Uploaded February 2021 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
amazon.com/Wings-Fly-Jarnell-Stokes/dp/1734245204
Over the course of nearly 400 years, more than 12 million Africans were abducted by slavers and shipped to Europe and North America. The process, known as the Transatlantic Slave Trade, was legally outlawed in the United States in 1807, but in 1860, one slaver violated that law — and shipped about 160 West African captives to Mobile, Alabama.
Among them was Kossola “Cudjo” Lewis, who is now known as one of the last known survivors of the Transatlantic slave trade. In 1927, Lewis was famously interviewed and filmed by author Zora Neale Hurston about his traumatizing experience as a slave and his attempt to recreate his West African homeland in Mobile.
Cudjo Lewis was born Oluale Kossola in 1841 in the Banté region of West Africa that is today encompassed by the nation of Benin. He grew up in a Yoruba community in a large family of 17 siblings.
In the spring of 1860, Kossola’s peaceful life was interrupted when he was abducted by the army of the African Kingdom of Dahomey and sold by them to slavers at the port Ouidah.
Kossola was consequently sold to Captain William Foster of the Clotilda, the last slave ship to dock in the United States. Aboard were 115 to 160 more African men and women forced across the Atlantic to Mobile, Alabama.
For the next four years, Kossola toiled as a slave and was renamed “Cudjo,” a name given by the Fon and Ewe peoples of West Africa. Meaher was also simply unable to pronounce “Kossola.” Kossola’s new last name, “Lewis,” was likely derived from his father’s name, Oluale.
In 1863, slavery was made illegal through Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, and five years later, the passage of the 14th Amendment made all former slaves American citizens, but Cudjo Lewis was not included as he was not born in the United States. It was only months later when Lewis was nationalized that he became an American citizen.
Following the end of legal chattel slavery in the United States, Cudjo Lewis met a young woman named Abile who also had been on the Clotilda. Together with many other freed Africans, they attempted to raise enough money for a voyage back home to their respective communities.
However, with the few economic opportunities afforded to former slaves in the South, many found that it would be impossible for them to raise enough money to return home. Cudjo Lewis decided that if he couldn’t go home, then he’d create a new one right there in the South.
He is considered the “only known African deported through the slave trade whose moving image exists,” and his story illuminated to Americans the full cruel story of the Transatlantic slave trade.
amazon.com/Wings-Fly-Jarnell-Stokes/dp/1734245204
Over the course of nearly 400 years, more than 12 million Africans were abducted by slavers and shipped to Europe and North America. The process, known as the Transatlantic Slave Trade, was legally outlawed in the United States in 1807, but in 1860, one slaver violated that law — and shipped about 160 West African captives to Mobile, Alabama.
Among them was Kossola “Cudjo” Lewis, who is now known as one of the last known survivors of the Transatlantic slave trade. In 1927, Lewis was famously interviewed and filmed by author Zora Neale Hurston about his traumatizing experience as a slave and his attempt to recreate his West African homeland in Mobile.
Cudjo Lewis was born Oluale Kossola in 1841 in the Banté region of West Africa that is today encompassed by the nation of Benin. He grew up in a Yoruba community in a large family of 17 siblings.
In the spring of 1860, Kossola’s peaceful life was interrupted when he was abducted by the army of the African Kingdom of Dahomey and sold by them to slavers at the port Ouidah.
Kossola was consequently sold to Captain William Foster of the Clotilda, the last slave ship to dock in the United States. Aboard were 115 to 160 more African men and women forced across the Atlantic to Mobile, Alabama.
For the next four years, Kossola toiled as a slave and was renamed “Cudjo,” a name given by the Fon and Ewe peoples of West Africa. Meaher was also simply unable to pronounce “Kossola.” Kossola’s new last name, “Lewis,” was likely derived from his father’s name, Oluale.
In 1863, slavery was made illegal through Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, and five years later, the passage of the 14th Amendment made all former slaves American citizens, but Cudjo Lewis was not included as he was not born in the United States. It was only months later when Lewis was nationalized that he became an American citizen.
Following the end of legal chattel slavery in the United States, Cudjo Lewis met a young woman named Abile who also had been on the Clotilda. Together with many other freed Africans, they attempted to raise enough money for a voyage back home to their respective communities.
However, with the few economic opportunities afforded to former slaves in the South, many found that it would be impossible for them to raise enough money to return home. Cudjo Lewis decided that if he couldn’t go home, then he’d create a new one right there in the South.
He is considered the “only known African deported through the slave trade whose moving image exists,” and his story illuminated to Americans the full cruel story of the Transatlantic slave trade.
