Biographies of key figures in the history of the transatlantic slave trade

1 - 5 of 37 individuals

Afonso I (c.1456 - c.1545)

Afonso (often spelt Affonso) was the ruler of the Kongo-Kingdom (present day Angola and Congo) from 1506. He was the son of a Christian convert and he protested to King Manuel of Portugal over the activities of the Portuguese trading in copper, ivory and slaves. He unsuccessfully tried to limit the number of slaves the Portuguese could take: the Portuguese in return attempted unsuccessfully to assassinate him. He proved insufficiently powerful to expel the Portuguese who continued their trade.

Yaa Asantewaa (1840 - 1921)

Yaa Asantewwa witnessed her brother, the King Nana Akwasi Afrane Okpese, trying to expand the Asante group of states into an empire as great as that of the Ghana empire or that of the Europeans. He declared war on the Fante and Ga people and formed alliances with the Dutch and then with the British. Driven by the desire to obtain guns, the King sold his own people as slaves, and used slaves to build his palace, resulting in many deaths during his reign.
Yaa Asantewwa rebelled against her brother, in her role as Queen Mother, and when he died in 1894 she nominated her own grandson as King of Edweso (an Asante state). He was quickly deported by the British, and Yaa Asantewaa made herself Queen in 1896 and personally led a war of resistance in 1900 confronting the injustice and the colonialism of the British. She used tactics and developed a military strategy rather than fighting herself. She was an inspirational leader, visiting her soldiers in battle to give advice and gunpowder.
Yaa Asantewaa’s war was the last of the major war in Africa led by a woman. She was eventually captured and sent into exile to the Seychelles off the east coast of Africa where she died in 1921.

Jean Barbot (1655 - 1713)

Jean Barbot was born on the Ile de Ré, an island on the west coast of France that had strong trading links with Holland and England. Barbot travelled to the Guinea coast of Africa on two occasions, in 1678 - 9 and 1681 - 2, as a merchant working as an agent for the French Royal African Company. After returning from the second trip he based himself in La Rochelle continuing his involvement in Atlantic trading voyages, although there is no evidence that he went to sea again. As a Protestant in a Catholic country, Barbot fled to England in 1685. He wrote an account of his voyages along the West African coast, ‘On Guinea’ published in England in 1732.

Thomas Buxton (1786 - 1845)

Thomas Fowell Buxton became the anti-slavery leader in Parliament following William Wilberforce’s retirement in 1825. He was MP for Weymouth from 1818 to 1837. He was a Quaker and a strong advocate for social reform, working with Elizabeth Fry among others. While working with Wilberforce, Buxton founded the Society for the Mitigation and Gradual Abolition of Slavery, which tried to build on the successful abolition of the slave trade and end slavery itself.
He campaigned tirelessly to this end until the passing of the Emancipation Act in 1833, and is quoted as saying ‘with ordinary talent and extraordinary perseverance, all things are attainable’. As slavery was still a major activity in other parts of the world Buxton wrote ‘The African Slave Trade and its Remedy’ in 1839, which called for diplomacy with African nations to end the slave trade.

Joseph Cinquez (c.1811 - 1879)

Joseph Cinquez was from the West African Mendi people. He was captured by other Africans, the Ley people, and sold to a Spanish slave trader. In 1839 Cinquez led the rebellion on board the slave ship Amistad, sailing from Cuba. He tried to force the crew to return to Africa, but the ship was taken into custody by the Americans and Cinquez and others were charged with piracy. He was freed in 1841, after learning some English and being exposed to Christianity. He returned to Africa to find his village destroyed and his family missing. He lived with missionaries and requested a Christian burial.