Gorée Island is a tiny island located approximately 3 kilometers from the main harbor of Dakar, Senegal, making it the closest point on the continent to the Americas. It is about 45 acres large and has an estimated population of 1,300 permanent residents. The island was named an UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1978 for its involvement in the Atlantic slave trade.
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| Africa Map: Gorée Island is denoted by the red triangle |
Perhaps the most physical testament to the slave trade in Gorée is the House of Slaves. The House of Slaves is a small fort that served as a warehouse for slaves making the journey across the Atlantic. It was built by the Dutch in 1776, and it is the last existing slave house in Gorée; the first were built by the Portuguese, the first European colonizers on the island, in 1536. The shipping of slaves from Gorée lasted for 312 years—from 1533, when the Portuguese launched the slave trade, to 1848, when the French halted it.
Today, thousands of visitors a year visit the island to learn about this gruesome part of African history. There is only one hotel on the island, however, and most tourists don’t even stay over night. It is said that Gorée is a very tranquil place, and that most people that visit act less like tourists and more like pilgrims visiting a holy shrine.
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| Entrance to the House of Slaves: http://webworld.unesco.org/goree/en/screens/0.shtml |
This site raises a lot of questions about the prevalence of the slave trade in Senegal. While I was researching, I found some conflicting opinions on importance of Gorée Island in the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Some scholars claim that only about 200 slaves passed through Gorée on their way to the Americas. I believe that the importance of it, however, is not diminished by the amount of slave traffic that passed through there; the important thing is that it serves as a testament to the atrocities of the slave trade.
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