African History, 199.
54
Jean-Baptiste Labat, Voyage du chevalier Des Marchais en Guinée, isles
voisines, et à Cayenne, fait en 1725, 1726 & 1727 (Paris: Saugrain, 1730), 118-
19.
55
Plasse, Journal de bord, 47. See also Bosman, New and Accurate Description,
480-81.
THE SUPPLY OF SLAVES FROM LUANDA, 1768–1806:
RECORDS OF ANSELMO DA FONSECA COUTINHO
Daniel B. Domingues da Silva

University of Missouri at Columbia
Luanda was not a town

in which the unwary amateur
could hope to turn a profitable trade.1
T
he supply of slaves from Luanda, in Angola, was an activity
that required significant experience in the transatlantic slave
trade. In the late sixteenth century, the Portuguese established
a colony at Luanda, which became one of the principal ports of slave
embarkation on the coast of West Central Africa. It supplied slaves
mostly to the plantations and mines of Portuguese and Spanish
Americas. As the demand for slaves tended to increase over time, the
economy of Luanda expanded based largely on the trade of human
beings. However, in the eighteenth century, at the peak of the
transatlantic trade, foreign competitors challenged Luanda’s position
in this activity by purchasing slaves in ports located north of
Luanda.2 Additionally, Benguela, a Portuguese port situated south of
Luanda, emerged at the beginning of the eighteenth century as an
important source of slaves, providing further competition for
merchants based in Luanda.3 As a consequence, Luanda merchants
had to adjust to the new circumstances and devise strategies to face
the increasing competition in the slave trade from West Central
Africa, as the records of Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho will show.
The lives and commercial strategies of merchants based in
Luanda have been explored comparatively recently. In 1972, Herbert
Klein accessed the account books for the years between 1750 and
1760 of a Portuguese merchant resident in Luanda, Captain João
Xavier da Proença e Sylva.4 In 1984, Joseph Miller analyzed the
account books of a Portuguese royal officer, António Coelho
Guerreiro, who resided temporarily in Luanda and had participated in
the slave trade between 1684 and 1692.5 In 1985, Clarence-Smith
explored the commercial strategies of slave traders operating in
African Economic History v.38(2010):53-76

54 DANIEL B. DOMINGUES DA SILVA
Brazil and Portuguese Angola during the period of suppression of the

slave trade, in the second quarter of the nineteenth century.6 More
recently, Roquinaldo Ferreira and Mariana Cândido have highlighted
the complexity of merchant operations in Luanda and Benguela,
exploring their commercial strategies in the slave trade as a group.7
Despite these contributions, no study has ever traced the
individual career of a slave merchant based in Luanda from the
beginning through to its completion. In 1806, Governor and Captain
General of Angola, D. Fernando António de Noronha, sent the
service records of Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho to the Portuguese
Regent Prince, emphasizing Coutinho’s contribution to the royal
revenue.8 These records included two lists of slaves shipped by
Coutinho, which run for a time period of almost 40 years, from 1768
until 1806.9 Together, these lists provide the most extensive record
available of slaves shipped by a single merchant based in Luanda at
the peak of the transatlantic slave trade. More importantly, they
provide a rare opportunity to trace the formation of a successful slave
merchant from the beginning of his career to maturity.
Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho, son of António da Fonseca
Coutinho, Knight of the Order of Christ, was born in Luanda.10 Little
is known about Coutinho’s early years at this point, but as an adult he
was clearly an ambitious man who sought to climb to the top of
Luanda’s social ladder by accumulating titles and highranking within
the military. In 1784, the Portuguese Queen D. Maria confirmed
Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho in the rank of Colonel of the
Auxiliary Troops of Massangano, in the interior of Angola.11 Two
years after that, the queen made him knight of her own house and
granted him with a symbolic stipend of 600 réis per month.12
Coutinho was then promoted to Colonel of the Militia of Luanda. In
1799, he followed in his father’s footsteps and became Knight of the
Order of Christ; the most distinctive title of status that one could
aspire to in the Portuguese Empire.13 He was able to apply for this
title thanks to his sister, D. Ana Maria, whom he had supported into
adulthood in exchange for the remuneration and recognition of all
services performed by their father for the Crown.14 Finally, between
1807 and 1810, Governor and Captain General of Angola, D.
António Saldanha da Gama, promoted Coutinho to commander of the
Militia of Luanda.15
THE SUPPLY OF SLAVES FROM LUANDA, 1768–1806 55
The governors of Angola had a favorable opinion of Anselmo da

Fonseca Coutinho. The Baron of Moçâmedes (1784-1790), for
instance, referred to him as “the most trustworthy merchant in
Luanda.”16 D. Manuel de Almeida e Vasconcelos (1790-1797) called
Coutinho “one of the most condign vassals of Her Majesty,”17 and D.
Fernando António de Noronha (1802-1806) said that Coutinho was a
“credit worthy and useful inhabitant of Angola.”18 All these
comments derived from the commercial power that Coutinho held. In
fact, between 1768 and 1806, Coutinho alone embarked about 5
percent of all slaves shipped from Luanda.19 As the slave trade was
the principal economic activity of this port, the share of slaves
shipped by Coutinho impressed the highest authorities in Angola.
Coutinho operated in a critical moment of the transatlantic slave
trade from West Central Africa. Economic growth and
industrialization in Europe, particularly in Britain, increased the
demand for primary products from the Americas, thereby expanding
the volume of slaves carried from Africa.20 Figure 1 compares the
annual estimated number of slaves shipped from Luanda with the
annual estimated number of slaves embarked from West Central
Africa. Since the mid-eighteenth century between 25 and 30
thousand slaves were shipped annually from West Central Africa.
Luanda had a consistent share of the total number of slaves departing
from this region. However, in the late 1770s, the slave trade from
West Central Africa declined sharply. War in Europe and the
Americas mobilized part of the slaving fleet of several nations,
notably the French and the English. In the 1780s, the slave trade from
West Central Africa recovered but at higher rates than before.
Luanda experienced a slight increase in the number of slaves
shipped, but was unable to follow the general trend. The slave trade
from Luanda recovered in part only in the beginning of the
nineteenth century.
Figure 1: Luanda in the Transatlantic Slave Trade from West

Central Africa, 1768–1806
50
45
Number of slaves exported (in thousands)
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
0
1768
1770
1772
1774
1776
1778
1780
1782
1784
1786
1788
1790
1792
1794
1796
1798
1800
1802
1804
1806
Years
WC Africa Portuguese vessels Luanda
Source: Eltis et al., Voyages, www.slavevoyages.org (accessed on June 2009) and

José C. Curto, “Quantitative Reassessment,” 20-25.
The competition for slaves on the coast undermined the

activities of Luanda merchants. In the eighteenth century, British and
French traders increased their participation in the slave trade from
West Central Africa. In general, they offered to Africans
commodities such as gunpowder and textiles at cheaper prices than
their Portuguese competitors. British and French vessels exchanged
most of these commodities for slaves in ports situated north of
Luanda, outside Portuguese rule, such as Cabinda, Loango and
Molembo.21 Figure 2 locates these ports on the coast of West Central
Africa. Africans tended to divert the supply of slaves from the
interior to the northern ports, threatening the commercial activities of
merchants based in Luanda. Portugal prohibited foreign vessels from
trading with any of its colonial ports. As a consequence, Luanda
merchants had to purchase slaves in the interior with commodities
imported mostly from India, Portugal and Brazil.22 In addition to the
competition from the northern ports, Luanda also faced competition
from the Portuguese port of Benguela, south of West Central Africa.

Benguela had emerged as a major port in the transatlantic slave trade
at the beginning of the eighteenth century, attracting part of the
investments previously made in Luanda from Brazil.23 Hence, the
competition for slaves on the coast of West Central Africa made the
slave trade a difficult business for merchants based in Luanda.
Figure 2: Ports of Slave Embarkation on the Coast of West

Central Africa, c.1750–c.1800
© Copyright Daniel B. Domingues da Silva

Regional competition reduced the ability of new individuals in

Luanda to break into the slave trade. The coastal supply of slaves
required capital as well as access to the sources of slaves and the
commercial routes connecting the interior to the coast of Africa. As
competition grew, access to these resources became increasingly
difficult for the merchants of Luanda. The records of Anselmo da
Fonseca Coutinho suggest that the career of a slave merchant in
eighteenth century Luanda required many years of experience to
build capital and access to the internal sources of slaves. Table 1
shows the number of slaves shipped by Coutinho over a period of
approximately 40 years, drawn from the two lists of slave shipments
copied from the customs books of Luanda and attached to his
records. It indicates that he took almost half of this period to become
a major slave merchant, shipping slaves only occasionally during the
first 12 years of activity. Coutinho became a major slave merchant
after 1785, when he was able to load a couple of vessels per year
with slaves, considering 350 slaves as the average carrying capacity
of each vessel.24 The first list of shipments lacks the dates of
embarkation, but both of them followed the books’ order
chronologically, allowing distribution of Coutinho’s shipments
according to the opening and closing dates of each book. Although
the first book started on 9 May 1767, the first list begins in the
following year, presumably when Coutinho shipped his first slaves,
and ends on 31 May 1796. The second list continues from this date
until 10 March 1806. Together, the lists confirm the years of
experience required to participate in the slave trade during an intense
period of competition.
The records of Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho also shed light on
the commercial strategies that Luanda merchants employed in the
transatlantic slave trade. The shipment of slaves across the Atlantic
was generally conducted by merchants situated in Europe or the
Americas. In the Portuguese slave trade, the majority of the vessels
began their voyages from the ports of Brazil, although a few of them
also departed from Portugal.25 In any case, lack of control over the
shipment of slaves across the Atlantic deeply affected the interests of
Luanda merchants, because they held ownership over the slaves until
the final point of sale in the Americas.26 As a result, Luanda
merchants were more vulnerable to slave casualties during the
Middle Passage. However, they devised ways to reduce casualties at

sea. Merchants new to the business tended to trade slaves only
occasionally. Additionally, they tended to ship the majority of their
slaves in fast sails, such as curvetas, sumacas and bergantins, in the
expectation that a fast trip across the ocean would result in fewer
casualties. Indeed, studies of mortality at sea demonstrated that a
successful slaving venture depended largely on the length of the
voyage.27 Table 2 provides the percentages of slaves shipped by
Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho distributed by rig of vessels and
according to the periods covered by the customs books of Luanda. It
shows that in the years before 1785, Coutinho shipped the majority
of his slaves in curvetas and sumacas. The remaining slaves he
shipped in other fast sails, such as bergantins and iates, or in larger
vessels like the galeras.
As the merchants succeeded in the trade, they tended to
distribute their shipment of slaves across different rigs. Table 2
shows that between 1785 and 1796 Coutinho shipped slaves in a
variety of sails, including larger and slower vessels, such as naus and
galeras. In the following years, he increased the share of slaves
shipped in larger vessels. Since these vessels came mostly from
Portugal, the shipment of slaves in naus and galeras suggests that, as
Coutinho gained experience in the trade, he attempted to negotiate
with merchants based in Portugal. Although any of the documents
attached to Coutinho’s records provide information on his financial
activities, they also indicate that he conducted business with
merchants in Brazil as well as Portugal. All government authorities
of Luanda emphasized Coutinho’s access to credit and resources in
both places. In 1797, Governor and Captain General of Angola D.
Manuel de Almeida Vasconcelos reported that Coutinho held the
largest credit in Luanda, trading with ports in Portugal as well as
Brazil.28 In 1799, the Crown Justice Official Dr. João Álvares de
Melo expressed a similar opinion, noting that Coutinho held
ownership over his own vessels, which often sailed to Lisbon and the
Americas.29
Table 1: Number of Slaves Shipped by Coutinho, 1768–1806
Number Number of Number of

Lists Periods
of years slaves slaves per
year
1 January
1768 to 12.0 478 40
11 January
1780
12 January
1 1780 to 5.1 733 145
4 February
1785
5 February
1785 to 11.3 7,933 701
31 May
1796
31 May
1796 to
2.4 1,865 787
16 October
1798
2
17 October
1798 to 7.4 5,833 789
10 March
1806
Total 38.2 16,842 441

Source: Certidão de António José Manzoni de Castro, 31 May 1796, enclosed in the
Petição de Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho, s.d., AHU, CU, Angola, box 115 doc. 45
and Certidão de António Martiniano José da Silva e Sousa, 10 March 1806, enclosed
in the Petição de Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho, s.d., AHU, CU, Angola, box 115
doc. 45.
Table 2: Coutinho’s Shipment of Slaves by Rig of Vessels

(Percent), 1768–1806
Approximate years of shipment

Rig of 1768– 1780– 1785– 1796– 1798–
Vessels 1780 1785 1796 1798 1806
Bergantim 1.8 – 11.0 20.0 41.8
Curveta 75.0 84.1 63.00 53.3 31.3
Fragata – – – 6.7 1.5
Galera 1.8 4.5 9.6 20.0 22.4
Iate 3.6 – – – –
Nau – – 1.4 – –
Paquete – – 1.4 – –
Sumaca 17.8 11.4 13.6 – 3.0
Total 100 100 100 100 100
doc. 45.
Indeed, vessel ownership was one of the first steps for Luanda
merchants to succeed in the slave trade. This not only provided them
with more control over the trade, but also allowed them to expand
their activities into the shipping business. Additionally, it provided
merchants with the opportunity to participate in governmental
activities.30 Coutinho’s records provide insufficient information on
the vessels that he owned. In 1797, D. Manuel de Almeida
Vasconcelos said that Coutinho owned two vessels,31 but in the
previous year Dr. João Álvares de Melo said that Coutinho owned
“several vessels.”32 The records, however, indicate the names of three
vessels only, all fast sails, the Curveta Rainha dos Anjos, the
Bergantim Flor do Mar and the Sumaca Santo António e Almas.33
Coutinho used to employ the first two in the slave trade, though in
1799 he lent the second one for an expedition to Benguela organized
by Governor and Captain General of Angola D. Miguel António de
Melo.34 Coutinho always seemed to have reserved the Sumaca Santo
António e Almas for these occasions but, at some point in the

government of D. Miguel António de Melo (1797-1802), French
pirates captured the Curveta Rainha dos Anjos en route to Rio de
Janeiro, so Coutinho asked the governor to release his sumaca from
the royal service so he could use it in the slave trade.35 All in all,
ownership of vessels gave slave merchants in Luanda more access to
both power and the slave trade.
Another way of reducing the costs of loss in transit was to ship
slaves in smaller numbers per vessel. Luanda was a busy port in the
slave trade, with a large number of vessels arriving and leaving
annually. The frequency of vessels calling at the port allowed
merchants to make several small shipments of captives in different
vessels. This strategy reduced the risks of losing an entire cargo of
slaves at sea, in the event that a vessel was captured, destroyed or
sank. It also allowed merchants in Luanda to dispose quickly of a
highly vulnerable “commodity.” Slaves often arrived at the coast
from the march from the interior exhausted, undernourished and, as a
consequence, susceptible to diseases. The slaves’ condition tended to
deteriorate as merchants accumulated too many captives on their
properties, increasing the risks of death among slaves as a result of
famine and contagious diseases.36 Hence, merchants sought to sell
their slaves as soon as possible. Table 3 shows the size of Coutinho’s
shipments between 1768 and 1806. It indicates that merchants
shipped their slaves typically in small numbers per vessel. Coutinho
rarely shipped a full cargo at any one time. Table 3 shows that the
majority of his shipments consisted of no more than 50 slaves per
vessel, but in fact almost half of all his shipments, 48 percent, ranged
between 1 and 10 slaves only. Coutinho’s records, therefore, confirm
the merchant practices of reducing the costs of loss in transit by
shipping small numbers of slaves per vessel.
A final way of reducing risks in a slave venture was to ship
slaves in partnership with other merchants. This was a practice
common among merchants in Europe and the Americas, but it was
also practiced in Africa.37 Partnerships allowed merchants to invest
less capital in a single voyage than if they were shipping slaves on
their own account. Table 4 shows the structure of ownership in
Coutinho’s shipment of slaves between 1768 and 1806. It indicates
that almost 60 percent of Coutinho’s shipments were made in
partnership with other merchants. Additionally, he shipped about 30

percent of the slaves by himself and almost 10 percent on behalf of
others. Merchants in Luanda rarely shipped slaves on their own
account, let alone on behalf of others. Thus, the confidence that other
merchants had in Coutinho’s ability to attend to their demands
clearly indicates that he enjoyed a prominent status among the
merchant community of Luanda.
Table 3: Size of Coutinho’s Slave Shipments, 1768–1806
Size of shipments Number of vessels
1–50 207
51–100 10
101–150 2
151–200 7
201–250 5
251–300 4
301–350 3
351 over 17
Total 255
doc. 45.
However, it required time for a slave merchant to achieve

prominence in Luanda. The slave trade was an activity that required
large investments. These investments came from markets situated
overseas in the form of commodities used to barter for slaves.
African slave traders demanded these commodities in advance, so
merchants in Luanda acted as brokers, sending commodities to the
interior in exchange for future payments from the sale of slaves in the
Americas.38 As in many other ports of the Portuguese Empire,
Luanda suffered from a scarcity of metal currency circulating in the
market.39 The fact that a few individuals were able to ship slaves on
behalf of others indicates that they had a reputation of being
successful merchants so others would feel confident enough to trust
them with commodities in advance to purchase slaves. Table 4 shows
that, at the beginning of his career, between 1768 and continuing
through 1785, Coutinho owned the majority of slaves he embarked.
This long apprenticeship in the slave trade surely provided him with
sufficient experience and access to resources to attract the partnership
of other merchants. As he succeeded in his career, the investment of
partners in his commercial activities increased to include shipments
on behalf of others. Since slaves were regarded as vulnerable
“commodities,” thus involving high risks, well established merchants
in Luanda preferred to control the logistics of the business instead of
holding ownership over the slaves embarked. Mastery of the business
logistics provided merchants with a privileged commercial position,
which allowed them to rise in prominence within the merchant
community of Luanda.
Table 4: Structure of Ownership in Coutinho’s Shipment of

Slaves (Percent), 1768–1806
On
Approximate On
In behalf
List years of Coutinho’s
partnership of
shipment account
others
1 1768–1780 90.4 9.6 –

1780–1785 78.2 21.8 –
1785–1796 33.8 66.2 –
2 1796–1798 16.5 43.1 40.4

1798–1806 24.0 61.3 14.8
Total 32.2 58.4 9.4

doc. 45.
Unfortunately, Coutinho’s records provide little information on

his trading partners, with exception of the names of some of them,
which appear in his lists of shipments. In the early period of his
career, Coutinho was the partner of two other merchants, both
presumably residents in Luanda, Manoel António Magalhães and
José António Pereira. In the later period of his career, Coutinho built
partnerships with several individuals. Some of them were crew
members of his Curveta Rainha dos Anjos or of vessels belonging to
other merchants, like the Galera NS da Conceição S Bento Bela
Africana; Galera Bom Jesus; Curveta NS da Conceição e Almas and
the Bergantim Africano. Some other individuals were in all
likelihood residents in Luanda, including Álvaro de Carvalho Matoso
or Sergeant Major Álvaro Matoso de Carvalho; D. Ana Maria de São
Miguel; António da Fonseca Coutinho; António de Azevedo Galiano;
António José Rodrigues; António Manuel de Melo; Bento António
Moreira; Father Boaventura José de Melo; Caetano Soares;
Domingos Antunes Guimarães; Estevão da Fonseca Negrão;
Francisco de Benício Carvalho; Jacinto Lopes; João de Araújo de
Barros; Father João Luís Fortunato; João Teixeira; Joaquim da
Fonseca Negrão; Joaquim de Matos; Joaquim Vieira de Abreu; José
da Costa Lisboa; José Joaquim Jorge; José Pinheiro Salgado; José
Teodósio Vilaça; Colonel José Vaz Salgado; Manuel da Rosa;
Manuel Luís Gonçalves; Silvestre José de Seixas; Tomás Corrêa
Porto. Finally, in one of Coutinho’s shipments, he appeared as
partner of the famous institution present in any major city of the
Portuguese Empire: the Santa Casa da Misericórdia.40
Although Coutinho’s records lack information on his partners,
they provide more complete information on his slave markets in the
Americas. The first list of shipments attached to his records clearly
indicates the intended port of slave disembarkation for each shipment
that he made. This information is lacking for the second list, but the
destination of the slaves can be retrieved with the help of Voyages:
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database.41 The second list provides
the dates of each shipment as well as the captain and vessel names.
This information was crosschecked with the shipping records
available in the Voyages Database to determine the destination of the

slaves contained in the second list. Fortunately, the Voyages
Database provides information on the ports of disembarkation for all
the vessels available in the second list. Table 5 shows the destination
of slaves according to each list for the years between 1768 and 1806.
It shows that Coutinho shipped slaves to Luanda’s principal slave
markets in the Americas, shown in Figure 3. In the second half of the
eighteenth century, the decline in gold exports from Brazil resulted in
a revival of agricultural production. This revival was further
stimulated by economic growth and industrialization in Europe,
which increased the demand for products from the Americas. The
slave markets in the Brazils responded positively to this impulse,
increasing the demand for slaves from Africa.
Although Luanda experienced a difficult moment in the slave
trade, it is no surprise that Coutinho shipped most of his slaves to Rio
de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro had long been the principal slave market of
Luanda.42 In the second list, the number of slaves shipped from
Luanda to this port declined significantly. Two reasons explain this
decline. First, the revival of the sugar industry in Bahia increased the
demand for African slaves, offering new commercial opportunities
for merchants based in Luanda.43 Second, Montevideo began trading
slaves directly with Africa. Montevideo was a port dominated by the
Spanish, where contraband slaves were traded in Rio de Janeiro, in
Brazil. However, in the last decade of the eighteenth century, the
demand for slaves in Montevideo increased, leading local merchants
to break into the transatlantic slave trade and explore connections
their partners in Rio de Janeiro had with Luanda. This activity was no
less illegal, but merchants in Luanda were willing to take the risks
because traders from Montevideo paid in money made of silver
extracted from the mines of the Spanish Americas.44 The second list
of shipments available in Coutinho’s records does not indicate the
intended destination of the slaves, but all the ships listed are also
included in the Voyages Database, which shows their port of
disembarkation in the Americas. Since the list was copied directly
from the official customs records, the information available in the list
and the database allows measuring the extent of the illegal activities
of merchants based in Luanda. Between 1796 and 1806 Coutinho
was at the peak of his career and, although Montevideo traders
offered ready access to metal currency, Coutinho shipped only 7

percent of his slaves to this destination. Thus, at the peak of the
transatlantic slave trade, well established merchants in Luanda
avoided shipping slaves illegally to the Americas.
In contrast to Rio de Janeiro, Coutinho seems to have reserved
some of his slaves to sell exclusively in the markets of Pernambuco
and Maranhão. Both held the same percentage of slaves shipped in
the two lists. In the second half of the eighteenth century, two trading
companies based in Portugal held the monopoly over the slave trade
to Pernambuco, Maranhão and Pará. The first, founded in 1755, was
the Companhia Geral do Comércio do Grão Pará e Maranhão. The
second, founded in 1759, was the Companhia Geral do Comércio de
Pernambuco e Paraíba. These two companies were part of a project
formulated in Lisbon to stimulate the production of cash crops such
as rice, cotton and sugar in remote areas of Brazil.45 They were also
responsible for providing labor to these areas through the
transatlantic slave trade. The companies thus had a slaving fleet,
which enjoyed reduced freight charges to ship slaves from Africa.
Additionally, slaves carried in the vessels of the Companhia Geral do
Comércio do Grão Pará e Maranhão to the captaincies of Maranhão
and Pará were disembarked tax free. Hence, the establishment of
these companies provided Luanda merchants with regular access to
major slave markets, such as Pernambuco, as well as an opportunity
to ship slaves to markets previously outside of their domain, such as
Maranhão and Pará. In the second half of the 1770s the companies’
monopoly ended, but they continued to trade slaves to Pernambuco,
Maranhão and Pará until the end of the 1780s, competing against
other slave traders.46 Finally, as these companies were financially
based in Lisbon, they provided slave merchants in Luanda with an
opportunity to do business with merchants based in Portugal. As
previously noted, government authorities in Luanda often mentioned
Coutinho’s access to credit and business in Portugal, which may have
been built with his shipment of slaves to Pernambuco, Maranhão and
Pará.
Table 5: Destination of the Slaves Shipped by Coutinho, 1768–

1806
List Number Percentage

Destination of slaves
(Period) of slaves of slaves
Intended port of
disembarkation
(Coutinho’s records)
Rio de Janeiro 4,762 52
Pernambuco 2,682 29
1
Maranhão 1,321 14
(1768–
Bahia 375 4
1796)
Pará 4 -
Total 9,144 100
Principal port of
disembarkation
(Voyages Database)
Rio de Janeiro 2,536 33
Pernambuco 2,252 29
2 Bahia 1,240 16
(1796– Maranhão 1,046 14
1806) Montevideo 562 7
Pará 41 1
Total 7,677 100
doc. 45.
Figure 3: Ports of Slave Disembarkation in Brazil, c.1750–c.1800
© Copyright Daniel B. Domingues da Silva
The records of Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho also reflect the

age profile of the slaves shipped from Luanda. In the second half of
the eighteenth century, the Portuguese taxed slaves shipped from
Luanda according to three age categories. Adult slaves, termed
cabeça or “head,” were taxed regardless of their sex. Standing
children, crias de pé, were taxed half the adult levy, and children at
the breast, crias de peito, were shipped tax free together with their
mothers. Although these categories were defined as age categories,

criteria separating children from adults were based on the height of
the slaves. Slaves measuring over four palmos tall, approximately 88
centimeters or 3 feet tall, were considered adults.47 Slaves measuring
this height or less were considered children, and were further divided
into children who could stand and children who were still suckling.
The Portuguese created these categories through the law of 25
January 1758, which regulated the tax collection over the slaves
shipped from the Portuguese ports in West Central Africa. The law
became in effect 5 January 1760 and because it focused on tax
collection, only late in the eighteenth century customs officials began
reporting the number of crias de peito shipped from Luanda.48
Furthermore, it should be noted that in the eighteenth century the
Portuguese, as did most Europeans, accepted that a person achieved
adulthood at the age of puberty, when they were eligible for
marriage.49 Therefore, the total number of slaves shipped from
Luanda tended to be lower than the number of slaves recorded and it
is likely that the total number of children shipped was higher than the
reported.
Coutinho’s records allow an assessment of the age profile of
slaves shipped from Luanda. Table 6 shows the number of slaves that
he shipped was distributed across the three principal age categories.
The first list of shipments contains only the number of adults and
crias de pé, but the second list provides the number of slaves shipped
for all three categories. Table 6 shows that Coutinho tried to address
the preferences for slaves of slave markets in the Americas, shipping
more adult slaves than children. Slaveholders in the Americas
demanded slaves who were ready to work, hoping to obtain a fast
return from their investments in labor power. They did not wish to
shoulder the costs of raising slave children until their productive age.
As a consequence, slaveholders in the Americas demanded more
adult slaves than children from Africa. Thus, as slave merchants had
ownership over the slaves until the final point of sale in the
Americas, they tended to avoid selling children into the transatlantic
slave trade.
Table 6: Age Profile of the Slaves Shipped by Coutinho, 1768–

1806
Approximate
Number of Number of Number of
List years of
adults crias de crias de
shipment
pé peito
1768–1780 477 1 –
1 1780–1785 731 2 –
1785–1796 7,925 8 –
1796–1798 1,805 4 56
2
1798–1806 5,644 7 182
Total 16,582 22 238
doc. 45.
Although children made up a small fraction of the total number

of slaves shipped, there were remarkable differences between the
number of crias de pé and crias de peito embarked. Coutinho’s
records indicate that he shipped over ten times crias de peito in
relation to crias de pé, but this difference only confirms the
preferences of slave markets in the Americas. According to the law,
crias de peito were shipped tax free along with their mothers, who
were taxed at the same level as any other adult slave. Unfortunately,
the records do not distinguish the sex of the slaves. However,
research on the transatlantic slave trade suggests that, in the
eighteenth century, two male slaves were shipped for every female.50
If this ratio is correct then, at the peak period of his career, between
1796 and 1806, Coutinho shipped at least 2,483 slave women, and if
all children at the breast were indeed shipped with their mothers, this
suggests that about 9 percent of these slave women were also
mothers. Crias de peito entered the slave trade not because

slaveholders in the Americas demanded young slaves, but because
they contribute to a percentage of the number of slave women sold
into the transatlantic slave trade.
All in all, the records of Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho show
that the merchants of Luanda strove to participate in the transatlantic
slave trade. The competition for slaves on the coast of West Central
Africa increased during the eighteenth century, making it difficult for
merchants based in Luanda to secure access to the sources of slaves
in the interior of Africa and address the demand for labor in the
Americas. The Portuguese restrictions on foreign imports forced the
merchants of Luanda to compete on unequal terms with merchants
based in other ports of West Central Africa. As a consequence,
merchants had to accumulate a great deal of experience in the slave
trade before rising to prominence among the merchant community of
Luanda. The slave trade was a commercial activity demanding huge
investments and involving high risks. Merchants had to master the
logistics of the business, build commercial strategies and please the
local authorities if they wanted to prosper in the trade. All these
strategies required time to develop and they did not guarantee a
successful career, as merchants remained largely dependent on the
market fluctuations of the transatlantic slave trade.
1
Joseph C. Miller, “Some Aspects of the Commercial Organization of
Slaving at Luanda, Angola - 1760-1830,” in Henry Gemery and Jan
Hogendorn, eds., The Uncommon Market: Essays in the Economic History
of the Atlantic Slave Trade (New York: Academic Press, 1979), 92.
2
David Birmingham, Trade and Conflict in Angola: The Mbundu and their
Neighbours under the Influence of the Portuguese, 1483-1790 (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1966), 137-141; Joseph C. Miller, “The Slave Trade in
Congo and Angola,” in The African Diaspora: Interpretative Essays
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976), 96-97; Miller, Way of
Death: Merchant Capitalism and the Angolan Slave Trade, 1730-1830
(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988), 226-27; Roquinaldo
Amaral Ferreira, “Transforming Atlantic Slaving: Trade, Warfare and
Territorial Control in Angola, 1650-1800” (Ph.D. thesis, University of
California at Los Angeles,, 2003), 17, 69, 83-88.
3
Birmingham, Trade and Conflict, 137-41; Miller, “Slave Trade,” 97-98;
Miller, Way of Death, 226-27; Ferreira, “Transforming Atlantic Slaving,”
70-71; Mariana P. Candido, “Enslaving Frontiers: Slavery, Trade and
Identity in Benguela, 1780-1850” (Ph.D. thesis, York University, 2006), 22-
25.
4
Herbert S. Klein, “African Women in the Atlantic Slave Trade,” in Claire
C. Robertson and Martin A. Klein, eds., Women and Slavery in Africa
(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1983), 29-38; Klein, The Middle
Passage: Comparative Studies in the Atlantic Slave Trade (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1978), 38-41.
5
Joseph C. Miller, “Capitalism and Slaving: the Financial and Commercial
Organization of the Angolan Slave Trade, According to the Accounts of
António Coelho Guerreiro (1684-1692),” International Journal of African
Historical Studies 17, no. 1 (1984), 4-10.
6
W.G. Clarence-Smith, The Third Portuguese Empire, 1825-1975: A Study
in Economic Imperialism (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1985),
30-34, 38-56.
7
Roquinaldo Amaral Ferreira, “Dos Sertões ao Atlântico: Tráfico Ilegal de
Escravos e Comércio Lícito em Angola, 1830-1860” (M.A. thesis,
Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, 1996), 118-49; Ferreira,
“Transforming Atlantic Slaving,” 126-43; Candido, “Enslaving Frontiers,”
101-18; Cândido, “Merchants and the Business of the Slave Trade in
Benguela c. 1750-1850,” African Economic History 35 (2007), 1-30
8
D. Fernando António de Noronha to the Regent Prince, 31 March 1806,
Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino, Conselho Ultramarino (hereafter, AHU,
CU), Angola, box 115 document 45.
9
Certidão de António José Manzoni de Castro, 31 May 1796, enclosed in
the Petição de Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho, s.d., AHU, CU, Angola, box
115 doc. 45 and Certidão de António Martiniano José da Silva e Sousa, 10
March 1806, enclosed in the Petição de Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho, s.d.,
AHU, CU, Angola, box 115 doc. 45.
10
Atestação de D. Manuel de Almeida e Vasconcelos, 7 February 1793,
AHU, CU, Angola, box 115 doc. 45. Instrumento em pública forma
sobrescrito por Felipe Benício e Rosa Mascarenhas, 08 June 1795, AHU,
CU, Angola, box 115 doc. 45.
11
Arquivo Nacional Torre do Tombo (hereafter, ANTT), Registo Geral de
Mercês, D. Maria I, Book 16, f. 126.
12
Idem.
13
ANTT, Registo Geral de Mercês, D. Maria I, Book 29, ff. 224v and 243.
14
Instrumento em pública forma sobrescrito por Felipe Benício e Rosa
Mascarenhas, 08 June 1795, AHU, CU, Angola, box 115 doc. 45.
15
João de Oliveira Barbosa to Conde das Galvêas, 2 December 1810, AHU,
CU, Angola, box 121 A doc. 31.
16
Atestação do Barão de Moçâmedes, 6 October 1790, AHU, CU, Angola,
box 115 doc. 45.
17
Atestação de D. Manuel de Almeida Vasconcelos, 2 January 1796, AHU,
18
Atestação de D. Fernando António de Noronha, 27 February 1806, AHU,
19
Calculated with data available in the lists of shipments and in José C.
Curto, “A Quantitative Reassessment of the Legal Portuguese Slave Trade
from Luanda, Angola, 1710-1830,” African Economic History 20 (1992),
20-25. Note that Curto’s figures may include untaxed slaves, while part of
Coutinho’s lists of shipment does not, so this percentage is likely to be
higher. See the text below for further discussion on the shipment of slaves
from Luanda.
20
David Eltis, Economic Growth and the Ending of the Transatlantic Slave
Trade (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), 31-33.
21
Birmingham, Trade and Conflict, 137-38; Miller, Way of Death, 73-78;
Joseph C.Miller, “Imports at Luanda, Angola: 1785-1823,” in Figuring
African Trade: Proceedings of the Symposium on the Quantification and
Structure of the Import and Export and Long-Distance Trade of Africa in
the Nineteenth Century, c.1800-1913 (St. Augustin, 3-6 January 1983)
(Berlin: Dietrich Reimer Verlag, 1986), 165-66.
22
Miller, “Imports at Luanda,” 192-200 and Table VI.3.
23
Benguela participated in the transatlantic slave trade already in the
seventeenth century, but until the beginning of the eighteenth century, most
of the slaves shipped from Benguela were actually delivered in Luanda for
sale into the Atlantic. David Birmingham states that Governor and Captain
General of Angola, Rodrigo César de Menezes (1733-1738), reported that
the bulk of the slaves coming to Luanda originated from the Benguelan
hinterland. Roquinaldo Ferreira notes that Lisbon authorities reported in
1688 that about one third of the slaves shipped from Luanda came in fact
from Benguela. Mariana Candido claims that until 1716 slaves shipped from
Benguela had to be delivered in Luanda for sale into the Atlantic, because
Benguela had no customs house to collect export duties. Cf. Birmingham,
Trade and Conflict, 141; Ferreira, “Transforming Atlantic Slaving,” 71-80
and 112-121; Candido, “Enslaving Frontiers,” 21-22.
24
Herbert Klein has observed that the legal carrying capacity of ships
loading slaves in Luanda between 1762 and 1765 averaged about 420
slaves, but they actually carried an average of 394 slaves per vessel. Klein
noted later that this pattern changed little in the late eighteenth century. Cf.
Herbert Klein, “The Portuguese Slave Trade from Angola in the Eighteenth
Century,” Journal of Economic History 32, 4 (1972), 902-03, and Table 6;
Miller, Way of Death, 30-32.
25
Daniel B. Domingues da Silva, “Africans in Transit: From the Angolan to
the Brazilian Hinterland,” in Allen Morris Conference on Florida and the
Atlantic World (Tallahassee: Florida State University, 2006), 5-9 and Table
2.
26
Klein, “Portuguese Slave Trade,” 906-907; Klein, Middle Passage, 38-39;
Miller, Way of Death, 252-53.
27
Klein has suggested that slave mortality at sea correlated with length of
voyage, but has observed that other factors could also affect the mortality
rates among the slave population on board during the Middle Passage.
Miller notes that slave casualties at sea tended to decline from relatively
high levels on ships making fast passages to a minimum on voyages of

medium and longer duration prior to rising again toward the end of voyages
of exceptionally slow progress. Cf. Klein, Middle Passage, 65, 87-89;
Joseph D. Miller, “Mortality in the Atlantic Slave Trade: Statistical
Evidence on Causality,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 11, 3 (1981),
395. Further information on the different types of rigs in the Portuguese
slave trade is available in Miller, Way of Death, 366-74.
28
Atestação de D. Manuel de Almeida e Vasconcelos, 28 August 1797,
AHU, CU, Angola, box 115 doc. 45.
29
Atestação do Dr. Ouvidor Geral João Álvares de Melo, 10 September
1799, AHU, CU, Angola, box 115 doc. 45.
30
Miller has argued that only by 1820 a group of traders in Luanda acquired
sufficient capital to purchase sailing vessels and ship slaves on their own
account. Cf. Miller, “Some Aspects,” 87.
31
Atestação de D. Manuel de Almeida e Vasconcelos, 28 August 1797.
32
Atestação do Dr. Ouvidor Geral João Álvares de Melo, 10 September
1799.
33
Carta de Ofício de D. Miguel António de Melo, 9 May 1799, AHU, CU,
Angola, box 115 doc. 45. Petição de Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho a D.
Miguel António de Melo, s.d., AHU, CU, Angola, box 115 doc. 45. The
Voyages Database provides information on only two records of slaving
voyages with Coutinho’s name as owner; one for an unnamed ship, which
set sail in 1799, and the other for the Bergantim Flor do Mar, which sailed
between 1810 and 1811. Cf. David Eltis, David Richardson, Manolo
Florentino, and Stephen D. Behrendt, Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave
Trade Database (www.slavevoyages.org), voyage id 46,313 and 49,898
(Accessed in June, 2009).
34
Carta de Ofício de D. Miguel António de Melo, 9 May 1799.
35
Petição de Anselmo da Fonseca Coutinho a D. Miguel António de Melo,
s.d. It appears that the unnamed ship listed in the Voyages Database with
Coutinho’s name was the Bergantim Flor do Mar, because the voyage
outcome in the database shows that the vessel was pressed into government
service and the year of the record matches with the year that Coutinho lent
the ship to Governor Melo, even though it refers to the year of arrival in the
Americas. None of the records with vessel name Curveta Rainha dos Anjos,
listed for the years between 1797 and 1802, shows Coutinho’s name as
owner or indicates the voyage outcome as thwarted by human agency from
the owner’s point of view.
36
Miller, “Some Aspects,” 98; Miller, Way of Death, 399-401, 27-36.
37
Manolo G. Florentino, Daniel B. Domingues da Silva, and Alexandre
Vieira Ribeiro, “Aspectos Comparativos do Tráfico de Africanos para o
Brasil (Séculos XVIII e XIX),” Afro-Ásia 31 (2004), 97-103.
38
Miller, Way of Death, 252-55, 295-311.
39
Joseph C. Miller, “Slave Prices in the Portuguese Southern Atlantic,
1600-1830,” in Paul E. Lovejoy, ed., Africans in Bondage: Studies in
Slavery and the Slave Trade (Madison: African Studies Program, University
of Wisconsin, 1986), 54-55.
40
The classic work on the history of the Santa Casa de Misericórdia in the
Portuguese Empire is A.J.R. Russell-Wood, Fidalgos and Philanthropists:
The Santa Casa da Misericórdia of Bahia, 1550-1755 (Berkeley: University
of California Press, 1968). For the Santa Casa de Misericórdia in Luanda,
see António Brásio, “As Misericórdias de Angola,” Studia (Centro de
Estudos Históricos Ultramarinos, Lisboa) 4 (1959), 106-49; Jofre Amaral
Nogueira, “A Misericórdia de Luanda através dos Séculos,” Boletim do
Instituto de Angola 3 (1954).
41
Eltis et al., Voyages, at www.slavevoyages.org.
42
Corcino Medeiro dos Santos, “Relações de Angola com o Rio de Janeiro
(1736-1808),” Estudos Históricos 12 (1973), 9-25.
43
Dauril Alden, “Late Colonial Brazil, 1750-1808,” in Leslie Bethell, ed.,
The Cambridge History of Latin America (New York: Cambridge
University Press, 1985) vol. 2, 627-35.
44
Alex Borucki, “Trans-Imperial Networks and Atlantic Warfare in the
Making of the Slave Trade to the Río de la Plata, 1777-1812” (Ph.D. thesis,
Emory University, 2008), 5.
45
António Carreira, As Companhias Pombalinas de Navegação, Comércio e
Tráfico de Escravos entre a Costa Africana e o Nordeste Brasileiro (Bissau:
Centro de Estudos da Guiné Portuguesa, 1969), 31-36, 243-52.
46
Carreira, Companhias Pombalinas, 48-50, 262.
47
Maurício Goulart, Escravidão Africana no Brasil: Das Origens à
Extinção do Tráfico (São Paulo: Editora Alfa-Ômega, 1975), 197. For the
conversion of palmos into meters see Fortunato José Barreiros, Memória
sobre os Pesos e Medidas de Portugal, Espanha, Inglaterra e França
(Lisbon: Typographia da Academia Real das Sciencias, 1838), 20.
48
Klein, “Portuguese Slave Trade,” 903-906; Klein, Middle Passage, 35;
Horácio Gutiérrez, “O Tráfico de Crianças Escravas para o Brasil durante o
Século XVIII,” Revista de História 120 (1989), 62.
49
That implied, for the Portuguese, that males achieved adulthood at 14
years of age and female at 12 years of age. See Sebastião Monteiro da Vide,
Constituições Primeiras do Arcebispado da Bahia (São Paulo: Typographia
de António Louzada Antunes, 1853), 109-10, Title 64.
50
Klein, “African Women,” 32. However, it should be noted that more
recent research has criticized the attention historians have been giving to
this ratio. See David Eltis and Stanley L. Engerman, “Fluctuations in Sex
and Age Ratios in the Transatlantic Slave Trade, 1663-1864,” Economic
History Review 46, 2 (1993), 321.
REEXAMINING THE GEOGRAPHY AND
MERCHANTS OF THE WEST CENTRAL AFRICAN
SLAVE TRADE:
LOOKING BEHIND THE NUMBERS
Filipa Ribeiro da Silva

Netherlands Royal Academy of Sciences
and
Stacey Sommerdyk
University of the Witwatersrand
T
he Slave Voyages Database is the most significant work on
the quantification of the Atlantic slave trade to have appeared
since Philip D. Curtin produced his census of the commerce.1
As the first resource of its kind compiled by economic historians of
the transatlantic slave trade the authors should be commended for
realizing a project of such enormous breadth and vision. Yet due to
the innovative nature of the resource, the creators have faced multiple
unforeseen issues in the categorization and dissemination of this
material. Equally, in light of the overwhelming conclusiveness of the
study, economic historians are left asking themselves the question of
what is next. Using the West Central African coast as a case study
this paper will explore two key areas of the database which, with
some modifications, could begin to inform and guide new research
directions. First, this article will examine the geographical
categorization of West Central Africa and will demonstrate how the
flexibility of geographical interpretation in West Central Africa can
be problematic. The authors of this article propose a more in depth
definition of the geography, paying special attention to Dutch sources
on the Loango Coast. Second, this article will discuss inherent
problems within the database’s categories. Ship captains and ship
owners have been categorized according to an English model and are
incompatible with the Portuguese and Spanish documentation. This
article will conclude with suggestions for uses of the database which
move beyond simple enumeration of the slave trade into questions
about the formation of merchant communities, the interconnectivity

78 F. R. DA SILVA AND S. SOMMERDYK
of merchant networks, as well as the process of database creation and

how it can inform historians in the creation of future databases.
I: A New Geographical Categorization

for West Central Africa and Its Implications
Beginning with the issue of geography, regional definition is a

problem that plagues all scholars of the transatlantic slave trade. This
difficulty springs from a lack of geographical standardization in
European shipping documents throughout the slave trade. This is
particularly pronounced in the region of West Central Africa as the
Dutch, Portuguese, English and French all possessed differing
definitions of the coastal region. Although some scholars including
Martin, Postma, and Manning clearly define the Loango Coast as a
separate trading region,2 the overwhelming trend is to approach the
West Central Coast as one trading community as exhibited by the
Slave Voyages Database. Despite the many benefits of having an
online resource with a vast amount of information, the formatting of
the African Voyages Database results in some significant limits when
studying specific regions within the vast definitions of West Central
Africa. The current version requires the user to have an intimate
knowledge of the sources in order to use the data and assumes that
they are able to identify the geographic location of the twenty-three
ports listed.3 Even with that level of awareness, the degree of
flexibility within interpretations is extremely high. This is exhibited
by Roquinado Ferreira’s Suppression of the Slave Trade and Slave
Departures from Angola, 1830s–1860s, in which he defines the entire
West Central African coast as “Angola” suggesting Portuguese
dominance in the entire region.4
The category of West Central Africa encompasses a number of
geographical regions with conflicting definitions. The primary terms
used to describe sections of this coast are Angola, Kongo, and
Loango. While Kongo and Loango are fairly linear categories -
Kongo being an African community situated to the south of the
Congo River and Loango being an African community to the North
of the Congo River— the definition of Angola’s location and size
differs from one group of European traders to the next and shifts
significantly over time.
REEXAMINING THE GEOGRAPHY AND MERCHANTS 79
In Warfare in Atlantic Africa 1500–1800, John K. Thornton

defines three “military-diplomatic regions” in Atlantic Africa: Upper
Guinea, Lower Guinea and Angola. He suggests that people within
these regions “had more interactions among themselves than with
those lying around them.”5 Within this context, Thornton defines
Angola as “the whole of west central Africa, from the coast of Gabon
to Angola.”6 This definition inherently possesses a difficulty: Angola
is both a region and a distinct sub-region. Having defined the region,
what is the definition of the sub-region? This is a difficult question to
answer as definitions can shift over time. Using Portuguese sources,
Thornton suggests that the initial Portuguese colony of Angola was
formed in the 1580s. The Portuguese gained a foothold by inserting
themselves in a war between the Kongo and the Ndongo peoples of
this area. Thus, at the dawn of the seventeenth century, Angola was a
small colony centered in Luanda and hemmed in by Kongo to the
north and Ndongo to the east. Throughout the seventeenth century
the Portuguese, using Imbagala allies, pressed steadily eastward
gaining land and slaves from the Ndongo.7 The eighteenth century
was characterized by less intense fighting, minimal expansion of the
Angola colony, and frequent raids to supply the slave trade. The
Portuguese colony exerted nominal power over its subjects in the
vicinity of the colony who engaged in frequent “low key wars.”8 In
Kingdoms of the Savanna, Jan Vansina aptly reminds us: “The
conquest of Angola is something that lasted for centuries.”9 Using
current maps of Angola, which reach from the Congo River in the
north (including the hotly contested region of Cabinda to the north of
the Congo River) to the Kalahari Desert in the south and reach
roughly a third of the way to the eastern African coast and include
Cabinda, it is almost impossible to project backwards and imagine
the Angola of the transatlantic slave trade era.
In addition to the problem presented by fluctuating definitions is
the problem of variation within the European definitions themselves.
The Dutch present a contrasting definition of Angola altogether.
Postma addresses this issue in 1990 in The Dutch in the Atlantic
Slave Trade, 1600–1815: “The northernmost portion of [the west
central African Coast], between Cameroon and the Congo River, was
generally referred to by the Dutch as Angola, although it has also
been referred to as Loango after the seventeenth century African state
in that region. This mixing of historical and contemporary labels can

be confusing.” 10 To avoid this confusion Postma chooses to use the
term Loango-Angola in reference to the region north of the Congo.
Postma goes on to explain:
Contemporary Dutch documents nearly always referred to [West

Central Africa] as Angola, although after 1649 they really meant
the area north of the Congo River. This area would be more
appropriately referred to as Loango, after the dominant state of
the region during the seventeenth and early eighteenth
centuries.11
While Postma’s demarcation of the Dutch sphere of influence in

West Central Africa is useful, Phyllis Martin’s terminology, which
locates the Loango coast to the north of the Congo River and the
Angola coast to the south of the Congo River, is the specific
language favored by this article.12
Moving from the general to the specific, another example of
confusing geography on the West Central African coast is found in
the category “Congo North.” Masquerading under the title of “Port,”
this first garnered attention as 88 percent of enslaved Africans from
this “port” embarked on Dutch ships. This is by far the category with
the highest Dutch involvement on the Loango Coast (as shown below
in Table 1). Further research showed that Postma collected the data
for 176 of the 238 voyages in this category. This raises several
important questions: What was Postma’s original purpose in creating
this category? Do the original sources contain more detailed
information? And perhaps most importantly, how did this key
information get lost in between the databases? This first question can
be easily answered by looking at Postma’s 1990 analysis of his Dutch
data. Here he explained his interpretation of the term “Angola” as
meaning north of the Congo River or the Loango Coast (as explained
above).13 However, the organizing principle of the database focuses
on the slaving hinterland rather than on how Europeans defined the
coast, or indeed how trade was conducted in various regions. Even
so, Martin offers compelling evidence that, in addition to the
overlapping slave supply from the Luanda hinterland via the Congo
River, traders of the Loango Coast purchased numerous slaves from
the same northern and eastern traders from whom they sought ivory
and copper.14 Thus, even if slaving hinterlands are the criteria for
separating the coast, the Loango Coast still stands out as a distinct
region. This raises another issue that can be addressed in answering
the last two questions. It was only upon searching the codes section
of the first Transatlantic Slave Trade Database on CDROM that the
location became clear: “Congo North (no dominant location, [Cape]
Lopez to Congo).”15 This implies that this region, otherwise referred
to as the Loango Coast, is a separate category from the Angolan
coast. It is unclear why the authors chose to leave this as a distinct
category rather than including it in the category of West Central
Africa if the region is not of distinct significance.
Along the 1200 km stretch of coast referred to as West Central
Africa, Europeans traded at 19 known locations for the purchase of
slaves. From north to south, these are the locations recorded by
European traders from which slaves were embarked: Mayumba,
Kiloango, Loango [including Boary], Malembo, Cabinda, Congo
North, Congo River, Rio Zaire [Congo River], Mpinda, Ambriz, Rio
Dande [Dande River], St. Paul de Loanda [Luanda], Salinas, Coanza
River [Kwanza River], Ambona, Benguela Velho [Old Benguela],
Nova Redonda, Quicombo [Kikombo], and Benguela. Table 1,
below, provides significantly more detail on the boundary of the
Loango and Angola coasts. Using the Slave Voyages Database to
establish Mpinda as the northern most port, which traded a majority
of its slaves to the Portuguese, the West Central African coast is split
into two regions. This allows researchers to calculate the number of
exports from the Loango coast alone. Of the 2.7 million enslaved
Africans embarked from located ports on the West Central African
coast, 870,000 slaves were embarked at the Loango coast and 1.8
million slaves were embarked at the Angola Coast (see Table 1).
Scholars with more expertise in Portuguese Angola may even suggest
a further separation of Benguela from Luanda, though this reaches
beyond the boundaries of this article.16 Having extrapolated these
numbers from the actual data, it is possible to further speculate that
of the 3.2 million slaves who embarked from this coast, one third
embarked from the Loango coast and two thirds from the Angolan
coast. Even with this separation, the Angola coast remained the most
significant supplier of slaves to the Atlantic slave trade, while the
Loango coast emerged as a separate category which remained among

the top four exporters of enslaved Africans exporting comparable
numbers of enslaved Africans to the Bights of Biafra and Benin (see
Table 2).
Through observing patterns of European trade on the West
Central African Coast, this division between north and south
becomes more distinct (see Graphs 1 & 2 and Table 1). Although the
Slave Voyages Database clearly indicates Portuguese dominance on
the West Central African coast with the Portuguese trading 67
percent of the 3.2 million enslaved Africans,17 this information is
misleading and gives the impression of Portuguese domination of the
entire West Central African coast. By separating the ports of the
Loango coast a very different profile of traders emerges. Using the
known data, Table 1 clearly demonstrated the separation of the
Loango and Angola coast (above). By focusing on the Loango coast
data, Graph 1 illustrates that traders using the Portuguese flag had
only nominal engagement in the slave trade on the Loango coast
before 1810.18 Contrary to popular belief, this graph shows the
Netherlands, Great Britain, and France as clearly dominating the
trade between 1650 and 1810, while the Portuguese dominated the
slave trade on the coast for a mere forty years between 1810 and
1850. Thus a pattern of free trade dominated the slave trade on the
Loango coast, while the Angolan coast was distinct for its Portuguese
dominated trade. However the degree to which these differing
patterns of trade were dependent on local politics must remain the
topic for an additional study.
Dividing the West Central African coast in this manner provides
a radically different pattern of European influence. This is
exemplified when exploring the case of the Dutch on the Loango
Coast. Switching from the hard numbers of the Slave Voyages
Database to the estimates, the database suggest approximately 5.7
million slaves embarked from the West Central African coast of
which Portugal/Brazil accounts for 4 million or 70 percent of these
slaves while the Dutch account for a mere 200,000 or 3.6 percent.19
However, if the coast is divided at Mpinda as exhibited in Table 1,
the concentration of Dutch activity on the Loango Coast is far more
pronounced as is evident in Graph 3.
Graph 1: Slave Exports from the Loango Coast by Ship Flag 1514–1800
70000
60000
50000
Other
Denmark / Baltic
40000
France
30000 U.S.A.
Netherlands
20000
Great Britain
10000 Portugal / Brazil
Spain / Uruguay
0
Graph 2: Slave Exports from the Loango Coast by Ship Flag,

1800–1864
200000
180000
160000
140000
120000
100000
80000
60000
40000
20000
0
Spain / Uruguay Portugal / Brazil Great Britain

Netherlands U.S.A. France
Denmark / Baltic Other
For the Dutch, the Loango Coast was the most significant coast
in the transatlantic slave trade, embarking almost 150,000 slaves,
followed by 125,000 in the Bight of Benin and 100,000 on the Gold
Coast. Interestingly, the Dutch transported 16 percent of all slaves
embarked at the Loango Coast. If these numbers can be seen as
indicators of European importance to the formation and evolution of
merchant communities on the African coast, then this is an area
where the Dutch played an unusually large role. Second only to their
importance to the slave trade on the Windward Coast where they
engaged in 23 percent of the slave trade but also where the supply of
slaves was far less substantial: the Dutch exported an estimated
80,000 of a total 340,000 slaves.20
Graph 3: Flag of Ships Embarking Slaves at the Loango Coast
Great Britain
14%
Portugal /
Brazil
40%
Netherlands
16%
Spain /
Uruguay U.S.A.
1% 6%
Other
0%
Denmark / France
Baltic 23%
0%
The radically different picture of Dutch influence which

emerges through the re-categorization of the West Central African
coast is only one of the many potential insights into understanding
the complex and overlapping trades which existed on the Loango and
Angolan coast. Evidence indicates that the Loango coast trade drew
from a north eastern hinterland not accessible to Luanda traders.
Differing trade patterns of European engagement further solidifies
this separation. While acknowledging these differences, the
redefinition of geographical regions to include these distinctions
would also resolve the problem of the awkward category of “Congo
North” as a “port.” It could be easily redefined as “Loango Coast
undefined.” Additionally, it is important to note that no matter how
West Central African regions are defined or where the boundaries are
formed, to view these regional categories as fixed and immovable
categories with contained systems would be short-sighted. Instead,
the Loango and Angola coasts can best be understood as overlapping
spheres with distinct but interconnecting systems, as are all of the
Table 1: Numbers of Enslaved Africans Embarked in the Primary West Central African Ports by Ship Flag
Port Spain / Portugal / Great Netherlands U.S.A. France Other Totals

Uruguay Brazil Britain
NORTH
Cabinda 4,276 241,198 29,572 6,521 10,347 55,972 347,886
Congo North∗ 140 1,034 4,179 78,057 2,635 2,859 100 89,004
Congo River 5,132 32,022 39,113 37,797 3,392 1,812 119,268
Rio Zaire 2,542 2,542
Kilongo 1,145 1,145
Loango 3,727 5,176 23,293 23,148 4,873 55,311 115,528
Malembo 63,066 24,572 25,742 77,843 191,223
Mayumba 210 212 716 149 1,309 2,596
Mpinda 2,554 2,554
SOUTH
Ambona 1,016 1,016
Ambriz 1,895 61,486 11,646 4,853 4,665 84,545
Benguela 3,982 336,442 1,537 331 391 342,683
Benguela Velho 401 401
Nova Redonda 1,795 1,795
Quicombo 622 622
Salinas 572 572
Luanda 5,424 1,350,134 1,304 15,827 107 801 475 1,374,072
Total 2,677,452
∗
“Congo North” is equivalent to “Loango Coast Undefined" as argued above.
Table 2: Total Documented Enslaved Africans Embarked for Shipment to the Americas Divided by Region
Embarkation Region A) Slaves B) Estimate Regional Totals

Embarked (from B)
West Africa Senegambia and offshore Atlantic 425,463 755,513
Sierra Leone 236,570 388,771
Windward Coast 181,358 336,868
Gold Coast 737,236 1,209,321
Bight of Benin 1,534,827 1,999,060
Bight of Biafra and Gulf of Guinea islands 1,084,413 1,594,560 6,284,093
West Central Africa Loango Coast 1,083,407 1,854,085
Angolan Coast 2,244,188 3,840,490 5,694,575
Other Southeast Africa and Indian Ocean islands 378,283 542,668
Other Africa 330,661 0
Asia & Africa 490 0 542,668
Total 8,236,896 12,521,336 12,521,336
Sources: http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/assessment/estimates.faces and http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/database/search.faces; Accessed 12 March
2010.
Table 3: Estimation of Slaves Embarked in Western Africa by Region and Flag
Spain/ Portugal/ Great Nether- Denmark/

Regions U.S.A. France Totals
Uruguay Brazil Britain lands Baltic
Senegambia & off-
122,088 221,612 226,637 9,205 43,791 124,247 7,933 755,513
shore Atlantic
Sierra Leone 85,432 16,907 163,393 2,276 56,494 61,048 3,221 388,771
Windward Coast 10,558 9,248 200,905 79,102 13,375 23,681 0 336,868
Gold Coast 6,705 68,394 718,127 103,375 126,259 115,574 70,887 1,209,321
Bight of Benin 132,018 1,009,212 353,853 126,913 4,402 348,897 23,765 1,999,060
Bight of Biafra 188,288 156,167 1,030,582 28,677 7,037 182,284 1,525 1,594,560
West Central Africa 432,789 4,018,540 534,280 204,788 29,464 472,288 2,425 5,694,574
South-east Africa &
83,646 348,185 31,663 0 24,504 53,383 1,286 542,668
Indian Ocean
Totals 1,061,524 5,848,265 3,259,440 554,336 305,326 1,381,404 111,041 12,521,336
regions of the Western African slave trade. The next section will
highlight one aspect of this interconnectivity by exploring the
presence of slave merchants within the Slave Voyages Database.
II: Categorization of the Slave Merchants:

Problems, omissions and their implications
Having explored the geographical challenges highlighted in the

discourse surrounding the Slave Voyages Database, we will now shift
our focus to the implications of the database in the study of this
hideous trade from the perspective of business history. The current
version of the Slave Voyages Database available online offers a
considerable amount of data about the names of the ships, their
owners and captains. The availability of search options within these
categories seems ideal if the reconstruction of the activities of a
specific businessman, a merchant house or firm within a defined time
frame is desired. For the regions being scrutinized in this article, this
type of search might be extremely useful to reconstruct the activities
of private merchants operating side-by-side with commercial
companies, like the Middelburgsche Commercie Compagnie. The
name search poses, however, multiple challenges to scholars
interested in studying the organization of the trade and European, or
American and African engagement. Using the question of identifying
networks of slave merchants operating simultaneously in West
Central Africa and in other regions of the Atlantic and the Indian
Oceans, this section will explore the possibilities for future research
while highlighting some of the issues with the definitions and
limitations of the Slave Voyages Database’s organizational model.21
The main difficulties in utilizing the database become apparent
when using the categories of ship captain and ship owner and also by
the absence of crucial elements for the reconstruction of commercial
activities and webs, such as freighters, insurers, credit providers,
agents, and brokers, which are highlighted in the following pages.
The categories of ship owner and ship captain used in the database
present several problems, especially if researchers are examining
non-English participation in the slave trade. These categories were
created according to an English model, which does not neatly fit the
multiple Portuguese and Spanish categories for crew leadership and
ship ownership. For example, Portuguese and Spanish distinctions

between shipmaster, ship’s commander, and ship’s pilot are lost
when conflated into the category of ship captain. This loss of
information is evident when reexamining primary sources and
multiple professional categories re-emerge, such as ship’s pilot,
commander, captain, master, and so on. Each of these terms has
distinct meanings in the context of Portuguese and Spanish maritime
enterprises (see Table 4).
The same principle applies to the multiple forms of rights that
businessmen held over ships. Some of this information is lost due to
the expanded categorization of ship owner. Owning a ship as an item
implied a set of rights over the property (propriedade). Within the
Iberian World, these rights were distinct from rights of someone
owning the use of a ship (senhorio), as property. As a consequence,
both legally and in practice, the ownership of a vessel as an object
and the right to its use could either be in the hands of two separate
merchants or more, or of a single merchant (see Table 5). The single
field in the new Slave Voyages Database for vessels ownership does
not address the distinctions mentioned above. Moreover, these two
types of property rights also had implications on the freightage of
ships. The merchants who possessed rights to the ship’s use were
able to rent it out to a third party. However, those who owned just the
ship/object and not its use, were only entitled to dispose of the ship as
an object, but could not lease out the ship’s use to a third party.
Fretador and armador are two other problematic terms (see Table 6).
Their literal translation into English is freighter and skipper,
respectively. While the translation of the former offers no problems,
the latter is extremely complex. An armador could be indeed a
skipper, but could also be a man in charge of equipping the ship.
Again, the two functions could be held either by an individual, by
multiple merchants, or even by the captain himself. These issues,
however, cannot be addressed in the context of the Slave Voyages
Database because freighters and skippers are altogether absent as
categories. Another problem is the overlapping of professional
categories and accumulation of multiple functions, as Table 5 clearly
illustrates.
As an example of Atlantic intercontinental commerce, the slave
trade required large investments in insurance, freightage of ships,
Table 4: Variations on crew leadership: a selection as way of example
First
known
Name (modern year of Known activity Portuguese Known Areas of Activity (in
spelling) activity in the slave trade terminology Africa and Indian Ocean) Voyage ID
West Central Africa, St.
Câncio, Jose ship's master, Helena, Southeast Africa,
Joao 1818 ship's captain mestre, capitão Indian Ocean Islands 1053
ship's captain,
second capitão, West Central Africa, St.
Carrilho, João lieutenant, ship's segundo-tenente, Helena, Southeast Africa,
Rodrigues 1806 commander comandante Indian Ocean Islands 144; 7240
Bight of Biafra, Gulf of Guinea
ship's captain, Islands, West Central Africa,
Chaves, José de ship's capitão, St. Helena, Southeast Africa,
Freitas 1826 commander comandante Indian Ocean Islands 874; 1037; 734
ship's master,
ship's mestre,
Franco, Joaquim commander, comandante, West Central Africa, Southeast
António 1826 ship's captain capitão Africa, Indian Ocean Islands 915; 1229; 3353
Gomes, ship's pilot, West Central Africa, St.
Domingos ship's captain, piloto, capitão, Helena, Southeast Africa,
António 1799 accountant caixa Indian Ocean Islands 49779; 7691
Source: http://www.slavevoyages.org22
Table 5: Variations on ships’ ownership: a selection as way of example
First known Know activity
Name (modern year of in the slave Portuguese Known Areas of Activity (in
spelling) activity trade terminology Africa and Indian Ocean) Voyage ID
businessman,
ship's owner, negociante,
Almeida, António lease holder, proprietário, Bight of Benin, Southeast 47209; 7056; 49780;
da Cruz e 1784 freighter senhorio, fretador Africa, Indian Ocean Islands 900054
West Central Africa, St.
Helena, Bight of Biafra, Gulf of
Almeida, Bernardo merchant, comerciante, Guinea Islands, Southeast
Luís de 1817 ship's owner proprietário Africa, Indian Ocean Islands 76; 305
merchant, co- comerciante, co- West Central Africa, St.
Alves, António ship's owner, proprietário, Helena, Southeast Africa,
Ferreira 1811 ship's captain capitão Indian Ocean Islands 1095; 5007; 915
merchant, comerciante, West Central Africa, St.
Caldeira, António ship's owner, proprietário, Helena, Southeast Africa,
Jose da Silva 1811 lease holder senhorio Indian Ocean Islands 900086
Sá, José Bernardino West Central Africa, St.
de (Baron and Helena, Bight of Biafra, Gulf of 2099; 2118; 2131; 2132;
Viscount of Vila businessman, negociante, Guinea Islands, Southeast 2136; 2138; 2139; 2207;
Nova do Minho) 1825 skipper armador Africa, Indian Ocean Islands 2245; 2310; 3408
businessman, negociante, West Central Africa, St.
Silva Porto, João skipper, ship's armador, Helena, Southeast Africa,
Alves da 1818 owner proprietário Indian Ocean Islands 1996
Table 6: Sale of Slaves by Prins Tom to the MCC ship Prins Willem V, November 1757
Port Date African Trader(s) Total No. of Slaves

Malemba 1 November 1757 Prins Tom 17
Malemba 10 November 1757 Prins Tom & Jan Clase 9
Malemba 13 November 1757 Prins Tom & Jan Clase 10
Sources: ZA, MCC, 985.
purchase of cargo, recruitment and payment of crews and commercial

agents. Additionally, insurers, merchants and commercial agents
needed to possess extensive commercial expertise and an extensive
knowledge of supply and consumption markets in Western Africa,
the Americas and Europe. This knowledge was necessary in order to
build wide trading networks which covered several geographical
areas. By including only vessels owners and captains in the Slave
Voyages Database, key elements in the study of the slave trade have
been lost. Information regarding the ownership of cargo, insurers,
credit providers, supercargoes on board the ships and business
conducted on shore is all extremely crucial and is at risk of being
lost. Without this information, important direct and indirect investors
and actors of slave trading have been left out of the picture. Several
Portuguese Sephardi merchants based in Amsterdam well-known for
their engagement in the Western African commerce and the slave
trade (among other areas of investment) during the first half of the
seventeenth century, are not included in the database mainly because
most of the ships they used were freighted.23 The case of Diogo
Nunes Belmonte is an excellent example. The ship De Engel Michiel,
whose voyages are listed in the database, was freighted by Belmonte
on 22 May 1613 to transport enslaved Africans from Luanda to the
Spanish West Indies and return to Seville loaded with Spanish
bullion, gold, silver and other goods.24
The same applies to the insurers of the slave ships and cargoes.
These men were indirect investors in the trade, but they were
essential in the operation of the business. In seventeenth-century-
Amsterdam, Jan Jansz Smits, Claes Andriaesz, Albert Schuijt, Barent
Sweets, Jan de Clerck, Pelgrom van Dronckelaer, Anthoni van
Diemen, Hans van Soldt, Hans van Geel, Hendrick Voet, Willem
Pauw, Van den Bogaert, Wijbrant Warwijck and Salomon
Voerknecht were the most important entrepreneurs backing the
insurance of commercial voyages to Western Africa and the slave
voyages to the Americas.25 For instance, in 1614, Jan Jansz Smits, in
association with Anthoni van Diemen, Pelgrom Van Dronckelaer,
Hans van Soldt de Jonge, Hendrick Voet, Albert Schuijt, William
Pauw, Van der Bogaert and many others non-Jewish merchants based
in Amsterdam insured Diogo Nunes Belmonte, for a ‘cargo of slaves’
on board De Engel Michiel, skippered by Sebastião Ribeiro, as well
as the return cargo, which was to be gold, silver and other

commodities. The ship was to sail on the route Luanda–West Indies–
Seville.26 Again, their names do not appear in the slave trade
database, though the voyage is listed.
The examination of the participation seventeenth-century
chartered companies in the slave trade through the lens of the slave
trade database might also be misleading. The Dutch West India
Company, for instance, appears as owner of various vessels operating
in the slave circuits. However, this does not mean that the Company
was a key player in the business. Often the ships were freighted by
private merchants, and the cargoes were their property or the
property of other parties. For example, on 1 August 1657, Henrico
Mathias signed a contract with the directors of the West India
Company to furnish slaves to Curaçao using the ship Den Coninck
Salomon.27 Heerman Abrahamsen, Dirck Pietersz Wittepaert and
Andries Sael signed an identical agreement with the West India
Company in 1662, for the supply of slaves to Curaçao, by the ship
Abrahams Offerande, which was the property of the aforementioned
merchants.28 Other contracts followed, like the one signed between
the West India Company and Marcus Broen and associates in 1675
also for the transportation of slaves to Curaçao.29
The analysis of the data available in the database might lead
users less familiar with the primary sources to paint an incomplete
portrait of the trade. Some of the merchants that appear in the slave
trade database as vessel owners or captains held multiple roles, as
mentioned earlier. For instance, Francisco Ferroni, a merchant in
Amsterdam, was not only a ship owner. He was the representative of
Domingo Grillo and Ambrósio Lomelin, holders of the Spanish
asiento (1662–1669) in Amsterdam. In this capacity, Ferroni
negotiated the agreements between the asientistas and the West India
Company and appears in the notarial contracts referring to slave
voyages as a party with interest in the trade. At the same time, in
1664, Ferroni granted power of attorney to Martin Noel to sign a
contract with the agents of Grillo and Lomelin in Barbados for the
supply of 600-1000 “Black Indians or Moors” to the Spanish West
Indies. Martin Noel was a merchant in London and an investor in the
Royal Company of the Adventurers of England.30 Credit providers
only indirectly engaged in the entire operation are another important
group of investors in the slave trade that is also absent from the Slave
Voyages Database.
Additionally, non-European traders operating in Africa, the
Americas and the Indian Ocean have also been neglected. Despite the
rich data available in eighteenth century, the Middelburgsche
Commercie Compagnie records regarding multiple trading
partnerships with indigenous traders on the Loango Coast are
incomplete. All data on indigenous traders has been excluded. The
records list over 600 individual African traders trading on the Loango
Coast alone. Prominent traders with the Middelburgsche Commercie
Compagnie on the Loango Coast included Prins Tom, Jan Claase,
and Tom Arij.31 A study of six voyages of the Middelburgsche
Commercie Compagnie ship Prins Willem V to the Loango Coast
mapped transactions between Captain Adriaan Jacobse and numerous
African traders. In these records, Prins Tom emerges as the most
prolific slave supplier. Between 21 August 1755 and 25 November
1757, Prins Tom engaged in 154 sales. Prins Tom supplied the Prins
Willem V with a total of 267 slaves in only two voyages (see Table
6).32 The compilation of a list of these traders would increase not
only our understanding of European/African trade relations on the
coast but could also provide more solid information on the origins of
the enslaved Africans which embarked upon European ships.
However, the use of the voyage as the organizing principle has the
unfortunate result of strengthening the Eurocentric bias of the data.
This issue leads us to the relevant matter of networks within the slave
trade business. Often captains, pilots, commanders, freighters and
ships owners performed various tasks and roles related not only with
sailing but also to business. Their tasks often included operating as
accountants in charge of commercial transactions on board the ships
and on the coast, where they would conduct trade with local traders
whether they were African, Euro-African or European (see Table
7).33 Henrico Mathias, for instance, had connections in Europe,
Western Africa and the American colonies to organize his
participation in the slave trade. In Europe, Mathias appeared
associated with Jacinto Vasques, a merchant in Seville with
investments in the slave trade, as well as with Marcelo van der Goes
and Philip van Hulten who were merchants in Amsterdam.34 On the
Gold Coast and Curaçao, Henrico Mathias maintained regular contact
with the representatives of the West India Company during the 1650s
and 1660s.35 In Curaçao, Mathias and his partners (Guiljelmo Belin
le Garde and Philip van Hulten, also merchants in Amsterdam) had
Ghijsberto de Rosa, conducting trade on their behalf with some
inhabitants of the island and the Company since the early 1660s.36
Edward Man and Isaac van Beeck, directors of the West India
Company Chamber of Amsterdam, were also important contacts for
Mathias’ business with Curaçao.37 These important links in the slave
trade commercial chain cannot be retrieved from the data assembled
in the Slave Voyages Database. The names of accountants,
information about supercargoes on board the vessels, names of local
merchants operating in Western Africa and the Americas on their
own name or as commercial agents of others has not been gathered
and made available for study.
In addition to all the aforementioned difficulties, scholars
examining the business activities of the men engaged with the slave
trade also have to overcome many linguistic challenges. Many
personal names in the database have language symbols associated
with them, in particular the French, Portuguese and Spanish names.
However, the names have not been standardized. For example, the
name of António Pedroso de Albuquerque, owner of three slave
vessels sailing between Brazil and the Congo River, appears written
in various ways (see Table 8). These languages symbols also pose
other challenges. During the transfer of the data into Microsoft Excel,
these symbols are sometimes replaced by special characters making
names difficult to decipher, especially for researchers who are not
native speakers (see Table 8). Secondly, the same personal name can
appear abbreviated or translated depending on the primary sources
that were used to collect the data on the first place. Thirdly,
identifying personal names is also made difficult by the existence of
multiple spellings used for each name. This is a consistent problem
within the categories of ships owners and ship captains regardless of
the language used (see Table 8). These variations in form also make
name identification unnecessarily complex. A fourth problem is the
use of expressions such as Son, Father, Junior and Senior. They
appear without specifying individual names making the recognition
of each man more complicated. Fifth and finally, multiple spellings
and the split of composite surnames, especially common in
Portuguese, Spanish and French, make name searches even harder.

As a solution to the difficulties pointed above, we suggest a single
standard spelling for each person, using Modern Language and
avoiding language symbols and special characters (see Table 8).
Despite the problems of categorization and language highlighted
earlier, business historians interested in analyzing the engagement of
private merchants in the slave trade as well as in examining their
modus operandi in the business can benefit from searching and using
the information available on the Slave Voyages website. By shifting
the attention from the involvement of individual states to private
entrepreneurship, and by focusing on private involvement in the trade
within the framework of state policies and regulations, a business
history will add a new dimension to the study of the transatlantic
slave trade. In the last two decades, several scholars have examined
in detail merchant groups operating in the Atlantic, their economic
activities and commercial and their financial networks. In addition,
the economic strategies of private businessmen operating in the
Atlantic either to cope with competition or promote cooperation with
other mercantile groups have also been analyzed.38 By drawing on
this scholarship and with the aid of the Slave Voyages Database,
researchers studying private entrepreneurship in the transatlantic
slave trade are poised to make an important contribution to our
understanding of the mercantile dimensions of this dreadful trade and
its relationship with other commercial activities in Western Africa,
the Atlantic and in other geo-economic regions.
III: Conclusions and Avenues for New Research
This article has explored how the categories of the Slave Voyages
Database could be refined to increase our understanding of both the
geographical definition of the West Central African Coast and the
contributions of the individuals involved. First we have argued for
the re-categorization of the West Central Africa into two distinct
regions: the Loango and Angola Coasts. Redefining these categories
based on the spheres of influence and trade dominated by African
polities allows us to see distinct patterns of European shipping and
influence in the two regions. Secondly we highlighted the potential
usefulness of the database in tracing the networks of individuals
Table 7: Agents for the slave trade: a selection as way of example
First
known Known activity
Name (modern year of in the slave Portuguese Known Areas of Activity (in Voyage
spelling) activity trade terminology Africa and Indian Ocean) ID
Fontes, José ship's master, West Central Africa, St. Helena,
Joaquim de ship's captain, mestre, capitão, Southeast Africa, Indian Ocean
Sousa 1817 supercargo sobrecarga Islands 3352
ship's captain, West Central Africa, St. Helena,
Lopes, Francisco accountant, capitão, caixa, Southeast Africa, Indian Ocean
da Silva 1813 ship's owner proprietário Islands 397
Moreira, José ship's captain, West Central Africa, St. Helena, 499;
Lopes da Costa ship's master, capitão, mestre, Southeast Africa, Indian Ocean 1043;
(Jr) 1823 supercargo sobrecarga Islands 47983
ship's captain, West Central Africa, St. Helena, 46468;
Sousa, Francisco ship's master, capitão, mestre, Southeast Africa, Indian Ocean 7239;
José de 1817 accountant caixa Islands 49039
ship's captain, Bight of Benin, West Central
Silva, Manuel accountant, capitão, caixa, Africa, St. Helena, Southeast 395;
Francisco 1814 ship's owner proprietário Africa, Indian Ocean Islands 515; 739
39
Source: http://www.slavevoyages.org
Table 8: Variations on spelling and other language issues: a

selection as way of example
Voyage Year of Personal name Major region of slave

ID Arrival (owner or captain) purchase
Albuquerque, West Central Africa and
1028 1829 Antonio Pedroso de St. Helena
1158 1830 Antônio Pedroso de St. Helena
1161 1830 António Pedroso de St. Helena
2581 1837 Zulueta Sierra Leone
West Central Africa and
4285 1858 Zulueta, Don Julian St. Helena
4799 1859 Zulueta, J
2224 1843 Zulueta, Juan Bight of Benin
2012 1840 Zulueta, JuliÃ¡n St. Helena
2228 1843 Zulueta, Julian Bight of Benin
Santos, FÃ©lix West Central Africa and
22 1817 JosÃ© dos St. Helena
Santos, Felix Jose West Central Africa and
414 1824 dos St. Helena
Abrahamsen, West Central Africa and
98803 1661 Heerman St. Helena
44141 1669 Abrahamsz, Hereman St. Helena
11733 1670 Abrams, Heerman St. Helena
Bight of Biafra and Gulf
11806 1658 Mathias, Henrico of Guinea islands
Senegambia and offshore
44183 1672 Mathias, Henrique* Atlantic
44187 1673 Mathijs, Henrique St. Helena
98808 1663 Matias, Henrique* St. Helena
Sources: http://www.slavevoyages.org
involved in the slave trade to the Americas which spanned both the
Atlantic and Indian Oceans. We caution the user of the database to
acknowledge the limitations of this data which is organized around
English categories of captaincy and ownership.
The absence of significant detail in the merchant data of the
Slave Voyages Database presents an opportunity for the creation of a
new resource. This is not to suggest that the compilers of Slave
Voyages Database got it wrong, but rather that their project was so
conclusive that the debate is evolving beyond the number of enslaved
Africans which crossed the Atlantic on European ships. If we were to
undertake such a challenge, the Slave Voyages Database provides a
project template upon which slavery researchers can both expand and
improve. First, by clearly defining geographical regions at the onset
of the project we could avoid conflicting geographical organizations
between researchers. This would mean taking into consideration local
and foreign geographical, political, and economic factors and clearly
presenting this information with the data. Second, we would attempt
to avoid a linguistic bias in the description of job titles, including
categories in English and the original language of primary sources.
Fields to categorize other economic activities not directly related to
the slave trade as well as political and military roles of each merchant
should also be incorporated in this type of dataset.
By moving from the voyage to the individual as the organizing
model, we would open the opportunity to gather biographical and
professional information for each merchant. It would also allow us to
include non-European traders and commercial partners where the
documents allow. Moreover, it would be possible to examine the
transatlantic slave trade as part of a wider economic system
encompassing the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans. This would
put the study of this trade in a global perspective and show that it did
not always have a major role or an isolated role in the economic
growth/decay of certain areas as emphasized by existing
historiography. Therefore, we believe that the data should not be
limited to slave trading but rather that it should eventually be
extended to all economic exchanges (at least to those taking place in
the Atlantic World). We argue in favor of this solution because recent
scholarship by us and others has shown that slave merchants invested
in multiple businesses, and often financed their slave trade operations
through investments in other economic activities which were less

risky and more profitable.
As for the geographical borders of this potential merchant
dataset, the fluidity of merchants, investors, insurers, and sailors
between markets is a clear obstacle. However, this can be overcome
by creating multiple geographical fields to trace each merchant’s
connections to the commercial chain of the early modern inter-
continental trade. This opens the opportunity to reconstruct financial
and commercial networks and to analyze commercial interactions on
both macro and micro scales. A potential database on merchants and
their participation in the slave trade would obviously be connected to
the Slave Voyages Database available online so that researchers may
link biographical and professional information to actual slave
voyages. This would build upon the strengths of the current database
and allow scholars to optimize usage of both resources. This is only
one of the many new possible directions of inquiry fueled by the
innovations made possible through the Slave Voyages Database. The
implication and importance of the Slave Voyages Database and its
place in the historical record is something we are only beginning to
comprehend. It will continue to inspire new ideas and debate and in
doing so will reshape the way we understand the interconnectivity of
the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific worlds.
1
Filipa Ribeiro da Silva is a post-doctoral fellow at the International
Institute of Social History of the Netherlands Royal Academy of Sciences,
and Stacey Sommerdyk is a post-doctoral fellow at the University of the
Witwatersrand. The authors would like to acknowledge the Social Sciences
and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the European
Union 7th Framework and the Project Slavery Trade, Slavery, Abolitions in
European Histories and Identities (EURESCL) for their support of the
research projects which form the basis of this article.
2
See Johannes Menne Postma, The Dutch in the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1600-
1815 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 60-61; Patrick
Manning, Slavery and African Life: Occidental, Oriental and African Slave
Trades (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 10.
3
Alecuba, Ambona, Ambriz, Benguela, Boary, Bomara, Cabinda, Cape
Mole, Coanza River, Congo North, Congo River, Rio Zaire, Grenada Point,
Kilongo, Loango, Malembo, Mayumba, Mpinda, Nova Redonda, Penido,
Quicombo, Salinas, Luanda, and Soyo.
4
Roquinaldo Ferreira, “The Suppression of the Slave trade and Slave
Departures from Angola, 1830-1860,” in David Eltis and David
Richardson, eds., Extending the Frontiers: Essays on the New Transatlantic
Slave Trade Database. (New Haven, CN: Yale University Press, 2008),
313-34.
5
John K. Thornton, Warfare in Atlantic Africa 1500-1800 (New York:
Routledge, 2003), 14.
6
Thornton, Warfare in Africa, 15.
7
Thornton, Warfare in Africa, 136-37.
8
Thornton, Warfare in Africa, 138-39.
9
Jan Vansina, Kingdoms of the Savannah (Madison: University of
Wisconsin Press, 1966), 18.
10
Postma, Dutch Atlantic Slave Trade, 56-57.
11
12
Phyllis M. Martin, The External Trade of the Loango Coast 1576-1870:
The Effects of Changing Commercial Relations on the Vili Kingdom of
Loango (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972), 8-10.
13
14
Martin, External Trade of the Loango Coast, 116-30.
15
See Codes Section of The Transatlantic Slave Trade Database on CD-
ROM, 1999.
16
Both Ferreira and Candido point to the distinct nature of the Benguela
trade while stopping short of suggesting this separation. See: Roquinaldo
Ferreira, “The Suppression of the Slave trade,” 31; and Mariana Candido,
“Merchants and the Business of the Slave Trade at Benguela, 1750-1850,”
African Economic History 35 (2007), 1-2.
17
Undefined. 2009. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database Voyages.
http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/assessment/estimates.faces. (accessed
Query - Principal place of slave purchase: West Central Africa and St.
Helena.
18
It is possible that records of Portuguese slave trade on the Loango Coast
remain to be discovered. This could further change our understanding of
trade volume for West Central Africa.
19
Undefined. 2009. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database Voyages.
http://www.slavevoyages.org.
20
These figures are calculated based on the figures in Table 3.
21
Throughout the early modern period, in particular during the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, businessmen’s participation in the slave trade as well
as in other commercial branches shows low levels of specialization. As a
consequence, merchants appear involved in various trades and operating in
multiple regions simultaneously. The merchants engaged in the West
Central African slave trade were also active in other regions of western
Africa, as evidence presented in the following tables will show. For further
information on the low levels of specialization of businessmen in the
Atlantic trade and in the commerce with western Africa, see, for instance:
Cátia Antunes, Globalisation in the Early Modern Period: The Economic
Relationship between Amsterdam and Lisbon, 1640-1705 (Amsterdam:
Aksant, 2004), chap. 3, 4, 5. Antunes, “Atlantic entrepreneurship: Cross-
cultural business networks, 1580-1776,” Paper presented at the workshop,
Transitions to Modernity, Yale University, Nov. 2007. Filipa Ribeiro da

Silva, Dutch and Portuguese in Western Africa: Empires, Merchants and
the Atlantic System, 1580-1674 (Leiden: Brill, 2011), chap. 5, 6.
22
Changes made by authors on Excel File as explained in the text.
Information on known activity in the slave trade gathered from various
primary sources and secondary literature, including José Capela, Dicionário
de Negreiros em Moçambique: 1750-1897 (Porto: Centro de Estudos
Africanos, Universidade do Porto, 2007). The information presented here is
part of a larger database on businessmen involved in the trans-Atlantic and
the Indian Ocean Slave Trades recently made available on the website of the
Project Slave Trade, Slavery and Abolition in European Histories and
Identities (EURESCL) funded by the European Union 7th Framework
Programme: http://www.eurescl.eu/
23
Among these were Diogo Nunes Belmonte, Miguel de Pas, Duarte and
David de Palacios as well as Manuel Dias Henriques. For further details on
the participation of these merchants in the Western African trade and the
slave trade, in particular, see: Ribeiro da Silva, Dutch and Portuguese in
Western Africa, chap. 6. Cátia Antunes and Filipa Ribeiro da Silva, “The
African Trade and Slave Trade in the business portfolio of Amsterdam’s
businessmen, 1580s-1670s,” Tijdschrif voor Sociale en Economiche
Geschiedenis (forthcoming).
24
Stadsarchief van Amsterdam (former Gemeente Archief van Amsterdam,
hereafter GAA), Notarieel Archief (hereafter NA) 258/81v: 1613-03-19; NA
254/188-188v: 1614-05-22.
25
Ribeiro da Silva, Dutch and Portuguese in Western Africa, chap. 6.
26
GAA, NA 254/188-188v: 1614-05-22.
27
GAA, NA 2118/...: 1657-08-01.
28
GAA, NA 1996A/113: 1663-04-28.
29
GAA, NA 322/675-699: 1675-04-27; NA 3221/695: 1675-04-27
30
GAA, NA 2231/82-89: 1669-09-09. For further details on the Grillo and
Lomelin asiento, see: Marisa Vega Franco, El trafico de esclavos con
America; asientos de Grillo Y Loemlín, 1663-1674 (Seville: Escuela de
Estudios Hispano-Americanos, 1984), 194-202; Enriqueta Vila Vilar, “La
sublevación de Portugal y la trata de negros,” Ibero-Americkanisches Archiv
2 (1976), 171-92; Johannes M. Postma, The Dutch in the Atlantic slave
trade. 1600-1815 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 33-38
and Appendix 3, 349-53.
31
Zeeuwsarchief (hereafter ZA), The archief van de Middelburgsche
Commercie Compagnie (hereafter MCC), 216, 219, 335, 400, 410, 456, 488,
517, 524, 528, 533, 575, 677, 795, 825, 932, 938, 980, 985, 990, 1009,
1013, 1019, 1106, 1224, 1229, 1286, 1289 & 1308.
32
ZA, MCC 980 & 985. For a list of the African traders who engaged in
trade with the Prins Willem V see: Stacey Sommerdyk, “Trans-Cultural
Exchange at Malemba Bay: The Voyages of the Fregatschip Prins Willem
V, 1755 to 1771,” in Circuits of Exchange: Slaves, Capital and Networks in
Atlantic Commerce (16th-19th centuries), edited by Filipa Ribeiro da Silva

and David Richardson (forthcoming).
33
For further details on slave trade networks, see: Filipa Ribeiro da Silva,
“Networking Across Empires: Dutch, Sephardim and Portuguese Business
and Commercial Webs for the Atlantic Slave Trade (1580-1674),” The
Americas 68, 1 (Jul. 2011), 7–32.
34
GAA, NA 2117/161: 1656-11-23; NA 2715/207: 1660-04-10.
35
GAA, NA 2717/65: 1661-01-19.
36
GAA, NA 2211/140-142: 1661-07-26.
37
GAA, NA 2118/137: 1657-08-01.
38
See, for example: Peter A. Coclanis, ed., The Atlantic Economy during the
Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century: Organization, Operation Practice and
Personnel (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 1999); John
J. McCusker and Kenneth Morgan, eds., The Early Modern Atlantic
Economy: Essays on Transatlantic Enterprise (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2000); Diogo Ramada Curto and Anthony Molho, eds.,
Commercial Networks in the Early Modern World (Firenze: European
University Institute, 2002).
39
Changes made by authors on Excel File as explained in the text.
Information on the activities in the slave trade gathered from multiple
primary sources and secondary literature, including José Capela, Dicionário
de Negreiros em Mocambique: 1750-1897 (Porto: Centro de Estudos
Africanos, Universidade do Porto, 2007). The information presented here is
part of a larger database on businessmen involved in the trans-Atlantic and
the Indian Ocean Slave Trades recently made available on the website of the
Project Slave Trade, Slavery and Abolition in European Histories and
Identities (EURESCL) funded by the European Union 7th Framework
Programme: http://www.eurescl.eu/
THE REGISTERS OF LIBERATED AFRICANS
OF THE HAVANA SLAVE TRADE COMMISSION:
TRANSCRIPTION METHODOLOGY AND
STATISTICAL ANALYSIS1
Henry B. Lovejoy
University of California at Los Angeles
B
etween 1824 and 1841, the Anglo-Spanish Court of Mixed
Commission in Cuba was responsible for creating passenger
lists for over ten thousand liberated Africans, or emancipados,
found aboard forty-two different slave ships. The Registers of Liberated
Africans are a unique historical source because they describe the
following personal information for victims of the transatlantic slave
trade: port and date of embarkation, register number, African name,
Christian name, sex, age, nación (nation), height, physical descriptions
(señales); and in some cases, the Christian name, nación and owner of
the African-born interpreters who were used during the registration
process.2 At present, David Eltis has been the leading expert working
with these records in conjunction with a much larger sample of
comparable registers from Freetown, Sierra Leone between 1819 and
1845.3 In the late-1970s, Eltis created “The African Names Database”—
containing a total of 67,228 individual entries—using microfiche copies
of these registers found in the Public Record Office, now National
Archives. “The African Names Database” is searchable online as such or
accessible via the “Additional Resources” link in The Trans-Atlantic
Slave Trade Database.4 This article provides a critique of the existing
database in relation to the Caribbean data and examines the
methodologies of transcription and database construction. As such, the
registers from the “Archives of the Havana Slave Trade Commission”
will be examined as a single unit of analysis. However, the implications
of this report are relevant to the much larger Sierra Leone dataset.
Naming practices in most world cultures have rich cultural
meanings which are usually passed on through family generations. It is,
108 HENRY B. LOVEJOY
for example, easy to identify the ethno-linguistic origins of the names

John, Jean, Juan and João as being English, French, Spanish and
Portuguese. This basic technique can therefore be applied to the analysis
of the African names recorded in these registers.5 A native Yoruba-
speaker from modern-day Nigeria, for example, will recognize Yoruba
names from passengers aboard the ships leaving Lagos or Ouidah.
Moreover, some of the listed Yoruba names are very specific to Yoruba
sub-groups such as Ijẹbu, others to Ọyọ, Ẹgba, etc. Clearly, a native
Yoruba-speaker will have more success isolating Yoruba names, even
though s/he may be familiar with, yet not feel entirely comfortable
identifying non-Yoruba names from neighbouring ethno-linguistic
groups who also left from the Bight of Benin, such as Nupe, Borgu,
Hausa, Fon, Edo, Mahi, etc. While the method of interpreting the African
names is basic, the practice is inherently more complex because the
forty-two ships in this collection left from nineteen different ports
located between Bissau and Luanda. A Yoruba-speaker would
presumably have much more difficulty recognizing, with any precision,
names from the Upper Guinea Coast or West Central Africa. A complete
analysis of the names will therefore require numerous volunteers from
hundreds of different West African ethno-linguistic backgrounds.
The compilers of The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database began
The African Origins Project, which is co-directed by Eltis, based out of
Emory University and released in 2011. It is a scholar-public
collaborative intending to trace the geographic origins of these victims of
the transatlantic slave trade. According to the website, this interactive
online research tool will solicit volunteers with knowledge of African
languages, cultural naming practices, and ethnic groups to draw on their
own expertise to identify the likely ethno-linguistic origins of these
documented names.6 In due course, the results should provide an idea of
the ethnic composition of the transatlantic slave trade in this period. The
project will enable people to search for names according to specific
African regions and view a transcription of the names stemming from the
spelling at the time of the nineteenth century registration. It will also be
possible to listen to a sound-bite of the presumed pronunciation to
REGISTERS OF THE HAVANA SLAVE TRADE COMMISSION 109
hopefully clarify any colonial distortions in spelling. Users will then be

able to submit their opinions as to the name’s possible ethno-linguistic
origins, which a team of experts involved with The Africans Origins
Project will verify each of the submissions for accuracy.
Since so much weight will be placed on the African names, any mis-
transcribed names could significantly affect the results of The African
Origins Project. During the registration process, Spanish and British
secretaries, who almost certainly had no fluency in many, if any, West
African languages and dialects, spelled out these names phonetically as
they heard them spoken. Furthermore, most non-Muslim, sub-Saharan
cultures had not developed orthographies for their languages in the first
half of the nineteenth century. To afford the registration process some
credibility, African-born interpreters were present to assist the secretary.
However, they were almost certainly illiterate and probably spoke some
Spanish at a minimal level; hence, they could not have verified the
secretary’s spelling or accentuation. It is unknown exactly where these
interpreters came from in Africa and what languages they spoke because
only their Christian names and nación were documented. The interpreters
typically had the same nación as a group of people on a given boat. A
perfect transcription of the African names is sometimes impossible
because it cannot be known with any certainty exactly what the secretary
was trying to spell.
Fortunately, the documents are kept in excellent condition and the
majority of names are entirely legible, if not always easy to transcribe.
However, like most documentation from the colonial period, the records
are handwritten and the ink has sometimes blurred and faded over time.
A name like Guegue, for example, could just as easily read: Gueque,
Quegueor Queque, all of which are plausible names. In other similar
examples, arguments could be made for more than one possible spelling
of the same name. This report examines the conditions in which the
registers from “The Archives of the Havana Slave Trade Commission”
were made in the past and the strategies implemented to minimize
transcription errors in the present. The most recent transcription of the
Caribbean registers was the result of a lot of thorough work and involved
the collaboration of several historians to scrutinize the letters of each

African name. This paper also presents the statistical data contained in
these registers on gender, height and age; regions and ports of
embarkation; and by the nación classifications in relation to regions in
Africa.
Transcription Methodology and Database Construction
In the National Archives, England, the Colonial Office (CO) 313 series is
labelled “The Archives of the Havana Slave Trade Commission.” In
chronological order therein, numbers CO 56-62 are the registers
originating in both Cuba and the Bahamas. The majority of the registers
were made in Havana and composed in Spanish, except for the only two
registers of the 1840s, the Jesús María and Secunda Rosario, which were
created at Nassau and written in English. Repatriation of the collection to
London probably occurred soon after the abolishment of the transatlantic
slave trade in the 1860s, but it is unclear if the whole collection from
Cuba went to the Bahamas at any point in time, or if the two English
registers were added to the Spanish ones later on. In any case, all these
voyages were originally bound for Cuba. Even though two registers were
made in the Bahamas, the Mixed Commission in Havana remained open
into the 1860s. After its closure, the records were most likely taken to
England at this point in time. There are also handwritten duplicates of the
original collection from the CO 313 series scattered throughout the
Foreign Office (FO) 84 series. It is not known exactly when or where
these duplicates were made, but the handwriting was different and
contains twenty-five of the forty-two registers between 1828 and 1835.
Outside of England, additional copies of these registers have not been
located in the Archivo Nacional de Cuba or the Archivo General de
Indias, Spain.7 During the re-transcription, I worked from Eltis’ database
and digital copies I made of the CO 313 and FO 84 collections in 2002
and again in 2009. I used the documents from the CO 313 series
exclusively, except for when an African name was entirely illegible or
had a plausible alternative spelling, and if a duplicate was available, only
then would I consult the FO 84 series. Both collections found in London

maintain the same structural format of rows and columns of the personal
information per captive.
Several key factors contributed to the necessity to review and update
the data in “The African Names Database.” First, the African names
recorded in the SPSS program of the 1970s did not include the accents
originally recorded in the colonial documentation because computer
technology at this time was not yet advanced enough to do so. In African
tonal languages, accents could change the name’s pronunciation,
interpretation and meaning; hence, the ethno-linguistic details about the
origins of an individual. It is worth noting that there are no accents
included in the majority of the registers written in English whether from
the Bahamas or Sierra Leone. Second, the “African Names Database” is
not organized in the same sequential order as the colonial records, but
instead loosely around nación classifications. For some reason the
original register numbers were not included in the “African Names
Database,” which makes cross-referencing with the original record a
logistical nightmare. Third, some of the numeric fields for age, sex,
height and nación were sometimes left blank, miscopied or hit with what
seems to have been some sort of computer glitch. Fourth, this database
does not include the documented Christian name given to each captive
during the registration process. This is a serious weakness because
emancipados and the enslaved population were identified by their
Christian names in colonial Cuba. Christian names in other forms of
documentation which are linked to a registered ship may be used to
identify an African name and hence the ethno-linguistic origins of the
individual. Last, the total for the sample Eltis reached is missing thirteen
individuals.
In light of the aforementioned reasons, it would appear as if the
“African Names Database” was not adequately edited and checked after
it was first transcribed from microfiche. As Eltis recognizes, however,
most of the names in the original documents are legible and any mis-
transcribed African names probably represent a small percentage overall.
Furthermore, neither “The African Names Database” nor The Trans-
Atlantic Slave Trade Database includes an inventory of the collection of

registers from the Caribbean or indeed Sierra Leone. Even so, some
African names were inevitably and unintentionally miscopied. Despite
the mistakes, Eltis published this database online in order to give other
scholars a chance to work with the data. My own research has attempted
to meet this challenge and benefit from its online release.8 Before a
revision of “The African Names Database” could begin, it became
evident that an inventory of the original collection should be established
to track progress.
As noted previously, “The African Names Database” had thirteen
names less than my total of 10,391. To explain this difference,
sometimes the secretary wrote little notes into the ledgers instead of an
African name. For example, the African name for captive 252 of the
Julita reads, “He did not express his name to the interpreter because he is
mute.”9 In other cases, it simply states, “does not say a name,” or “does
not have one.” In any case, the notes written in the place of an African
name apparently had no practical value to the aims of “The African
Names Database” and indeed The African Origins Project. Otherwise,
Eltis simply missed two names during his transcription. Rosanne Marion
Adderley published an inventory of the collection from Cuba in a study
unrelated to the aims of The African Origins Project. She used these data
to examine the male to female ratio of the emancipado community from
the Caribbean registers. She demonstrates that the proportion of males in
the entire sample was about 70% and that the total was the same as
mine.10 Appendix I is my updated inventory of the Cuba dataset and
includes: register date, ship name, port of embarkation and total number
of individuals per ship. It also includes the Voyage ID number for easy
cross-referencing with The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database.
However, it should be noted that the “The African Names Database” and
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database still does not take into
consideration the further displacement of these liberated Africans from
Cuba to other British colonies in the Caribbean.
Since “The African Names Database” does not include accents for
intonation, original register number and Christian names, I systematically
re-transcribed all this information, including the African names line-by-

line, ship-by-ship. Once I had completed a ship, I inserted the updated
information with the individual ID number that had been assigned to
each person in “The African Names Database.” This task meant
descrambling the order of “The African Names Database” so that it
matched the original order of the colonial records. Once the two
databases were linked, I copy-edited the columns of information for age,
sex, height and nación. From my review, it seemed as if a computer
glitch had somehow infected the 1970s SPSS programme because there
were many blank fields in the height column which always correlated to
someone who measured exactly three, four and five feet. From time to
time, someone's age would also read 114, when indeed it could have
been either 11 or 14. Through my careful revision, I took the liberty of
filling in blank fields and rectifying any minor mistakes.
The transcription process was tedious, time consuming and it ran the
risk of being less thorough the more consecutive hours spent working.
From beginning to end, it took over six months of full-time work to
transcribe, descramble and edit the 10,391 entries from the Caribbean
data. It could sometimes take several days to complete one ship
depending on its legibility and the order in “The African Names
Database.” From my experience, the repetitiveness of data entry
increased the potential for spelling, copying and typing errors. Naturally,
my mind wandered from time to time and I would turn my attention to
the number of possible mistakes that I could have made along the way.
Sometimes I thought about how hard it would have been for the
secretaries registering these weary individuals in person by the boatload
and how many careless mistakes they might have made. In various places
in the original records it is possible to see where the secretaries had
scratched out their own mistakes. I also began to feel an ever increasing
respect for Eltis who had compiled a database with over 67,000 entries
compared to the mere 10,000 I was now tasked with organizing.
Since there is no way of clarifying any mistakes the secretary may
have made in the past, the issue at hand is to minimize the number of
transcription errors in the present. As I matched my re-transcription
alongside Eltis’ version, I noticed how frequently we spelled the same

African names, minus the accents, in noticeably different ways.
Sometimes our renditions were so different I could only locate an
individual’s position in “The African Names Database” through the
process of elimination and then by cross-referencing the data of age, sex,
height and nación. I estimate that Eltis and I have spelled names
differently by one or more letter for about a quarter to one third of the
entire collection. It should also be noted that there were also some minor
discrepancies in spelling among the various nación classifications and
sub-classifications, which also have accents for intonation. Despite these
many difficulties, many revisions were inevitably required. My revision
of the Caribbean registers has demonstrated that “The African Names
Database” should still be edited in its entirety.
As a result of my re-transcription, Eltis brought together a team of
historians involved with The African Origins Project to scrutinize over
the differences between the “African Names Database” and my updated
version. Over several days in July 2010, Eltis, Oscar Grandío Moraguez,
Daniel Domingues da Silva, Philip Misevich and I closely compared
digital copies of the original documentation with my revised database
and “The African Names Database.” Through this collaborative editing
process, we debated spellings, lettering and accents. In the more
debatable moments, we came to a consensus by vote even if some of us
continued to agree to disagree. Given the nature of these data, I would
still estimate that between five and ten percent of the African names in
the updated transcription may still have alternative spellings or are still
mis-transcribed. Nevertheless, this methodological strategy was
necessary to reduce the number of transcription errors. In consideration
of The African Origins Project, it would be extremely useful to include
links to digital copies of the original records so that volunteers
interpreting the names could verify the colonial handwriting for
themselves.
The updated database of registers from the Caribbean will be
published with the release of The African Origins Project. The sound
bites will be re-recorded to account for the accents and possible changes
in the plausible pronunciation. The full transcription of the Caribbean,

and indeed Sierra Leone, dataset is still only partial because the columns
pertaining to the physical descriptions and interpreters have yet to be
fully transcribed. The physical descriptions (señales) contain information
related to personal injuries, body and facial markings, tattooing,
scarifications and evidence of small pox. Fortunately, this data is easier
to transcribe since the writing uses recognizable Spanish and English
words. In consideration of the Caribbean records alone, the physical
descriptions amount to a two-to-three line description per individual,
which I estimate, could take more than a year to transcribe, translate and
edit. These descriptions are certainly a gold mine of information relating
to ethnicity and other topics, such as small pox, but new methodologies
will still need to be developed on how to sort through the material and
organize it for analysis.
Preliminary Analysis and Statistical Data
Of all the transcribed data contained in the Caribbean registers, sex and
height are probably the most trustworthy information. It is unlikely the
secretaries made many mistakes when recording this type of personal
data because all that was required was a simple assessment and
measurement of the human body. In the sex column, people were
labelled as either varón (male) or hembra (female). Height was measured
in feet and inches; and sometimes down to the fraction of an inch. In this
database, feet and inches were converted into inches alone in order to
calculate averages more easily. Table 1 is the distribution of the registers
by gender and average height. The height data is in inches and
centimetres.
Table 1: Gender and Average Height of the Emancipados

Gender Individuals Percentage Height
(inches/cm)
Male 7,509 72.3 56/142
Female 2,881 27.7 53/135
Total 10,391
The lower percentage of females is typical for this period and reflects the
high demand for male labour in response to the expansion of the Cuban
sugar industry in the nineteenth century. On average, males were just
under five feet tall and about three inches taller than their female
counterparts.
In comparison to the sex and height data, the listed ages are
unreliable as an historical source. Presumably, the secretaries guessed
ages at a time when these people had just endured the lengthy trial of a
transatlantic crossing. It is most likely that the ages provided were
entirely different than the actual ages of each individual. Given the
nature of slave trading patterns at this time, young healthy adults were in
highest demand and the average age of the entire dataset was just over
nineteen years old. Adults listed as forty years and older represented just
3% of the overall total. The oldest male was listed at seventy-two years
old and the oldest female was sixty. No one was listed as three, four and
five years old; children two years and younger were probably infants.
The youngest infants were listed at less than 1 month old, meaning some
children could have been born on slave ships or indeed during the trial.
In total, there were twenty-nine infants (sixteen male and thirteen
female), and on average, they measured about two feet (61 cm).
As a general pattern observed in the age, sex and height columns,
the order of people in the registers was typically men, boys, women and
girls, and sometimes according to nación sub-classifications. Toward the
ends of the registers, there were a number of loose stragglers of varying
gender, ages and nación classifications. This ordering suggests that the
secretaries were trying to make some sort of distinction between adults
and children. Price levels varied and were never uniform throughout the
island in any time period. Between 1821 and 1835, there were many
short term fluctuations in the cost of slaves, marked by a sharp decline by
1833 when prices hit levels prevalent in the 1790s. After 1836 until the
1850s, there was general stability in slave prices with no sharp
fluctuations. In this period, the average prices per adult slave varied
between 250 and 500 reales, while children could have cost anywhere
between 150 and 250 reales.11
Even though the listed ages could be different than the actual age,
European buyers of slaves along the coast of Africa had a history of
using height to distinguish between adults and children. In 1795, Thomas
Leyland, a notorious slave trader and three times mayor of Liverpool,
instructed Captain William Young of the Spitfire that his “ship is intitled
to carry 253 full grown [people], exceeding 4 Feet 4 Inches, and 169
small [people], under 4 Feet 4 Inches, and it is certain of such description
will make the highest Average in the West Indies, particularly at the
Havannah.”12 This measurement—henceforth called Leyland’s
measurement (converted into 52 inches or 132 centimetres)—is a good
indication of how slave traders in Cuba used height to differentiate
between adults and children. Regardless, Leyland’s measurement did not
take into account growing abnormalities during and after puberty; thus,
there could have been many adults shorter, and indeed children taller,
than 52 inches.
Given the original order in the records, Table 2 identifies adults and
children based on Leyland’s measurement—meaning adults are equal to
and taller than 52 inches, while children are considered shorter than this
measurement. Table 3 assumes the ages provided by the secretary are
approximate and roughly assumes the age of adulthood at puberty to be
about thirteen years for both sexes.13 Both tables provide the percentages
of men, boys, women and girls in the total sample, as well as averages
for height and age.
Table 2: Approximate Proportions of Men, Boys, Women and Girls

based on Leyland’s Measurement (LM) with Averages for Age and
Height
Sex/Height Individuals Percent Age Height (cm/in.)

Men (≥LM) 5,588 53.8 23.9 150/59
Boys (<LM) 1,904 18.3 10.7 119/47
Women 1,833 17.6 19.4 142/56
(≥LM)
Girls (<LM) 1,035 10.1 10.6 122/48
Table 3: Approximate Proportions of Men, Boys, Women and Girls

based on Thirteen Years Old with Averages for Age and Height
Sex/Age Individuals Percent Age Height (cm/in.)

Men (≥13) 5,520 53.1 24.3 150/59
Boys (6-12) 1,971 19.0 10.3 122/48
Women (≥13) 1,737 16.7 19.4 142/56
Girls (6-12) 1,131 10.9 10.3 125/49
Again, the methods used to obtain the proportion of adults and

children in both tables are highly contentious and should be treated as
such. Table 2, for example, does not take into account growth
abnormalities during puberty, while Table 3 does not consider how the
age of adulthood is defined differently in many cultures. If, for example,
a different age was used to determine the age of adulthood in Table 3, the
results would obviously be very different. However, the order in the
original records suggests the secretaries were trying to make some sort of
distinction. No matter how debatable the results of both tables may be,
the totals differed by less than one hundred people and the percentages
by less than 1 percent. Furthermore, the averages for age and height in
both tables are nearly identical. Tables 2 and 3, in my opinion, provide a
reasonable approximation of the proportion of adults in the entire
sample, which could have been upwards of 80 percent. The high

percentage of young adult males also reinforces the type of labour
required to support the rapidly expanding sugar industry in Cuba.
The ports of embarkation for ships in the sample (see Appendix 1)
can be placed into the eight broad African coastal regions as defined in
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, which are: Senegambia, Sierra
Leone, the Windward Coast, Gold Coast, Bight of Benin, Bight of
Biafra, West Central Africa and Southeast Africa. The three busiest ports
represented in the registers were Ouidah, Bonny and Rio Pongo, which
areall estuaries that involved several locations. Table 4 reflects the
distribution of the Cuban registers according to the eight regions of
embarkation as defined in The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database. It
also provides the estimates of the total number of slaves disembarking in
Cuba between 1824 and 1841 and the percentages of how much the
registers represent the overall volume of trade to Cuba in this period. In
total, the Caribbean registers represent about 3% of the movement to
Cuba in this seventeen year period.
The region in the sample that best represented the overall trade was
West Central Africa and the Bight of Benin. There are no slaves in the
sample from the Gold Coast and Southeast Africa. In the 1820s, hardly
any ships, if any at all, arrived to Cuba from the Gold Coast due to the
increasing effectiveness of British patrols operating out of Sierra Leone
and the closing of the notorious British and Dutch slave factories at Cape
Coast and Elmina. Even though people from South East Africa went to
Cuba in this period, none are represented in this sample probably because
the British only had jurisdiction in the Atlantic Ocean north of the
equator until the amendments of 1835. After, it would take the patrols
some considerable time to effectively patrol the South Atlantic.
The regions of embarkation as defined in the The Trans-Atlantic
Slave Trade Database (TSTD2) overlap with the uses of the ten broad
nación classifications used in the Caribbean registers. Table 6 reflects the
Caribbean dataset according to nación and the African regions of
embarkation. Based on the relatively small groupings of people boarding
slave ships in Senegambia, Sierra Leone and Windward Coast, I elected
to group these eleven voyages together under one region labelled the
Upper Guinea Coast. This region includes ports located between Bissaud
and Rio Pongo in upper Guinea. Since there were larger contingents of
people leaving from the Bight of Benin, the Bight of Biafra and West
Central Africa, these regions are the same as defined in the TSTD2. The
percentages represent the proportion of nación classifications in the
entire sample.
Table 5: Regional Origins of Emancipados with Estimates of the

Overall Volume of the Transatlantic Slave Trade to Cuba, 1824–
1841
Region of Embarkation Registers Total Percent

Senegambia 146 3,142 4.6
Sierra Leone 1,545 43,708 3.5
Windward Coast 207 5,575 3.7
Gold Coast 0 2,711 0.0
Bight of Benin 3,663 59,458 6.2
Bight of Biafra 2,514 129,831 1.9
West Central Africa 2,316 33,476 6.9
Southeast Africa 0 35,563 0.0
Total 10,391 313,464 3.3
The historiography related to when, where and how these colonial

terms originated and what they may have meant throughout the entire
history of the transatlantic slave trade is extensive.14 Colonial slave
traders and owners subjectively classified people from the many different
regions in Africa according to these broad colonial terms. They do not
take into consideration the myriad of African ethno-linguistic groups.
Furthermore, their historical interpretation in the recent past and present
has generated a great deal of historical debate especially since these
terms were used differently, or not at all, depending on British, French,
Dutch, Danish, Spanish or Portuguese interests. As Robin Law
demonstrates, Lucumí was typically used only in Spanish speaking
colonies, whereby Nâgo referred to people leaving from the Bight of

Benin in Portuguese, French and British colonies.15
Table 6: Region of Embarkation and Nación Classifications in the

Caribbean Registers
Regions of Embarkation Individuals Percent
Nación Classifications
Upper Guinea Coast
de Bissau 146 1.4
Sierra Leona 4 0
Arpongo 1 0
Gangá 863 8.3
Mandinga 883 8.3
Congo 1 0
Bight of Benin
Mina 686 6.6
Arará 349 3.3
Lucumí 2,624 25.3
Mandinga 2 0
Carabali 2 0
Bight of Biafra
Lucumí 104 .1
Carabali 2,410 23.2
West Central Africa
Congo 2,316 22.3
Total 10,391
The purpose here is not to discuss the nación classifications in

relation to African ethno-linguistic groups, but to demonstrate their
geographic association with their respective regions and ports of
embarkation. Understanding what these terms mean could have
tremendous implications related to the study on slavery in Cuba because
cabildos de nación formed in accordance with these broad
classifications. The scholarship related to mutual aid societies in Cuba is
also extensive.16 There are also other studies examining certain slave
uprisings which were fought and organized by groups of people
belonging to certain nación classifications.17
Evidence related to colonial uses of these nación terms can be found
in the interpreter column and side notes of the registers. Sometimes terms
were used for the name of a language, such as English or French, and
African interpreters were chosen because they could “speak” Mandinga,
Gangá, Arará, Mina, Lucumí, Carabali or Congo. However, the nación
classifications de Bissau, Sierra Leona and Arpongoprobably represent
the names of ports or rivers, such as Bissau, the Sierra Leone River and
Rio Pongo. De Bissau was the only classification used for the people
aboard la Caridad Cubana of 1839, which left Bissau from the Upper-
Guinea Coast. Sierra Leona and Arpongo only total five people; all of
whom arrived on the Secunda Rosario in 1841 from the Rio Pongo with
many Gangá and Mandinga.
The Mandinga-Gangá boundary is not clearly defined, but according
to the registers would appear to be around Rio Pongo. Mandinga only
left from Rio Pongo which is an estuary on the Atlantic Ocean near
Boffa, in modern-day Guinea. In other historical sources, Mandinga
typically left from places in the Senegambia region, including Bissau.
Gangá left from Grand Mesurado, Cape Mount, Galinhas Islands,
Sherbro and Rio Pongo. Gangá is a much more complicated
classification to define because this term was only used in Cuba and
generally nowhere else in the Americas. In the Caribbean registers,
Gangá were found aboard slave ships, often with Mandingas at Rio
Pongo.
Mina, Arará and Lucumí all left from ports between Popo and
Lagos in the Bight of Benin and likewise the boundaries are not clearly
defined. Minas were mostly concentrated around Popo, but a small
percentage also left from Ouidah. Arará only left from Popo and Ouidah.
There were very few Mina and Arará in this collection probably as a
result of the increased effectiveness of British maritime patrols off the
Gold Coast, Sierra Leone and eventually around Ouidah in the late-
1830s. Lucumí, which were the most represented in the entire sample,
primarily left from Ouidah and Lagos, but small contingents left from as
far west as Popo and as far east as Bonny in the Bight of Biafra. There
were also two people classified as Mandinga leaving from Lagos, which
seems rather out of place. However, these two Mandinga could have
referred to some of the Muslim ethnic groups located in the Bight of
Benin hinterland.
Carabali typically arrived to Cuba from the following ports in the
Bight of Biafra: River Brass, Bonny, Calabar and Cameroons River.
There were however two individuals classified as Carabali leaving from
Lagos in the Bight of Benin. Otherwise, Congo typically refers to places
in West Central Africa. There were nine registers with only Congo
people onboard. The ports of embarkation included Loango, Mayumba,
Congo River, Ambriz and Luanda. The only Congo captive leaving from
the Upper Guinea Coast seems entirely misplaced or was possibly some
sort of clerical error from the past. Captive number 216, Melí, a.k.a.
Dolores, was listed as a twenty-four year-old Congo woman found
aboard the Segunda Rosario along with people classified as Mandinga,
Gangá, Arpongo and Sierra Leona.
Along with these ten broad classifications, the secretaries also used
over two hundred different nación sub-classifications, which appear to
signify—despite their colonial distortions—more specific African ethno-
linguistic groups (see Appendix II for complete list of all sub-
classifications). For example, the sub-classifications, Gangá Gorá and
Gangá Conó, could have referred to Gola and Kono ethnic groups
respectively. Or, the two Mandinga leaving Lagos have a sub-
classification of Mandinga Fula, possibly meaning they could have been
Fulani Muslims. It should be noted that about one third of the entries for
these emancipados did not have any sub-classification at all. Some sub-
classifications also appeared to have alternative spelling. For example,
Lucumí-Ayó was also written as Eyó, Elló and Aylló, which the team of
historians responsible for editing the database determined were almost
certainly the same sub-classification. Ayó, and its alternative spellings,
probably referred to Oyo-Yoruba.18Another example includes Congo
Moyombe which was also written as Congo Mollomve. In Appendix II,
the sub-classifications with alternative spellings are put in parentheses

and grouped together. Last, some of the sub-classifications transcended
the broader colonial nación classifications as the examples of Mandinga
Conó and Gangá Conó demonstrate.
The nación classifications and sub-classifications over-simplify the
regional, ethnic and linguistic backgrounds of these liberated Africans.
They were assigned, beyond the registers, based solely on the subject
opinions of colonial slave traders, owners/masters and government
officials. These classifications are therefore highly problematic and
cannot be trusted on their own merit. The identification of the African
names, which is the primary aim of The African Origins Project, will
hopefully clarify where these people came from in the African interior
beyond the port of embarkation. Once the entire sample of African
names has been interpreted and the data released, historians should get a
better sense of the meanings associated with the nación classifications in
this period.
Conclusion: Implications for the Sierra Leone Dataset

and The African Origins Project
In the aftermath of the transfer of Sierra Leone to the British crown from
the Sierra Leone Company in 1807 and “The Act for the Abolition of the
Slave Trade” was passed the year after, a court of Vice Admiralty was
established in Freetown to enforce British maritime law. This was just
one of well over a hundred such courts scattered across British
possessions around the globe. In fact the court that adjudicated the
greatest number of liberated Africans was in St. Helena. The High Court
of Admiralty, located in London, was the appellate court. By 1818, Great
Britain had pressured Portugal, France, the Netherlands and independent
republics of the former Spanish empirein the Americas into signing anti-
slave trading treaties. Soon after, Courts of Mixed Commission, like the
one in Havana, were established in some of those non-British colonies as
well. Hundreds of cases were processed in these courts of Vice
Admiralty and Mixed Commission. Even though the courts managed to
free hundreds of thousands of people, an estimated three million

enslaved people from Africa still went to the Americas from 1808
onward. Although other registers exist, it appears that the courts at
Freetown, Havana and Nassau are the only ones to include African
names.
Since 2010, Paul Lovejoy, Susanne Schwarz, Neil Marshall,
Jennifer Toews and others have been working on the digitization project
funded by the British Library’s Endangered Archives Programme in
Sierra Leone and have identified a collection of registers which is larger
than the collection of registers housed at the British National Archives.
The collection in Freetown begins in 1808, while the London collection
begins in 1819. At present, it remains unclear which of the two
collections are the original, but it is most likely the collection located in
Sierra Leone. The registers in Sierra Leone may be incomplete because
two volumes could not be located during either research trip, but
duplicates of those volumes exist in the FO 84 series in London. At this
point in time, the exact total of registered individuals at Sierra Leone
remains unknown, but it totals more than 84,000, instead of the 57,000 or
so entries already transcribed in “The African Names Database.” It also
includes approximately 12,000 from 1808-1819, not recorded in London.
An inventory of both the Freetown and London collections would
certainly resolve any dispute concerning the overall total, demonstrate
duplicates and possibly locate any of the missing volumes. Any missing
registers will obviously need to be transcribed. Since a perfect
transcription of the African names is sometimes impossible, the other
57,000 or so names from the Sierra Leone dataset should be edited to
reduce the number of transcription errors. Fortunately, Eltis has done the
bulk of the transcription work and it is far easier to edit than it is to start
over. Still, a decision must be made as to which collection should be
used before “The African Names Database” is edited and that
transcription is re-released with The African Origins Project.
Appendix I: Inventory of the Registers from “The Archives of the

Havana Slave Trade Commission”
TSTD Reg. Date Ship Name Port of Individuals/

Voyage Embarkation Ship
ID
2358 1824 Relâmpago Grand Mesurado 149
2366 1825 Isabel Gallinhas 10
2374 1826 Mágico Popo 175
558 1826 Fingal Cape Mount 58
557 1826 Orestes Ouidah 212
Nuevo
561 1826 Campeador Calabar 211
Xerxes (a.
664 1828/06/22 Gerges) Bonny 385
668 1828/08/25 Intrepido Bonny 133
753 1828/12/10 Maria Congo River 1
756 1828/12/23 Firme Popo 483
Fortuna (a.
770 1829/04/28 Josefa) Gallinhas 202
Voladora (a.
776 1829/07/01 Mulata) Popo 330
777 1829/08/12 Midas Bonny 208
941 1829/12/05 Gallito Rio Pongo 135
960 1830/05/28 Santiago River Brass 100
Emilio (a.
963 1830/07/07 Cesar) New Calabar 187
1245 1832/05/04 Planeta Cameroons River 236
1249 1832/07/03 Aguila Loango 596
1250 1832/07/16 Indagadora Lagos (Onim) 134
1266 1833/01/05 Negrito Ouidah 477
1295 1833/12/03 Joaquina Bonny 318
1298 1833/12/31 Manuelita Lagos (Onim) 477
1307 1834/02/10 Rosa Ouidah 289

1338 1834/12/07 Carlota Gallinhas 163
1355 1835/02/01 Maria Bonny 340
1361 1835/02/23 Julita Ouidah 336
La Joven
1367 1835/04/15 Reyna Congo River 254
1368 1835/05/07 Chubasco Rio Pongo 230
1372 1835/05/12 Marte Loango 326
1383 1835/07/23 Tita Ouidah 392
1396 1835/11/24 Amália Congo River 200
1403 1835/12/31 Diligência Mayumba 94
Ninfa (a.
1446 1836/02/04 Matanzera) Calabar 396
Ricomar (a.
1462 1836/03/15 Zafiro) Ouidah 186
1479 1836/07/08 Preciosa Rio Pongo 290
1469 1836/11/11 Empresa Luanda 407
1631 1837 Matilde Ambriz 255
1569 1838 Antonica Congo River 183
Sierra del
1856 1839 Pilar Lagos (Onim) 172
CaridadCuba
1860 1839 na Bissau 146
2071 1840 JesúsMaría Sherbro 234
Segunda
2078 1841 Rosario Rio Pongo 281
Total Ships 42 Total Individuals 10,391
Appendix II: Nación Classifications and Sub-Classifications in the Registers of “The Archives of the Havana Slave
Trade Commission”
Lucumí Individuals Congo Individuals

LucumíAyó, Eyó, EllóorAylló) 1,235 Congo (no sub-classification) 1,172
Lucumí (no sub-classification) 598 Congo Mondongo 354
LucumíEcumachó 470 Congo Bomá 182
LucumíTapá 82 Congo Luango 154
LucumíLlabú (Yavú) 68 Congo Musundí 143
LucumíChambá (Chamvá) 62 Congo Moyombe (Mollomve) 66
LucumíOtá 61 Congo Mongoma 45
LucumíEvá (Ebá) 60 Congo Bimgo 9
LucumíAgusá (Jausá) 36 Congo Damba 8
LucumíCacanda 21 Congo Musicongo 6
LucumíBasa 9 Congo Bamba 5
LucumíMosi 3 Congo Lemba 5
LucumíYesa 3 Congo Mobonva 5
LucumíDagñame 2 Congo Antpaango 4
LucumíEcuá 2 Congo Somo 4
LucumíIgara 2 Congo Baco 3
LucumíBogú 1 Congo Camba 3
LucumíDasá 1 Congo Chocho 3
LucumíEfú 1 Congo Gongo 3
LucumíEgruá 1 Congo Gumga 3
LucumíEllico 1 Congo Lombo 3
LucumíGuarí 1 Congo Real 3
LucumíLayí 1 Congo Soso 3
LucumíLayí (Llallí) 1 Congo Tando 3
Lucumí Llama 1 Congo Biri 2
LucumíOpu 1 Congo Boco 2
LucumíPové 1 Congo Buco 2
LucumíSabé 1 Congo Buere 2
LucumíVacúo 1 Congo Bullonde 2
LucumíYacó 1 Congo Canga 2
Total Lucumí 2,728 Congo Cango 2
Total Sub-Classifications 29 Congo Cansa 2
Congo Cay 2
Carabali Individuals Congo Cuní 2
CarabaliSuamo (Isuamo) 504 Congo Enchí 2
CarabaliCamaron 396 Congo Ensuca 2
CarabaliElugo 302 Congo Fula 2
CarabaliIbibí (Bibí) 266 Congo Lano 2
CarabaliBrican 171 Congo Lucutí 2
CarabaliBrícamo 122 Congo Manba (Manva) 2
CarabaliDuri (Induri) 117 Congo Matendi 2
CarabaliCicuato 101 Congo Muema 2
CarabaliApapá (Apápá) 80 Congo Noque 2
CarabaliOrú 61 Congo Quiso 2
Carabali Ibo 52 Congo Sombo 2
CarabaliApá 39 Congo Tamba 2
Carabali Isa 35 Congo Bafo 1
CarabaliBanfule 29 Congo Bandechendi 1
CarabaliOsosó 29 Congo Bansa 1
Carabali Bane 19 Congo Biabo 1
CarabaliUngua 14 Congo Bongela 1
CarabaliOtán 10 Congo Buchimpe 1
CarabaliMogo 9 Congo Cabinda 1
CarabaliObane 6 Congo Caí 1
CarabaliUqua 5 Congo Chiongo 1
CarabaliVende 5 Congo Chita 1
Carabali Bony 4 Congo Cimchí 1
CarabaliItepu 4 Congo Cimgo 1
CarabaliAchena 3 Congo Cocumbe 1
CarabaliAgó 2 Congo Cola 1
CarabaliCalabal 2 Congo Conche 1
CarabaliEsalá 2 Congo Cuma 1
CarabaliAquese 1 Congo Cuno 1
CarabaliAsa 1 Congo Cusa 1
CarabaliAtane 1 Congo Cutuide 1
CarabaliBasá 1 Congo Danval 1
CarabaliBó 1 Congo Decolo 1
CarabaliCuachú 1 Congo Densuso 1
CarabaliCuiüa 1 Congo Emagebo 1
CarabaliCunácuná 1 Congo Enlaza 1
CarabaliDoque 1 Congo Ensadi 1
CarabaliEculasu 1 Congo Ensomga 1
CarabaliEdú 1 Congo Esombe 1
CarabaliEpá 1 Congo Febo 1
CarabaliErí 1 Congo Femba 1
CarabaliEsa 1 Congo Fete 1
CarabaliEyó 1 Congo Ganda 1
CarabaliNenu 1 Congo Gimse 1
CarabaliNiconecha 1 Congo Guaguana 1
CarabaliOcoloba 1 Congo Guelé 1
CarabaliOmuma 1 Congo Guembo 1
CarabaliOnecha 1 Congo Jali 1
CarabaliOrobio 1 Congo Laba 1
CarabaliUbacaua 1 Congo Leque 1
CarabaliUgu 1 Congo Llanga 1
Total Carabali 2,412 Congo Lomica 1
Total Sub-Classifications 51 Congo Longo 1
Congo Lotala 1
Mandinga Individuals Congo Lufo 1
Mandinga (no sub-classification) 553 Congo Lumbi 1
MandingaSosó 110 Congo Lusanda 1
MandingaTeminé 101 Congo Lusanga 1
MandingaLogó 50 Congo Macará 1
MandingaLimbá 11 Congo Maganié 1
MandingaQuisí 11 Congo Melele 1
MandingaToma 10 Congo Mesa 1
MandingaLocó 9 Congo Mesara 1
MandingaCurangó 6 Congo Moache 1
MandingaBámbara 5 Congo Moamba 1
MandingaComiaca 5 Congo Mocanda 1
MandingaBagá 3 Congo Mongo 1
MandingaFulá 3 Congo Monlaso 1
MandingaConó 2 Congo Mopaso 1
MandingaSangara 2 Congo Mudimba 1
MandingaCranco 1 Congo Mulimba 1
Mandinga Gora 1 Congo Musimba 1
MandingaVaré 1 Congo Muyala 1
MandingaYeré 1 Congo Niense 1
Total Mandinga 885 Congo Noca 1
Total Sub-Classifications 18 Congo Ocama 1
Congo Ofó 1
Gangá Individuals Congo Pesa 1
Gangá (no sub-classification) 466 Congo Queta 1
GangáLongobá (Longová) 215 Congo Quiama 1
GangáBuché 37 Congo Quindonga 1
GangáConó 28 Congo Ruya 1
GangáBeré 27 Congo Sacala 1
Gangá Fai 24 Congo Sande 1
GangáGorá 21 Congo Say 1
GangáQuisí 21 Congo Sese 1
GangáFulá 10 Congo Simba 1
GangáManí 6 Congo Sita 1
GangáBahi 5 Congo Solón 1
GangáBumi 2 Congo Suca 1
GangáToma 1 Congo Sucuté 1
Total Gangá 863 Congo Tibo 1
Total Sub-Classifications 12 Congo Timga 1
Congo Totela 1
Mina Individuals Congo Untacala 1
Mina (no sub-classification) 273 Congo Vinda 1
Mina Fanti 101 Total Congo 2,317
Mina Popó 312 Total Sub-Classifications 129
Total Mina 686
No sub-classifications Individuals
Arará Individuals De Bisao 146
AraráMagí (Magín) 147 Sierra Leona 4
Arará (no sub-classification) 130 Arpongo 1
LucumiArará 67 Total 151
AraráCuatro Ojos 5
Total Arará 349
1
This paper was not possible without funding from the Tabor Pre-Dissertation
Fellowship, Latin America Institute and the Department of History (all from the
University of California, Los Angeles). It was originally presented at The Slave
Voyage Database and African Economic History: A Workshop, York University,
Canada, (May, 2010). Special thanks to David Eltis, Liz Milewicz, Oscar
Grandío Moraguez, Daniel Domingues da Silva, Phil Misevich, my father,
Susanne Schwarz, David Richardson and the people involved with The African
Origins Project at Emory University.
2
The ten nación classifications found in these registers are: De Bisau, Arpongo,
Sierra Leona, Mandinga, Gangá, Mina, Arará, Lucumí, Carabalí and Congo.
3
National Archives (NA), London, Foreign Office (FO), 84, vols. 4, 9, 15, 21,
38, 63, 64, 76, 86, 87, 100, 101, 102, 116, 127, 166 and 212. Cited from David
Eltis, “Nutritional Trends in Africa and the Americas: Heights of Africans,
1819-1839,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 12, 3 (1982), 454.
4
David Eltis, David Richardson, Manolo Florentino, and Stephen D. Behrendt,
Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database (www.slavevoyages.org),
(Accessed in August 2010).
5
After the online release of “The African Names Database,” Eltis and G. Ugo
Nwokeji demonstrate how this methodology can be applied to ascertain where
certain individuals came from in the Bight of Biafra hinterland. See G. Ugo
Nwokeji and Eltis, “The Roots of the African Diaspora: Methodological
Considerations in the Analysis of Names in the Liberated African Registers of
Sierra Leone and Havana,” History in Africa 29, (2002), 365-79.
6
See The African Origins Project, www.african-origins.org/about (accessed
January 2011). Currently, I am a member of the project’s development team and
academic consultant for research on the Havana registers.
7
Evidence related to the Mixed Commission and some of the trials can be found
in these non-British archives, but those records are sporadic at best.
8
Eltis, personal emails and conversations (May-July, 2010).
9
“No espresó su nombre pr. los interpretes que es mudo.”
10
Roseanne Marion Adderley, “New Negroes from Africa:” Slave Trade
Abolition and Free African Settlement in the Nineteenth-Century Caribbean
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006), 128-29. Adderley and I reached
different totals regarding the number of males and females in the dataset.
Adderley’s totals were: 7,498 males and 2,893 females. Regardless of these
differences, the male to female ratio remains about the same.
11
See Laird W. Bergad, Fe IglesisasGarcía and Maríadel Carmen Barcia, The
Cuban Slave Market, 1790-1880 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1995).
12
Cited and quoted as Leyland to Young, 15 June 1795, Ms 10/49, Leyland
papers, Harold Cohen Library, Liverpool in Paul E. Lovejoy, “The Children of
Slavery – The Transatlantic Phase,” Slavery and Abolition 27, 2 (2006), 207-
208.
13
The twenty-nine infants are not included in these tables. There were three
male captives whereby an age was not provided in the original records: captive
number 61 aboard the Marte; and captives number 145 and 146 aboard the
Caridad Cubana.
14
Refer to Gwendolyn M. Hall, Social Control in Slave Plantation Societies: A
Comparison of St. Domingue and Cuba (Baltimore; Johns Hopkins University
Press, 1971); Linda M. Heywood, ed., Central Africans and Cultural
Transformations in the American Diaspora (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2002); and Stephen Palmié, Wizards and Scientists: Explorations in Afro-
Cuban Modernity and Tradition (Durham: Duke University Press, 2002).
15
Robin Law, “Ethnicity and the Slave Trade: ‘Lucumi’ and ‘Nago’ as
Ethnonyms in West Africa,” History in Africa 24, (1997), 205-19.
16
See Fernando Ortiz, Los cabildos y la fiesta afrocubanos del Día de Reyes
(Habana: Editorial de Ciencias Sociales, 1992 [1921]) and María del Carmen
Barcia, Los ilustres apellidos: Negros en la Habana colonial (Habana: Oficina
del Historiador de la Ciudad de Habana, 2009).
17
See Manuel Barcia, Seeds of Insurrection: Domination and Resistance on
Western Cuban Plantations, 1808-1848 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana University
Press, 2008); and Juan Iduate, “Noticiassobresublevaciones y conspiraciones de
esclavos: Cafetal Salvador, 1833,” Revista de la Biblioteca Nacional José Marti
73, 24, (1982), 117-52. In Iduate’s article, there are over 250 African names
recorded in the original documentation. At some point, these names should be
included in The African Origins Project.
18
See also Eltis “The Diaspora of Yoruba Speakers, 1650-1865: Dimensions
and Implications,” in Toyin Falola and Matt Childs, eds., The Yoruba Diaspora
in the Atlantic World (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004), 19-39. In
this chapter, Eltis grouped together several of the Lucumí sub-classifications
that had alternative spellings.
EXTENDING THE AFRICAN NAMES DATABASE:
NEW EVIDENCE FROM SIERRA LEONE*
Suzanne Schwarz
University of Worcester
I
n 1999 the authors of The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade: A Database
on CD-Rom emphasised that one of the “basic limitations” of the
data set was it contained “thousands of names of shipowners and
ship captains, but … no names of the millions of slaves carried to the
Americas.”1 In many respects, the anonymity of the African men, women
and children forcibly transported to the Americas reflects problems
inherent in business records generated by slave merchants and captains
who saw no utility or interest in recording the names of Africans
routinely dehumanised as items of cargo.2 By representing Africans as
anonymous figures devoid of any personal or cultural identity, the
abolitionist image of the slave ship Brooks featured on the front cover of
the original database reinforces the importance of recovering from
obscurity details of African lives shattered by the Atlantic slave trade.3
The availability of systematic quantitative evidence on the forced
migration of millions of unidentified men, women and children in this
groundbreaking database, however, has undoubtedly stimulated new
research initiatives to trace the African identity of these individuals.4
In terms of retrieving the identities and origins of at least some of
the Africans affected by the trade, an important development in the new
expanded Slave Voyages database is the inclusion of the names of
67,228 African men, women and children derived from lists of liberated
Africans held in the FO84 series at the National Archives at Kew.5
Although these individuals represent less than one per cent of an
estimated 12.5 million Africans transported in the transatlantic slave
trade between the early-sixteenth and the mid-nineteenth century, the
evidence offers considerable potential to trace the features of the trade in
the early nineteenth century from an African perspective.6 In contrast to

138 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
the “mass of black human flesh” depicted in the image of the Brooks,7
these Registers of Liberated Africans provide rich details of the names,
gender, appearance, age and height of enslaved Africans released at
Sierra Leone and Cuba from illicit slaving vessels intercepted by Royal
Navy patrols between 1819 and 1845. Over 80 per cent of the African
Names Database is composed of the names of Africans landed at
Freetown between 1819 and 1845, with a further 10,378 names derived
from the registers of the Court of Mixed Commission at Havana between
1824 and 1841.8
The earliest entries in the Registers of Liberated Africans at Kew
(and hence in the African Names Database) date only from 1819, eleven
years after the commencement of policies of slave trade suppression by
royal naval patrols stationed at Freetown.9 However, important evidence
on the earliest groups of African recaptives landed at Freetown in the
immediate aftermath of British abolition has recently re-emerged after a
period of neglect during a collaborative British Library Endangered
Archives project under the direction of Paul E. Lovejoy.10 Registers of
Liberated Africans, containing details of enslaved Africans released by
the Vice-Admiralty Court at Freetown in the early phases of suppression
activity from 1808, were retraced in the Sierra Leone Public Archives at
Fourah Bay College in Freetown in February 2010. Entries for 15,967
Africans are contained in nine registers spanning the period between
1808 and 1822, and they include Africans taken off intercepted slave
vessels, Africans released as a result of naval attacks on slave barracoons
on the coast, as well as a smaller number of “slaves seized in the
colony.”11 Comparison between these nine early Registers of Liberated
Africans and the African Names Database indicates that they provide the
names of approximately 12,000 Africans adjudicated by the Vice-
Admiralty Court who are not currently listed in the Database, thereby
substantially increasing the total of known names of enslaved Africans.12
The registers spanning 1808 to 1819 potentially include 12,178 entries
which are not currently listed in the African Names Database. However,
the number of African names actually listed is lower as some entries are
blank. For example, no names or descriptions are provided in the
EXTENDING THE AFRICAN NAMES DATABASE 139
registers for recaptives numbered from 1,100–1,105, 1,121–1,126, 1,144,

and 1,151. A pencil entry notes how number 4,143 is “a blank.”13
This paper examines the scope and nature of these early Registers of
Liberated Africans, and their potential for establishing the identities,
origins and experiences of the first groups of recaptured Africans
released at Freetown by British anti-slave trade patrols in the immediate
aftermath of British abolition. These early registers not only record
patterns of forced migration associated with the earliest phases of
suppression activity, but also provide a basis for tracing links between
individuals’ point of embarkation in Africa and their subsequent life
histories. This ability to reconstruct individual life histories is
exceptionally rare in the historiography of transatlantic slavery, and is
facilitated in part by the rich body of documentary evidence generated by
colonial administrators in Sierra Leone. These records make it possible
to trace the subsequent movements and experiences of a significant
proportion of these men, women and children following their release,
thereby shedding light on survival strategies adopted by enslaved
Africans in the aftermath of abolition. Many of the individuals released
at Freetown were entered into the service of the Royal African Corps and
the Royal Navy, whilst others were apprenticed for up to fourteen years
in a system attacked by contemporaries as another form of enslavement.
As many of the recaptives remained within the Crown Colony and its
hinterland, the identification of their areas of origin also informs
understanding of the diverse influences which shaped cultural formation
of the settlement in the first decades of the nineteenth century.14
II
These nine Registers of Liberated Africans comprise part of a much

longer series of Registers of Liberated Africans in the Public Archives of
Sierra Leone which extend to 1848 and, according to the numbering
sequence in the volumes, account for 84,307 enslaved Africans released
at Freetown. The front cover of the final register in the Freetown series
indicates that the numbering sequence extends to 84,420, but the last
140 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
entry relates to Marloryar, a girl aged two identified as recaptive number

84,307 who was released from the ship Bela Miquelina on 5 August
1848.15 In the 1960s, Richard Meyer-Heiselberg concluded that the
overall total was higher and estimated that 94,329 individuals were
released when references to recaptives in the Liberated African
Department letter books between 1848 and 1861 were taken into
account.16 This far exceeds the total of 56,850 names of recaptives
released at Sierra Leone who are currently included in the African
Names Database. Even allowing for the addition of approximately
12,000 names from the registers spanning 1808 to 1819, this indicates
that the Freetown registers include far more names than are currently
listed. Systematic comparison between the names in the Freetown series
of registers and the names derived from the Registers of Liberated
Africans at Kew is required to trace the identity of the outstanding
individuals. Another reason for cross-referencing the Freetown registers
with the Kew series is that a very cursory comparison of entries points to
significant differences in how names and other details were recorded. In
the Freetown register spanning the period from 1819 to 1822, for
example, recaptive number 12,183 was recorded as Mafa, but the register
at Kew records his name as Mufas. The extent to which such differences
in transcription between the two registers affects the linguistic analysis of
names requires further research, and highlights the importance of a
systematic comparison of the Freetown and Kew registers where they
begin to overlap from 1819. Further analysis is required to determine the
precise relationship between the two series of registers and whether one
series is derived from the other.17 Two registers are still missing in the
Public Archives of Sierra Leone but, as they relate to the period after
1822, this does not affect analysis of the earlier series of Vice-Admiralty
registers which form the main focus of this paper.18
The nine registers spanning 1808 to 1822 provide some of the
earliest extant lists of the names of Africans enslaved in the transatlantic
trade. The first surviving Register of Liberated Africans (1808-1812)
predates by more than a decade inventories of recaptive Africans used by
Misevich in his analysis of “The Origins of Slaves Leaving the Upper
Guinea Coast,” which drew on registers from the Court of Mixed

Commission in Havana between 1824 and 1841.19 A distinctive feature
of the nine early Registers from the Vice-Admiralty Court in Freetown is
that the lists of names were not duplicated in a series of registers returned
to London. Hence, the African names identified in the early series of
registers offer a unique record of the identities of the very first cohorts of
recaptives released at Freetown.20 At various intervals in the early
nineteenth century censuses compiled in Freetown list the names of some
of these recaptives, but these do not reproduce the full range of details
contained in the registers at Freetown.21
Although the existence of these early Registers of Liberated
Africans was known to several scholars working in Freetown,22 they
have clearly escaped the notice of many slave trade scholars in recent
decades. In 1966, Meyer-Heiselberg compiled an inventory of the
registers’ contents, including systematic notes on the age and gender
distribution of the African recaptives. Although he commented on the
difficult and cramped working conditions in the archives, he did not
make any direct reference to the poor physical condition of the registers.
Almost half a century later, these early registers are in a very fragile and
endangered condition, and their deterioration has no doubt been
exacerbated by the emergency re-location of the archives during the
recent civil war in Sierra Leone.23
In a preliminary visit to the Public Archives of Sierra Leone in
February 2010, the Endangered Archives project team identified the first
two Registers of Liberated Africans for 1808–1812 and 1812–1814
among piles of badly damaged documents stacked on all available
surfaces in the congested archive office. The first register is in a
particularly fragile condition. Entries for up to 3,772 Africans released
between 1808 and 1812 are listed on loose pages and the brittle, acidic
nature of the paper has resulted in the edges breaking away (Figure 1).
There is extensive damage from iron gall, with the result that a large
number of entries are extremely difficult to decipher. The second register
142 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
Figure 1
Source: Register of Liberated Africans, 1808-1812, Sierra Leone Public Archives
in a bound volume provides details of up to 2,515 Africans with

identification numbers ranging from 3,773 to 6,288, but the covers are
missing and the binding is loose. A third register spanning the period
from 1814 to 1815 lists up to 2,823 individuals identified by numbers
ranging from 4,684 to 7,507. A further six registers include entries for
individuals numbered through consecutively to recaptive number 15,967,
identified as Ouner, a twelve-year old male released from the Spanish
schooner Josefa (a) Maracagerca in October 1822.24 Three of the nine
registers contain long series of duplicate entries, although the format of
the entries is not identical.25 Although seven of the nine registers have
recently been re-bound, they all show evidence of damage caused by
acidification, water, mildew, iron gall and insects. The environmental
conditions in the archives contribute to the endangered nature of these
sources, as they are housed on open shelves in conditions of high
humidity.26
In addition to providing a unique identification number for each of

the Liberated Africans, the registers provide details of the name, age,
gender, and stature (height) of the individuals listed. Several registers
also include information on the “disposal” of recaptives, although the
entries vary considerably in frequency, content and format.27 In contrast
to the Havana series, details of the recaptives’ country of origin or nation
are only recorded sporadically. The names of clerks and their African
interpreters are not identified in the registers at Freetown.28 In common
with the later FO84 series at Kew, the “description” column provides
extensive information on scarification, tattoos and other physical
features. Pen sketches of markings appear at infrequent intervals, and
appear to have been used to capture some of the more elaborate,
decorative or unusual examples. The description for Wosousoo, a man of
20 identified as recaptive number 2,669, included a sketch of marks on
his “breast & belly” which were represented as two spherical shapes with
12 short lines radiating from the upper circle and 13 short lines radiating
from the one below. It was also noted how his “forehead and temples
scarred” and that he had “several black spots under ea[ch] eye.”29 One of
the first examples of a drawing to appear in the registers relates to a
Renga, a man age 20 of 5 feet 2 inches in height who was identified as
recaptive number 1,030. He had a “large round scar on back, d[itt]o
below right breast” and a simple sketch of a vertical line underscored by
a short horizontal line was used to represent the appearance of a mark
“under [his] left arm pit.”30 As comparatively little research has been
done on scarification, there is scope for systematic analysis of the
“cultural code” embedded in these markings and their relationship to
meanings of identity, ethnicity, social status, kinship, as well as the
origins of the recaptives.31 The descriptions also document the marks
resulting from the violence endemic in the trade and the branding of
enslaved Africans prior to their release at Freetown.32 A number of
Africans disembarked from the Portuguese/Brazilian registered Principe
da Beira in 1812 had been branded with the letters TR, with the T
superimposed over the letter R.33 Soqua, a woman aged 32, was “branded
on [her] arm” and Cawley, a man aged 35, had a “lumpified TR on [his]
144 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
arm.”34 The circumstances which resulted in Ensiah, a man aged 30,

receiving a “musquet shot through [his] left thigh” are unclear from the
brief entry in the register, but this may indicate that he had resisted his
enslavement prior to his release from the Marie Paul in 1808.35 The
“description” column frequently includes reference to other physical
characteristics including smallpox markings, the colour of skin, injuries
and deformities, and the appearance of hair and teeth. Details of family
relationships among enslaved Africans are occasionally documented.
Fatima, a woman aged 30 released from the Cuba (a) Marianha in 1809
was described as being “with a child only 4 days old” and having
“Moorish hair.” Embas, a woman aged 29, was described as the “mother
of Senegal No 1019,” a child who was only months old.36
Following the transfer of the colony to the Crown and the formation
of a Vice-Admiralty Court, the first vessel condemned and entered in the
registers on 10 November 1808 was the Marie Paul, a French schooner
in the command of Captain Debouney. Neither the Slave Voyages
Database nor the Register of Liberated Africans indicates where this
vessel had embarked its human cargo of 69 slaves. Of these Africans,
nine had died by the time the court proceedings had been completed.37
The losses were no doubt exacerbated by a period of eleven weeks in the
Middle Passage, although some vessels could show devastating levels of
mortality in shorter periods.38 Macha, a man age 28 whose right ear had
been partly cut off, was listed as recaptive number 1 and his release
marked the beginning of policies leading to the eventual release of tens
of thousands of Africans in the Crown Colony. The majority of Africans
on this vessel were males, with 35 classified as adults ranging in age
from 14 to 34. Ten males classified as boys ranged in age from ten to
thirteen and the tallest among them was Baaree, identified as recaptive
45, entered in the register as 4 feet 8¾ inches.39 Although more than one-
fifth of the Africans on this vessel were children, this was still
significantly lower than the average proportion of children among the
enslaved in the first quarter of the nineteenth century.40 Secree and
Sochra, both aged ten, were girls of 4 feet 3 inches and 4 feet 7 inches
respectively. Anta, the third girl, was aged one and described as a
“sucking child … daughter of Adam No. 56.”41 As the ship had departed
Africa in August 1808, she had been embarked as a nine-month old baby
with her mother aged 26.42
The Africans listed in the early registers include individuals released
as a result of a number of controversial attacks on coastal slave factories
by royal naval patrols. As these were mostly in places close to Sierra
Leone, the individuals released reflected a narrower geographical range
than among slaves liberated from transatlantic vessels. As the Rio Pongo
and the Iles de Los were outside British jurisdiction, the raids were of
dubious legal authority.43 Recaptives numbered from 4,684 to 4,923 were
“seized at Rio Pongus by the Expedition 1814.” A number of family
relationships are highlighted in the description column. Amburee, a boy
of 3, identified as recaptive number 4,853 was described as the “son of
Sally no. 4874.” Tom, a boy of 2 years of age, was described as the “son
of Peggy no. 4877.” A number of Africans of advanced age were listed
among this group, and included Tangba a woman of 70, and Sera and
Maria, women both aged 66.44 Two infants and their mothers were
among a group of Africans “Received from the Isle de Los” in April
1814.
Following the introduction of Courts of Mixed Commission at
Sierra Leone in 1819, the names of Africans released at Freetown also
begin to appear in a second series of registers in Foreign Office Papers
(FO84) in the National Archives at Kew. The first of the African
recaptives to appear both in the registers at Sierra Leone and in the series
at Kew was Boorah, a man age 23 embarked at Little Bassa on the
Windward Coast and landed at Freetown on 14 September 1819 after the
NS de Regla was condemned for being in breach of international
treaties.45 The identification number he was ascribed in the Freetown
register was 12,179, although this numbering sequence was not
reproduced in the registers at Kew.46 Boorah was presumably among
some of the earliest recaptives to walk up the Old Wharf Steps at
Freetown constructed the previous year.47 He was 5 feet 2½ inches in
height and was “marked on the right side of [his] belly” and had “a large
hole in the left ear.” Fabiana, a Spanish schooner seized at sea, was the
146 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
next vessel condemned on 7 October 1819 for “breach of the treaty,” and
is among the first group of vessels to be listed in both the Freetown
registers and the series at Kew.48 In the ninth register of Liberated
Africans spanning the period from February 1819 to October 1822, the
first 270 names listed are not currently included in the African Names
Database. Most of these were disembarked from the Sylphe, a Portuguese
schooner, delivered to Freetown on 19 February 1819.49
III
The anti-slave trade patrols succeeded in releasing only a small fraction

of the total number of Africans embarked on slave vessels in the
nineteenth century.50 Between 1808 and 1863, only 198,710 out of a total
of 3.2 million Africans embarked as slaves were released (6.2%). The
proportion was lower still in the early years of suppression activity, as
only 3.9% of enslaved Africans embarked on transatlantic vessels were
released between 1808 and 1817 (23,239 of 603,000 Africans
embarked).51 This reflects the small number of royal naval vessels
stationed off the African coast, which numbered just two to four ships in
the period between 1808 and 1815.52 Enslaved Africans released at
Freetown in the first decade of suppression activity were taken off ships
which had embarked slaves in seven of the eight main areas of coastal
embarkation used in the Slave Voyages database. Of 110 vessels
adjudicated by the Vice-Admiralty Court between 1808 and 1818,53 the
largest groupings of vessels had embarked slaves on the Upper Guinea
coast, the Bight of Benin and the Bight of Biafra. Among the 23 vessels
which had embarked slaves in the Bight of Benin was the Dois Amigos,
part-owned by Francisco Felix de Souza, a Brazilian trader resident in
Ouidah.54 The Africans on board this intercepted vessel were embarked
at Ouidah in 1816 and, in common with many others embarked at ports
in the Bight of Benin, were originally destined for slavery in Brazil.55
Twenty of the vessels adjudicated in this period had embarked slaves in
the Bight of Biafra. Grouping together vessels from Senegambia, Sierra
Leone and the Windward Coast suggests that the largest number of
intercepted vessels (29 of 110) had embarked slaves on the Upper

Guinea Coast.56 None of the vessels condemned between 1809 and 1817
had obtained slaves at Bunce Island or the Iles de Los, areas which had
dominated slave supply before 1807.57 This reflects the way in which
suppression activities focused on the Sierra Leone estuary displaced the
trade from the colony’s immediate hinterland and re-orientated slave
supply to areas north and south of the colony.58 In 1812, British
commissioners reported that the patrols had managed to cause sufficient
“interruptions and annoyance” to disrupt slave exports from the rivers in
the colony’s immediate hinterland.59 The astute adaptation of slave
traders resulted in a shift in trade to areas which were more difficult for
royal naval vessels to police and control.60 Six of the vessels adjudicated
before the Vice-Admiralty Court had embarked Africans in West Central
Africa, another important supply area for Brazil.61 Three vessels, the
Donna Mariana, the Ana, and the Triunfo Africano, had embarked slaves
on the Gold Coast.62
The regional designations of coastal areas used in the Slave
Voyages database do not indicate, however, where the enslaved
originally came from in Africa.63 There is some comparative data for
Sierra Leone from the early 1820s based on Church Missionary Society
(CMS) registers which document the origins of 638 recaptive
schoolchildren in Sierra Leone. “Cosso” or Mende from the Upper
Guinea coast constituted one of the largest groupings in the registers
(16.9%), which is consistent with the high proportion of intercepted
vessels from this area. Smaller groupings from the Upper Guinea coast in
the CMS registers included Fula, Mandinka, Sherbro, Susu and Temne.64
Large groupings of children in the registers were identified as Igbo
(15.7%), Ibibio/Efik (6.7%) and “Accoo” or Yoruba (6.9%). This
indicates that Yoruba were numerically less significant than in
Sigismund Wilhelm Koelle’s mid-nineteenth century survey, which
revealed that approximately half of the recaptives “spoke dialects of
Yoruba.”65 Jones argues that “in general, the figures seem to suggest that
between the early 1820s and late 1840s the relative importance of
148 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
Yoruba- and Ewe-speaking groups in the Colony grew rapidly, while that
of Igbo and of ‘nations’ from near Sierra Leone declined.”66
The potential for using the African names in the Registers of
Liberated Africans as a way of tracing the geographic origins of enslaved
Africans before they reached their coastal point of departure has been
explored by G. Ugo Nwokeji and David Eltis for the Cameroons, and by
Misevich in a study of slaves originating from the Upper Guinea coast.67
This method depends on name recognition by teams of African linguists
and an ability to link the names to current areas of usage. This poses a
number of methodological complexities, as the extent to which the verbal
rendition of names by African recaptives resulted in an accurate
representation of their form and sound in the registers is problematic.
Even though details of their names and age were supplied by the
recaptives, the information was conveyed through an African interpreter
and entered into the register by an English speaking clerk who,
unfamiliar with African pronunciation and linguistic forms, relied on
different phonetic representations of the names.68 The methodology is
also complicated by the existence of “multi-ethnic” names and Islamic
names. However, in his study of recaptives originally embarked in Sierra
Leone, Misevich is confident that the recorded names show such a clear
association with those in common use in modern-day Sierra Leone that
they can be used to identify the “interior origins of Africans exported
from Sierra Leone.”69 There is scope to compare Misevich’s database of
over six and a half thousand African names from Sierra Leone with the
names of recaptives in the Vice-Admiralty registers released from
vessels which had embarked slaves on the Upper Guinea coast. For the
purposes of this article, I will undertake a preliminary comparison of
Misevich’s database with the names of recaptives released from two
vessels which had embarked slaves in different areas of the Upper
Guinea coast.
The Maria Josefa was one of five intercepted vessels that had
embarked slaves in the Galinhas between 1808 and 1818.70 This was an
“important export point … located about 150 miles leeward of the Sierra
Leone peninsula” in the south-east of modern Sierra Leone.71 Out of a
total of 63 Africans embarked in the Galinhas in 1814, 62 were

disembarked at Freetown.72 Of the 62 names listed in the register, it is
possible to identify three-quarters in Misevich’s database. Discarding ten
names that were multi-ethnic and in common use throughout Sierra
Leone, leaves 35 individuals for whom it is possible to identify origins.
Almost half of the names can be identified as Mende or Sherbro, which
indicates that many of the slaves embarked on this vessel were drawn
from supply areas between 50 and 75 miles from the coast. Names that
are identifiably Mende include Dugba and Yako, and names classified as
Sherbro include Sese and Choma.73 This predominance of Mende and
Sherbro names from southern Sierra Leone is entirely consistent with the
pattern Misevich found in his later study of recaptives recorded in the
Freetown and Havana registers, and it is also reflects the patterns of
origin of Africans on board the Amistad. If the names of Temne and Vai
origin are combined with the Mende and Sherbro names, this indicates
that two-thirds were drawn from an area stretching approximately sixty
miles inland from the coast. This is identical to the pattern found in
Misevich’s study based on the later registers and he concludes that the
area’s “shallow slaving frontier” contrasts with longer distances
associated with other areas of slave embarkation.74
The Pennel was one of seven intercepted vessels that had embarked
slaves in the the Rio Pongo between 1808 and 1818.75 This vessel which
commenced its transatlantic voyage in Britain embarked 18 slaves at the
Rio Pongo in 1809, all of whom were released at Sierra Leone. The
limitations of name recognition are clear in the case of this vessel, as it is
possible to identify the origins of only ten of the names listed. Although
the importance of Muslim influence is reflected in the presence of six
names of Islamic origin, including Mousa, Mamadoo, and Brima, these
names are clearly not distinctive to any specific region. Given their
presence on ships embarking from the Rio Pongo, it is possible that these
individuals originated from the Futa Jalon, the main Islamic state in the
adjacent interior.76 As early as 1793, employees of the Sierra Leone
Company displayed an awareness of the importance of the Futa Jalon as
an area of slave supply to the Rio Pongo. An expedition to the Futa Jalon
150 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
in 1793 was undertaken as a means of developing a long-distance trade

in “legitimate” commodities, but also as a means of persuading Muslim
leaders to abandon slave trading and develop the natural resources of
their land.77 In 1814, six years after the formation of the Vice-Admiralty
Court, efforts were still being made to persuade Muslim traders to
abandon slave trading. An abolitionist medal commissioned by Zachary
Macaulay from the Soho Mint in Birmingham was intended to deter
Muslim traders from bringing their slaves to the coast for sale into the
transatlantic slave trade. This medal intended for distribution in Sierra
Leone featured an Arabic inscription on the reverse stating that the “sale
of slaves prohibited in 1807, Christian era, in the reign of George the
Third; verily we are all brothers.”78
IV
Evidence relating to the “disposal” of these early recaptives is recorded

in a number of the registers. Although there are substantial gaps in
coverage, the entries still provide a valuable glimpse of the subsequent
life histories of the first cohorts of recaptives to experience this forced
migration to Sierra Leone. The register containing entries for recaptives
numbered from 10,115 to 15,143 provides information on the allocation
of individuals to different colony villages and areas of settlement,
including Kissey Town, Regent Town, Charlotte Town, Bathurst Town
and Kent. Cudjoe, a boy aged 8 entered as recaptive number 10,204, was
among those allocated to the “C[hristian] M[issionary] Society’s
Christian Institution Leicester Mountain.” This evidence provides a basis
for reconstructing settlement patterns in the early phases of suppression
activity, and as recaptives from different vessels were often sent in
groups to different areas it also sheds light on features of community
formation among Africans drawn from different provenance zones of the
slave trade. The Register of Liberated Africans for 1812-1814 includes
some reference to the occupations of individuals, but this information is
unevenly distributed in the register. Pencil notations on the “disposal” of
some recaptives are included in the register for 1814 to 1815. For
example, the letters RAC are entered against the names of recaptives
numbered from 4,765 to 4,799 indicating that they had been enlisted into
the Royal African Corps. Other entries record references to occupations,
and the death of individuals.
The information on “disposal” contained in the first Register of
Liberated Africans for 1808 to 1812 is particularly rich, and includes
comments on the apprenticeship of recaptives. A large proportion of
those for whom information is available were entered into the Royal
African Corps or apprenticed within the colony. A single line in the
register describes how African males numbered 359 to 389 embarked in
the Rio Pongo and released from the American vessel the Lucia (a)
Albert in 1810 had all “Entered His Majesty’s Land Service as soldiers in
the Royal African Corps.” These included Balla a man of 29 whose name
points to Koronko origins and Bara, whose name indicates Temne
origins.79 Service at sea was the fate of Sennama, Jeddo, Maca and
Coomba, four boys aged between 10 and 11 who were released from the
Lucia (a) Albert in 1810, and “Entered on board His Majesty’s Ship
Crocodile.”80 Sara, a boy of 6, whose name indicates Limba origins, was
apprenticed to Lieutenant Scott of “His Majesty’s Ship Myrtle.”81 A
number of recaptives were entered for service on board ships engaged in
anti-slave trade patrols. Tom, a boy aged eight released at Freetown on
24 November 1808, was subsequently entered on board His Majesty’s
sloop Derwent. Thong, a boy aged eight, was also entered on board this
vessel in the command of Captain Frederick Parker, together with a man
and a boy aged eight released from the Two Cousins on 25 November
1808.82 Other recaptives took the initiative to leave the colony and return
home. Miah, a man aged 25, had “returned to his country at his own
Request” and Banna was amongst a number of individuals who had
“returned to their country at their own request.”83
The terms of the Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade in 1807
made provision for the apprenticeship of recaptives and their enlistment
into “His Majesty’s Land or Sea Service, as Soldiers, Seamen or
Marines...”84 In October 1809, correspondence in Colonial Office papers
included “suggestions for the disposal of the Captured negroes at Sierra
152 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
Leone.” Various recommendations were set out in response to the

question “What course ought in future to be pursued with respect to the
Slaves taken and condemned as prize at Sierra Leone?” It was argued
that the best course for boys and girls released from slave ships was to
bind them as apprentices, as this offered the opportunity of admitting
them to “domestic intercourse with persons more civilized than
themselves...” It was recommended that a small number of married adult
males who possessed “a sufficient degree of intelligence to undertake at
once the culture of a small farm” should be provided with a few acres of
land. The “rest of the Men, with such exceptions, and limitations, as it
shall appear proper to make may … be enlisted into His Majesty’s
Service; and after the Garrisons of Sierra Leone, Goree, Cape Coast
Castle &c. are supplied with an adequate number of men, the residue
may be drafted, from time to time, into the West India Regiments.”85
Although fierce contemporary controversy surrounded the
apprenticeship of recaptives on the basis that it represented another form
of enslavement, it appears that the existing Nova Scotian and Maroon
settlers saw apprenticeship as an opportunity to acquire additional
labour.86 Thomas Johnson, described as Colonel of the Maroons, was
amongst those who took as apprentices males and females released from
the Marie Paul in 1808. Barre, a boy of 13, identified as recaptive
number 39 was apprenticed to Johnson, and Scipio next in the list was
apprenticed to George Ferrie, a gaoler. Two boys named Samba, aged 10
and 11 were both apprenticed to yeomen, and this may relate to the
African name Sambo which suggests Fula origins as a name given to
second sons.87 Phillis Hazeley, one of the first female settlers to take an
apprentice from among the recaptives, took Barka a woman of 14.
Sambo, a male aged 16 released from Lucia (a) Albert and Seaka, a male
aged 14, were apprenticed to Martha Burden, a Nova Scotian shopkeeper
who owned a large property on the corner of Wilberforce Street, and
after her death they were transferred to her son-in-law.88 Despite his
impassioned exchanges with Zachary Macaulay and William
Wilberforce on the immorality of apprenticing recaptives, Thomas
Perronet Thompson, the first governor of the Crown Colony, is recorded
as apprenticing Sybell, a girl aged four from the San Joaquim.89 This
reflected his obligation to enforce the provisions of Articles VII and XVI
of the Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade.90 Thompson also took a
female apprentice Maradah, aged 16 from the Pennel, in 1809.91 Dr.
Robert Thorpe, who launched a vitriolic attack on Macaulay and
Wilberforce for sustaining slavery in the colony, is also recorded as
receiving recaptives as apprentices.92
A number of entries give personal information about the recaptives
which is not obtainable from other sources. In the case of Fatima, a
woman of 24 identified as recaptive number 55, the register notes that
she was “married to a Joliff man (a Moor).”93 A woman of 26 released
from the ship Lucia (a) Albert was described as living with “a Foulah
Man settled in the Colony.”94 Another woman aged 25 released from the
same ship was noted to be living with “Jim Maloolin, a Foulah Man
settled in the Colony.”95 Others were simply recorded as being “settled in
the colony” or working with their countrymen. An African woman,
identified as recaptive number 453 from the Lucia (a) Albert was
described as “living with Mousa Kenta, No 273 in this Register.” The
entry for “Musah Kenta” indicates that he was aged 20 and had been
released from the schooner Cuba (a) Marianha a year earlier.96
A further list of recaptives which has come to light in Colonial
Office correspondence at the National Archives at Kew provides
information on the first 1,991 Africans landed at Freetown between 1808
and 1812 and adds significantly to the biographical information about
these uprooted individuals.97 The numbering of Africans in the list
corresponds directly with the first surviving register at Freetown, and
nominal linkage between the two sources makes it possible to trace the
subsequent movements of a large number of those landed. Of the
enslaved Africans disembarked from the Marie Paul in 1808, only about
half of the original number remained in the colony by the time the listing
was completed. The entries indicate that 29 recaptives still living in the
colony were pursuing a number of different occupations. These included
Masamba, a man of 25, described as “a mason living in the colony” and
Karafa, a “labourer living in the colony.” Two of the men, Yoro and
154 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
Barrick, had been “entered into the Royal African Corps.” No entries are
included for 27 of the Africans originally listed in the Register of
Liberated Africans, and a number of these appear to have left their
apprenticeships.98 Sochra, a girl aged ten had been apprenticed to Mary
Brown, a Maroon, in 1808 but by the time the list was compiled she was
absent from the colony. Similarly, Barka (recaptive number 57) was
apprenticed to the schoolmistress Phillis Hazeley in 1808 but was no
longer present in the colony four years later. These gaps in numbering in
the list are explained by how “those Captured Negroes that are not
accounted for have deserted to Native Towns in the back parts of the
country.” Sinnaba, a woman aged 17 identified as recaptive number 53
released from the Marie Paul in 1808, had “returned to her country.”
Recaptives from other vessels also left the colony. This was a form of
active resistance to their enforced migration to Sierra Leone, and their
subsequent apprenticeship. Both the register of Liberated Africans and
the list in Colonial Office records agree that Maria, recaptive number
202, had “Returned to the Croo country.”99 For those Africans enslaved
in the hinterland of Sierra Leone, there was a greater opportunity to
return home compared to those who had been enslaved further afield in
the Bight of Benin or the Bight of Biafra, although many recaptives did
return home to Yorubaland in the Bight of Benin from 1838 onwards.100
As a result of the Endangered Archives pilot project, a diverse range of

manuscript sources relating to liberated Africans in Sierra Leone has
been digitized and deposited in the Public Archives of Sierra Leone. The
further award of a major grant by the British Library Endangered
Archives project in 2011 will facilitate the on-going digitization of
nineteenth-century sources by Sierra Leonean archivists. In addition to
extending the scope of the African Names Database, the analysis of these
early Registers of Liberated Africans from the Vice-Admiralty Court
opens up the potential to trace the origins of some of the first individuals
released at Freetown, as well as their later destinations. As the transfer of
the colony to the Crown in 1808 resulted in the development of a more

bureaucratic and carefully regulated administrative system, there is a
wealth of documentary evidence which makes it possible to reconstruct
the lives of African recaptives individually and collectively. For those
recaptives apprenticed to colonial officials and Nova Scotian and
Maroon settlers, the surviving records make it possible to locate them by
reference to households, streets and individual land plots. There is
considerable potential for tracing the life history of recaptive populations
in the colony, including their medical history, by reconstituting
information in the civil registers in conjunction with surviving parish
registers. A methodological problem in this process of nominal linkage,
however, is that many of the recaptives adopted or were ascribed
European names. As in the CMS school registers analysed by Adam
Jones, there is no systematic listing of African names and adopted names
for individuals.101 There are some individual exceptions. Recaptive
number 7 from the Marie Paul was identified as Sank in the Register of
Liberated Africans, but in the “List of Captured Negroes” he was
identified by the name Tom Wilson. In common with Samuel Ajayi
Crowther, other recaptives kept or subsequently resumed their African
names.102 Clearly, this reconstruction of biographical information for up
to 100,000 recaptives released at Sierra Leone represents a huge agenda
for research and highlights the importance of preserving the endangered
archives of Sierra Leone.103
* An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Transatlantic Slave

Voyages Database Workshop at the Harriet Tubman Institute for Research on
the Global Migrations of African Peoples at York University, Toronto, on 3 May
2010. I would like to thank Katrina Keefer, Martin Klein, Robin Law, Henry
Lovejoy, Paul Lovejoy, Philip Misevich and Silke Strickrodt for their helpful
comments and suggestions on this paper. I would also like to thank Albert
Moore, Senior Government Archivist in Sierra Leone, and his staff for their help
and guidance during visits to the Public Archives of Sierra Leone. I am grateful
to Philip Misevich for his generosity in allowing me to consult his extensive
database of African names from Sierra Leone.
156 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
1
David Eltis, Stephen D. Behrendt, David Richardson, and Herbert S. Klein,
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. A Database on CD-Rom (New York:
Cambridge University Press, 1999), 1-2.
2
The outlook of James Irving, a Liverpool slave ship captain and surgeon, was
probably typical of other men engaged in the trade, as he described 526 Africans
on board the Jane in 1786 as “disagreeable Cargo” and “Black Cattle.” Suzanne
Schwarz, ed., Slave Captain. The Career of James Irving in the Liverpool Slave
Trade, 2nd edition (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2008), 22, 85-87.
3
Marcus Wood, Blind Memory. Visual Representations of Slavery in England
and America 1780-1865 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000), 27-
29.
4
The African Origins Project is a “scholar-public collaborative endeavour to
trace the geographic origins of Africans transported in the transatlantic slave
trade.” www.slavevoyages.org/tast/about/origins.faces
5
African Names Database, www.slavevoyages.org/tast/resources/slave.faces
6
Between 1501 and 1867, an estimated 12,521,000 Africans were transported
into slavery. David Eltis and David Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave
Trade (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2010), xvii, 19.
7
Wood, Blind Memory, 27.
8
Recent analysis of the Havana registers indicates that a total of 10,391 Africans
were released from 42 vessels by the Court of Mixed Commission. Henry B.
Lovejoy, “The Shipping Registries of the Archives of the Havana Slave Trade
Commission: Transcription Methodology and Statistical Analysis,” Paper
presented at the Transatlantic Slave Voyages Database Workshop, Harriet
Tubman Institute for Research on the Global Migrations of African Peoples,
York University, Toronto, 3 May 2010.
9
The Kew series of registers relates to the work of the Courts of Mixed
Commission from 1819 onwards. Anglo-Portuguese, Anglo-Spanish and Anglo-
Dutch commissions established at Sierra Leone in 1819 replaced the British
Vice-Admiralty Court. An Anglo-Brazilian Commission was added to those
sitting in Freetown in 1828. Leslie Bethell, “The Mixed Commissions for the
Suppression of the Transatlantic Slave Trade in the Nineteenth Century,”
Journal of African History 7:1 (1966), 79-82; Christopher Fyfe, A History of
Sierra Leone (London: Oxford University Press, 1962), 137-138. For a
discussion of the work of the Vice-Admiralty Court and the legal framework
within which it operated, see Tara Helfman, “The Court of Vice Admiralty at
Sierra Leone and the Abolition of the West African Slave Trade,” The Yale Law
Journal, 115 (2006), 1122-1156.
10
British Library Endangered Archives, Pilot Project EAP 284.
11
Recaptives numbered from 100 to 248 are identified as “slaves seized in the
colony.” The second register also lists Africans “seized in the colony”, including
three individuals numbered from 4,679 to 4,681. Public Archives of Sierra
Leone, Register of Liberated Africans 1808-1812 and Register of Liberated

Africans 1812-1814 [hereafter PASL, RLA].
12
PASL, RLA, 1808-1848.
13
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, 1812-1814.
14
Adam Jones, “Recaptive Nations: Evidence Concerning the Demographic
Impact of the Atlantic Slave Trade in the Early Nineteenth Century,” Slavery
and Abolition 11:1 (May 1990), 42-57.
15
This vessel embarked 522 Africans at Lagos, of whom 517 were disembarked
at Freetown. www.slavevoyages.org, voyage 3680.
16
As indicated earlier, the Registers of Liberated Africans at Freetown include
Africans released from coastal slave barracoons, as well as slaves seized in the
colony. The additional 9,909 entries identified by Meyer-Heiselberg, for
example, include 1 woman, 17 boys and 4 girls released from a “cano captured
by Thomas Ellis” and landed at Freetown on 2 October 1851. As a result, a
straightforward numerical comparison with the totals of Africans disembarked
from slave ships bound for the Americas at Sierra Leone in the Slave Voyages
Database is not possible. R. Meyer-Heiselberg, Notes from Liberated African
Department in the Archives at Fourah Bay College Freetown, Sierra Leone
(Uppsala: The Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, 1967), 55-61. In the
period between 1846 and 1863, 53 vessels were adjudicated by the Vice-
Admiralty Court at Freetown after the work of the Courts of Mixed Commission
came to an end. The cases accounted for approximately 15,000 liberated
Africans. I am grateful to David Eltis for this information supplied in email
correspondence.
17
Email correspondence with David Eltis, Paul Lovejoy and Philip Misevich,
August-September 2010.
18
During visits to Sierra Leone in February and August 2010, members of the
Endangered Archives team retraced the entire series of registers from 1808 to
1848 with the exception of three volumes spanning recaptives numbered 25,423-
30,708, 43,538-50,761 and 67,636-75,356. Richard Anderson subsequently
located the volume spanning recaptives numbered 25,423-30,708.
19
Philip Misevich, “The Origins of Slaves Leaving the Upper Guinea Coast in
the Nineteenth Century,” in David Eltis and David Richardson, eds., Extending
the Frontiers. Essays on the New Transatlantic Slave Trade Database (New
Haven/London: Yale University Press, 2008), chapter 5.
20
In contrast to the Court of Mixed Commission registers from Havana, these
early registers from Freetown do not usually provide the Christian names of the
recaptives. Lovejoy, “Shipping Registries.”
21
See, for example: TNA, CO 267/31, “List of Captured Negroes on Hand
December 31st 1810 and of those Received, Enlisted, Apprenticed, Disposed of
to December 31st 1812.”
158 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
22
Fyfe, History, 107; Daniel Augustine Vonque Stephen, “A History of the
Settlement of Liberated Africans in the Colony of Sierra Leone During the First
Half of the 19th Century,” MA thesis, University of Durham, 1963, II-III;
Meyer-Heiselberg, Notes from Liberated African Department, I-XII, 1-11. Most
recently, Gibril R. Cole has drawn attention to the Registers; see "Re-thinking
the Demographic Make-up of Krio Society," in Mac Dixon-Fyle and Gibril
Cole, eds., New Perspectives on the Sierra Leone Krio (New York: Peter Lang,
2006), 43.
23
The Public Archives of Sierra Leone were established by the Sierra Leone
Public Archives Act in 1965. In the following year, a UNESCO report
highlighted the importance of the surviving records relating to the liberated
Africans. Albert S. Moore, “The Role of Archives in National Development:
Sierra Leone Public Archives. A Case Study,” BA dissertation, University of
Sierra Leone (1993), 9-14.
24
This vessel embarked 216 individuals principally at Bonny in the Bight of
Biafra, of whom 184 arrived at Sierra Leone. www.slavevoyages.org, voyage
2351.
25
The sequence of registers includes volumes spanning entries numbered 1-
3,772; 3,773-6,288; 6,289-8,528; 4,684-7,507; 8,529-9,758; 7,508-9,758; 9,759-
11,908; 10,115-15,143 and 11,909-15,967. Meyer-Heiselberg, Notes from
Liberated African Department, I, IV.
26
Inventory of Endangered Documents in the Public Archives of Sierra Leone,
British Library Pilot Project Code EAP 284.
27
See below, section IV.
28
G. Ugo Nwokeji and David Eltis, “Characteristics of Captives Leaving the
Cameroons for the Americas, 1822-37,” Journal of African History 43 (2002),
192, 209; Lovejoy, “Shipping Registries.”
29
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, recaptive 2,669.
30
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, recaptive 1,030.
31
Lovejoy notes how “there seems to have been a basic distinction between
people from West Africa, who practiced scarification, with some qualifications,
and people from west central and southeast Africa who did not, again with some
qualifications.” Paul E. Lovejoy, “Scarification and the Loss of History in the
African Diaspora,” in Andrew Apter and Lauren Derry, eds., Activating the Past
Historical Memory in the Black Atlantic (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholarly
Publishing, 2010). Katrina Keefer at York University, Toronto is currently
undertaking research on patterns of scarification in the Sierra Leone registers.
32
This process continued in the Americas, as the “marks of slavery” replaced
ritual forms of scarification. Facial and body scarification was “virtually absent
among the creole populations of enslaved America.” Lovejoy, “Scarification and
the Loss of History”.
33
The area of slave embarkation is unknown. www.slavevoyages.org, voyage
7570.
34
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, recaptives 1,891, 2,016-2,022, and 2,035.
35
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, recaptive 27.
36
Senegal was listed as recaptive number 1,017. PASL, RLA 1808-1812,
recaptives 313, 1,006 and 1,017.
37
This loss by mortality of 13% was slightly lower than the average rate of 18%
for vessels adjudicated by the Vice-Admiralty Court at Sierra Leone between
1808 and 1818. www.slavevoyages.org
38
After embarking 308 Africans in the Bight of Biafra, the Santana de Africa
spent just over seven weeks in the Middle Passage before arriving at Freetown
on 21 August 1815. Only three Africans (1%) survived and were listed in the
Vice-Admiralty register as recaptives numbered from 7,802-7,804. These three
men were aged 16, 18 and 19. www.slavevoyages.org, voyage 7638; PASL,
RLA 1815-1816.
39
The age of children was usually estimated on the basis of height. As Lovejoy
points out, “the designation of slaves as ‘children’ is often unclear, but is
sometimes assumed to be pre-pubescent, and hence roughly before age 13-14
and certainly before mid-teens.” Paul Lovejoy, “The Children of Slavery – the
Transatlantic Phase,” Slavery and Abolition 27:2 (August 2006), 198-199;
Audra A. Diptee, “African Children in the British Slave Trade During the Late
Eighteenth Century,” Slavery and Abolition 27:2 (August 2006), 186.
40
www.slavevoyages.org, voyage 7539; Lovejoy, “Children of Slavery,” 200-
202.
41
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, recaptives 58-60.
42
The number of infants on board slave ships was usually very small. Lovejoy,
“Children of Slavery,” 205-207; Diptee, “African Children,” 186, 190.
43
Fyfe, History, 120-122; Helfman, “The Court of Vice Admiralty,” 1145-1149.
44
PASL, RLA 1812-1814, recaptives 4,905, 4,909 and 4,911.
45
www.slavevoyages.org, voyage 2314.
46
In the Kew series, the numbering sequence begins at 1 in 1819 and extends to
56,935 in 1845. I am grateful to David Eltis for this information contained in
email correspondence, May 2010.
47
A. Archer Betham, “The Old Wharf Steps, Freetown,” Sierra Leone Studies. A
Reprint of Some of the Articles from the First Twenty Two Volumes Bearing on
the Work of the Monuments and Relics Commission (The Government Printer:
Freetown, 1953), 1-4; Fyfe, History, 134.
48
www.slavevoyages.org, voyage 2315.
49
Recaptives numbered 11,909-12,107 in the register for 1819-1822 were
released from the Sylphe. This was a continuation of the list of recaptives
(11,744-11,908) from this vessel contained in the previous register for 1816-
1819. In total, 364 Africans were released at Freetown. This schooner had
160 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
commenced its voyage in Guadeloupe and purchased 388 slaves at Bonny in the
Bight of Biafra. PASL, RLA 1819-1822; www.slavevoyages.org, voyage 7675.
50
Robert Burroughs, “Eyes on the Prize: Journeys in Slave Ships Taken as
Prizes by the Royal Navy,” Slavery and Abolition 31:1 (March 2010), 99-104.
51
Eltis and Richardson, Atlas, 273-275.
52
A.W.H. Pearsall, “Sierra Leone and the Suppression of the Slave Trade,”
Sierra Leone Studies, New Series, 12 (1959), 211-213, 219-229.
53
The number of cases dealt with by the Vice-Admiralty Court was higher, but
not all of the vessels carried enslaved Africans. Some of the cases also related to
“slaves seized in the colony.” The National Archives, HCA 49/97/1, “Vessels,
Cargoes & Slaves Proceeded against in the Court of Vice Admiralty at Sierra
Leone Between June 1808 & March 1817.”
54
www.slavevoyages.org, voyage 7597; Robin Law, “Francisco Felix de Souza
in West Africa, 1820-1849,” in José C. Curto and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds.,
Enslaving Connections: Changing Cultures of Africa and Brazil During the Era
of Slavery (New York: Humanity Books, 2004), 187, 192.
55
Cuba was the other major destination for Yoruba and other enslaved Africans
embarked from ports in the Bight of Benin; Lovejoy, “Scarification and the Loss
of History.” Africans embarked in the Bight of Benin would have included
individuals who spoke Gbe languages. In addition, the enslaved Africans would
have included Yoruba and “an identifiable Muslim population from the far
interior.” Yoruba who were disembarked in Brazil become known as “Nagô”,
whilst speakers of Gbe languages from the Bight of Benin were known as Gege
or Mina. Curto and Lovejoy, eds., Enslaving Connections, 12. See also Robin
Law, “Ethnicity and the Slave Trade: ‘Lucumi’ and ‘Nago’ as Ethonyms in
West Africa,” History in Africa 24 (1997), 205-219; “Ethnicities of Enslaved
Africans in the Diaspora: On the Meanings of ‘Mina’ (Again),” History in
Africa, 32 (2005), 247-267.
56
The blockading strategies adopted by royal naval patrols influenced the
origins of the recaptives released at Sierra Leone. In the period between 1808
and 1827, the naval vessels “patrolled most frequently along the ‘Windward
Coast’ on either side of Sierra Leone.” Philip D. Curtin and Jan Vansina,
“Sources of the Nineteenth Century Atlantic Slave Trade,” Journal of African
History 5:2 (1964), 187.
57
Misevich, “Origins of Slaves,” 161.
58
Allen M. Howard, “Nineteenth-Century Coastal Slave Trading and the British
Abolition Campaign in Sierra Leone,” Slavery and Abolition 27:1 (April 2006),
27-28.
59
House of Commons Parliamentary Papers Online, Extracts from the Report of
the Commissioners Appointed for Investigating the State of the Settlements and
Governments on the Coast of Africa (1812), 3.
60
Howard, “Nineteenth-Century Coastal Slave Trading,” 27-28; Philip R.
Misevich, “On the Frontier of ‘Freedom’: Abolition and the Transformation of
Atlantic Commerce in Southern Sierra Leone, 1790s to 1860s,” Ph.D thesis,
Emory University, 2009, 4, 19, 60-61.
61
Curto and Lovejoy, eds., Enslaving Connections, 12.
62
www.slavevoyages.org, voyages 7552, 7546 and 7527.
63
Paul E. Lovejoy, “Extending the Frontiers of Transatlantic Slavery, Partially,”
Journal of Interdisciplinary History 40:1 (Summer, 2009), 58-59, 64-67.
64
Jones, “Recaptive Nations,” 50-52.
65
Jones, “Recaptive Nations,” 46.
66
67
Nwokeji and Eltis, “Characteristics of Captives,” 191-210; Misevich, “Origins
of Slaves,” 155-175.
68
Misevich, “Origins of Slaves,” 158, 164; Nwokeji and Eltis, “Characteristics
of Captives,” 192, 196, 208-209.
69
Misevich, “Origins of Slaves,” 157-158.
70
The vessel was restored on 12 August 1809. The other four vessels were the
Resurreccion, Nueva Paz, Rosa and Dos de Mayo. www.slavevoyages.org,
voyages 7523, 7532, 7594, 7562, 46559.
71
Howard, “Nineteeenth-Century Coastal Slave Trading,” 27. See also Adam
Jones, From Slaves to Palm Kernels: A History of the Galinhas Country (West
Africa) 1730-1890 (Wiesbaden: F. Steiner, 1983).
72
PASL, RLA 1812-1814 and 1814-1815, recaptives 5,926-5,987.
73
This information about origins of names is based on Misevich’s database.
74
Misevich, “On the Frontier of ‘Freedom,’” 5, 67, 86-88, 96. In the Cameroons
estuary between 1822 and 1837, the names of the recaptives indicated that the
“great majority of the captives originated within 200 miles of the coast.”
Nwokeji and Eltis, “Characteristics of Captives,” 191, 200-201.
75
The other six vessels were the Eugenia, Joana, Lucia (a) Albert, Triunvirato
(a) Dorset, Lucia (a) Rainbow, and the Laberinto. www.slavevoyages.org,
voyages 7557, 7565, 7566, 7585, 7609, 46924, 7672.
76
Howard, “Nineteenth-Century Coastal Slave Trading,” 26, 30; Walter
Rodney, “Jihad and Social Revolution in Futa Jallon in the Eighteenth Century,”
Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria 4: 2 (1968), 269-284.
77
Bruce L. Mouser, ed., Journal of James Watt: Expedition to Timbo Capital of
the Fula Empire in 1794, African Studies Program, University of Wisconsin-
Madison, 1994, xiii-xvi, 25-26, 33-34, 54-55.
78
National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, ZBA2808 (www.nmm.ac.uk
/visit/exhibitions); Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery, Accession Number
1885N1541.88, Medal Commemorating the Abolition of the Slave Trade 1807.
This medal, issued in 1814, was designed by John Phillip and engraved by G.F.
Pidgeon. www.bmagic.org.uk/objects/1885N1541.88.
162 SUZANNE SCHWARZ
79
The information about origins of names is based on Misevich’s database.
80
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, recaptives 419-422.
81
82
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, recaptives 64, 67, 75-76.
83
PASL, RLA 1808-1812.
84
Helfman, “Court of Vice Admiralty at Sierra Leone,” 1143, note 79.
85
TNA, CO 267/31, “List of Captured Negroes on Hand December 31st 1810
and of those Received, Enlisted, Apprenticed, Disposed of to December 31st
1812.”
86
For a discussion of this controversy, see Michael J. Turner, “The Limits of
Abolition: Government, Saints and the ‘African Question’, c. 1780-1820,”
English Historical Review, 112: 446 (1997), 319-357.
87
I am grateful to Robin Law for this information. PASL, RLA 1808-1812,
recaptives 43-44.
88
PASL, RLA 1808-1812, recaptives 401 and 417; Fyfe, History, 102-103.
89
90
Turner, “Limits of Abolition;” Helfman, “Court of Vice Admiralty at Sierra
Leone,” 1143, note 79.
91
92
Robert Thorpe, A Letter to William Wilberforce … Containing Remarks on the
Reports of the Sierra Leone Company, and African Institution: With Hints
Respecting the Means by which an Universal Abolition of the Slave Trade Might
be Carried into Effect, 4th edition (London: F.C. Rivington, 1815), passim.
93
Jolof in Senegal. The entry indicates that he was Muslim.
94
Fula.
95
96
PASL, RLA 1808-1812.
97
TNA, CO 267/31, “List of Captured Negroes.”
98
No information is provided about the location of recaptives numbered 4, 13-
15, 17, 21-22, 24-26, 31, 36-41, 43-44, 48-49, 51-52, 56-57 and 59-60. In the
case of recaptive number 60, this one year old child had died in March 1809.
TNA CO 267/31, “List of Captured Negroes;” PASL, RLA 1808-1812.
99
Kru in Liberia.
100
Jones, “Recaptive Nations,” 52; Curtin and Vansina, “Sources of the
Nineteenth Century Atlantic Slave Trade,” 193; Andrew F. Walls, The
Missionary Movement in Christian History. Studies in the Transmission of Faith
(New York/Edinburgh: Orbis Books/T. & T. Clark, 1996), 105.
101
102
A.F. Walls, Materials for the Study of Sierra Leone Church History,
Unpublished Paper (March 1960). Koelle recorded both the African and
European names of many of his informants. P.E.H.,“The Enslavement of
Koelle’s Informants,” Journal of African History 6:2 (1965), 193-203.
103
This research may make it possible to identify further biographical
information about 179 recaptives who served as Koelle’s informants for his
Polyglotta Africana in the mid-nineteenth century. Hair, “Enslavement of
Koelle’s Informants,” 196-203.
CONTRIBUTORS
Daniel B. Domingues da Silva is assistant professor of African history

at the University of Missouri, Columbia. He received his Ph.D. from
Emory University in 2011. His research focuses on the history of slavery
and the transatlantic slave trade between Angola and Brazil. He has
received support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the
Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. He has published in Slavery and
Abolition (2008) and Revista Afro-Ásia (2004), and is currently a
consultant for Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database
(www.slavevoyages.org) and the African Origins Portal (www.african-
origins.org).
Henry B. Lovejoy is completing his Ph.D. thesis on "Oyo Influence on

the Transformation of Lucumi Identity in Colonial Cuba" in the
Department of History at the University of California, Los Angeles. He
has published "The Transculturation of Yoruba Annual Festivals during
the Día de Reyes in Colonial Cuba" in Christopher Innes, Annabel
Rutherford and Brigitte Bogar (eds.), Carnival—Theory and Practice
(2012) and is a contributing member to The African Origins Project
(www.african-origins.org/about). He has been awarded a Post-Doctoral
Fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
of Canada for 2012–2014 at the University of British Columbia.
Paul E. Lovejoy is Distinguished Research Professor in the Department

of History, York University, and Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.
He holds the Canada Research Chair in African Diaspora History and is
Director of the Harriet Tubman Institute for Research on the Global
Migrations of African Peoples. He has published 28 books, including
Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa (3rd ed.,
2011). He is past member of the International Scientific Committee of
the UNESCO “Slave Route” Project, Secteur du Culture, and has served
as Associate Vice-President (Research) at York University from 1986 to
1990 and as a member of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research
Council of Canada from 1990 to 1997, and Vice President in 1996 to
1997. He received a Killam Senior Research Fellowship from the Canada
Council in 1994 to 1997 and was Visiting Professor at El Colegio de
Mexico in 1999. In 2007, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by the
University of Stirling, and in 2011 he received the Life Time
Achievement Award from the Canadian Association of African Studies
and the Teaching Award of the Faculty of Graduate Studies, York
University.
Suzanne Schwarz is Professor of History at the University of Worcester,

and an Honorary Fellow of the Wilberforce Institute for the study of
Slavery and Emancipation at the University of Hull. She currently holds
a Leverhulme Research Fellowship, and her recent research on Sierra
Leone examines the origins, destinations and experiences of the first
cohorts of Liberated Africans released at Freetown in the period between
1808 and 1819. She is working with Paul Lovejoy on a British Library
Endangered Archives project to preserve rare and invaluable sources in
the Public Archives of Sierra Leone. Her previous publications include
Slave Captain. The Career of James Irving in the Liverpool Slave Trade
(Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2008) and a volume entitled
Liverpool and Transatlantic Slavery (Liverpool: Liverpool University
Press, 2007), co-edited with David Richardson and Anthony J. Tibbles.
Filipa Ribeiro da Silva studied History and Portuguese overseas

expansion at the New University of Lisbon in Portugal, where she
obtained her BA honors (1996) and Master degree (2002). She received
her Ph.D. at Leiden University in 2009, where she specialized in
seventeenth-century Dutch and Portuguese settlement in western Africa.
From 2009 to 2011, she held a Post-Doctoral fellowship at the
Wilberforce Institute for the study of Slavery and Emancipation (WISE),
University of Hull, as a member of the Project: Slave Trade, Slavery and
Emancipation in European Histories and Identities financed by the
European Union 7th Framework Program. Subsequently, she has been a
post-doctoral fellow at the International Institute of Social History of the
Netherlands Royal Academy of Sciences, where she is a member of the
CLIO-INFRA Project and the Global Collaboratory on the History of
Labor Relations. She has published various articles and Dutch and
Portuguese in Western Africa: Empires, Merchants, and the Atlantic
System (2011).
Stacey Sommerdyk received her M.A. in history from York University

in 2007, where she was affiliated with the Harriet Tubman Institute. She
received her Ph.D. in history from the University of Hull under the
supervision of David Richardson at the Wilberforce Institute for the
study of Slavery and Emancipation (WISE). Her thesis, “Trade and the
Merchant Community of the Loango Coast in the Eighteenth Century,”
reassesses the role of the Dutch in the slave trade. She has published
“Rivalry on the Loango Coast: A Re-examination of the Dutch in the
Atlantic Slave Trade” in Trabalho forçado africano: o caminho de ida,
edited by Arlindo Manuel Calderia et al. Edições Húmus, Ribeirão,
Portugal, 2009. Currently, she is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the
Department of History at the University of the Witwatersrand.
Jelmer Vos is Assistant Professor in the Department of History at Old

Dominion University. He received his Ph.D. from the School of Oriental
and African Studies and was a post-doctoral fellow at Emory University
and the Universidade Nova de Lisboa. He is currently preparing a
manuscript on the history of the Kongo kingdom, northern Angola, under
early colonial rule. His recent publications include "Child Slaves and
Freemen at the Spiritan Mission in Soyo, 1880–1885," Journal of Family
History (2010) and "Of Stocks and Barter: John Holt and the Kongo
Rubber Trade, 1906–10," Portuguese Studies Review (2011).
The Harriet Tubman Series on the African Diaspora
Publications in Association with

The Harriet Tubman Institute for Research on the Global
Migrations of African Peoples
General Editor
Paul E. Lovejoy FRSC

Distinguished Research Professor
Canada Research Chair in African Diaspora History
Director, The Harriet Tubman Institute
York University, Toronto Canada
Paul E. Lovejoy and Toyin Falola, eds., Pawnship, Slavery and

Colonialism in Africa, 2003
Donald G. Simpson, Under the North Star: Black Communities in Upper

Canada before Confederation (1867), 2005
Paul E. Lovejoy, Slavery, Commerce and Production in West Africa:

Slave Society in the Sokoto Caliphate, 2005
José C. Curto and Renée Soulodre-La France, eds., Africa and the
Americas: Interconnections during the Slave Trade, 2005
Paul E. Lovejoy, Ecology and Ethnography of Muslim Trade in West
Africa, 2005
Naana Opoku-Agyemang, Paul E. Lovejoy and David Trotman, eds.,

Africa and Trans-Atlantic Memories: Literary and Aesthetic
Manifestations of Diaspora and History, 2008
Boubacar Barry, Livio Sansone, and Elisée Soumonni, eds., Africa,

Brazil, and the Construction of Trans-Atlantic Black Identities, 2008
Behnaz Asl Mirzai, Ismael Musah Montana, and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds.,
Slavery, Islam and Diaspora, 2009
Carolyn Brown and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds., Repercussions of the Atlantic

Slave Trade: The Interior of the Bight of Biafra and the African
Diaspora, 2011
Ana Lucia Araujo, Mariana P. Candido and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds.,

Crossing Memories: Slavery and African Diaspora, 2011
Ute Röschenthaler, Purchasing Culture in the Cross River Region of

Cameroon and Nigeria, 2011
Ehud R. Toledano, ed., African Communities in Asia and the

Mediterranean: Identities between Integration and Conflict, 2011
Editorial Board
Edward Alpers, UCLA

Carolyn A. Brown, Rutgers
Rina Cáceres, Universidad de Costa Rica
Myriam Cottias, CNRS
Mohammed Ennaji, Université Muhammad V
Toyin Falola, University of Texas
Naana Opoku-Agyemang, University of Cape Coast
Mariza de Carvalho Soares, Universidade Federale de Fluminense
Elisée Soumonni, Université Nationale du Bénin
Ibrahima Thioub, Université Cheikh Anta Diop
Ehud Toledano, Tel Aviv University
David V. Trotman, York University

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SPECIAL ISSUE:

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Voyage Database and the 1–28

The Supply of Slaves from Luanda, 1768–1806: 53–76

Reexamining the Geography and Merchants of the 77–106

The Shipping Registries of the Havana Slave Trade 107–136

Extending the African Names Database: New Evidence 137–162

Under the leadership of David Eltis, and including Herbert Klein,

database an identity of its own as “TSTD2,” that is the “transatlantic

considered in the extrapolations that invariably will be attempted on the

migration of Africans will surely increase even more because of the

The Problem of Choosing National Carriers

34.6 percent and ships from France accounted for approximately 16

Source : Eltis et al., Transatlantic Slave Trade Database

Table 2: Region of Origin of Africans Destined for the Americas, 1500–1867

Bight of Bight of West South

755,500 388,700 336,900 1,209,300 1,999,100 1,594,600 5,694,600 542,600 12,521,300

6.0% 3.1% 2.9% 9.7% 16.0% 12.7% 45.5% 4.3%

Source: Eltis et al., Transatlantic Slave Trade Database.

European regional approach that also questioned Curtin’s schema. He

The Problem of the Regional Organization

Which “regions” are relevant to the study of trans-Atlantic slavery, both

commonly held cultural features as matrilineality is beyond the scope of

a Portuguese colony of Angola at Luanda certainly were different than

Portuguese and Brazilian trades, and was really a reflection of trade

that there is limited explanatory power in the use of these designations.

Why Look at a Database About the Enslavement of Africans

underlying the identification of categories. The presentation of the

that have little correspondence to African history. The different meanings

The Case of the Upper Guinea Coast

The earliest European designations of the Atlantic coast referred to the

Table 3: Departures from Upper Guinea Coast

St. Louis 1668–1829 145,000 9.8

The problem arises from the TSTD2 confusion of coastal categories

voyage database is missing. Why the architecture of the Slave Trade

compounds the problem of correlation with African history. This

understanding the African past attempts to understand the process of

Appendix: Comparison of 1999 and 2009 versions of Slave Trade

Table 1: Regional Origins of Slaves in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic

Table 2: Regional Origins of Slaves in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic

1701–10 16,300 1,200 3,100 20,600

1711–20 22,700 3,100 4,400 23,800

1721–30 34,900 9,400 4,500 48,800

1731–40 44,800 1,500 9,400 55,700

Summary of Discrepancies Between Slave Trade Database 1999 and

African Economic History v.38(2010):29–51

women and children, although the overall ratio of children on board

The significance of the Windward Coast for eighteenth-century slavers

communities created a supply of captives for export.7 In later years,

Coast, Elmina emerged as the major center of trade, while on the

This study is based on a database of 72 slaving voyages undertaken by

voyages to Gabon, all located in the provincial archives of Zeeland in

Table 1: Regional Distribution of Slave Purchases in the MCC

centuries is astounding, especially since this port had the capacity to

Table 2: Ten Most Important Places of Purchase in the MCC Guinea

Table 3: Age and Gender Distribution of Slaves in the MCC Guinea

Although the study of slave mortality falls largely outside the

shipboard mortality data to differing “purchasing strategies” in the Dutch

Around 1740, because of a pressing demand for slaves in the Americas

Daniel B. Domingues da Silva

Luanda was not a town

African Economic History v.38(2010):53-76

Brazil and Portuguese Angola during the period of suppression of the