In his diary, Antera Duke (ca.1735-ca.1809) wrote the only surviving eyewitness account of the slave trade by an African merchant. A leader in late eighteenth-century Old Calabar, a cluster of Efik-speaking communities in the Cross River region, he resided in Duke Town, forty-five miles from the Atlantic Ocean in what is now southeast Nigeria. His diary, written in trade English from 1785 to 1788, is a candid account of daily life in an African community at the height of Calabar's overseas...

In "The Confessions of Nat Turner," the eponymous protagonist recounts the harrowing journey that culminated in the 1831 slave rebellion in Virginia. Written in a deeply confessional style, the text oscillates between a stark realism and poignant introspection, capturing the psychological turmoil of enslaved individuals and their struggle for dignity and autonomy. The narrative stands as both a historical document and a piece of creative literature, inviting readers into the complexities o...

‘An exemplary work of investigative journalism that is also a wonderfully colourful book of history and travel’ Observer, Books of the Year‘A piece of postmodern historiography of quite extraordinary sophistication and ingenuity… [written with] exceptional delicacy and restraint’ TLSTo Westerners, the name ‘Timbuktu’ long conjured a tantalising paradise, an African El Dorado where even the slaves wore gold. Beginning in the late eighteenth ...

The events that capitulated the Congo into prominence in 1960 were many: Congo’s recent independence from Belgium, Congo’s immense mineral wealth, the lack of leadership which plunged the country into civil war, and the harsh treatment by the Belgians of the native population for the proceeding 100 years. The first democratically elected Prime Minister was deposed in a coup shortly after his election because of his communist ties and because he objected to the Belgian-backed secession of t...

The Tragedy of Victory: On-the-Spot Account of the Nigeria-Biafra War in the Atlantic Theatre is a chronological narrative of the war that lasted from July 6, 1967 to January 15, 1970. With about 500 photographs and maps and facts, told with accuracy, the well-organised and efficient Third Marine Commandos, earlier commanded by Col. Benjamin Adekunle (with Lt. Col. G. Alabi-Isama, as the Chief of Staff) had already controlled the Atlantic coast from Bonny to Calabar before Col. Olusegun Obas...

Endowed with natural resources, majestic bodies of fresh water, and a relatively mild climate, the Great Lakes region of Central Africa has also been the site of some of the world's bloodiest atrocities. In Rwanda, Burundi, and the Congo-Kinshasa, decades of colonial subjugation—most infamously under Belgium's Leopold II—were followed by decades of civil warfare that spilled into neighboring countries. When these conflicts lead to horrors such as the 1994 Rwandan genocide, ethnic differenc...

'If you want to understand Nigeria's history in one succinct go, this is a very good choice.'Noo Saro-WiwaKnown as the African Giant, Nigeria's story is complex and often contradictory. How, despite the ravages of colonialism, civil war, ongoing economic disappointment and most recently the Boko Haram insurgency, has the country managed to stay together for a hundred years? Why, despite an abundance of oil, mineral and agricultural wealth, have so many of its people remained...

Apartheid.It's not a bygone political ideology. It's something within a lot of us.In this book Mark Howard takes a very personal look at the political system he grew up in.He links that to later experiences, post apartheid and outside of South Africa, and concludes that an inhumane system associated with a single period and place in history is in fact more than that.Apartheid is as much a personal preference as it is a political system.His personal e...

Through the Dark Continent is essential reading for anyone interested in nineteenth century Africa and the European explorers who travelled through it.Sir Henry Morton Stanley (1841-1904) was a Welsh-American journalist and explorer who was famous for his exploration of central Africa and his search for missionary and explorer David Livingstone. Upon finding Livingstone, Stanley reportedly asked, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" Stanley is also known for his search fo...

International media coverage in the 1960s and early 1970s represented the Biafran War, in which the state of Biafra attempted to secede from the Nigerian Federation, as a grand humanitarian disaster, characterised by sustained conflict, starvation and genocide. Using interviews and newly-released archival material, Michael Gould questions this depiction, examining the role of foreign parties in the conflict and the impact of propaganda upon its international reception both during and after...

Economic, political, and ethnic favoritism are common themes in the historiography of colonial Africa. Land ownership and control, and the abilities of the respective landscapes to sustain Africa’s growing population amidst the throes of climate change, have created recurrent identity crises throughout Africa.The book’s chapters elevate the discussion on recurrent environmental issues, the problems of contested ownership of land, autochthonism as well as the interaction and blendin...

This seminal work tells the story of Ghana's gold miners, one of the oldest and most militant groups of workers in Africa. It is a story of struggle against exploitative mining companies, repressive governments and authoritarian trade union leaders.Drawing on a wide range of original sources, including previously secret government and company records, Jeff Crisp explores the changing nature of life and work in the gold mines, from the colonial era into the 1980s, and examines the d...