By
HELENE COOPERMAY 31, 2015
WASHINGTON
— On Dec. 3, 1794, a Portuguese slave ship left Mozambique, on the east coast
of Africa, for what was to be a 7,000-mile voyage to Maranhão, Brazil, and the
sugar plantations that awaited its cargo of black men and women.
Shackled
in the ship’s hold were between 400 and 500 slaves, pressed flesh to flesh with
their backs on the floor. With the exception of daily breaks to exercise, the
slaves were to spend the bulk of the estimated four-month journey from the
Indian Ocean across the vast South Atlantic in the dark of the hold.
In the
end, their journey lasted only 24 days. Buffeted by strong winds, the ship, the
São José Paquete Africa, rounded the treacherous Cape of Good Hope and came
apart violently on two reefs not far from Cape Town and only 100 yards from
shore, but in deep, turbulent water. The Portuguese captain, crew and half of
the slaves survived. An estimated 212 slaves did not, and perished in the sea.
Acesse na íntegra: The New York Times
