Elmina Castle

Elmina Castle is a tourist attraction and World Heritage Monument in Cape Coast, Ghana. This hasn’t always been the case. Looking at the castle from the outside, nothing can ever prepare the unsuspecting visitor or tourist emotionally to hear about the tales of horror and atrocities that went on beyond those walls.

The Portuguese built the castle in 1482, originally established as a trading post for goods bartered for local gold and valuable gem. However, as the demand for slaves increased in the Americas and Caribbean, the castle became strategic in the perpetuation of this abhorrent human cargo trade. The storerooms of the castle were converted into dungeons, and the ownership of the castle changed hands several times, eventually ending up being seized by the British in 1872. By  

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this time, slavery had been abolished. The British didn't use Elmina to house slaves; they used Cape Coast Castle for that.

Elmina Castle, known then as the slave castle, is one of over twenty castles built along the shoreline of the Gold Coast (now known as Ghana). The Gold Coast was one of the richest markets for slave traders during the peak of the slave trade. Hundreds of thousands of captives passed through the dungeons of Elmina Castle, and were shipped off, like commodities into the Americas and Caribbean against their wishes. This illicit human trade carried on for close to 300 years.

Slaves were captured through civil wars, and out-and-out attacks on villages. In some cases, social deviants were alleged to have been sold into slavery. Other times also, slaves were simply captured by slave hunters, like Kunta Kinte was in the Gambia. They were shackled and made to march gruelling journeys, which could last hundreds of miles at times. It could be days or weeks before the slaves reached Elmina Castle and other castles and forts along the coast. Half of all captives did not even make it.

Not knowing what awaited them on the slave ships, those who made it to the coast were held captives in the castle’s dungeons. They were subjected to all sorts of indignities, intimidation and torture. They were shackled in the damp and dark dungeons. It is said that up to three hundred captives were packed into each dungeon, without room to even lift an arm or move around. Food was scarce and disease was rampant.

The unsanitary conditions under which the captives lived were unbelievable. Without room to breathe properly in those dungeons, the captives had to defecate there. The sick were often not attended to, and many of them died while held captives there. Air quality wasn’t a priority. The stench in those dungeons must have been nauseating. Even today, the dungeons still reek.

A visit to Elmina leaves one with an eerie feeling of ghostly hallucinations. As the tour guide is talking, it is easy to visualize hundreds of captives in the dungeons, screaming out their agonies, just pleading to be returned home. But alas, we know that didn’t happen. Countless number of them died under these atrocious conditions. Those who survived the dungeons had to endure further indignities of being shackled together, tightly packed like cattle, on those slave ships. As we all know, when they died, they were simply tossed over-board into the sea, and their names were forgotten.

Entrance fee is $7 for a foreign adult and $4 for students and $2 for children.