An outline, era by era

European coastal forts and the slave trade

Early Modern Era · ~1500 – ~1800

From the 1480s European traders built fortified trading posts along the coasts of West and West-Central Africa, from Senegambia to Angola. The first great fort was São Jorge da Mina (Elmina), built by the Portuguese in 1482 on the Gold Coast. Dutch, English, Danish, Swedish, Brandenburger and French companies later added dozens more, so that the Gold Coast became one of the most heavily fortified stretches of coast in the world.

At first the forts were mainly for gold, ivory and pepper. From the sixteenth century they increasingly served the transatlantic slave trade, which carried perhaps 12 million Africans across the ocean before it ended in the nineteenth century. The forts were usually built on land leased from African rulers, who kept control of trade inland. They held goods and captives awaiting ships, and were the base of European companies. Their ruins, including Elmina and Cape Coast Castle, now stand as memorials and World Heritage sites.

Things happened, and the rest is history

  1. Portugal builds Elmina, 1482

    Event

    What happened

    In 1482 a Portuguese expedition under Diogo de Azambuja lands on the Gold Coast and, after negotiating with the local ruler, builds the fortress of São Jorge da Mina. It protects Portuguese trade in gold, which is bought with cloth, metalwork and other goods.

    The rest is history

    Elmina became the model for later European coastal forts and the centre of Portuguese trade on the Gold Coast. Over time it also handled captives, as Portugal began shipping enslaved people to São Tomé and later Brazil. The Dutch captured it in 1637, and it remained in European hands until the British took it over in 1872.

    Sources

    1. PrimaryPina, Rui de. Chronica de El-Rei D. João II. Portuguese chronicle, early 16th century. Account of the building of Elmina in 1482.
    2. BookFeinberg, Harvey M. Africans and Europeans in West Africa: Elminans and Dutchmen on the Gold Coast during the Eighteenth Century. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1989.

  2. Portuguese exploration and the São Tomé plantations

    Event

    What happened

    Through the fifteenth century Portuguese ships work their way down the African coast, reaching the Senegal region in the 1440s and the Gold Coast in the 1470s. From the 1490s Portugal settles the uninhabited island of São Tomé and grows sugar there with enslaved labour brought from the mainland.

    The rest is history

    The island showed that sugar plantations worked by enslaved Africans could be profitable, a model later copied in Brazil and the Caribbean. This created demand for captives that the coastal posts then supplied. Portuguese trade at first also drew on Kongo and Angola, where posts were set up in the sixteenth century.

    Sources

    1. BookThornton, John. Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
    2. BookRussell-Wood, A. J. R. The Portuguese Empire, 1415-1808: A World on the Move. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998.

  3. The Dutch West India Company takes Elmina, 1637

    Event

    What happened

    The Dutch West India Company, founded in 1621, attacks Portuguese possessions. In 1637 a Dutch force captures Elmina, and in 1642 the Dutch take the nearby fort of Axim, ending Portuguese control on the Gold Coast.

    The rest is history

    The Dutch became the leading European power on the Gold Coast and made Elmina their regional headquarters. Their company moved from gold toward the slave trade as plantations in the Americas expanded. Other powers answered by building their own forts nearby, which crowded the coast.

    Sources

    1. BookPostma, Johannes. The Dutch in the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1600-1815. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
    2. BookVan Dantzig, Albert. Forts and Castles of Ghana. Accra: Sedco, 1980.

  4. Forts on land leased from African rulers

    Event

    What happened

    Most European forts on the Gold Coast stand on ground leased from local rulers, to whom the Europeans pay rent. Africans at the coast, such as the Fante and Akan states, control access to inland markets and set terms of trade.

    The rest is history

    Historians such as John Thornton argue that Europeans had little power to dictate terms in West Africa before the nineteenth century. Forts depended on African goodwill for food, labour and trade, and could be besieged or abandoned. Africans also supplied nearly all the captives sold, usually taken in wars and raids inland, though how far they controlled the trade is still discussed.

    Sources

    1. BookLaw, Robin. Ouidah: The Social History of a West African Slaving Port, 1727-1892. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2004.
    2. BookThornton, John. Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

  5. The English at Cape Coast and the Royal African Company

    Event

    What happened

    In 1664 an English naval force under Robert Holmes captures Cape Coast Castle from the Dutch, who had held it since taking it from the Swedes in 1659. In 1672 the Royal African Company is chartered in England with a monopoly on English trade in West Africa. The company rebuilds and extends the castle, which becomes its main base.

    The rest is history

    The company shipped large numbers of enslaved people to English colonies in the Caribbean and North America. Its monopoly ended in 1698 for private traders, who greatly increased the volume of the trade. English slaving then grew rapidly in the eighteenth century, centred on Cape Coast and nearby forts.

    Sources

    1. BookDavies, K. G. The Royal African Company. London: Longmans, 1957.
    2. BookSt Clair, William. The Door of No Return: The History of Cape Coast Castle and the Atlantic Slave Trade. New York: BlueBridge, 2007.

  6. Danish, Swedish and Brandenburg forts, 1650s to 1680s

    Event

    What happened

    Smaller northern European powers also enter the trade. Sweden establishes a Gold Coast colony in 1650 and builds Carolusborg at Cape Coast about 1652. Denmark builds Fort Christiansborg at Osu in the 1660s, and Brandenburg founds Groß Friedrichsburg in 1683.

    The rest is history

    These short or modest ventures reflect the competition for the coast. Christiansborg later became the seat of government of the Gold Coast and of independent Ghana. Brandenburg sold its post to the Dutch in 1717.

    Sources

    1. BookNorregard, Georg. Danish Settlements in West Africa, 1658-1850. Boston: Boston University Press, 1966.
    2. BookVan Dantzig, Albert. Forts and Castles of Ghana. Accra: Sedco, 1980.

  7. Gorée and the French posts in Senegambia

    Event

    What happened

    The French found Saint-Louis on the Senegal River in 1659 and take the island of Gorée from the Dutch in 1677. These posts trade in gum, hides, gold and enslaved people.

    The rest is history

    Gorée and Saint-Louis became centres of the French trade, and Saint-Louis grew into a town. Gorée's role in the slave trade was probably smaller than often said, though it is a memorial site today. It was a UNESCO World Heritage site from 1978.

    Sources

    1. BookSearing, James F. West African Slavery and Atlantic Commerce: The Senegal River Valley, 1700-1860. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.
    2. BookCurtin, Philip D. The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1969.

  8. The scale of the transatlantic trade

    Event

    What happened

    Between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries European ships embark about 12 million Africans, and about 10.5 million survive to land in the Americas. The trade peaks in the eighteenth century, when Britain, Portugal and France carry most captives.

    The rest is history

    The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, first published in 1999, gathers records of over 36,000 voyages. Britain abolished its slave trade in 1807, and forts were gradually sold or abandoned. The Dutch left the Gold Coast in 1872, and the British took over remaining posts.

    Sources

    1. BookEltis, David, and David Richardson. Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2015.
    2. BookLovejoy, Paul E. Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa. 3rd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.

  9. The Door of No Return

    Popular belief

    The legend

    Visitors are often told that every enslaved person passed through a single narrow door at a fort, such as the House of Slaves on Gorée, and never saw Africa again. Guides there say millions left through this one door.

    The rest is history

    Gorée was a small post and did not ship millions. Historians such as Philip Curtin estimated the number sent from it at a few hundred a year at most, and the House of Slaves dates to the 1780s, built by a mixed-race trading family. The 'door' story grew in the twentieth century, partly through a curator, Boubacar Joseph Ndiaye. Many captives left from beaches and ports without forts. Even so, the forts did hold captives in dungeons, as at Elmina and Cape Coast.

    Sources

    1. BookCurtin, Philip D. The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1969.
    2. BookSt Clair, William. The Door of No Return: The History of Cape Coast Castle and the Atlantic Slave Trade. New York: BlueBridge, 2007.

  10. Europeans seized captives by raiding the interior

    Popular belief

    The legend

    A common belief holds that European slavers marched inland and captured Africans themselves, with the forts as bases for raiding.

    The rest is history

    For most of the trade Europeans did not capture people inland. Disease, hostile states and the strength of African polities kept them near the coast. Captives were mostly taken by African states and merchants in war, raiding and debt or judicial enslavement, then sold at the coast. Europeans still drove the demand and supplied guns and goods that fuelled the violence. Later, in the nineteenth century, Europeans took a more direct role.

    Sources

    1. BookThornton, John. Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
    2. BookLovejoy, Paul E. Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa. 3rd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.

  11. Africa was empty of trade before Europeans came

    Popular belief

    The legend

    It is sometimes said that Europeans found a continent without markets or states, and that forts brought trade to West Africa.

    The rest is history

    Trade networks already linked the Gold Coast and the interior to the Sahara and the Mediterranean. Gold from Akan lands had long crossed the desert, and the Portuguese came partly to divert it. Slavery also existed in Africa before Europeans arrived, and trans-Saharan and Indian Ocean slave trades ran for centuries. The forts joined an existing commercial world and changed its scale.

    Sources

    1. BookLaw, Robin. Ouidah: The Social History of a West African Slaving Port, 1727-1892. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2004.
    2. BookLovejoy, Paul E. Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa. 3rd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.

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