'Enslaved' Episode 4 Preview: Discover the first and only African town in America set up by freed slaves
In the fourth installment of the docuseries of 'Enslaved', Samuel L Jackson visits Africatown, Alabama, the only African town established in America. There is a wealth of history preserved in this historical town because not only was its founding fathers Black, but they were also the last Africans brought to America (illegally) and soon regained their freedom.
As a result, they were able to preserve much of their traditions and rituals without it being disembered by the racist and predatory system of slavery. One of the town's founding fathers is Cudjoe Kazoola Lewis, one of the last victims of the slave trade in the US.
He was brought with 115 other African captives, illegally to the United States on board the ship Clotilda in 1860, after federal law was passed prohibiting the transportation of slaves. The captives were landed in backwaters of the Mobile River near Mobile, Alabama, and hidden from authorities. The ship was scuttled to evade discovery and was not found again until 2019.
After the Civil War, the Clotilda ship's captives were set free and they tried to raise money to return to their homeland. The men worked in lumber mills and the women raised and sold produce, but they could not acquire sufficient funds. After realizing that they would not be able to return to Africa, the group tried to get the man who brought them to the New World for a grant of land. When this request was refused, the members of the community continued to raise money and began to purchase land on which they developed Africatown as a self-contained, independent Black community.
The group appointed leaders to enforce communal norms derived from their shared African background. They also developed institutions including a church, a school and a cemetery. Africatown was unique because it was both a "Black town", inhabited exclusively by people of African ancestry, and also an enclave of people born in another country. It was a refuge from racism like other Black enclaves but also a refuge from non-Africans.
The episode will hopefully go into the legacy of these African founding fathers of America and the traditions they brought to the New World — something we never hear about. In particular, what part of those legacies have found their way into our culture today that we are not aware of? According to the episode's synopsis, the fourth episode will celebrate stories of resistance, accomplishment and hope and how the culture that we live in presently was, in many ways, born in the bowels of sunken slave ships.
The other portion of the episode will be devoted to 'The Diving With a Purpose' — divers helping youths in Costa Rica discover their African heritage, by diving and identifying a sunken slave ship off their coast. This part of the narrative might have similarities to the episode last week about the Maroon settlements, where escaped Africans set up their own communities, preserving their culture and pride against all odds.
'Enslaved' Episode 4 airs on October 5 on Epix at 10/9c.
