In 1837, a Portuguese slave ship named Arrogante was intercepted off the coast of Cuba by the British Royal Navy’s HMS Snake. What at first seemed like a typical enforcement of Britain’s anti-slavery patrols soon spiraled into one of...
On the morning of March 28, 1941, deep in a wooded ravine at Fort Benning, Georgia, the lifeless body of Private Felix Hall was discovered. He had been hanging from a tree by a noose, his hands tied behind...
From 1885 to 1908, DR Congo was transformed into a massive forced labor camp. This territory, then known as the Congo Free State, was unlike any other colony in Africa. It wasn’t controlled by a government or a European...
On the night of June 15, 1920, a white mob in Duluth, Minnesota, dragged three African-American circus workers from jail, Elias Clayton, Elmer Jackson, and Isaac McGhie, and lynched them in front of thousands. The men had been falsely...
Ruth First was a journalist, activist, and scholar who dedicated her life to exposing the cruelty of apartheid in South Africa. Unafraid to challenge the regime, she used words as weapons against injustice. Her bold resistance made her a...
In the 1780s, Alexander Falconbridge, a British surgeon, made several voyages aboard slave ships along the West African coast. Initially employed to care for the crew and captives, Falconbridge later turned into one of the most effective voices against...
When the U.S. banned the transatlantic slave trade in 1808, Southern plantation owners could no longer import Africans. To meet rising demand for labour, they turned inward, breeding enslaved Africans already in the country. At the heart of this...
In the summer of 1908, Springfield, Illinois, Abraham Lincoln’s hometown, erupted in a violent two-day race riot fueled by racial hatred. Angry white mobs attacked Black residents, burned their businesses, and lynched those who dared to stand their ground....
Thomas Leyland was a British slave trader, banker, and politician whose wealth and influence in 18th-century Liverpool were largely built on the back of the transatlantic slave trade. His journey to immense wealth began with a stroke of luck...
Antonio Ruiz, known as Falucho, was an Afro-Argentine soldier who rose from slavery to become a national hero in Argentina’s fight for independence. Serving under General José de San Martín, he is remembered for choosing death over betrayal of...
