History
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The trade of human beings from Africa to Louisiana began in 1718, with the first slave ships, the Aurore and the Duc du Maine, arriving in 1719 and carrying 451 enslaved Africans to the Louisiana colony. Their voyage began a transatlantic slave trade that continued through French, Spanish, and American rule, forcing approximately 12,000 documented and an untold number of undocumented men, women, and children onto slave ships bound for Louisiana. Wolof, Bambara, Mandingo, Fulbe, Nard, Ganga, Kissy, Susu, Mina, Fon, Yoruba, Chamba, Hausa, Igbo, Ibibio, Kongo/Angola, Makwa, and members of many other "nations" were deported from Greater Senegambia, the Gold Coast, the Bight of Benin, and West Central and Southeast Africa. Their skills and cultural practices were foundational to the development of Louisiana. Their Middle Passage averaged more than sixty days, and thousands perished from malnutrition, scurvy, other diseases, and the violent suppression of onboard rebellion. Those who survived were often unloaded along the banks of the Mississippi River. In 1808, the United States banned the international slave trade, though illegal shipments of Africans to Louisiana continued, with the last documented slave ship, the Fenix, arriving in New Orleans in 1830.
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New Orleans, Louisiana · United States
