The Last Slaves

NAMED A TOP BOOK OF 2024 BY AMAZON AND WASHINGTON POST

Hannah Durkin lets the enslaved speak for themselves, and they tell a story not only of unimaginable suffering but also of courage and survival.Wall Street Journal

The Survivors of the Clotilda, a comprehensive account of one of the most important parts of American history, is a triumph.Booklist (starred review)

"A welcome history of defiance and survival."Kirkus Reviews

Joining the ranks of Rebecca Skloots The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and Zora Neale Hurstons rediscovered classic Barracoon, an immersive and revelatory history of the Clotilda, the last slave ship to land on US soil, told through the stories of its survivorsthe last documented survivors of any slave shipwhose lives diverged and intersected in profound ways.

The Clotilda, the last slave ship to land on American soil, docked in Mobile Bay, Alabama, in July 1860more than half a century after the passage of a federal law banning the importation of captive Africans, and nine months before the beginning of the Civil War. The last of its survivors lived well into the twentieth century. They were the last witnesses to the final act of a terrible and significant period in world history.

In this epic work, Dr. Hannah Durkin tells the stories of the Clotildas 110 captives, drawing on her intensive archival, historical, and sociological research. The Survivors of the Clotilda follows their lives from their kidnappings in what is modern-day Nigeria through a terrifying 45-day journey across the Middle Passage; from the subsequent sale of the ships 103 surviving children and young people into slavery across Alabama to the dawn of the Civil Rights movement in Selma; from the foundation of an all-Black African Town (later Africatown) in Northern Mobilean inspiration for writers of the Harlem Renaissance, including Zora Neale Hurstonto the foundation of the quilting community of Gees Benda Black artistic circle whose cultural influence remains enormous.

An astonishing, deeply compelling tapestry of history, biography, and social commentary, The Survivors of the Clotilda is a tour de force that deepens our knowledge and understanding of the Black experience and of America and its tragic past.

The Survivors of the Clotilda includes 30 artworks and photographs.