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The Kingdom of Kongo was founded by Bantu-speaking peoples in the western portion of central Africa. Established in 1390, the kingdom soon gained supremacy by conquering neighboring states. The rulers of the Kingdom of Kongo were among the earliest African Christian converts after the arrival of Portuguese explorers and missionaries in the late 15th century. The Kongo was also one of the most prolific suppliers of captives to the Portuguese slave trade. Although initially lucrative, the trans-Atlantic slave trade eventually brought the kingdom’s demise. These events are recorded on the Biblical Timeline Poster with World History during that time.

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Origin

Bantu-speaking peoples from the Benue River area migrated into the Uele and Bas-Congo (Kongo Central) regions around 1000 BC. They were the first known migrants in the area once occupied by the Kingdom of Kongo. They were followed by waves of Nilotic-speaking migrants from the southern and central regions of Sudan, as well as groups (mainly cattle herders) from East Africa who eventually settled around the Great Lakes area.

These migrants occupied an area that is now within the borders of northern Angola, Democratic Republic of Congo, Republic of Congo, and (to a certain extent) southern Gabon. The Bantu-speaking peoples brought with them their knowledge of metallurgy and agriculture. The mighty Congo River and its tributaries run through this fertile area, allowing the new settlers to grow yams, sorghum, millet, oil palms, and vegetables. Their ability in making iron tools allowed them to grow more crops. With an abundance of food, it was not long before their population increased.

As years passed, most of the people who lived in the area spoke a Bantu language called Kikongo. What made the ancient Kongolese society unique was their matrilineal descent system (children inherited their ranks and properties through their mothers). Their simple villages and towns soon turned into mini-states (wene) ruled by chieftains or clan heads.

The Kingdom of Kongo and the Atlantic Slave Trade

During the 1380s, Lukeni lua Nimi (the king of the Mpemba Kasi wene) and Mpuku a Nsuku (the king of Mbata wene) agreed to form an alliance. Other petty states soon joined this alliance, and by 1390, Lukeni lua Nimi was able to consolidate power to establish the Kingdom of Kongo. He established the kingdom’s capital at Mbanza-Kongo (renamed Sao Salvador by the Portuguese) in present-day Angola. He continued to expand the kingdom by conquering neighboring petty states. Once incorporated into the kingdom, the manikongo (king) would appoint and send governors into the kingdom’s provinces.

The Kongo way of life changed after the arrival of Portuguese explorer Diogo Cao and his sailors in 1482. In 1491, King John II of Portugal sent the first missionary expedition to Kongo led by Dominican and Franciscan priests. These missionaries were accompanied by tradesmen, artisans, soldiers, and several women. They were successful in converting King Nzinga a Nkuwu and a number of his courtiers into Christianity. Nzinga a Nkuwu and his queen were baptized, and later adopted the names Joao I and Eleanor in honor of the Portuguese monarchs.

Nzinga a Mbemba, the governor of the province of Nsundi, seized the throne when King Joao I Nzinga a Nkuwu died in 1506. He was baptized in the same year as the previous king and adopted the name Alfonso I when he took the throne. Portuguese missionaries flocked to Kongo during his reign. The king made Catholicism the state religion and even sent his own son to Rome to study theology. After establishing diplomatic relations with the king of Portugal, he sent Kongolese students to study in Europe. He also encouraged the establishment of Portuguese schools in his kingdom. Portuguese merchants used the island of Sao Tome as their base in trading with the Kingdom of Kongo. The Kongo people traded products such as honey, animal hides, copper, ivory, and raffia cloth for Portuguese guns, cannons, ammunition, and luxury goods. However, it was not long before the Portuguese found a more valuable Kongo commodity to trade: slaves.

Slavery had long been a part of Kongolese society, but it was the Portuguese who took it to new lows. The Portuguese bought or kidnapped thousands of captives from the Kongo, and took them to their base in Sao Tome. The captives would then take the notorious Middle Passage across the Atlantic and would be offloaded in Brazil. By the early 1500s, the business of slavery began to tear the kingdom apart and King Alfonso I pleaded with his Portuguese counterpart to stop the slave trade. The appeal fell on deaf ears as the majority of Portugal’s trade and wealth largely depended on the slave trade and the cheap labor the slaves provided. King Alfonso I attempted to ban the slave trade, but this only angered the Portuguese merchants who then tried to have him assassinated in 1540. The king’s death in 1545 was the beginning of the end of the Kingdom of Kongo.

The kingdom was beset with civil wars during the reign of King Diogo I (1545-1561). The Portuguese took advantage of the situation by intervening in the war and pitting one faction against the other. The kingdom declined further when Jaga warriors from the east attacked Mbanza-Kongo in 1568. King Alvaro I (1566-1587) fled to an island on the Congo River to escape the destruction. He later sent emissaries to the Portuguese stationed in Sao Tome to appeal for their support in driving the Jaga warriors out of the kingdom. The Portuguese sent 600 soldiers to help repulse the Jaga warriors and restore Mbanza-Kongo to Alvaro I.

Alvaro I and the succeeding kings became puppets of the Portuguese thereafter. By the early 17th century, the Portuguese trade shifted to Luanda, leaving the king in Mbanza-Kongo without a dependable source of revenue. The resentment of the Kongo rulers against the Portuguese finally came to a head when a war between the two parties exploded on October 29, 1665. The Kongo king Antonio I died in battle, and the kingdom soon fell apart. By the late 17th century, Mbanza-Kongo (renamed Sao Salvador) was only a shadow of what it once was.

Pope Pius IX was elected at the most inopportune and tumultuous point in Italian and European history. Italy was unified as a nation-state in 1861 at the expense of various monarchs and the pope. With the Papal States and his temporal power gone, the pope lashed out at secular rulers, revolutionaries, and liberals as best as he could. In a last-ditch attempt to regain his power, Pope Pius IX summoned leading Catholic theologians to the First Vatican Council held between 1869 and 1870. One of the most crucial decisions of the Council in 1870 was the declaration of the Pope’s infallibility and primacy. This event is recorded on the Biblical Timeline Poster with World History during that time. 

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The Risorgimento

The discontent and aspirations for Italian national unity finally culminated in a revolution in 1848. Pope Pius IX, ruler of the Papal States, finally gave in to pressure from the revolutionaries and took a step toward liberalism by issuing a constitution for his realm. However, his compromise with the Italian revolutionaries failed, and it ended with the murder of his appointed Minister of the Interior, Pellegrino Rossi. Pius IX was forced to flee to Gaeta but was restored with the help of French troops in 1850.

The revolutions spearheaded by Garibaldi and Mazzini failed, but their call for Italian unification was taken up by the Piedmontese Prime Minister Count di Cavour. A savvy and practical politician, he successfully maneuvered to attain the unification of Sardinia and Lombardy in 1859 under the House of Savoy. The unification was soon followed by the inclusion of Modena, Romagna, Tuscany, and Parma.

When Garibaldi saw these new developments, he immediately worked on liberating the Kingdom of Two Sicilies in the south. Cavour, on the other hand, took what remained of the Papal States (with the exception of Rome), effectively ending the pope’s temporal power. He soon followed it up by taking Naples as well. In 1861, the greater part of Italy was finally united under King Victor Emmanuel II of the House of Savoy. Italy took Venice from Austria in 1866 during the aftermath of the Austro-Prussian War. Finally, in 1870, the Italian troops sent by Cavour drove French troops out of Rome, ending their 20-year occupation of the city since Pius’s restoration. King Victor Emmanuel’s occupied the city and assumed the title “King of Italy.”

Terms

Papal Infallibility – a dogma of the Roman Catholic Church asserting that the pope, when issuing doctrines on morals and faith ex cathedra, is incapable of committing errors. The Church should follow all doctrines that are spoken ex cathedra.

Ex Cathedra – in the Catholic Church, speaking with authority which stems the pope’s position. Latin for “out of/from the chair” (of St. Peter).

Dogma – divinely revealed doctrine (or set of doctrines) on morals and faith issued and made official by the authorities of the Catholic Church.

Classical (19th Century) Liberalism – an ideology closely associated with the various reform movements in 19th-century Europe. Proponents of classical liberalism desired the abolition of feudal regimes and the reformation of the government and the Roman Catholic Church. They were also vocal advocates of:

* Individual liberty and sovereignty of the people

* Representation in the government (although limited to men with properties only)

                                                           * Equality before the law

The Italian proponents of liberalism desired the restriction of the power of the authorities (in the case of the Papal States, the pope and the clerics) and the formation of an elected assembly (the parliament). The passage of a constitution was also a paramount goal for the 19th century Italian liberals.

Nationalism – an ideology inspired by the French Revolution, nurtured in early 19th century Germany, and linked with classical liberalism in its early phases. Nationalism is the ideology that stresses the unity of people who share an ethnicity, language, culture, or history. Early and mid-19th-century Italian nationalists include Giuseppe Grimaldi, Giuseppe Mazzini, and Count di Cavour.

Rationalism – a philosophical movement with roots in the Age of Enlightenment. Philosophers who support the ideas of rationalism assert that reason–not religion or sensory experiences–is the only source of knowledge.

Ultramontanism – a movement within the Roman Catholic Church which sought to revive the power and independence of the pope. It had its roots in the Medieval Age and the Reformation but became more popular after the French Revolution.  

Gallicanism – a movement within the Catholic Church with roots in 17th century France. Advocates of Gallicanism rejected the temporal power of the pope and supported the idea of separation of church and state. They wanted the pope to submit to a general council, as well as rejected the notion that papal decrees cannot be reversed or reformed.

The First Vatican Council and the Declaration of the Papal Infallibility

Relations between the Catholic Church and European governments were at an all-time low after the Risorgimento. The loss of the Papal States and the end of his temporal powers only pushed Pope Pius to become more conservative. In 1864, he released the controversial Syllabus of Errors and the encyclicals Quanta Cura to lash out at the liberals and the nationalists.

He also targeted the proponents of rationalism, socialism, communism, naturalism, pantheism, and other ideologies which gained traction in the 19th century. Protestants, members of secret societies, and supporters of the separation of church and state also received his condemnation. The publication of the Syllabus dashed the hopes of liberal Catholics and supporters of Gallicanism for conciliation but was wholeheartedly welcomed by Ultramontanists.

The publication of the Syllabus, however, was only the start for Pope Pius IX who still hoped to recover his temporal power. As early as 1864, he already had plans to convene a General Council in response to the loss of his territories and his temporal power. He confided the plan to several bishops and cardinals, most of whom readily agreed to attend the General Council. Some prelates even secretly suggested to include the issue of papal infallibility to the topics that would be discussed.

On June 29, 1868, the pope issued an apostolic letter entitled Aeterni Patris summoning experts in canon law and theologians to Rome for the First Vatican Council. They were to form five commissions which would discuss topics such as

1. Catholic faith and doctrines

2. Canon laws and discipline

3. Eastern churches and Catholic missions in foreign lands

4. Relations between the Catholic church and European states

5. Religious orders

Most of the bishops who attended the Council were either conservative Italians or members of religious orders which were financially dependent on the pope. It was no wonder that many bishops were all too eager to agree with whatever the pope wanted.

The First Vatican Council (or Twentieth Ecumenical Council) met between December 8, 1869, and July 18, 1870. The debates were heated, and a number of theologians resisted some decrees on the grounds that they were unbiblical. In the end, however, the majority won out. The Council formulated the doctrine of papal infallibility and primacy.

By the late 18th century, the clamor to abolish the slave trade increased in Western Europe and in the northern colonies of America. Denmark was the first to answer the call to end the importation of slaves from Africa to its colonies in the West Indies. But in spite of fierce resistance from slaveholders at home, the North American abolitionist movement led by the Quakers was quick to gather steam. The abolitionist movement finally bore fruit between 1811 and 1848 when several Western European nations officially put an end to slavery through legislation.

By 1811, Spain had outlawed the slave trade and slavery itself. However, it was not until 1886 that Cuba, one of Spain’s overseas colonies, followed suit. In what would become the United States, slavery would become a contentious and bitter issue that would eventually lead an entire nation to a civil war in 1861. Amidst these developments was the controversial Amistad Revolt (1839-1842). This mutiny captivated the American public when it was tried in American courts between 1840 and 1841. Apart from its political, societal, and legal repercussions at home, the Amistad also sent ripples across the Atlantic when Spain decided to intervene with the case. These events are recorded on the Biblical Timeline Poster with World History during that time.

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La Amistad: From the Lomboko to Cuba

Britain had outlawed the slave trade in its colonies in 1807, and this was soon followed by the Abolition of Slavery Act in 1833. Despite the British ban, the illicit slave trade remained lucrative thanks to the steady demand in some colonies in the West Indies. At the center of this illegal activity was the Lomboko slave fortress in Sierra Leone, a facility owned by the wealthy Spanish slave trader Pedro Blanco.

Many of the men, women, and children kidnapped and sold to Blanco belonged to the Mende people. Others belonged to different tribes such as the Bembe and Kono. Some people were kidnapped because they failed to repay their debts on time. Others meanwhile were prisoners of war or were captured from slave raids. A few were accused of adultery and were punished by some disgruntled husbands by capturing and selling them into slavery.

A doctor checked the health and viability of each slave upon their arrival at the Lomboko. They spent some weeks in Blanco’s slave fortress before they were loaded into the Tecora, a Portuguese slave ship. After separating them from the women and children, the men were shackled together inside the cramped holds to prevent them from rebelling or from committing suicide by throwing themselves overboard. During the voyage, they were given meager rations of food. They had to relieve themselves where they were shackled together so that the poorly ventilated hold quickly stank and soon became a petri dish for diseases. The Tecora’s crew disposed of dead captives by throwing them into the ocean. Sick or dying captives were also thrown into watery graves because of the crew’s fears that they would infect the rest of the “cargo.”

The Tecora finally docked in the port of Havana in June 1839. The slave traders cautiously auctioned the slaves in Havana for fear of British naval officers who patrolled the area. Among those who arrived in Havana for the slave auctions were the Spanish merchants and slaves owners Pedro Montes and Jose Ruiz. After purchasing 49 men, one boy, and three girls, the Spaniards chartered the vessel La Amistad (Spanish for “friendship”) and sailed for Camaguey, Cuba. Ramon Ferrer owned and captained the ship, and was assisted by two crew members. Also on board were the ship’s cook Celestino and the cabin boy Antonio.

The Amistad Mutiny

La Amistad left Havana for Camaguey on June 28, 1839. Unlike in the Tecora, Montes and Ruiz did not shackle the slaves during the day. They were allowed to roam the ship if they wanted during daylight but were once again shackled at night. During the voyage,  Sengbe (Cinque) Pieh (one of the Mende captives) tried to find out what Montes and Ruiz intended to do to him and the other captives. He asked the cook Celestino who insinuated that the Africans would be chopped up, cooked, and eaten by the crew. The cook’s joke was not only in bad taste but also ill-timed. He would eventually pay for his morbid sense of humor with his life.

Sengbe saw for himself the atrocities committed by white men during the Middle Passage, so he readily believed Celestino. He wasted no time in planning a rebellion with the help of fellow captives Grabeau and Burnah. On the eve of July 1, 1839, Sengbe was able to pick the locks of the shackles with a nail and free himself and the other slaves. Once freed, they found cane machetes stashed in the hold. Each man took a machete and headed to the deck where their first victim, Captain Ramon Ferrer, was sleeping.

Ferrer woke up and managed to warn Montes and Ruiz of the mutiny. The Africans, however, easily overpowered him and strangled him to death. Montes was wounded during the fight, while the two seamen immediately abandoned the ship. The depth of the slaves’ anger was reserved for Celestino who they hacked to death. Only the cabin boy Antonio was spared from the slaves’ wrath.

With the ship now under their control, Sengbe and the other Africans decided to sail for home. Since none of them knew how to steer the vessel toward Sierra Leone, they forced Montes and Ruiz to steer for them. The two agreed but craftily directed the ship in a meandering course toward the coast of North America in hopes that a United States ship would eventually find and help them. The Amistad sometimes came across merchant ships, but the Africans concealed the mutiny by hiding Montes and Ruiz below deck. With the slave owners’ money, they were able to buy food and water from passing ships when their stocks ran dangerously low.

The sailors of the vessels the Amistad came across were mystified by the appearance of the all-African crew and the ship’s derelict condition. Soon, wild rumors of a pirate ship commandeered by Africans spread to the American East Coast and fired up the locals’ imagination. Some people claimed it was a pirate ship loaded with gold, while others believed that it was the ghostly ship of the Flying Dutchman.

Sengbe, Grabeau, and Burnah decided to drop anchor in Long Island and buy food there by the end of August 1839. The men stood out like a sore thumb, and they were soon spotted by Captain Henry Green and his men. Green realized that this must be the mysterious ship that he heard about in the news, so he immediately made moves to ingratiate himself with Sengbe and his companions so he could eventually claim for himself the Amistad, its cargo, and the Africans. Despite not knowing each other’s language, both sides agreed through gestures to meet again on the following day.

As agreed, both parties appeared on the beach and met again the next day. Captain Green’s dream of salvaging the Amistad was dashed when the revenue cutter USS Washington appeared and interrupted them. Lieutenant Thomas R. Gedney of the USS Washington ordered his crew to seize the Amistad and subdue its crew.

To the American crew’s surprise, they found the ship full of Africans and quickly realized that they were the mutineers. Gedney also saw an opportunity to claim the Amistad and acquire the Africans as his own slaves. He then had Sengbe seized and isolated in the USS Washington to prevent him from launching another mutiny. Gedney did not want to stay in New York as slavery had been outlawed in the State, so he had it towed to New London, Connecticut where slavery was still legal. He then submitted his claims to the Amistad and its cargo for hearing to Judge Andrew T. Judson of Connecticut.

Preparing for a Legal Battle

The Africans (the four children included) were jailed in New Haven while the judge examined Amistad’s papers. He also listened to the testimonies of Ruiz and Montes, as well as those given by the cabin boy Antonio. All three identified Sengbe, Burnah, and Grabeau as the leaders of the mutiny. The judge did not bother to interview the Africans because not one of them knew how to speak English or Spanish. In addition, no one living in Connecticut at that time knew the Mende language. Sengbe and his companions were charged with piracy and murder after the judge heard the Spaniards’ testimonies. Their trial was set on September 19, 1839.

News of the plight of the Amistad mutineers soon reached prominent Connecticut abolitionists. The Quaker abolitionist and New London grocer Dwight P. Janes were the first to take up their cause and form the Amistad Committee. He was joined by fellow abolitionists Lewis and Arthur Tappan, Reverend Simeon Jocelyn, and Reverend Joshua Leavitt.

These men took it upon themselves to raise funds for the mutineers’ legal fees. The Committee managed to convince Attorney Roger Sherman Baldwin to represent the Africans in the long legal battle. They also wrote to the press about the plight of the mutineers and spread the news about their situation. Their efforts became so successful (perhaps too successful) as thousands of well-meaning visitors and gawkers flocked to New Haven prison where the Africans were kept.

The Amistad Case and its Political Implications

For the US President Martin Van Buren, the arrival of the Amistad could not have come at the worst time. He was up for reelection in 1840 and his campaign was in full swing. The Amistad case was both a domestic and international issue, so he sought a decision that would satisfy the American voters (both abolitionists and staunch slaveholders) and prevent a diplomatic row with Spain. He found neither.

Van Buren’s top advisers (who also happened to be Southern slaveholders) wanted him to return the Amistad, its cargo, as well as Sengbe and his friends, to Cuba to pacify Spain. There they would eventually be tried and hanged if found guilty. The Spanish foreign minister also reminded the president of the two treaties America signed with Spain in 1795 and 1819 in regards to aiding ships in distress. Spain only wanted the Amistad issue silenced because of some thorny and embarrassing facts about its legality. Spain had abolished the slave trade in 1811, so its citizens had no business transporting enslaved people across the Atlantic. Its law enforcement too had been so weak that it was unable to impose the ban in Cuba. Spain also wanted the Amistad matter resolved quietly and quickly because it had signed an anti-slavery treaty with Britain in 1833. If the Amistad issue Britain, Spain surmised that British government would consider this a violation of the treaty and would immediately intervene in Cuba.

Van Buren, on the other hand, was torn between the abolitionists (mostly concentrated in the North) and the staunch slaveholders (who mostly lived in the South) at home. The abolitionists believed that the Africans had gained their freedom by launching a mutiny and should be allowed to go back to Sierra Leone. The slaveholders, meanwhile, wanted to return the Africans to Ruiz and Montes. They insisted that the Africans should go back to Cuba and be hanged there for murdering the ship captain and the cook. They readily believed the Spaniards’ story that Sengbe and his friends were born in Cuba and they had been slaves there for many years. This in spite of the fact that none of the Africans understood Spanish, and none of them answered to their alleged Spanish names read out to them during the trial.

The Amistad Trial

The Amistad trial for murder and piracy began on September 19, 1839, in Hartford, Connecticut. The case was presided by Justice Smith Thompson of the United States Circuit Court. U.S. District Attorney W.S. Holabird led the prosecution, while Attorney Roger Sherman Baldwin led the Amistad defense. Baldwin was assisted by lawyers Seth Perkins Staples and Theodore Sedgwick.

The defense first asked the court to issue a writ of habeas corpus for the captive girls, but this was immediately blocked by Holabird. He asserted that the African children were considered as properties and not humans, so the principles of the writ of habeas corpus did not apply to them. Besides, he already had secret orders from President Van Buren to wrap the case up so it could be transferred to Cuba as quickly as possible.

Baldwin countered this and presented the little girls to the court to garner sympathy for their plight. The children were visibly distressed during their appearance. The argument whether to grant the girls the writ of habeas corpus went on for two days before Holabird did an abrupt about-face. He acknowledged that the girls were humans and were born free so that a writ was completely unnecessary. He also asserted that the girls should be sent back to Africa as soon as possible. The truth, however, was Holabird was pressured to deflect anything in the trial that might taint Van Buren’s reputation and damage his campaign.

On September 23, Justice Thompson declared that the case could not be tried by a U.S. court as the mutiny happened in waters controlled by Spain. The judge, however, did not issue a writ of habeas corpus as the matter of whether the Africans were properties of Ruiz and Montes was yet to be decided. The second trial was set in a U.S. District Court.

The District Court Trial

The Amistad Committee had already realized that their case might be in danger when they learned that it was assigned to Judge Andrew T. Judson. The prejudiced Judson had prosecuted the Connecticut schoolteacher Prudence Crandall when she tried to integrate an African-American girl into her school in 1833. The odds were against the abolitionists and the Amistad mutineers, but the Committee and the legal defense continued to prepare for the trial.

While they awaited the trial, members of the Committee were busy combing through New York Harbor in search of a Mende interpreter. They were lucky to find James Covey, a native of Sierra Leone and former captive himself, who worked as a sailor on a British vessel.    

To the Committee’s surprise, however, Judson allowed a little improvement on the prisoners’ living conditions. He permitted them to be brought outside every now and then to do some exercises and breathe in some fresh air. The captive children were sent to private homes where foster families taught them the English language. Students from the nearby Yale College visited the captives to evangelize and teach them English.

Dr. Richard Madden, an Irish abolitionist who lived and worked in Havana, had hurried to Connecticut to give his sworn testimony on the thriving slave trade in Cuba. This damning testimony shredded the credibility of Montes and Ruiz, and they were soon charged with imprisonment. Both men were arrested and sent to prison in New York in October 1839. Montes posted bail and quickly sailed to Cuba, while Ruiz refused to post bail (he did not want to admit to any wrongdoing) and remained in prison. He eventually posted bail and also fled to Cuba. The indictment and imprisonment of his compatriots outraged the Spanish foreign minister. The events only added to the pressure on the beleaguered Van Buren.

The District Court hearing of the Amistad finally began on January 7, 1840, in New Haven. With James Covey as interpreter, Sengbe was able to narrate how they were captured in Sierra Leone and eventually sold in Havana. While the Amistad narration was ongoing, two ships were already waiting on the dock to take the Africans away. The first one was the USS Grampus, a vessel sent by Van Buren to take the captives to Cuba after the trial. The Amistad Committee, however, had prepared their own chartered ship. The abolitionists’ ship was to take the Africans to Canada after the trial.

Judge Judson shocked everyone when he ruled in favor of the captives on January 13, 1840. The court granted Lieutenant Gedney one-third of the value of the Amistad and its cargo as per U.S. law of salvage. He, however, was not allowed to claim the captives as part of the salvage as the Africans were transported to Cuba illegally. The judge ruled that the captives should be returned to Africa posthaste. Captain Green’s claim, on the other hand, was denied by the court. Perhaps one of the most unhappy persons at that time was Van Buren who, despite his illegal maneuvers, was not successful in his reelection bid later that year.

The Final Showdown

The prosecution, naturally, was unhappy with the decision and decided to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. A new trial was set on February 22, 1841.

For the defense, the chances of winning the case did not look too good once again as five out of nine Justices (including the Chief Justice) came from the South. The abolitionists, therefore, was forced to look for a prominent anti-slavery advocate who would support their case and lend a voice to the cause. They found one in the former U.S. president John Quincy Adams.

The 73-year old John Q. Adams was the son of the United States second president John Adams and his progressive first lady, Abigail Adams. A staunch anti-slavery advocate, he had already served the United States as a senator, ambassador, and Secretary of State. He served as U.S. President between 1825 and 1829 and was serving as a Representative of Massachusetts when Attorney Baldwin approached him. He was initially hesitant to accept the Committee’s offer because of his age, but Baldwin eventually convinced him to join the defense team.

The Supreme Court trial began on February 22, 1841. The U.S. Attorney General Henry D. Gilpin led the prosecution this time and was first to deliver the opening statements. Baldwin’s opening statements, meanwhile, hinged on three premises. First, he questioned and demolished the truthfulness and validity of the papers produced by Montes and Ruiz. He then argued that the Adams-Onis Treaty did not apply to the captives as they were not born in the Spanish colony of Cuba. Lastly, he argued that since Sengbe and the other captives were free men, the U.S. Federal government had no right to send them to Cuba as it would go against the U.S. Constitution.

Four days later, John Quincy Adams himself addressed the Supreme Court. He stated that the Adams-Onis Treaty could only be used during wartime, and its terms did not apply to the Amistad case. He also blasted former President Van Buren in front of the Supreme Court for interfering with the Amistad case. His lecture on the Amistad case went on for another eight hours.

The Supreme Court finally reached a decision in March 1841. The Court determined that Sengbe and the other mutineers were free men, and as such, they were to be released from prison and be allowed to return to their homeland immediately. The Justices also decided that Ruiz, Montes, and the Spanish foreign minister had no right to hold the captives or prevent them from returning to Sierra Leone. To the Amistad Committee’s relief, the Justices asserted that all human beings have the right to fight for their freedom and the captives had earned theirs through the mutiny. Gedney’s claims to a portion of the cargo were also affirmed. Attorney Baldwin was not present when the Supreme Court handed the decision on the case so Adams sent him an ecstatic note instead.

Bittersweet Victory

Sengbe and his fellow captives were at first skeptical when the news of their freedom reached them. But celebrations and joy replaced their initial skepticism when they realized that they were finally going home. The abolitionists also met the news with great joy and were quick to publicize the Amistad victory. The Africans stayed in Connecticut for several months while the abolitionists were raising funds so they could charter a ship back to Sierra Leone. Sengbe and his companions helped in raising funds by creating and selling handicrafts.

The Africans boarded the ship Gentleman on November 25, 1841, and said tearful farewells to their American friends. They were accompanied by American missionaries who saw an opportunity to evangelize in Sierra Leone. The Amistad mutineers and the American missionaries arrived in Sierra Leone in January 1842.