Friday, April 7, 2017

Quidah (Juda), a city in Benin: Slave Port





Ouidah
The Portuguese Fort of Ouidah in 1886






Ouidah , was once known as Juda, a city in Benin , it is located 42 kilometers from Cotonou . The population is currently at about 60,000 inhabitants . In the eighteenth century, this city was one of the main centers of the abduction and transport of slaves in the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

Quidah was the main place to transport the slaves to the Americas, From the eleven million Africans taken by Western Slave Traffickers almost two million left from Benin. 60 percent from the two main ports Quidah and Lagos. Quidah was strategically isolated from the rest of the kingdom to guarantee the royal monopoly. The Yovoghan, which translate to "leader of the Whites" was the commercial interface between European slavers and the Abomey slave state. This was set up by King Agadja of Agbomin (1708-1740), the slave trade was set up by King Kpengla (1774-1789) and was undertaken by periodic raids on the margins of the kingdom to the benefit of the ethnic groups of Fons. The slaves were assembled in a square to be sold, then chain together and taken to the beach to be separated. They were then put in canoes, taken to the ships andplaced in holds as they awaited the voyage to the Americas. Many slaves convinced they were to be eaten threw themselves into the sea.

Quidah was the main port for export of the slaves, Many European countries, such as the Danish, Portuguese, Dutch, French and the English came there to capture or trade for slaves. The Kings and elite tribes bartered with the Europeans to obtain the best price for their human commerce. In Benin today, the history of the slave trade by the Abomey kingom has fostered tension between the Fons and the ethnic tribes that live further north that fell victim to the annual raids carried out at that time condemning many of their ancestors into slavery.

Quidah is home to many monuments: 

 The Whydah Galley





 A model of the Whydah Galley



Whydah was commissioned in 1715 in London, England, by Sir Humphrey Morice, a member of the British Parliament, known as 'the foremost London Slave merchant of his day'.A square-rigged three-masted galley ship, it measured 110 feet (34 m) in length, with a tonnage rating at 300 tuns burthen, and could travel at speeds up to 13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph).

Christened Whydah after the West African slave trading kingdom of Ouidah (pronounced WIH-dah), the vessel was configured as a heavily armed trading and transport ship which included the Atlantic slave trade. It set out for its maiden voyage in early 1716, carrying a variety of goods from different businesses to exchange for delivery, trade, and slaves in West Africa. After traveling down West Africa through modern-day Gambia and Senegal to Nigeria and Benin, where its namesake port was located, it left Africa with an estimated 500 captives,gold, including Akan jewelry, and ivory aboard. It traveled to the Caribbean, where it traded and sold the cargo and captives for precious metals, sugar, indigo, rum, logwood, pimento, ginger, and medicinal ingredients, which were to then be transported back to England.Fitted with a standard complement of 18 six-pound cannon, which could be increased to a total of 28 in time of war.

On the return leg of its maiden voyage of the triangle trade, it began a new role in the Golden Age of Piracy, when it was captured by the pirate Captain Samuel "Black Sam" Bellamy, and was refitted as his flagship.
Bellamy sailed the Whydah up the coast of Colonial America, capturing ships as he went. On April 26, 1717, the Whydah was caught in a violent storm and wrecked. Only two of Bellamy's crew survived, along with seven others who were on a sloop captured by Bellamy earlier that day. Six of the nine survivors were hanged, two who had been forced into piracy were freed, and one Indian crewman was sold into slavery.

Whydah and her treasure eluded discovery for over 260 years until 1984, when the wreck was found – buried between 10 and 50 feet of sand, under water depths of 16 to 30 feet deep, spread four miles parallel to the Cape's coast. With the discovery of the ship's bell in 1985 and a small brass placard in 2013, both inscribed with the ship's name and maiden voyage date, Whydah is the only fully authenticated Golden Age pirate shipwreck ever discovered.

*Source: Wikipedia






"The Door of No Return"
 


La Porte Du Non Retour is a monument that was built in the design of  a gate.  It is the symbolism of the departure of captured slaves leaving for the Western world from Benin.  It was the last place slaves walked before they were taken to the slave ship; the slaves knew from that point that they wouldn’t be able to ever see their familes or Benin again.

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