Clotilda: The Return Home (2024) Movie Script
[Garry Lumbers]
This is where it starts.
[Tara Roberts]
Altevese, Garry, Cassandra,
and Delisha are descendants
trying to take their ancestors
home to West Africa
for the first time
in over 100 years.
This is an opportunity
to reckon, to heal...
[Altevese Rosario] Oh my God.
[Tara Roberts] ...to honor.
[Altevese Rosario] Is the
king saying my ancestor was
not sold into slavery?
[Tara Roberts] This is
absolutely universal.
This is all of our history.
And that just feels
really powerful to me.
[Garry Lumbers]
Come on! Come on!
[clapping rhythmicly]
[whimsical music plays]
[Tara Roberts]
Diving With a Purpose
is a non-profit group.
It's made up of predominantly
Black scuba divers who mainly
have a passion for scuba diving.
[Tara Roberts]
How do you want to start?
[Tara Roberts] But the part of
their work that I most connect
to is this workaround
diving for slave shipwrecks.
There were approximately
36,000 voyages that brought
12.5 million Africans
to the Americas.
[Tara Roberts] We are
going to measure this wreckage.
[Tara Roberts] Most often,
we think of the people on
these slave ships as cargo,
as like faceless statistics...
[Crew] Welcome back!
[Tara Roberts]
but they were people.
They were mothers,
daughters, husbands, sons.
They were princes.
They were kings.
They were farmers, dreamers,
scientists, teachers.
They were all of that,
but we don't often
see them in that way.
[Tara Roberts] And the
Clotilda is actually the only
one of those ships to
have been found intact.
This work to recover
that history is hard.
But as I met descendants of
the ancestors on the Clotilda,
and I saw the strength that
they got from connecting to
that past, it's like, well,
if they can do it, maybe I can.
Alright, y'all.
So where are we?
[Altevese Rosario] We are at
the monument of our ancestor,
Kossola Oluale.
Whose slave name
was Cudjo Lewis.
We're going to take some
soil in order to represent him
and take him home.
[Tara Roberts] Home for
Kossola was near the kingdom of
Dahomey in West Africa,
within what is
now known as Benin.
In 1860, he was captured by
members of the Dahomey tribe,
sold into slavery,
and forced onto the last
known slave ship to America,
the Clotilda.
Kossola was only 19 years old.
[Cassandra Lewis]
Kossola said that when
he went onto the ship,
there was a man
standing there, and he said,
"Take your clothes off.
You won't need this
where you're going."
And that right there,
taking his country cloth,
it just took
something out of him.
[Tara Roberts] Kossola and
109 captive Africans were
confined aboard the Clotilda,
all chosen and among
the last to enter the world
of chattel slavery in America.
Under this brutal system,
humans were
reduced to mere property,
treated like cattle,
and perpetually owned
under laws designed to
enforce their degradation.
Kossola, renamed Cudjo Lewis
and those aboard the Clotilda
endured and
persevered through this
cruel system for almost
five years in Mobile, Alabama,
until they were freed in 1865.
Their first wish?
To return to Africa.
[Altevese Rosario] Their
plan was to work and to save
their money and return home.
[Cassandra Lewis] But when
they go to pay for the ticket,
the price kept rising.
[Tara Roberts]
Unable to return home,
the survivors of the
Clotilda brought home here.
They purchased land from
their former enslaver and
called it Africatown.
They built a community
complete with houses,
a school, and a church,
establishing the first town
in the United States
to be founded, controlled,
and continuously occupied
by African Americans.
[uplifting music plays]
Here, they could celebrate
their culture and preserve
their memories of
home for generations.
Cudjo, the Clotilda's
last male survivor,
married, raised children,
and passed down
his life story with a
hand-drawn map
showing the path home.
[Cassandra Lewis] His last
words were that he wanted
to go back to Africa.
He wanted to see his family.
He always say, I
want to see my mom.
I'm looking for a feeling when
we hit Africa for him to say,
"I'm home.
You did a good job."
[Tara Roberts] Altevese,
what are you feeling?
[Altevese Rosario] You mean,
what's coming back up?
[laughs]
I'm very emotional because
this was what he always wanted,
and we get to be
the ones that do it.
That's a big deal.
Because this is huge.
This is something that has been
100-plus years in the making.
- We got it. Yeah.
- Yeah.
Remind me of that
when we're there.
[Garry Lumbers] Cause
we keep thinking that...
- It's just us.
- It's just us.
- Yeah.
- But we're not in this alone.
[Altevese Rosario] No.
So, we are gathering
soil from Cudjo's memorial
to take back to Africa.
In the African tradition,
it is the women who
are to take and the men
who are to give.
[Tara Roberts] It's a ritual
that serves throughout time,
and it feels like that's what
we're about to do in Benin.
This is something
for the ancestors,
it's something for us,
and it's something
for future generations.
Delisha, does this exist for
you in your body anywhere?
[Delisha Marshall] For me,
I'm not blood-related to Cudjo,
but we are family,
and that was the
spirit of Africatown.
[Tara Roberts]
Delisha's ancestor was
also on the Clotilda,
a royal prince named Gumpa.
[Delisha Marshall]
People are like, oh my God,
you're royalty,
and I'm like, I'm really not.
[Laughs]
It would be nice,
but there's a very
ugly side of that story.
[Delisha Marshall] Gumpa was
a member of the royal family.
He was related to the
king at the time, Glele.
[Tara Roberts] The same
king who ordered the raid
on Cudjo's village.
[Delisha Marshall] Gumpa did
something that offended him,
and the royal family
wanted to get rid of him,
and that's how he ended
up on the Clotilda.
[Tara Roberts]
Betrayed by his own family,
Gumpa emerged as a
beloved leader of Africatown,
where part of his legacy
still stands today.
[Delisha Marshall] The
last structure remaining from
that time is Gumpa's chimney.
It's a symbol of how the people
of the Clotilda came together.
Yesterday, I was able to place
a couple of flowers out there,
say thank you for
all the things that
they endured and survived,
and dig up some of the soil from
around the chimney.
And I plan on taking
that back with me to Benin,
and hopefully,
I can leave
some of it in the palace.
[Tara Roberts] On some level,
it's just you
honoring your grandfather.
[Altevese Rosario] This is
our way of giving back.
[Tara Roberts] By them
fulfilling the long-ago request
of their ancestor
and taking him home,
I think it heals
something for all of us
who will never
be able to do that.
Before this reverse
journey begins,
the descendants wish to
pay their respects to all the
people aboard the Clotilda,
whose stories may have
been lost but never forgotten.
[Cassandra Lewis]
I was a little girl,
and my father would
make us repeat the ship and
the year that they
came over and over again.
[Tara Roberts] When the
Clotilda arrived in 1860,
importing enslaved
people into the U.S. had
been illegal for decades.
So, after the captain
offloaded everyone,
he burned and sank the
ship to destroy any evidence.
[Cassandra Lewis] One day,
I got tired, and I said,
"Dad," I said,
"why do we keep doing
this over and over again?"
He say, "They think we don't
know what we saying because we
don't have proof of a ship,"
he say, "but it's out there,
and you always remember."
[Tara Roberts] For 159 years,
the only evidence of
Clotilda's illegal voyage was
the firsthand accounts
of its survivors.
Then, in 2019, a
discovery was made.
[Dr. James Delgado]
Yes, it is Clotilda.
[Cassandra Lewis] So all
of us said we don't have to
pass it on to our
kids the way he did it.
We can talk about it
because we got proof.
[Delisha Marshall] We can
throw these flowers as a way
to say thank you
to the ancestors and
ask them for their protection
as they watch over us.
For the ancestors!
[Descendants] To the ancestors!
[Garry Lumbers]
We're going home.
[Delisha Marshall]
[Cassandra Lewis] I think it's
going to be really emotional.
And I just want to take it in.
I want to feel it in my heart.
I think it'll make me whole.
[Delisha Marshall] Going back
to Benin having a conversation
with descendants of King Glele,
we are distantly related,
so that brings up a whole
other set of mixed emotions.
[Altevese Rosario] The hope is
that whomever we encounter on
the other side is going
to be just as encouraged,
just as joyful to
connect with us.
[Garry Lumbers] As we are
trying to connect with them.
[Tara Roberts] This
is an opportunity and
an experience to reckon,
to heal, to honor,
and that just feels
really powerful to me.
[Tara Roberts] Benin, a small
gem in the heart of West Africa.
Everywhere in this
vibrant country,
echoes of its past are palpable:
ancient kingdoms, revolutions,
and independence
from France since 1960.
And the people welcomed us so
warmly as soon as we arrived.
[Garry Lumbers]
This is where it starts.
[Delisha Marshall] I'm excited!
We're here!
[Altevese Rosario] We're home.
We're, we're officially home.
[Airport Personnel]
Welcome. Welcome.
[speaking in French]
[Ada] He says, "Welcome to
the land of your ancestors."
[Descendants]
Thank you. Thank you.
[Airport Personnel]
Welcome! Have a nice journey!
[Garry Lumbers]
There's so many of us,
like my mom, my grandma,
my grandfather.
We're not with only us.
You know, we're
bringing everybody.
[African music playing]
[Tara Roberts] We're
on our way to Ouidah,
a coastal town that has
remarkably transformed from
the busiest slave market in
West Africa to the spiritual
heart of Benin.
Cudjo and Gumpa's
last steps on African soil
were here in 1860,
and it's where our
reverse journey begins.
[singing in native language]
Standing on the shore,
the weight of the
horror and injustices that
awaited those torn from
their homeland washed over us.
[barking]
[Altevese Rosario] He was
being stripped from his home.
He didn't know
where he was going.
He didn't have any
family with him.
He was being taken away
from everything that he knew
and that he loved,
never to see them again.
[Delisha Marshall]
They stole his family,
and I'm mad as hell
that they did that.
It took us 162 years
to get back here.
[Tara Roberts] They say
that the Atlantic is churning
with these lost souls.
1.8 million Africans died
in the middle passage.
That's the crossing from
Africa to the Americas.
Just in the crossing,
1.8 million people died.
Overlooking Ouidah Beach
is a monument that represents
The Door of No Return.
There are many such "doors."
Sometimes literal doors.
Other times, open spaces.
They exist up and down
the coast where slavers from
the Americas and Europe
loaded their ships with people
who had been captured,
kidnapped, bought, and sold.
Cudjo and Gumpa came
from different parts of the
warring Dahomey empire.
One captured in a raid and
sold as a prisoner of war.
The other betrayed by
his relative, the king,
and given away as a gift.
But today, they return together,
carried symbolically
by their descendants.
So we're here in Ouidah in
the Village of Zoungbodji,
and this is called
the Tree of Return.
And that just means that
captive Africans would walk
around it three times so that
their souls would remain here
even though their bodies
were being taken far away.
[Altevese Rosario]
We're returning.
We're returning them.
[Delisha Marshall] Yeah,
they're physically not here,
so we're returning
on their behalf.
[Cassandra Lewis] To me,
it feels like getting closer
to their soul.
[Garry Lumbers] When I first
came, I didn't feel anything.
But then, when I put
everybody's hand together,
then I was just like, 'bam'.
It just started to clicking.
[Tara Roberts]
Can I touch it, too?
[Delisha Marshall]
Yeah, get in here.
This is your ancestors, too.
This is everybody's ancestors.
[Tara Roberts] You're right.
You're right.
I know that at least 20%
of my blood comes from Benin.
So you're right.
Like this is...
[overlapping chatter]
Me, too.
[Altevese Rosario] This
is you now communing
with your ancestor.
-Wow
-Absolutely. Yeah.
[Tara Roberts] When I
started this journey,
I was like, does
it really matter?
Do your ancestors, I don't know,
does it really
make a difference?
And I think it does.
I think knowing who you
are gives you strength,
gives you confidence.
And that is absolutely
something that's universal.
All right, I know that you have
a ritual that you want to do,
so I am going to step
away and let you do it.
[Delisha Marshall] Billy Adams.
[Descendants] Ashe (Amen)
[Delisha Marshall] John Africa.
[Descendants] Ashe (Amen)
- Lancer Africa.
- Ashe.
[Delisha Marshall] We are
calling the names of those
that are known that have
departed on the Clotilda.
And we tried to use as many
African names as we could.
-Omolabi
-Ashe.
[Tara Roberts] As
they read the names of
Clotilda survivors out loud,
I thought about what
all the captured Africans who
walked around this tree
were forced to leave behind.
[Delisha continues reading]
[Altevese Rosario] When you
separate people from everything
that looks like them,
from everything
that sounds like them,
they lose their entire self.
[Descendants] Ashe.
- Lottie Dennison.
- Ashe.
- Samuel Johnson.
- Ashe.
- Anna Keeby.
- Ashe.
- Gumpa.
- Ashe
- Kossola Oluale.
- Ashe.
[African music plays]
[Tara Roberts] We've been
invited to an Egungun ceremony,
a West African dance tradition
that manifests the spirits of
ancestors for remembrance,
celebration, and blessings.
The timing was perfect.
The descendants of Cudjo
and Gumpa are embarking on
the next phase of
their reverse journey,
the slave market.
[Alex Amoussouvi] Ouidah
was one of the most important
slave towns on the
west coast of Africa.
When the slaves
were brought from the
different wars that existed,
they were brought
to the slave market,
chosen by different
slave traders before they
would board the ships.
[Tara Roberts] So I'm just
imagining Cudjo on the platform.
[Altevese Rosario] I can
only imagine, first of all,
how degrading it
is because you're in front of
a crowd of people,
and you have these
strangers poking and prodding.
You don't know
what they're saying.
You don't know what's happening.
[Tara Roberts] Yeah.
Can you tell us a little bit
about Gumpa, Delisha?
[Delisha Marshall] He
was here at the market.
He looked very dignified,
very beautiful,
dark brown chocolate skin.
As I understand it, Gumpa
was given away as a gift.
[Alex Amoussouvi] Almost
18,000 Africans were taken
from the port of Ouidah
every year.
And that is why we
consider it as a genocide.
It is a genocide.
[Tara Roberts] The next stop
on our journey is the place
where Cudjo was held
before he came here.
That was a barracoon.
Barracoons were outdoor
stockades where captured
Africans were held for days,
even months, until ships,
like the Clotilda,
arrived to take them
across the Atlantic.
[Alex Amoussouvi] There were
five major forts in Ouidah:
the Danish, the Dutch,
the French, the English,
and the Portuguese fort.
They were kept chained here
until the ships were ready.
[Altevese Rosario]
Oh, my goodness.
[Tara Roberts]
Those are shackles?
[Altevese Rosario]
Those are shackles.
Oh, my God.
Oh, my...
[gasps].
[Tara Roberts]
That's a neck shackle.
[Altevese Rosario]
Oh, my God.
[Cassandra Lewis] Imagine this
around your neck and the weight.
[Alex Amoussouvi] Captives
could be up to 60, 80, 100,
200 that were kept here
with very little, no food.
Only once in a day,
they were fed.
[Garry Lumbers] How do you
think the women's felt?
[Altevese Rosario] That was the
first thing that came to mind.
If you're having
your menstrual cycle.
[Delisha Marshall]
Or if you're pregnant.
[Tara Roberts] Trafficking
that many people, you know,
through a fort like this.
[Altevese Rosario] Which
I'm sure was not cleaned,
so whatever the group
of people did in here once
they were taken away,
another group came in
and sat in the blood,
in the feces, in the urine.
You're now sitting in
yours and someone else's.
[Garry Lumbers]
This is a lot to ingest.
[Alex Amoussouvi] On average,
they were spending roughly
two months here.
[Altevese Rosario] And
then you're at the market.
[Tara Roberts] Right.
[Altevese Rosario]
You're at the market like
you're a cow waiting to be sold.
[Alex Amoussouvi] The moats
are just around the fence that
circles the old fort.
They were infested
with crocodiles.
It is believed that there
were some that were thrown
into the gutters.
[Altevese Rosario] Cassandra,
you want to lead us in prayer?
[Cassandra Lewis] Lord,
Father God, this room here,
it's just a spirit here,
it's just making us
feel kind of down.
I ask you to lift us up and
carry us in a decent way.
[Descendants] Amen.
[African music plays]
[Tara Roberts]
We're off to Abomey,
once the capital of
the Dahomey kingdom.
Between the 17th
and 19th centuries,
twelve kings reigned,
many of whom expanded
the kingdom by conquering
neighboring tribes and
selling captives to be enslaved.
During that era, Dahomey
became one of the most powerful
kingdoms on the
West Coast of Africa.
[singing in Fon]
Today, the country of Benin
is no longer a monarchy,
it's a republic, and the
title of king is primarily
a ceremonial one.
[Alex Amoussouvi]
Let us prostrate. Like this.
[Alex Amoussouvi] The
King of the most powerful
Dahomey Kingdom wants to
renew his gratitude.
[speaking in Bon]
[Alex Amoussouvi]
Everybody accepts today that
the slave trade was a
crime against humanity.
[speaking in Bon]
[Alex Amoussouvi]
And today, we are ready to
move forward in a partnership,
in a strength building
between Africans and Africans
of the diaspora.
[speaking in Bon]
[Alex Amoussouvi]
And that is why His Majesty is
expecting you to
come back again.
All his children,
all his grandchildren,
they should come back home.
[Cassandra Lewis]
Wow, this is amazing.
You can't even imagine.
[Altevese Rosario]
It's a sense of peace,
it's a sense of comfort.
[Garry Lumbers] This is what
Afro-Americans need to know.
[Altevese Rosario] Yeah, that
they can always come home.
[Tara Roberts] After our
visit with the current king,
we're now off to
meet a direct descendant of
a past king.
Like Delisha, this
descendant can trace
his lineage to King Glele,
who ordered the raid
on Cudjo's village and exiled
Gumpa from the royal court.
[speaking in Bon]
[speaking in Bon]
[Interpreter] The king
is very happy to welcome you.
-Thank you.
[speaking in Bon]
[Interpreter]:
If you have any questions,
it is your time to ask him.
[Delisha Marshall] Can you
tell us a little about Glele
and what he was like?
[speaking in Bon]
[Interpreter]: When the
King Glele come to power,
he reign with peace
and with progress of the
Kingdom of Dahomey.
He liked people.
He liked Europeans.
He liked everybody.
[Altevese Rosario]
Because the King has such a
good relationship with
the Europeans,
did he know what
European slavery was like?
[Interpreter] The King of Abomey
never sold people as a slave.
Those men and women
travel to America to
work with those Europeans,
and they want to
have a good relationship
with those Europeans,
so if today we
talk about slavery,
it's to show the negative
parts of the kingdom of Abomey,
but that is not right.
It is wrong.
So this is the facts.
[Altevese Rosario] Is the
King saying the fact is that
my ancestor was
not sold into slavery?
[speaking in Bon]
[Interpreter]: The King said
that they never sold people.
[Altevese Rosario]
Because my ancestor, Kossola,
told his children and his
children's children that he
did not go willingly.
To say that Africans
were not sold into slavery
is not only false,
but it makes it seem as
though he thinks I'm foolish.
[speaking in Bon]
[Laughter].
[Altevese Rosario] I feel very
much so mocked by the laughter,
and that got me more
enraged to the point to where
I wanted to get
up and walk away.
[Cassandra Lewis] I was stunned.
Do you know we lost relatives?
And for you to
sit here and deny it,
it was shocking to me.
[Garry Lumbers] I didn't
want the conversation to go
where it was going.
I just didn't want
nobody to be hurt.
He's not going to say that
his family was part of an
illegal slave trade.
I don't expect for him
to say that he's wrong.
[speaking in Bon]
[Tara Roberts] The king
started off saying these things
that impacted us all.
But then he changed his tune,
but he didn't change
his tune on his own.
Someone on our team went
to the prince and told him
no, no, no, no, no, no,
this is what happened,
and you will not disrespect us.
[Alex Amoussouvi]
The king says for
reconciliation to take place,
it is important
to continue to talk,
to continue to exchange,
for us to be finally,
how you say?
[Alex Amoussouvi]
Cleansed. Cleansed, exactly.
[Altevese Rosario] I
have a final question.
Why not sell them,
send them to a
place where they can
keep their culture intact,
where they can be
with their people,
where they can
eventually return home?
Because in America,
they are completely cut off
from their language,
from their people,
from their culture,
[Delisha Marshall]
From their families.
[Altevese Rosario] So
why send them to a place
where you know they
will never have contact with
what is most
deeply pure of them?
[Delisha Marshall] It's okay.
[Altevese Rosario]
It's not okay. It's not.
[Delisha Marshall] It's okay.
This is what we came for.
We came for answers.
[Altevese Rosario] I did notice
other ladies that were crying.
And that was a
sense of comfort for me.
Regardless of what
else has happened,
regardless of what anyone
else is saying, you get it,
and you're with me in spirit,
and you feel my pain.
[Delisha Marshall] Both sides
need to take ownership.
So I'm equally mad at
Glele and people like him who
enslave their own.
That doesn't diminish any of
the part that slave traders and
slave owners played in this.
Everyone needs to be held
accountable for what happened.
And that is why a lot of
people are still angry.
[African music plays]
[Delisha Marshall] Some of
the elders from Glele's family
took me into Glele's
personal palace.
This would be where Gumpa would
hang out like in everyday life.
Prior to leaving Alabama,
I dug up some soil which
is around the chimney that
still remains of the
house that he lived in...
Welcome home, Gumpa.
to give his soul a release
and to fulfill his wish.
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day,
our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those
who trespass against us.
Lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is kingdom, the
power and glory forever.
Amen.
I know it's something
that he's been wanting,
and my family's been
wanting to do for 162 years.
So finally being able
to do that for him,
it feels very freeing, and I
hope he's at peace as well.
[uplifting music plays]
[Tara Roberts] We're
on our way to Bant.
[Altevese Rosario]
Yes. I am so excited.
Like I can barely
contain myself.
[Tara Roberts]
What about you, Garry?
Do you feel nervous
about anything at all?
[Garry Lumbers] I'm
just going to take it in.
[Delisha Marshall]
That has to be exciting.
I'm excited for you, guys.
[distant African music]
[cheering and chanting in Bon]
Oh, wow.
Do y'all see this?
Oh, my God.
[Altevese Rosario]
Scores of people.
Old people, young people.
Men. Women.
[cheering and chanting in Bon]
[cheering and chanting in Bon]
[Cassandra Lewis] You
got my brother's nose.
You got my sister's eyes.
You got my cousin's cheeks.
Everybody represents somebody.
[Altevese Rosario] I didn't
feel like a stranger anymore.
[African music plays]
The oldest of the elders just
told us welcome back home,
you're home, you're our family,
your family is here.
And every person just
echoed that sentiment,
and it really did feel that way.
[Justin] He's very
glad because your ancestor
write his story
and because of his story
you know the route
and you've come back home.
[Altevese Rosario]
I am so overwhelmed.
[Tara Roberts] I have snot
coming out my nose now.
[Altevese Rosario] Like,
I'm thinking, okay this is the
path that he walked.
Like even just in his normal
everyday, just going places,
this is the ground
that his feet touched,
and then coming back
into the village,
these are the
songs that he sang.
These are the
dances that he did.
These are the drums
that he saw, and he heard.
[Tara Roberts] Yes,
yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
These are the faces that he saw.
[Altevese Rosario]
These are the faces,
these are his people,
and these are my people,
and they're saying
you're home, you're home.
[Tara Roberts] Yes, yes, yes!
This isn't even
my story, but it is my story.
[Altevese Rosario]
It is your story,
it's all of our stories, it is.
It is your story.
[Tara Roberts] The moment had
finally come to ceremoniously
bring Cudjo Lewis home.
[Altevese Rosario] So it was a
ceremony that we had to perform,
a ritual that could only be
performed by blood relatives.
And it had to do with us
giving him an offering,
and it was really just
us inviting him back,
his spirit back
into the village,
and then sealing it in a way
where his spirit is tethered
to his village.
[Delisha Marshall]
I'm so excited.
[Cassandra Lewis] I had to
get down and draw the map.
[Garry Lumbers]
Pour it out, Cassandra.
We're going to put
Pop-pop in the middle.
Put the heart in there, yeah.
[Cassandra Lewis] We
spread Cudjo's and his wife's
soil in the middle
with the heart.
[Altevese Rosario]
We placed soil from our
other ancestors from Mobile,
bringing them home as well.
[Garry Lumbers]
Tell them to call Cudjo.
Tell him to come home.
[group chanting in Bon]
[Garry Lumbers] Louder.
Louder! Louder! Louder!
[group chanting in Bon]
Bring him home, come on.
Bring him home!
That wasn't just me.
That was the family.
That was the
people of the village.
That was everybody!
Come on, come on,
come on, come on, come on!
[chanting continues and fades]
[Cassandra Lewis] When it ended.
I said is it done?
And he said yes.
So I had to turn to
everybody and say it's done.
[Tara Roberts] It wasn't
my family returning home.
But it was.
The stories of our ancestors,
specifically
African American people,
are human stories.
And they're not just about
the condition of enslavement.
There is joy.
There is power.
There is agency.
This work is about discovery.
[Garry Lumbers] We're ready.
We're good, we're good.
[Tara Roberts] It's about
remembering and honoring and
reckoning and restoring,
and ultimately,
it's about healing.
[Altevese Rosario] Where
we performed our ceremony,
that is a part of the three
acres of land that the village
has gifted us.
The expectation is
that we come back.
Which we will.
[African music plays]
[Tara Roberts] Our
journey wasn't over yet.
The town of Bant
had a surprise for
Cudjo's descendants.
[Altevese Rosario] Oh
my goodness gracious,
you have got to be kidding me.
[Cassandra Lewis]
When we saw it,
I spotted it from afar,
and I couldn't take
my eyes off of it.
The statue was so beautiful.
[Altevese Rosario]
Wow, look at this!
[Tara Roberts] Do you
want to read it out loud?
[Altevese Rosario]
"Cudjo Oluale Kossola Lewis
from Benin to Alabama, USA,
last survivor of the
last known slave ship to
enter the United States.
He was one of over 100
African men and women purchased
and brought across the
Atlantic to Mobile, Alabama,
aboard the slave ship Clotilda."
[Garry Lumbers]
They never forgot him.
He must've sent out some
strong vibes back here, man,
for them to
remember him like this.
[Altevese Rosario] Yeah.
[Tara Roberts] My hope that
as people listen to this story,
as they connect
to this miraculous,
amazing opportunity
for the descendants to
connect with their roots,
that something gets
healed in our world.
And that feels like,
that's everything.
This is where it starts.
[Tara Roberts]
Altevese, Garry, Cassandra,
and Delisha are descendants
trying to take their ancestors
home to West Africa
for the first time
in over 100 years.
This is an opportunity
to reckon, to heal...
[Altevese Rosario] Oh my God.
[Tara Roberts] ...to honor.
[Altevese Rosario] Is the
king saying my ancestor was
not sold into slavery?
[Tara Roberts] This is
absolutely universal.
This is all of our history.
And that just feels
really powerful to me.
[Garry Lumbers]
Come on! Come on!
[clapping rhythmicly]
[whimsical music plays]
[Tara Roberts]
Diving With a Purpose
is a non-profit group.
It's made up of predominantly
Black scuba divers who mainly
have a passion for scuba diving.
[Tara Roberts]
How do you want to start?
[Tara Roberts] But the part of
their work that I most connect
to is this workaround
diving for slave shipwrecks.
There were approximately
36,000 voyages that brought
12.5 million Africans
to the Americas.
[Tara Roberts] We are
going to measure this wreckage.
[Tara Roberts] Most often,
we think of the people on
these slave ships as cargo,
as like faceless statistics...
[Crew] Welcome back!
[Tara Roberts]
but they were people.
They were mothers,
daughters, husbands, sons.
They were princes.
They were kings.
They were farmers, dreamers,
scientists, teachers.
They were all of that,
but we don't often
see them in that way.
[Tara Roberts] And the
Clotilda is actually the only
one of those ships to
have been found intact.
This work to recover
that history is hard.
But as I met descendants of
the ancestors on the Clotilda,
and I saw the strength that
they got from connecting to
that past, it's like, well,
if they can do it, maybe I can.
Alright, y'all.
So where are we?
[Altevese Rosario] We are at
the monument of our ancestor,
Kossola Oluale.
Whose slave name
was Cudjo Lewis.
We're going to take some
soil in order to represent him
and take him home.
[Tara Roberts] Home for
Kossola was near the kingdom of
Dahomey in West Africa,
within what is
now known as Benin.
In 1860, he was captured by
members of the Dahomey tribe,
sold into slavery,
and forced onto the last
known slave ship to America,
the Clotilda.
Kossola was only 19 years old.
[Cassandra Lewis]
Kossola said that when
he went onto the ship,
there was a man
standing there, and he said,
"Take your clothes off.
You won't need this
where you're going."
And that right there,
taking his country cloth,
it just took
something out of him.
[Tara Roberts] Kossola and
109 captive Africans were
confined aboard the Clotilda,
all chosen and among
the last to enter the world
of chattel slavery in America.
Under this brutal system,
humans were
reduced to mere property,
treated like cattle,
and perpetually owned
under laws designed to
enforce their degradation.
Kossola, renamed Cudjo Lewis
and those aboard the Clotilda
endured and
persevered through this
cruel system for almost
five years in Mobile, Alabama,
until they were freed in 1865.
Their first wish?
To return to Africa.
[Altevese Rosario] Their
plan was to work and to save
their money and return home.
[Cassandra Lewis] But when
they go to pay for the ticket,
the price kept rising.
[Tara Roberts]
Unable to return home,
the survivors of the
Clotilda brought home here.
They purchased land from
their former enslaver and
called it Africatown.
They built a community
complete with houses,
a school, and a church,
establishing the first town
in the United States
to be founded, controlled,
and continuously occupied
by African Americans.
[uplifting music plays]
Here, they could celebrate
their culture and preserve
their memories of
home for generations.
Cudjo, the Clotilda's
last male survivor,
married, raised children,
and passed down
his life story with a
hand-drawn map
showing the path home.
[Cassandra Lewis] His last
words were that he wanted
to go back to Africa.
He wanted to see his family.
He always say, I
want to see my mom.
I'm looking for a feeling when
we hit Africa for him to say,
"I'm home.
You did a good job."
[Tara Roberts] Altevese,
what are you feeling?
[Altevese Rosario] You mean,
what's coming back up?
[laughs]
I'm very emotional because
this was what he always wanted,
and we get to be
the ones that do it.
That's a big deal.
Because this is huge.
This is something that has been
100-plus years in the making.
- We got it. Yeah.
- Yeah.
Remind me of that
when we're there.
[Garry Lumbers] Cause
we keep thinking that...
- It's just us.
- It's just us.
- Yeah.
- But we're not in this alone.
[Altevese Rosario] No.
So, we are gathering
soil from Cudjo's memorial
to take back to Africa.
In the African tradition,
it is the women who
are to take and the men
who are to give.
[Tara Roberts] It's a ritual
that serves throughout time,
and it feels like that's what
we're about to do in Benin.
This is something
for the ancestors,
it's something for us,
and it's something
for future generations.
Delisha, does this exist for
you in your body anywhere?
[Delisha Marshall] For me,
I'm not blood-related to Cudjo,
but we are family,
and that was the
spirit of Africatown.
[Tara Roberts]
Delisha's ancestor was
also on the Clotilda,
a royal prince named Gumpa.
[Delisha Marshall]
People are like, oh my God,
you're royalty,
and I'm like, I'm really not.
[Laughs]
It would be nice,
but there's a very
ugly side of that story.
[Delisha Marshall] Gumpa was
a member of the royal family.
He was related to the
king at the time, Glele.
[Tara Roberts] The same
king who ordered the raid
on Cudjo's village.
[Delisha Marshall] Gumpa did
something that offended him,
and the royal family
wanted to get rid of him,
and that's how he ended
up on the Clotilda.
[Tara Roberts]
Betrayed by his own family,
Gumpa emerged as a
beloved leader of Africatown,
where part of his legacy
still stands today.
[Delisha Marshall] The
last structure remaining from
that time is Gumpa's chimney.
It's a symbol of how the people
of the Clotilda came together.
Yesterday, I was able to place
a couple of flowers out there,
say thank you for
all the things that
they endured and survived,
and dig up some of the soil from
around the chimney.
And I plan on taking
that back with me to Benin,
and hopefully,
I can leave
some of it in the palace.
[Tara Roberts] On some level,
it's just you
honoring your grandfather.
[Altevese Rosario] This is
our way of giving back.
[Tara Roberts] By them
fulfilling the long-ago request
of their ancestor
and taking him home,
I think it heals
something for all of us
who will never
be able to do that.
Before this reverse
journey begins,
the descendants wish to
pay their respects to all the
people aboard the Clotilda,
whose stories may have
been lost but never forgotten.
[Cassandra Lewis]
I was a little girl,
and my father would
make us repeat the ship and
the year that they
came over and over again.
[Tara Roberts] When the
Clotilda arrived in 1860,
importing enslaved
people into the U.S. had
been illegal for decades.
So, after the captain
offloaded everyone,
he burned and sank the
ship to destroy any evidence.
[Cassandra Lewis] One day,
I got tired, and I said,
"Dad," I said,
"why do we keep doing
this over and over again?"
He say, "They think we don't
know what we saying because we
don't have proof of a ship,"
he say, "but it's out there,
and you always remember."
[Tara Roberts] For 159 years,
the only evidence of
Clotilda's illegal voyage was
the firsthand accounts
of its survivors.
Then, in 2019, a
discovery was made.
[Dr. James Delgado]
Yes, it is Clotilda.
[Cassandra Lewis] So all
of us said we don't have to
pass it on to our
kids the way he did it.
We can talk about it
because we got proof.
[Delisha Marshall] We can
throw these flowers as a way
to say thank you
to the ancestors and
ask them for their protection
as they watch over us.
For the ancestors!
[Descendants] To the ancestors!
[Garry Lumbers]
We're going home.
[Delisha Marshall]
[Cassandra Lewis] I think it's
going to be really emotional.
And I just want to take it in.
I want to feel it in my heart.
I think it'll make me whole.
[Delisha Marshall] Going back
to Benin having a conversation
with descendants of King Glele,
we are distantly related,
so that brings up a whole
other set of mixed emotions.
[Altevese Rosario] The hope is
that whomever we encounter on
the other side is going
to be just as encouraged,
just as joyful to
connect with us.
[Garry Lumbers] As we are
trying to connect with them.
[Tara Roberts] This
is an opportunity and
an experience to reckon,
to heal, to honor,
and that just feels
really powerful to me.
[Tara Roberts] Benin, a small
gem in the heart of West Africa.
Everywhere in this
vibrant country,
echoes of its past are palpable:
ancient kingdoms, revolutions,
and independence
from France since 1960.
And the people welcomed us so
warmly as soon as we arrived.
[Garry Lumbers]
This is where it starts.
[Delisha Marshall] I'm excited!
We're here!
[Altevese Rosario] We're home.
We're, we're officially home.
[Airport Personnel]
Welcome. Welcome.
[speaking in French]
[Ada] He says, "Welcome to
the land of your ancestors."
[Descendants]
Thank you. Thank you.
[Airport Personnel]
Welcome! Have a nice journey!
[Garry Lumbers]
There's so many of us,
like my mom, my grandma,
my grandfather.
We're not with only us.
You know, we're
bringing everybody.
[African music playing]
[Tara Roberts] We're
on our way to Ouidah,
a coastal town that has
remarkably transformed from
the busiest slave market in
West Africa to the spiritual
heart of Benin.
Cudjo and Gumpa's
last steps on African soil
were here in 1860,
and it's where our
reverse journey begins.
[singing in native language]
Standing on the shore,
the weight of the
horror and injustices that
awaited those torn from
their homeland washed over us.
[barking]
[Altevese Rosario] He was
being stripped from his home.
He didn't know
where he was going.
He didn't have any
family with him.
He was being taken away
from everything that he knew
and that he loved,
never to see them again.
[Delisha Marshall]
They stole his family,
and I'm mad as hell
that they did that.
It took us 162 years
to get back here.
[Tara Roberts] They say
that the Atlantic is churning
with these lost souls.
1.8 million Africans died
in the middle passage.
That's the crossing from
Africa to the Americas.
Just in the crossing,
1.8 million people died.
Overlooking Ouidah Beach
is a monument that represents
The Door of No Return.
There are many such "doors."
Sometimes literal doors.
Other times, open spaces.
They exist up and down
the coast where slavers from
the Americas and Europe
loaded their ships with people
who had been captured,
kidnapped, bought, and sold.
Cudjo and Gumpa came
from different parts of the
warring Dahomey empire.
One captured in a raid and
sold as a prisoner of war.
The other betrayed by
his relative, the king,
and given away as a gift.
But today, they return together,
carried symbolically
by their descendants.
So we're here in Ouidah in
the Village of Zoungbodji,
and this is called
the Tree of Return.
And that just means that
captive Africans would walk
around it three times so that
their souls would remain here
even though their bodies
were being taken far away.
[Altevese Rosario]
We're returning.
We're returning them.
[Delisha Marshall] Yeah,
they're physically not here,
so we're returning
on their behalf.
[Cassandra Lewis] To me,
it feels like getting closer
to their soul.
[Garry Lumbers] When I first
came, I didn't feel anything.
But then, when I put
everybody's hand together,
then I was just like, 'bam'.
It just started to clicking.
[Tara Roberts]
Can I touch it, too?
[Delisha Marshall]
Yeah, get in here.
This is your ancestors, too.
This is everybody's ancestors.
[Tara Roberts] You're right.
You're right.
I know that at least 20%
of my blood comes from Benin.
So you're right.
Like this is...
[overlapping chatter]
Me, too.
[Altevese Rosario] This
is you now communing
with your ancestor.
-Wow
-Absolutely. Yeah.
[Tara Roberts] When I
started this journey,
I was like, does
it really matter?
Do your ancestors, I don't know,
does it really
make a difference?
And I think it does.
I think knowing who you
are gives you strength,
gives you confidence.
And that is absolutely
something that's universal.
All right, I know that you have
a ritual that you want to do,
so I am going to step
away and let you do it.
[Delisha Marshall] Billy Adams.
[Descendants] Ashe (Amen)
[Delisha Marshall] John Africa.
[Descendants] Ashe (Amen)
- Lancer Africa.
- Ashe.
[Delisha Marshall] We are
calling the names of those
that are known that have
departed on the Clotilda.
And we tried to use as many
African names as we could.
-Omolabi
-Ashe.
[Tara Roberts] As
they read the names of
Clotilda survivors out loud,
I thought about what
all the captured Africans who
walked around this tree
were forced to leave behind.
[Delisha continues reading]
[Altevese Rosario] When you
separate people from everything
that looks like them,
from everything
that sounds like them,
they lose their entire self.
[Descendants] Ashe.
- Lottie Dennison.
- Ashe.
- Samuel Johnson.
- Ashe.
- Anna Keeby.
- Ashe.
- Gumpa.
- Ashe
- Kossola Oluale.
- Ashe.
[African music plays]
[Tara Roberts] We've been
invited to an Egungun ceremony,
a West African dance tradition
that manifests the spirits of
ancestors for remembrance,
celebration, and blessings.
The timing was perfect.
The descendants of Cudjo
and Gumpa are embarking on
the next phase of
their reverse journey,
the slave market.
[Alex Amoussouvi] Ouidah
was one of the most important
slave towns on the
west coast of Africa.
When the slaves
were brought from the
different wars that existed,
they were brought
to the slave market,
chosen by different
slave traders before they
would board the ships.
[Tara Roberts] So I'm just
imagining Cudjo on the platform.
[Altevese Rosario] I can
only imagine, first of all,
how degrading it
is because you're in front of
a crowd of people,
and you have these
strangers poking and prodding.
You don't know
what they're saying.
You don't know what's happening.
[Tara Roberts] Yeah.
Can you tell us a little bit
about Gumpa, Delisha?
[Delisha Marshall] He
was here at the market.
He looked very dignified,
very beautiful,
dark brown chocolate skin.
As I understand it, Gumpa
was given away as a gift.
[Alex Amoussouvi] Almost
18,000 Africans were taken
from the port of Ouidah
every year.
And that is why we
consider it as a genocide.
It is a genocide.
[Tara Roberts] The next stop
on our journey is the place
where Cudjo was held
before he came here.
That was a barracoon.
Barracoons were outdoor
stockades where captured
Africans were held for days,
even months, until ships,
like the Clotilda,
arrived to take them
across the Atlantic.
[Alex Amoussouvi] There were
five major forts in Ouidah:
the Danish, the Dutch,
the French, the English,
and the Portuguese fort.
They were kept chained here
until the ships were ready.
[Altevese Rosario]
Oh, my goodness.
[Tara Roberts]
Those are shackles?
[Altevese Rosario]
Those are shackles.
Oh, my God.
Oh, my...
[gasps].
[Tara Roberts]
That's a neck shackle.
[Altevese Rosario]
Oh, my God.
[Cassandra Lewis] Imagine this
around your neck and the weight.
[Alex Amoussouvi] Captives
could be up to 60, 80, 100,
200 that were kept here
with very little, no food.
Only once in a day,
they were fed.
[Garry Lumbers] How do you
think the women's felt?
[Altevese Rosario] That was the
first thing that came to mind.
If you're having
your menstrual cycle.
[Delisha Marshall]
Or if you're pregnant.
[Tara Roberts] Trafficking
that many people, you know,
through a fort like this.
[Altevese Rosario] Which
I'm sure was not cleaned,
so whatever the group
of people did in here once
they were taken away,
another group came in
and sat in the blood,
in the feces, in the urine.
You're now sitting in
yours and someone else's.
[Garry Lumbers]
This is a lot to ingest.
[Alex Amoussouvi] On average,
they were spending roughly
two months here.
[Altevese Rosario] And
then you're at the market.
[Tara Roberts] Right.
[Altevese Rosario]
You're at the market like
you're a cow waiting to be sold.
[Alex Amoussouvi] The moats
are just around the fence that
circles the old fort.
They were infested
with crocodiles.
It is believed that there
were some that were thrown
into the gutters.
[Altevese Rosario] Cassandra,
you want to lead us in prayer?
[Cassandra Lewis] Lord,
Father God, this room here,
it's just a spirit here,
it's just making us
feel kind of down.
I ask you to lift us up and
carry us in a decent way.
[Descendants] Amen.
[African music plays]
[Tara Roberts]
We're off to Abomey,
once the capital of
the Dahomey kingdom.
Between the 17th
and 19th centuries,
twelve kings reigned,
many of whom expanded
the kingdom by conquering
neighboring tribes and
selling captives to be enslaved.
During that era, Dahomey
became one of the most powerful
kingdoms on the
West Coast of Africa.
[singing in Fon]
Today, the country of Benin
is no longer a monarchy,
it's a republic, and the
title of king is primarily
a ceremonial one.
[Alex Amoussouvi]
Let us prostrate. Like this.
[Alex Amoussouvi] The
King of the most powerful
Dahomey Kingdom wants to
renew his gratitude.
[speaking in Bon]
[Alex Amoussouvi]
Everybody accepts today that
the slave trade was a
crime against humanity.
[speaking in Bon]
[Alex Amoussouvi]
And today, we are ready to
move forward in a partnership,
in a strength building
between Africans and Africans
of the diaspora.
[speaking in Bon]
[Alex Amoussouvi]
And that is why His Majesty is
expecting you to
come back again.
All his children,
all his grandchildren,
they should come back home.
[Cassandra Lewis]
Wow, this is amazing.
You can't even imagine.
[Altevese Rosario]
It's a sense of peace,
it's a sense of comfort.
[Garry Lumbers] This is what
Afro-Americans need to know.
[Altevese Rosario] Yeah, that
they can always come home.
[Tara Roberts] After our
visit with the current king,
we're now off to
meet a direct descendant of
a past king.
Like Delisha, this
descendant can trace
his lineage to King Glele,
who ordered the raid
on Cudjo's village and exiled
Gumpa from the royal court.
[speaking in Bon]
[speaking in Bon]
[Interpreter] The king
is very happy to welcome you.
-Thank you.
[speaking in Bon]
[Interpreter]:
If you have any questions,
it is your time to ask him.
[Delisha Marshall] Can you
tell us a little about Glele
and what he was like?
[speaking in Bon]
[Interpreter]: When the
King Glele come to power,
he reign with peace
and with progress of the
Kingdom of Dahomey.
He liked people.
He liked Europeans.
He liked everybody.
[Altevese Rosario]
Because the King has such a
good relationship with
the Europeans,
did he know what
European slavery was like?
[Interpreter] The King of Abomey
never sold people as a slave.
Those men and women
travel to America to
work with those Europeans,
and they want to
have a good relationship
with those Europeans,
so if today we
talk about slavery,
it's to show the negative
parts of the kingdom of Abomey,
but that is not right.
It is wrong.
So this is the facts.
[Altevese Rosario] Is the
King saying the fact is that
my ancestor was
not sold into slavery?
[speaking in Bon]
[Interpreter]: The King said
that they never sold people.
[Altevese Rosario]
Because my ancestor, Kossola,
told his children and his
children's children that he
did not go willingly.
To say that Africans
were not sold into slavery
is not only false,
but it makes it seem as
though he thinks I'm foolish.
[speaking in Bon]
[Laughter].
[Altevese Rosario] I feel very
much so mocked by the laughter,
and that got me more
enraged to the point to where
I wanted to get
up and walk away.
[Cassandra Lewis] I was stunned.
Do you know we lost relatives?
And for you to
sit here and deny it,
it was shocking to me.
[Garry Lumbers] I didn't
want the conversation to go
where it was going.
I just didn't want
nobody to be hurt.
He's not going to say that
his family was part of an
illegal slave trade.
I don't expect for him
to say that he's wrong.
[speaking in Bon]
[Tara Roberts] The king
started off saying these things
that impacted us all.
But then he changed his tune,
but he didn't change
his tune on his own.
Someone on our team went
to the prince and told him
no, no, no, no, no, no,
this is what happened,
and you will not disrespect us.
[Alex Amoussouvi]
The king says for
reconciliation to take place,
it is important
to continue to talk,
to continue to exchange,
for us to be finally,
how you say?
[Alex Amoussouvi]
Cleansed. Cleansed, exactly.
[Altevese Rosario] I
have a final question.
Why not sell them,
send them to a
place where they can
keep their culture intact,
where they can be
with their people,
where they can
eventually return home?
Because in America,
they are completely cut off
from their language,
from their people,
from their culture,
[Delisha Marshall]
From their families.
[Altevese Rosario] So
why send them to a place
where you know they
will never have contact with
what is most
deeply pure of them?
[Delisha Marshall] It's okay.
[Altevese Rosario]
It's not okay. It's not.
[Delisha Marshall] It's okay.
This is what we came for.
We came for answers.
[Altevese Rosario] I did notice
other ladies that were crying.
And that was a
sense of comfort for me.
Regardless of what
else has happened,
regardless of what anyone
else is saying, you get it,
and you're with me in spirit,
and you feel my pain.
[Delisha Marshall] Both sides
need to take ownership.
So I'm equally mad at
Glele and people like him who
enslave their own.
That doesn't diminish any of
the part that slave traders and
slave owners played in this.
Everyone needs to be held
accountable for what happened.
And that is why a lot of
people are still angry.
[African music plays]
[Delisha Marshall] Some of
the elders from Glele's family
took me into Glele's
personal palace.
This would be where Gumpa would
hang out like in everyday life.
Prior to leaving Alabama,
I dug up some soil which
is around the chimney that
still remains of the
house that he lived in...
Welcome home, Gumpa.
to give his soul a release
and to fulfill his wish.
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day,
our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those
who trespass against us.
Lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is kingdom, the
power and glory forever.
Amen.
I know it's something
that he's been wanting,
and my family's been
wanting to do for 162 years.
So finally being able
to do that for him,
it feels very freeing, and I
hope he's at peace as well.
[uplifting music plays]
[Tara Roberts] We're
on our way to Bant.
[Altevese Rosario]
Yes. I am so excited.
Like I can barely
contain myself.
[Tara Roberts]
What about you, Garry?
Do you feel nervous
about anything at all?
[Garry Lumbers] I'm
just going to take it in.
[Delisha Marshall]
That has to be exciting.
I'm excited for you, guys.
[distant African music]
[cheering and chanting in Bon]
Oh, wow.
Do y'all see this?
Oh, my God.
[Altevese Rosario]
Scores of people.
Old people, young people.
Men. Women.
[cheering and chanting in Bon]
[cheering and chanting in Bon]
[Cassandra Lewis] You
got my brother's nose.
You got my sister's eyes.
You got my cousin's cheeks.
Everybody represents somebody.
[Altevese Rosario] I didn't
feel like a stranger anymore.
[African music plays]
The oldest of the elders just
told us welcome back home,
you're home, you're our family,
your family is here.
And every person just
echoed that sentiment,
and it really did feel that way.
[Justin] He's very
glad because your ancestor
write his story
and because of his story
you know the route
and you've come back home.
[Altevese Rosario]
I am so overwhelmed.
[Tara Roberts] I have snot
coming out my nose now.
[Altevese Rosario] Like,
I'm thinking, okay this is the
path that he walked.
Like even just in his normal
everyday, just going places,
this is the ground
that his feet touched,
and then coming back
into the village,
these are the
songs that he sang.
These are the
dances that he did.
These are the drums
that he saw, and he heard.
[Tara Roberts] Yes,
yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
These are the faces that he saw.
[Altevese Rosario]
These are the faces,
these are his people,
and these are my people,
and they're saying
you're home, you're home.
[Tara Roberts] Yes, yes, yes!
This isn't even
my story, but it is my story.
[Altevese Rosario]
It is your story,
it's all of our stories, it is.
It is your story.
[Tara Roberts] The moment had
finally come to ceremoniously
bring Cudjo Lewis home.
[Altevese Rosario] So it was a
ceremony that we had to perform,
a ritual that could only be
performed by blood relatives.
And it had to do with us
giving him an offering,
and it was really just
us inviting him back,
his spirit back
into the village,
and then sealing it in a way
where his spirit is tethered
to his village.
[Delisha Marshall]
I'm so excited.
[Cassandra Lewis] I had to
get down and draw the map.
[Garry Lumbers]
Pour it out, Cassandra.
We're going to put
Pop-pop in the middle.
Put the heart in there, yeah.
[Cassandra Lewis] We
spread Cudjo's and his wife's
soil in the middle
with the heart.
[Altevese Rosario]
We placed soil from our
other ancestors from Mobile,
bringing them home as well.
[Garry Lumbers]
Tell them to call Cudjo.
Tell him to come home.
[group chanting in Bon]
[Garry Lumbers] Louder.
Louder! Louder! Louder!
[group chanting in Bon]
Bring him home, come on.
Bring him home!
That wasn't just me.
That was the family.
That was the
people of the village.
That was everybody!
Come on, come on,
come on, come on, come on!
[chanting continues and fades]
[Cassandra Lewis] When it ended.
I said is it done?
And he said yes.
So I had to turn to
everybody and say it's done.
[Tara Roberts] It wasn't
my family returning home.
But it was.
The stories of our ancestors,
specifically
African American people,
are human stories.
And they're not just about
the condition of enslavement.
There is joy.
There is power.
There is agency.
This work is about discovery.
[Garry Lumbers] We're ready.
We're good, we're good.
[Tara Roberts] It's about
remembering and honoring and
reckoning and restoring,
and ultimately,
it's about healing.
[Altevese Rosario] Where
we performed our ceremony,
that is a part of the three
acres of land that the village
has gifted us.
The expectation is
that we come back.
Which we will.
[African music plays]
[Tara Roberts] Our
journey wasn't over yet.
The town of Bant
had a surprise for
Cudjo's descendants.
[Altevese Rosario] Oh
my goodness gracious,
you have got to be kidding me.
[Cassandra Lewis]
When we saw it,
I spotted it from afar,
and I couldn't take
my eyes off of it.
The statue was so beautiful.
[Altevese Rosario]
Wow, look at this!
[Tara Roberts] Do you
want to read it out loud?
[Altevese Rosario]
"Cudjo Oluale Kossola Lewis
from Benin to Alabama, USA,
last survivor of the
last known slave ship to
enter the United States.
He was one of over 100
African men and women purchased
and brought across the
Atlantic to Mobile, Alabama,
aboard the slave ship Clotilda."
[Garry Lumbers]
They never forgot him.
He must've sent out some
strong vibes back here, man,
for them to
remember him like this.
[Altevese Rosario] Yeah.
[Tara Roberts] My hope that
as people listen to this story,
as they connect
to this miraculous,
amazing opportunity
for the descendants to
connect with their roots,
that something gets
healed in our world.
And that feels like,
that's everything.