Goree island – History of the Atlantic slave trade

Goree Island is a small 45-acre island located off the coast of Senegal that is only three kilometers away from Dakar. This quiet and quaint island with just 1000 permanent residents and ever visiting tourists once played an important part in the early days of African-American history.  Goree Island was a prominent place for the development of Atlantic slave trade and served as a center for expanding slave trade by the Europeans.

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The island had no inhabitants until Portuguese explorer Dias discovered it in 1444. And from the time of its discovery, the island had been in many hands like the Dutch, French and the British until it finally became a French colony in 1677 and remained so till its independence in 1960.

The island which is considered as a memorial to the African Diaspora had over 20 million African slaves passing through it between the mid-1500s and the mid-1800s. During the African slave trade, Goree Island was a slave-holding warehouse were African men, women and children were jailed before being transported to the Americas.

Millions of West Africans were taken against their will and were forcefully brought to Goree Island. They were then sold into slavery and were held in the holding warehouse on the island until they were shipped across the Atlantic Ocean.

The living conditions of the slaves were pathetic on Goree Island. They were chained with their backs facing the wall in an 8-square-foot cell with only a small slit of window facing outward. Once a day, they were fed and allowed to attend to their needs, but still they were prone to diseases and no medical help was given. They were kept naked, except for a piece of cloth tied around their waists.

The slave house that was built to keep the slaves had a small door called the “door of no return” through which every man, woman and child walked to the slave boat to be taken to the ‘New World’. The slave house built in 1777 remains intact to this day with cells and shackles, and is a major tourist attraction of Goree Island.

Chosen to be a World Heritage Site by the United Nations Educational, Scientific Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Goree Island still retains and preserves all the traces of its terrible past and displays to the world the miserable life once led by their ancestors.

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By Tara Alexander

Sources: Wikipedia

Africa Global News Publication