The year is 1863 and me and my family have been captured and taken from our village in the Whydah. We are very terrified and do not know what is going on or why we have been captured. All we know is that they are taking us on this huge ship along with the majority of our village and they are throwing us on this huge ship. They say we are being brought to a place to start a new life and to help and make money. What we did not know was that we were making money for the men that have taken us and selling us. They told us that the boat is named the Cicerón and that it is owned by Julián Zulueta and José Carreras. The voyage to the port that we are going to was very nerve-racking. For the months we were sailing, things happened that I had never seen. We come from a small village and I had never seen so many people in one place, especially in such a small space. There are more then 960 people on this ship, many of them coming from all over Africa to be sent to what we found out is the country of Cuba. The trip over was nothing that I had ever seen. My family and I were scared to death due to the fact that we did not know what was going to happen to us once we got off the ship and because we did not know what was going to happen to us while on the boat. While on the boat we became friends with some of the other passengers. But it was very difficult because one day our friends would be there and the next they would be gone. We have no idea where they went or why they were taken away. Some of the passengers were taken away because they started to develop these sores on their body and began to look sick. We had no idea what to do for them and one day they were taken away to another room. We saw them take some of our friends and tell them that they were going over board, or that they were going to be food for the sharks. We had no idea what they were talking about, but this frightened us to death not knowing what sharks were. Eventually, we got close to where we were landing and they were saying this will be our home for the rest of our lives.

“EXPLORE THE DISPERSAL OF ENSLAVED AFRICANS ACROSS THE ATLANTIC 

WORLD.” Slave Voyages, www.slavevoyages.org/.