Henrietta Marie (ship)

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The Henrietta Marie was a 17th century English slave ship named after Henrietta Maria of France , wife of Charles I , King of England, Scotland and Ireland.

After selling 190 slaves in Jamaica , the ship sank in 1701 35 miles off the coast of Key West, Florida, due to strong storms on the New Ground Reef in 30 feet of water. The wreck was discovered by Mel Fisher in 1972 . When the wreck was uncovered, iron chains and other means of handcuffing the slaves were discovered. The ship could be identified by the ship's name due to a bronze bell.

The Henrietta Marie was the first shipwreck to be clearly identified as a slave ship. The route of the ship corresponded to the Atlantic triangular trade between Europe, the West African coast and America, which was preferred by the slave ships. The finds in the wreck convey a picture of life on board the ship and the slave trade in general. The wreck is now one of the most abundant sources of finds from the early slave trade. As such, it can be described as a "gold vein" for information about a central part of the history of Africa and America.

In 1993, in memory of African slaves, the National Association of Black Scuba Divers had a plaque put up on the berth of the Henrietta Marie . The plaque is aimed at the coast of Africa, which is thousands of kilometers away, and bears the name of the ship and the text “ In memory of and in recognition of the courage, pain and suffering of the enslaved African people. Speak their name and gently touch the souls of our ancestors "(" In memory and recognition of the courage, pain and suffering of enslaved African people. Speak her name and gently touch the souls of our ancestors. ").

literature

  • Madeline Burnside: Spirits of the Passage: The Transatlantic Slave Trade in the Seventeenth Century , Simon & Schuster Ltd, 1997, ISBN 0684818191
  • Jane Webster: Looking for the material culture of the middle passage. In: Journal for Maritime Research , Volume 7, Issue 1, 2005, pp. 245-258, DOI: 10.1080 / 21533369.2005.9668352

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ [1]

Coordinates: 24 ° 40 ′ 19.3 "  N , 82 ° 23 ′ 23.7"  W.