A visit to Badagry Slave Route is just a reminiscence
account of the era of slavery on the coast of West Africa. Badagry happened to
be one of the numerous transport hubs in West Africa where over 600,000 slaves
were sold to slave traders and shipped to Western World. It was even more
painful to learn that the local chiefs and their warriors perpetrated slavery
in the land when they captured their own people and sold to the slave merchants
in exchange for small valuables.
We left for the trip on the 9th of July, 2018,
both me and my amicable friend, Kenneth Stephen. Mr Kenneth is a robust and
well fed guy with a medium-size pot-belly. I love him for the fact that he is a
fun-loving and adventurous guy; features we both shared.
The visit was worth the travel as it is 2hours plus from
Lagos; and Badagry itself is a coastal town in Lagos State, and it is between
the City of Lagos and the border within Benin Republic at Seme.
The tales behind the Badagry
Slave Route might move you to tears, as it did to me. Yes, you might have heard
about the story in your History class; but seeing the paraphernalia used for
slavery and the spots it happened, with a demo on how they were used on the
slaves is definitely something to cause you to quiver. It is quite an emotional
experience!
Our first point of call was at
the Mobee Family Slave Relics Museum which is located along the Mobee Street of
Badagry, and it houses many of the tools used to capture and hold captives. A
cold sensation ran down my spine when I saw the chains used to shackle the
slaves; and more especially when the guides illustrated how the chains were
used on the slaves:
“These chains were used to bind the slaves like this,” John and his
fellow guide demonstrated, “both hands and feet, and clung the other at their
necks, while they move on a single line,” They illustrated.
From the Mobee Family Slave Relics Museum, we
moved to the Baracoon; that is, the slave cell, where we’re made to believe
that about 40 slaves were sheltered in a small room probably measuring about
3mx4m, until they were traded.
“Here’s the room the slaves
were kept”, John said, ushering us into the room.
“About 40 slaves were celled here until
they’re sold”, he said.
“You mean forty persons were
kept in this thin room? Damn it!” My friend Kenneth exclaimed; “I am only
imagining how compressed they would have felt staying in this small room”.
“That one didn’t bother the
slave traders,” John added.
And from the Baracoon, we headed
for a 2-3mins boat ride to Gbeferu Island; the path to the point of no return.
Gbeferu is a geographical area of Badagry leading to the Atlantic Ocean. In
those days, slaves were made to walk along this Island on a single line bound
with chains. Today, the Island has become a sandy beach domain.
The walk from the Gbeferu Island
to the point of no return was a longish one. It takes 25-30mins walk to the
Atlantic, and along the coast of Gbeferu is the spirit attenuation well. We
were shown a well squarely borded with small wall erected with block and also
having a locally thatched roof shading it.
“In this well,” our guide
said, showing us a well, “all the chiefs in Badagry dealing on Slave business
came together and cast a spell in this well; a kind of black magic (Juju) which
brings memory lost. The slaves were forced to drink from the well and within
three months, they lost their memory.”
And for over 600 years now nobody has ever
drank from the well, according to John, our guide. But I still could not
believe that drinking the charmed water from the well caused the slaves to lose
their memory; otherwise, they would not have replicated their culture in the
white men’s land. I thought they might have been given something that caused
them to hallucinate rather than to lose the memory.
And finally from the longish trek
on the Gbeferu Island, the slaves were led on the path to the ocean, where a
waiting vessel had been docked to ship them away. It is said that when a slave
made it to this point, which is termed, “Point Of No Return”, there is no
chance of returning home, as the slave would be shipped across the Atlantic
Ocean, to an unknown destination.
It is hard to see what Africans
had to pass through during those dark days of slavery, and the museum,
especially the paintings there, clearly shown how the slaves were badly
treated.
