John Baptist Dasalu and Fighting for Freedom
When a man from Benin was brought to Havana by slave traders, he worked for a count but came up with a plan to secure his freedom and became a poster boy for church missionaries.
An 1856 portrait shows a 40-year-old man from Benin who managed to secure his freedom after being captured. Dasalu was taken from Dahomey to Cuba, alongside over five hundred adults and children in the ship Grey Eagle. Once in Havana, he worked for the Count of Fernandina but managed to get a letter to a missionary Charles Gollmer back in Africa. Jake Subryan Richard's essay traces the way one man’s migrations reveal the shifting boundaries of slavery and freedom.
Jake Subryan Richards teaches at the London School of Economics and was chosen as a New Generation Thinker in 2021 on the scheme run by Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Council, which turns research into radio. You can hear him discussing his research in a Free Thinking episode called Dr Johnson's Circle /programmes/m000vq3w and in another episode looking at Ships and History /programmes/m001626t
Producer: Ruth Watts
Last on
Broadcast
- Fri 29 Apr 2022 22:45Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio 3
Featured in...
![]()
New Generation Thinkers—Free Thinking
From prison breaks to VR dinosaurs: insights from the AHRC & Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ's scheme for academics.
Death in Trieste
A 1760s murder still informs ideas about aesthetics, a certain sort of sex, and death.
Watch: My Deaf World
Five compelling experiences of what it is like to be deaf in 21st-century Britain.
The Book that Changed Me
Five figures from the arts and science introduce books that changed their lives and work.
Download The Essay
Download all the episodes from the series and listen at your leisure.
Podcast
-
![]()
The Essay
Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.
