Biography of Mahommah G. Baquaqua by Samuel Downing Moore

across Africa and the Americas. First published in Detroit in 1854, the narrative preserves Baquaqua’s firsthand testimony and experiences.
Born in the region of Djougou in present-day Benin, Mahommah Gardo Baquaqua was captured and forced into the Atlantic slave trade. He was transported to Brazil in the 1840s, where he endured enslavement before eventually reaching New York aboard a ship and escaping in 1847.
The narrative recounts his memories of West African society, his capture, the brutal conditions of slavery, his experiences in Brazil, and his difficult journey toward freedom. It later follows his travels through Haiti, the United States, and Canada, as well as his education and involvement with abolitionist circles.
More than a personal biography, the work is an important historical testimony that gives a formerly enslaved African man a rare individual voice within the history of the transatlantic slave trade.
This audiobook is an essential choice for listeners interested in African history, slavery and abolition, firsthand historical narratives, Black history, nineteenth-century biography, and stories of survival and freedom.