Cudjoe Lewis—born Oluale Kossola around 1841 in Bantè, in the kingdom of Dahomey (present-day Benin)—stands as a powerful witness to two intertwined histories: the rich traditions of the Yoruba people of West Africa and the enduring scars of the transatlantic slave trade. Remembered as the last known survivor of the Clotilda, the final recorded slave ship to bring enslaved Africans to the United States, Lewis’s life illuminates both the brutality of enslavement and the resilience of African culture in the Americas.
Early Life and Capture
Kossola was born into the Yoruba ethnic group, whose communities at the time were part of the sophisticated Oyo cultural sphere. His youth was shaped by the rhythms of Yoruba village life until circa 1860, when soldiers of the kingdom of Dahomey—under King Ghezo—conducted one of their frequent slave-raiding expeditions. During this raid Kossola and hundreds of others were seized and marched to the coastal slave port of Ouidah, a key hub in the transatlantic slave trade.
Although the United States had banned the international slave trade in 1808, American slave traders still financed clandestine voyages. In Ouidah, Kossola was sold to American traffickers and forced aboard the schooner Clotilda, along with roughly 110 other captives.
The Illegal Voyage of the Clotilda
The Clotilda’s voyage was organized in secret by Timothy Meaher, a wealthy shipper from Mobile, Alabama, who aimed to defy federal law and profit from human trafficking. In mid-1860 the Clotilda crossed the Atlantic and slipped into Mobile Bay. To destroy evidence of their crime, the crew burned and sank the ship in the Mobile–Tensaw Delta—its remains would not be positively identified until 2019, when maritime archaeologists confirmed the wreck.
On arrival, Kossola was renamed Cudjoe Lewis, a common practice meant to erase African identity. He was enslaved on Alabama plantations until the end of the American Civil War in 1865, when the Thirteenth Amendment formally ended slavery. Freedom, however, brought daunting challenges: Lewis and his fellow Clotilda survivors had to build livelihoods in a society still marked by racism and economic exclusion.
Founding of Africatown
Determined to preserve their heritage, about thirty Clotilda survivors—including Lewis—pooled their resources and purchased land in 1870 from the Meaher family itself, the very family that had financed their illegal capture. They established a settlement they called Africatown (also known as Africa Town) on the outskirts of Mobile.
The founders organized their community using social and political traditions from their West African homelands, maintained Yoruba and other African languages for decades, and celebrated their ancestral customs. Lewis emerged as a respected elder and community leader, helping to keep the group’s cultural memory alive.
Later Life and Zora Neale Hurston’s Interviews
In the early twentieth century, Lewis shared his memories with journalists, historians, and notably with Zora Neale Hurston, the Harlem Renaissance writer and anthropologist. Hurston interviewed him in the late 1920s, capturing his vivid recollections of capture, the Middle Passage, and the founding of Africatown. Publishers of the time rejected the manuscript for its unflinching portrayal of slavery; it remained unpublished until 2018, when it appeared as Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”.
Lewis died on July 26, 1935, in Africatown, by then recognized as the last known survivor of the transatlantic slave trade.
Cudjoe Lewis’s life underscores the persistence of the illegal slave trade more than fifty years after it was outlawed in the United States. His testimony preserves an authentic African perspective on capture, enslavement, and cultural survival. Africatown—today a U.S. National Register of Historic Places site—remains a living symbol of resilience, where descendants and preservationists continue to honor the memory of Lewis and his fellow founders.
The 2019 confirmation of the Clotilda wreck renewed international attention to Africatown’s history and to the broader story of the Atlantic slave trade’s last chapter. Lewis’s journey—from Yoruba village child to elder of an African American community—remains a powerful narrative of endurance, identity, and the unbreakable ties between Africa and its diaspora.
Sources
Hurston, Zora Neale. Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo.” Amistad, 2018.
Nollywood actress Destiny Etiko has revealed that she lost ₦5 million after placing a bet during the 2026 FIFA World Cup final, saying the experience has discouraged her from gambling again.
The actress disclosed this in a post shared on her Instagram handle on Monday, shortly after the conclusion of the World Cup final between Spain and Argentina.
“First time betting and I lost . Will never try it again. My 5M gone . In fact am done watching football. Anxiety almost killed me,” she wrote.
Etiko, however, did not disclose the particular bet she placed or provide further details about how she lost the money.
Earlier, during the World Cup final, the actress shared a series of updates on her Instagram Story, indicating she was backing Argentina to defeat Spain.
In one post, she wrote, “Argentina all the way. Who can’t wait?”
As the match progressed, she appeared increasingly frustrated with Argentina’s performance, posting, “This ball tough o. Argentina is pissing me off.”
She also praised Argentina goalkeeper Emiliano Martínez for keeping the defending champions in the game, writing, “The goal keeper is the savior oo.”
PUNCH Online had reported that Spain defeated defending champions Argentina 1-0 after extra time to win the 2026 FIFA World Cup on Sunday.
Substitute Ferran Torres scored the decisive goal in the second period of extra time to hand Spain their second World Cup title, 16 years after their maiden triumph in South Africa in 2010.
Argentina played the closing stages with 10 men after midfielder Enzo Fernández was sent off for a second bookable offence, while Spain dominated possession before eventually finding the breakthrough through Torres.
The self-styled Director-General of the Presidential Foreign Investment Promotion Council (PFIPC), Adeniyi Adeyemi, was arrested last Tuesday by the Intelligence Response Team led by Chief Superintendent of Police, Moses Lohor.
It was learnt that Adeyemi was arrested between 11am and 12pm inside a building in the Ijebu-Ijesa area of Osun State.
The suspect’s arrest followed a bench warrant issued against him by a Federal High Court in Abuja after he allegedly failed to appear for arraignment on eight counts.
Giving details of the operation that led to the arrest, a senior police officer in the Osun State Police Command, in an interview with Punch, said Adeyemi’s location was first uncovered in the Aregbe-Fakule area of Osogbo on July 9 after evading tracking by the Department of State Services (DSS).
The police officer said Lohor’s team took over the tracking after the DSS withdrew from the case.
He added that the operatives eventually located Adeyemi in Ilesa and subsequently arrested him on Tuesday morning.
The source said, “The Moses Lohor team were in Osun for surveillance ahead of the August 15 governorship election. They were mapping hotspots and collating other intelligence. As a matter of fact, the Lohor team didn’t report to the Osun State Police Command. They operated from the area commander’s office at Oke-Fia in Osogbo.
“Adeyemi was already on their watch list, but they didn’t act because the case was being handled by the DSS. Adeyemi’s last known location tracked by the DSS was Ibadan, but they couldn’t apprehend him because he regularly switched off his phone.
“A senior police officer from Abuja informed the Lohor team about the DSS withdrawal on Wednesday. Lohor’s team then decided to track Adeyemi’s location on Thursday, July 9. Incidentally, he was located around the Aregbe-Fakule area of Osogbo.
“Luckily for them, late on Monday night, Adeyemi’s location showed he was around Ilesa, and the Lohor team intensified efforts, which led to his arrest on Tuesday morning. The team only informed the Osun State Commissioner of Police when they moved in to make the arrest.”
Adeyemi is reportedly being detained at the Force Headquarters in Abuja, from where he is expected to be arraigned on July 27.
Popular Nollywood actress in the Yoruba movie industry, Biola Fowosere, has opened up about the challenges she faced after her ex-husband left their marriage.
It was reports that Biola, during an interview on African A List, said her ex-husband abandoned her and their children despite not doing anything wrong in the union.
The thespian who broke down in tears during the interview said her ex-husband is the only person she would like to ask why he abandoned his family.
Biola also spoke about battling severe depression after the separation, spending one year and six months in the hospital while struggling to recover emotionally.
According to the movie star, she almost lost her sanity, adding that it has been seven years since they lost contact.
She said, “The only person I’d really want to ask a question is my ex-husband. I’d really like to ask him what I did wrong because I did nothing before he left me and the kids. I want to ask what my children and I did to deserve what he did to us,” she said.
“I spent one year and six months in the hospital battling depression after he left. I almost ran mad. We are not in contact. Since he left, we haven’t seen him. He blocked us seven years ago.”
