Bonfim (1819)

Voyage Overview

The Portuguese Schooner, Bonfim, left Bahia on 15 September 1819 and purchased 183 enslaved people at the Costa da Mina (no date recorded). This broad region corresponds to a coastal strip in the Gulf of Guinea encompassing the Gold Coast and Bight of Benin. While some ships leaving ports along the Gold Coast would not have carried Yoruba speakers, many of these ships would have been avoiding British blockades and likely traded further east in the Bight of Benin, most especially between Little Popo, Ouidah and Lagos. The captain, Manoel Pereira dos Santos, sailed the vessel, owned by Manoel José Freire de Carvalho, back toward Brazil as intended, when it landed at São Salvador da Bahia in 1820. Only 160 people survived the Middle Passage. For more information, see Map of 1819.

Archival Resources

Creator

Arquivo Público do Estado da Bahia (APEB), Maço 456, “Alvarás de navegação (registros),” 1789-1822, f. 288-308v.

Description

The available metadata on this archival resource includes: type of vessel, date and place of departure from Bahia, and names of the captain and owner (if known). However, there is much missing data since the record refers to outbound vessels and not inbound arrivals; hence, totals for number of enslaved people on board is absent. The Voyages database provides estimates for these ship totals based on the type of vessel, which denotes tonnage and ship capacity. This record contains sparse details about Yoruba speakers beyond usages of "Costa da Mina," which is an ambiguous geographic slave trading term for the Gold Coast and Bight of Benin.

As Referenced in Voyages

Arquivo Público do Estado da Bahia (Salvador da Bahia, Brazil), APEB, cod 456, p. 294.

Arquivo Histórico Municipal de Salvador (Salvador da Bahia, Brazil), AHMS, 27.2, p. 38v.