30 Atlantic African, American, and European Backgrounds to Contact, Commerce, and EnslavementCarolinas
Carolina colonies depended upon the economic success of
four major agricultural items, sugar, rice, indigo, and cot-
ton, and the transatlantic slave trade. From the 1600s to the
1740s, planters demanded a labor supply from the Wind-
ward (Sierra Leone and Liberia) and Gold (Ghana, Togo,
and Benin) coasts for rice production. Between the 1750s
and 1787, an infl ux of slaves from Senegambia (Senegal and
Gambia) facilitated indigo cultivation. By the early 19th cen-
tury, cotton production demanded slaves from the Kongo-
Angola region.
In 1670s, British sugar planters and enslaved Africans
from the island of Barbados arrived in the port of Charles
Town, South Carolina. Although the fi rst set of enslaved
Africans in the Carolinas originated from the Gold Coast,
three major shift s contributed to the change in African re-
gional preference: competition with Caribbean colonies,
introduction of rice, and the prevalence of slave resistance.
During the early 17th century, British and French col-
onies in the Caribbean dominated sugar production andCastle also serves as a point of destination where many
people, especially persons of African descent, travel to visit
yearly. Recently, a placard has been placed on the other
side of the so-called Door of No Return that reads “Door
of Return.” Th is Door of Return welcomes the descendants
of enslaved Africans dispersed throughout the Western
Hemisphere as a result of the transatlantic slave trade and
is, perhaps, a lasting testament to their collective victory
over the tragic historical circumstances that occurred at
Cape Coast Castle.
See also: Atlantic Slave Trade; Elmina
Ashley C. Bowden
and Walter C. RuckerBibliography
Hartman, Saidiya. Lose Your Mother: A Journey along the Atlantic
Slave Route. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
Reed, Ann Marie. “Sankofa Site: Cape Coast Castle and Its Mu-
seum as Markers of Memory.” Museum Anthropology 27, nos.
1–2 (2004):13–23.
St. Clair, William. Th e Door of No Return: Th e History of Cape
Coast Castle and the Atlantic Slave Trade. New York: Blue-
Bridge, 2007.
Cape Coast Castle along the west coast of Ghana. (Julius Cruickshank)