08/20/2026
THROWBACK THURSDAY
On August 20th, 1619, the arrival of 20 men, women, and children from the Kingdom of Ndongo (today's Angola) at Jamestown marked the beginning of slavery in the New World. They were captured by Portuguese slave traders and then taken by British privateers who sold them to the colony.
There we no laws establishing slavery in Virginia, so the first recorded Africans in a British Colony were treated as indentured servants. In later decades, colonial laws shifted and Virginia established slavery in the 1660s . When it was established sixty years later as the last British Colony, Georgia outlawed the institution, but the ban was quickly removed.
Enslaved people arrived in Madison with the first settlers. The city was literally built on enslaved labor. When Sherman's March to the Sea arrived on Madison's streets in 1864 - 22 months after the Emancipation Proclamation - people held in slavery for generations were instantly set free. This immediately began a new journey of freedom for people seeing equal rights and protection as new American citizens.
On our Historic Madison Tour, we help you understand why Madison's story must be told with black and white perspective. How you experienced Madison's history was entirely dependent on the color of your skin.