The Atlantic Ocean floor
is one giant graveyard
and a crime scene.
Remains of over 2,000,000
of our ancestors
once covered these
dark recesses of the world.
For centuries, the transatlantic
sl*ve trade seemed unstoppable,
but it was brought to an end.
What got this many people
so fired up that they spoke out?
There's a greater
than 99% probability
that all living
African Americans
have at least one relative
who landed here, really
the epicenter of sl*very.
The world of print would
bring sl*very right up close.
It's something that you can't
avoid thinking about anymore.
These Africans had actually
fought and won their freedom.
They ended up dying in chains
in freezing cold water.
This was equal
in value to a human being.
So, researching the
details and the horror
of the transatlantic sl*ve
trade radicalized him.
Is it fair to say
Lincoln freed the sl*ves?
Not quite.
The captain said,
"I come from hell
and I'm going to damnation."
I think I know exactly
what he was afraid of.
London was at the very center
of the transatlantic
sl*ve trade.
England's enormous
wealth was in part created
by the trafficking
of enslaved humans.
But it was also the place
where the first political steps
were taken to bring
the awful chapter
in human history to an end.
- Hey.
- Hi, Sam.
- Hello.
- Good to see you guys.
- You, too.
- How are you?
Wow.
- Wow, look at this.
- It's kind of awesome, right?
The Abolition
of the sl*ve Trade Act of 1807,
as the King wishes.
So it had royal assent.
Yes.
This is a "wow."
"The same should be
forthwith abolished
and prohibited
and declared to be unlawful."
But this doesn't
abolish sl*very.
It abolished the purchase
and transfer of sl*ves
from African countries.
It's all about the trade itself.
Britain was the biggest
trafficker in Africans,
and then it was
the first European country
to abolish it.
It was a really momentous time
in British history
because after decades
of campaigning, petitions,
Parliament finally decided
to stop British ships
and British merchants kidnapping
and trafficking Africans.
But they left the institution
of sl*very in the Caribbean,
on which the economy
was still very dependent,
that remained intact.
- Exactly.
- If you were a sl*ve,
you wouldn't
have felt any different.
It would take almost
another 30 years
to abolish sl*very altogether.
Okay, so suddenly in 1807,
this is possible.
Why wasn't it possible in 1806?
There's another document
that I want to show you.
Right, this is
the Manchester petition
against the sl*ve trade.
It's got many thousands
of signatures on it,
as you can see.
These just would have
been ordinary people
trying to influence Parliament.
There were hundreds of petitions
like this that were presented
to Parliament,
especially in the 1790s
and in the years right up
to the Act of Abolition.
And this is just Manchester?
This is just Manchester.
It's really strange,
what your eye is drawn to
when you look at this.
You know, I've found like four
Samuels already.
I'm used to seeing "Samuel",
so I was like,
"Oh, wow, there's a "Sam."
There's a "Samuel."
Think there's
an "Afua" on there?
That I doubt.
Never say "never."
All these ordinary people.
That made a difference.
Regular old jobs that are
trying to make a difference,
just like now.
Another thing here is
you can see women signed it.
I mean, this was an era
before women had the vote.
What I want to know
is what happened
that suddenly got
this many people so fired up
that the attitude changed
and they spoke out?
What turned this country into
the first European country
to abolish sl*very?
Exactly.
In this small town,
on the Western coast of England,
just at the moment,
when the tide was finally
beginning to turn
against the sl*ve trade,
a sl*ve ship called "The London"
was wrecked in a storm.
It was carrying over
60 enslaved Africans.
Almost all of them died
as the ship smashed
on the cliffs
of the Bristol Channel.
Yet the tragedy was
practically forgotten
until recently when
Professor Mark Horton
and his colleagues
began the process
of reviving the story.
The story starts in 1796.
A convoy of ships was coming
in from the West Indies,
carrying loot, but also Africans
from the former French Colonies,
who'd been fighting for
independence in St. Lucia.
They'd be captured
and re-enslaved.
And one of the ships,
"The London," got separated out.
A great storm erupted,
and as you can see,
it's a very dangerous coastline.
And in a trice, the ship was
dashed onto the rocks just here.
All of the people on the deck
survived, but of course,
the people below decks
shackled in their positions,
down there as cargo,
would have drowned
as the ship stoved in.
The water would have rushed in.
It was a dark night in October,
nobody would have bothered
to come and rescue them.
So, these people died
in shallow water
and no one bothered
to unshackle them
or even give them
a fighting chance.
Yes, everyone was looking
after their own skin.
Are any of those remains,
any of that,
is that still down there today?
Well, surprisingly,
nobody has ever looked.
We will be the first try
and explain this tragedy
from the very last days
of the sl*ve trade.
The sl*ve trade took
place at a time
when it was not easy to spread
new ideas like abolition,
but one man found
a way to do it.
Who was Thomas Clarkson?
Thomas Clarkson was
a native of Wisbech.
He was born in 1760.
And he was set an essay,
and the subject
was is it lawful to make others
sl*ves against their will?
Thomas didn't know too much
about the subject
but immersed himself in it.
It completely changed his life.
He realized then that
something had to be done
to abolish this
dreadful sl*ve trade.
And Thomas just became
completely overtaken
by this desire to see
the end of the sl*ve trade.
So, researching the details
and the horror
of the transatlantic sl*ve
trade radicalized him.
Yeah, very much so.
He spent the rest of his
life dedicated to that cause,
traveled thousands of miles
all around the country
on horseback.
He would be this figure
turning up in the towns,
talking to groups of people,
getting them to set up
societies to abolish
firstly the sl*ve trade
and then sl*very.
Basically, anything and
everything that could be done
to support the cause
of abolition,
Thomas Clarkson
was there doing it.
So he tried to make people
understand that Africans
were not chattel,
but human beings
with knowledge and culture.
Yes, he did.
Is this what he referred
to as his African chest?
His African box, yes.
The first division,
as he called it,
was the manufactory items,
items from nature
that could be used
in this country for medicines.
He would also have the fabrics
to show the craftsmanship
of the people in Africa,
basically to argue that
we've got these amazing things,
why are we selling Africans
when we could be
trading with them
for this wonderful objects?
So, these were items to make
a positive case
as to what the potential
for trading Africa was.
Looks like there were some
things that also made
the more negative
case about what was wrong,
how African sl*ves were treated.
Yeah, he had some items
in the bottom of the chest.
Division four contained
the instruments of t*rture.
This is a sinister-
looking object.
What was this?
The neck collar.
This would have been t*rture.
This would be put
around the neck.
You've got these
spikes sticking out,
which meant that the person
who had to wear it
wouldn't be able to
escape into the bush
because they'd get caught
on the growth.
You also couldn't lay down.
You couldn't sit comfortably.
They wouldn't be able
to get close to people.
Must have been
absolutely horrific,
not to mention the weight
of the object itself.
And then we have a long chain
to put around the ankles
to fix people,
a row of them.
So people's feet would have been
clamped together with this
and then also attached
to either a row
of other - Yes.
Also chained people to an
object, to keep them tied up?
Yes.
To keep them from running
away because they were
a commodity,
they were being sold.
It would have probably
shocked people to know
that these were
being manufactured
within this country.
Clarkson had a tremendous
influence on people.
The Bristol Channel
has the highest tidal range
in the world.
It's about 40-50 feet.
So we have to get exactly
the right time of year
when we've got
a really low tide.
And today is the lowest tide.
My team are going to
work on dry land
with geophysical equipment
to see if we can find
remains of the ship,
on the beach itself.
Meanwhile,
you're going to go out to sea,
dive to see if you can find
remains of it underwater.
This is our final mission,
and we've learned
a lot up until now.
This mission is disturbing to me
because these Africans
had actually fought
and won their freedom
on the Island of Saint Lucia
in the Caribbean.
And within a year of that time,
the British came back
and re-enslaved them.
Took them back to England.
They didn't bring them from
St. Lucia to here, right?
As prisoners of w*r,
they brought them
as re-enslaved Africans.
They ended up dying
in chains in the hull
of that ship
in freezing cold w*r.
The accounts from the time
show that "The London"
foundered off the small
bay called Rapparee Cove,
which is adjacent
to the Harbour of Ilfracombe.
So this is where we're
going to be looking.
This is where
the wreck ended off at.
I plotted out some
of the targets
that we should go look at.
So we'll move closer
and closer and closer
into the area where she
was sitting on the rocks.
For the first time
since "The London" foundered
more than 220 years ago,
an underwater search for
the wreck is finally happening.
It's not a very deep dive,
but the visibility is not good.
The Northern Atlantic
waters are frigid
and the Bristol Channel currents
are exceptionally strong.
To find debris
from the shipwreck,
we scanned the bottom
with metal detectors,
looking for metallic components
that could have been
on the ship or part of the ship.
Pieces of the hull, nails,
g*ns, anchors,
chains, and shackles.
It could take hours
to pick up a signal.
So we work in shifts,
each pair surveys underwater
for up to one hour
and then the next team jumps in.
The magnetometer
hit on something.
So we started digging,
feverishly digging,
and fanning
and digging and fanning.
You get into it.
You could hear
the magnetometer going off,
hitting on something
and you just want to be able
to find what it's hitting on.
I could see Valerie
in this cloud of black
and it was super turbid.
I couldn't see her.
I couldn't see my hand.
I couldn't see anything.
And you know, I found something.
This is what I found.
Mallory, what do
you think it is?
Oh, there you go.
Here you go, it's a wrench.
It's a wrench. Found a wrench.
Guys, I'm coming up!
So after hours of searching,
we didn't find anything.
And now the tide is going down.
So we have to stop.
Pick it up again tomorrow.
Now it's time for
the archeologists on land
to get to work.
Hopefully, they'll have
better luck than us.
On the other side of
the ocean in the United States,
sl*very was so infused
with the local economy
that a change in public opinion
wasn't enough to end it.
Here, abolition
was earned in blood,
in the deadliest conflict
America has ever known.
So what's the significance
of this place?
- There's a spooky feel to it.
- Yeah. I mean
That's not very scientific.
No, but a lot of
people died here.
There were Confederate forces
up on that ridge
firing down
on the Union soldiers.
The Confederates are up there.
The Union soldiers
are rushing over here.
Right, and you could see here,
the Confederates
have the high ground.
And so they are able to
pick Union soldiers off
as they're trying to cross
this little bridge.
And I think the choice
to make this charge, um
cost a lot of people
their lives.
When it comes to
the struggle for abolition
in the United States,
this battle was
the turning point.
We're standing
in a Union-only cemetery
for soldiers that were k*lled
in the bloodiest day
in US history,
on September 17, 1862.
That's a day that
lives in more infamy
than uh, D-Day
or September 11th.
3,650 people have died here.
Another 2000
died in the days, months,
weeks that followed the battle.
Almost 6,000 soldiers,
Union and Southerners
That's correct.
Died in this one battle?
How did this battle impact
African American's liberation?
The Battle of Antietam
had a secret underpinning,
a secret agenda.
Lincoln had, hidden away
in his desk, a document.
Lincoln's Emancipation
Proclamation
would elevate the w*r,
would make it about a new,
higher purpose.
Make it not just about
reunification,
but also about
the ending of sl*very.
So Lincoln has
drafted this proclamation,
but he drafted in 1862 when
things are going really badly
for the Union army
and his advisors say
basically like
we like this idea,
like we're, we're kind of
in favor of this,
but it's going to look
really bad and desperate
if you do it when the w*r
is going so poorly for us.
And so, after the victory
here at Antietam,
Lincoln decides
I have the victory I need,
and I'm going to issue
the proclamation.
Lincoln's Emancipation
Proclamation,
one of the things that did
was they offered a first-time
invitation for
African American soldiers
to join the Union Army.
They did so in droves.
By the end of the Civil w*r,
about 10% of the soldiers
who fought on the Union side
would be African Americans.
What happens at Antietam
enables Black people
to do what they had wanted
to do for so long,
which was to fight sl*ve owners.
This is a chance for me
to fight for freedom
for people who look like me
all across the country.
So is it fair to say
Lincoln freed the sl*ves?
Not quite.
Lincoln was responding to
Black people's own actions
to free themselves.
Starting in May 1861,
before a lot of major battles
have taken place,
Black people are running
to Fort Monroe in Virginia,
seeking out the Union Army and
demanding that the army
should make them free.
And so what Lincoln
does is open a door
through which they could
travel to freedom.
The story of emancipation is
is just wrong
if it's told without
African Americans
actually claiming
their own freedom.
"The London" came ashore
at high water
and so she would have foundered
somewhere here on the beach.
And so it's highly likely that
the remains of the ship
were actually
buried in the sand.
We're using a technique
known as magnetometry.
So if there's any metal objects
down there at any great depths,
they're likely to come up
as an anomaly.
So we're very systematically
going backwards and forwards
along the beach to measure
every centimeter of the beach.
What the drone does,
it enables us to provide
a three-dimensional map
of the cove and the cliffs
and so forth around.
So it provides a visual picture
of what is there,
so it helps interpret
our findings.
There's something really strange
about the wreck of "The London."
It was so close to the harbor,
why did it crash?
Well, the locals saw
the ship was in distress.
Lots of people from
the harbor rowed out
to try and help the ship
and guide the ship
into the harbor.
We even had a pilot
who tried to come on board,
but the captain refused.
Refused?
Refused help.
The harbor is right there.
Why didn't he just go
into the safe harbor?
Why was he still out here?
Well, the captain was
reported to have said,
"I've come from hell,
I'm going to damnation."
It's a really puzzling thing
why he refused help.
So we managed to bring
together all the data.
There's clearly a lot
of metal further down
to the end of the beach there,
as we go lower.
There's a whole lot
of anomalies in there.
And then there's a big anomaly,
just in there.
So our job tomorrow
is really clear.
We've got an hour and a half
of the lowest tide
to investigate,
get out our shovels
and literally find out
what's remaining.
And whether these rarely
are part of a shipwreck,
and hopefully "The London."
As the transatlantic
sl*ve trade expanded,
Western European cities,
such as London and Paris,
became the biggest
and wealthiest in the world.
But it was also here that
technological advancements
gave a major boost
to the movement for abolition.
And most of all,
the printing press.
What do we have here?
First of the iron presses
from about 1800.
We've got a illustration
on there, a wood engraving.
All engraved by hand,
that was engraved in 1860.
This process I'm engaged in,
helped put an end
to the sl*ve trade and sl*very.
You just place it on the image.
That's it. That's good.
And then pull the handle
across to you
as far as you can take it.
Just all the way up.
- It worked!
- Excellent.
- It looks really good.
- Yeah.
This technology really
takes information
and ideas to a totally
different level.
Print becomes cheap
because of mechanization.
And what happens
is that this material
is offered to the public
in newspapers and cartoons,
and it becomes a great
informer of opinion.
Major issues,
the death of Nelson,
or the abolition
of the sl*ve trade.
Big issues,
puts them in graphic form
and gives them
an extraordinary audience.
People make their
political judgements
around the cartoons
that they see.
The sl*ve trade and sl*very
was something that the British
and other Europeans
could keep at arm's length.
It was over the horizon
out of sight, out of mind.
Cartoons, the world of print
of the late 18th century,
bring it right up close.
It's something that you can't
avoid thinking about anymore.
For instance, George Cruikshank
becomes hugely influential.
This is a really horrific image.
Is this the captain, here?
That's Captain Kimber,
torturing the young African
on board his ship.
I've noticed that
the white abolitionists
are widely known and celebrated,
but what's less known
is the names
of some of the Africans
who were involved.
It was an army
of unknown soldiers
in the background of this.
And the most interesting
one in some ways
is the African, Olaudah Equiano.
I acquired a first
edition of his book,
which was published in 1789.
His autobiography.
- A first edition.
- First edition.
That's incredible.
How did he make
the transition from a sl*ve
to being a published author
who was influencing
public opinion in Britain?
It's an extraordinary story.
He traveled up and down
the Caribbean
as a sl*ve on a ship,
a lot of Africans
are making money
on the edges of the sl*ve system
and he actually buys
his own freedom.
He has the cash
to buy his own freedom.
What story does
he tell in this book?
It's a story of violence.
It's a story of exploitation.
It's a story of cruelty
on a monumental scale.
It's a denunciation of sl*very
through the eyes of one man.
And through the story
of his own individual life.
He is opening people's eyes
to what it is like
for an African to endure
the sl*ve trade and sl*very.
Right now it's the lowest
tide of the year
in Rapparee Cove.
The water level is 50 feet lower
than it usually is
during high tide.
The boats in the harbor
are literally grounded.
And while we're strategizing
for our next dive,
the archeologists are in a race
against the incoming tide.
The targets closest
to the shoreline
are at the highest
priority right now
because these areas
will only be accessible
for a little over an hour
before the tide comes back in.
I've been coming to
this cove for nearly 50 years.
When I come down here,
I come down to other look
to see what's around
and I pick up whatever's there.
The vision of the wreck wrecking
on the rocks in this cove,
have been in my mind
for many, many years.
And I was looking for the story.
Who were the people on board
and what happened to them?
20 years ago, I was involved
with one of the most shocking
finds in this cove:
human remains.
I saw finger bones
and I found a fragment
of a skull
and three teeth sticking out
of that bank.
I felt in my heart,
I was convinced
it was from one of the sl*ves.
I started digging
into old documents
and I discovered
shocking descriptions
of the morning after
the ship had foundered,
when dozens
of bodies of Africans
littered the beach.
The morning after,
the local population came down
to try to bury these bodies
because they thought
they should do it
because of their
religious convictions.
They started to move the bodies
and then the tide
dropped back a bit
and then exposed a load of gold
that came from a treasure chest.
It was tipped out
of the rowing boat.
So they all rushed to the gold
and left the bodies.
While we wait for the
tide to come up in Ilfracombe,
Richard and I have
taken a small team
to the nearby Isles of Scilly.
Here lie the remains
of an English ship
called "The Douro."
It went down at 1843,
well past the time
that the sl*ve trade
and sl*very were abolished
throughout the British empire.
In the case of "The Douro,"
as with thousands
of other ships,
it is suspected
that it continued
to illegally traffic
and enslave Africans.
We're here to find evidence
to support this claim.
So "The Douro"
was supposed to have
hit the rock
that can just see
breaking there.
That round rock.
It's probably
foundered on the reef,
just behind us here.
We need to try and find
the manillas if we can,
see if we can find this currency
that was used in sl*ve trade.
Visibility is probably
only one to two meters,
which is not great down here.
I can see what looks like
the first prong of the anchor.
So, it's very large
Larger than
I thought it would be.
We are now going to focus
on the manilla.
Kinga is searching around
with a metal detector.
It looks like
she's got something.
It could be the right shape.
And yeah, she's pieced
them together.
You can see that is a piece
of manilla that Kinga's found.
We actually, we found a manila
with the metal detector,
underneath the sand,
right by the anchor.
In two pieces,
it's broken, some manila.
Here's what "The Douro"
was carrying
when it went down in 1843.
So this essentially proves
that even after
sl*very was banned,
that ship was taking
a currency that was used
to trade for human lives.
It's hard comprehend
sl*very isn't it?
In this world,
and the freedom that we have,
but that's just,
it's quite poignant. Right?
Unbelievable.
This was something
that was equal in value
to a human being who,
who laughs and dreams.
There were thousands of
these aboard "The Douro"
when they were all taken
in the West African coast
and each one of these
was traded for a human life.
The story of emancipation
during the civil w*r,
was a mosaic of thousands
of individual acts.
But one story stands out.
It took place here
in Charleston Harbor,
a great terminus
of the Trans-Atlantic
sl*ve trade.
It's the spot, where almost half
of all the enslaved
Africans who came to America
throughout the course
of the entire
transatlantic sl*ve trade,
where they took
their first steps.
Right here is called
Gadsden's Wharf.
It was the largest wharf
in the colonies.
It was the spot where more
enslaved Africans landed
and were sold than any other
place in the country.
It became really
the epicenter of sl*very.
There's a greater
than 99% probability
that all living
African Americans
have at least one relative
who landed here.
And your great-
great-grandfather.
He was once a sl*ve here?
Yeah, my great,
great grandfather.
His name was Robert Smalls.
He is commonly known
as one of the first heroes
of the civil w*r.
He was born on April 5th,
1839 in Buford, South Carolina.
Eventually became a laborer
on a boat called "The Planter."
And over the years,
because he had the ability,
he ended up becoming
the pilot of that boat.
When the civil w*r broke out,
he got his family
and the crew and their families
and head out.
There was a federal
blockade just outside
the mouth of the harbor.
And he knew that
if he could get there,
that he'd be free.
Robert put on the top hat
and the long coat
of a Confederate captain,
he knew all the passcodes,
blowing the whistle.
There were about five forts
that he had to sail past,
including the most dangerous
and the biggest here,
Fort Sumpter,
where the civil w*r began.
They had to sail past
the range of the cannons
in Fort Sumpter.
And so they got
a bit further down,
so they were beyond the range
and they quickly lowered
the Confederate flag
and they were free.
Because of his bravery
and the capture of
an enemy vessel for the Union,
Smalls became a national hero.
With the money he was awarded
for delivering "The Planter,"
he eventually bought
the southern home
he grew up in as a sl*ve.
- 511.
- That's it.
This is it. 511 Prince street.
It's actually everything
I would have imagined
a southern house.
Yeah. It's a beautiful home.
- It's very homey.
- Yeah. It's beautiful.
Generations
of your family, right?
Absolutely.
Going back to my great,
great, great grandmother.
So this is it.
This is the bedroom.
After the w*r he's here.
Apparently hears
a knock on the door,
opens the door
and there's Jane Bold McKee.
Jane was the wife of his
masters, former master.
And she was ill,
mentally ill, physically ill
and thought she was coming
home to her house,
thought that she
was going to resume life
in the way
that she had lived it.
And Robert embraced her,
brought her in
and took care of her
for the remaining months
of her life.
He allowed her to live
in the master bedroom
and they catered to her.
He was owned by this woman.
He was treated
as a piece of property,
but yet he had the humanity
in him to bring her in
and to care for her.
So.
What a gesture, what a man.
Robert smalls became
a Congressman
and would later be remembered as
the father of public education
in the United States.
The tide's coming very fast now.
So we have to pick up the pace
if we want to find something.
We're hoping to find
wrought iron,
the old form of metal.
"The London's" wooden hull
would have been reinforced
by that kind of iron.
There's all this iron
standing all over the water
and all over the rock.
I need to get a second
pair of hands in here.
But then finally,
we got to one of the targets.
I don't know.
What do you think it is?
That's angle iron, 20th century.
Come on,
We haven't got long Patrick.
It would be buried.
It's a coin,
but I'm afraid it's modern.
It's got a picture
of the queen on the back.
About there, come on chaps.
But then our efforts pay off.
Whoa!
So this is a great lump of iron.
And you can tell that it's
made out of wrought iron.
Yeah. And what's
happened at the end here?
It's been bent
and it's been torn.
That wouldn't have
been made like that.
It's been thumped.
Like in a wreck.
And it's exactly the right size
from a ship isn't it?
Yes, yes.
If we took it like this,
we put it underneath,
you would just see
how it would fit
underneath some rigging.
This iron is from
the time period of "The London."
I mean, wrought iron
is spot on for this date.
It's our right time period.
We actually got preserved here,
a kind of frozen moment in time
when "The London"
is being smashed up
against the rocks behind us,
and is actually
twisting this strap.
And hold it. Surprisingly heavy.
Ghana, in West
Africa, was one of the main
areas from where captured
Africans were trafficked
and enslaved.
After centuries
of the sl*ve trade,
abolitionists tried
to show Europeans
and people in the New World,
that the Africans among them
were human beings like them.
The memory of the millions
who perished on the voyages
across the ocean has been lost.
Ghanaian artist,
Kwame Akoto-Bamfo,
is trying to resurrect
that forgotten part of history.
Kwame?
Hello, Mr. Jackson.
Sam, man.
So let's look at what you got.
Okay.
Are these just normally
out like this?
Yeah.
Wow.
- All right.
So this is a story of the people
who were on those ships.
Yeah.
So right ahead
How many are out here now?
Wow.
Mm-hmm
Mm-hmm
So, who are these faces?
Mm-hmm
Yeah.
It's crazy 'cause
I can just look
in just one section right here,
and I can identify
people that I know.
Now that the tide is up,
we're back in the water.
One big piece of the puzzle
is still missing for me.
Why did Captain Robertson,
the captain of "The London,"
refuse to accept refuge
in the nearby harbor?
Mallory has plotted to
dive a little further out
in the ocean this time,
as the wreckage of "The London"
may have drifted away
from land over time.
Then, there it was.
It was this huge object.
It was an old mooring anchor,
positioned outside the harbor,
providing incoming ships
stability out at sea.
It's make and design correspond
with the
timeline of "The London,"
and some of the local records
mention the mooring anchor
being out there at the time.
I saw it, and I thought,
"Hold on." Now I know
why Captain Robertson
came out to Rapparee Cove
instead of going
into the harbor.
He wanted to tie himself
to the mooring anchor.
He wanted safety
without scrutiny.
And I think I know exactly
what he was afraid of.
So, from what I've been
reading and researching,
I think a reason why
the captain may have been
apprehensive about
coming into Ilfracombe
is because four years earlier,
there was this case,
Captain Kimber.
He had done something terrible.
You're out on a ship.
You have your sl*ves down below
in really inhumane
terrible conditions.
And they need the sl*ves
to arrive strong.
And they would, what you call,
"Dance the sl*ves."
And there was this girl,
this sl*ve girl.
This girl, as it was reported,
was Christian,
and she had been ordered to
take off her clothes and dance,
and she didn't want to.
Obviously not
And Captain Kimber wasn't
going to have any of this.
He tore her clothes from her,
tied her ankle to a rope
from the mast,
pulled her up and down.
Over and over and over and over,
until she died.
He k*lled her that way.
The surgeon saw this
and was horrified.
When they got back,
the surgeon reported this.
He couldn't stay quiet.
And at that point,
the tide started to turn,
and there was a cartoon drawn
of this girl being
dropped on the deck,
and Captain Kimber is watching.
And this was in the homes
of many, many, many Englishmen,
and they saw
this girl as a human.
And so,
Captain Kimber went to trial.
And this had never
been heard of before,
and everybody was watching.
This was a really big case.
But unfortunately,
he was acquitted.
However,
it became the catalyst of,
"You need to treat sl*ves
like they're people
and not like they're cargo."
And I think that's exactly why
the Captain of
"The London" was hesitant
to come into harbor.
Who knows how this captain
had been treating his sl*ves?
Maybe there was something
he wanted to hide.
He had re-enslaved free people,
and the world was not going to
sit back and ignore it anymore.
Hi.
Suddenly, my cousin
and her family come along
to surprise me.
I recognized your face
easily from up there.
Who's this?
Who's this? It's Josh.
My father is
originally from here,
and my mom is from The Bahamas,
where I'm from.
I've never met my cousins
in person before.
I've seen pictures.
I have no recollection of this,
so this is kind of me
meeting all of you for
the first time, really.
- Yeah.
- Great.
This is absolutely crazy.
After all these diving missions
we've gone through,
and the research we've done
all over the world,
finally both sides
of my mixed heritage
have become real for me.
That is so cool.
I've only seen
you guys in pictures.
For the past few years,
we dove and investigated
sunken sl*ve ships
all over the world.
And now, hearing of our work,
we've been invited
to Washington, D.C.
to meet a very special person,
the legendary
civil rights leader,
Congressman John Lewis.
How many times have
you been arrested?
During the '60s,
I got arrested 40 times
for sitting in
at lunch counters
and restaurants,
going on the freedom ride.
We were arrested,
we were jailed,
we were beaten,
we were left bloody,
left unconscious.
Just by sitting in places
that only white people
were supposed to.
Just that.
You remember the first time
you were arrested?
I remember the first time
ever arrested.
Right.
I can never, ever forget it.
I felt free.
Free?
I felt liberated because
my mother and my father
and grandparents had said,
"Stay out of trouble.
Don't get in trouble."
And I got in trouble.
What I call good trouble,
necessary trouble.
I didn't quite understand
my own history,
and I have so many
questions that,
each time I go diving,
some of it gets answered.
We dove and saw
relics, remnants of the chaos,
of the brutality, of the abuse.
Sometimes it's just too much,
but we have to tell this story.
This story needs to be told.
And that's where
I guess I'm stuck.
Right?
All of the places
that we've been,
you can see the beauty of it,
and the wonder of it.
You see these islands
or shorelines.
When we were in Suriname,
we're standing on the shoreline
of the most beautiful scenery
that you ever wanted to see.
But to know that
680 Africans were m*rder*d
within a couple of hundred
yards of the shoreline,
I'm conflicted all the time.
I understand very well
what you're saying.
And we cannot sweep
it under the rug.
We've got to bring it all out.
Make it plain.
And we have
an obligation, a mission,
a mandate to do just that.
So the whole world
can feel this.
Keep the faith. Don't give up.
- No, sir.
- Never that.
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01x06 - Abolition
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Series explores various aspects of the history of sl*very in the United States, including the efforts of American actor Samuel L. Jackson to reconnect with his African heritage through DNA testing.
Series explores various aspects of the history of sl*very in the United States, including the efforts of American actor Samuel L. Jackson to reconnect with his African heritage through DNA testing.