The Record Scratch: Uncovering Documents Relating to William Ansah Sessarakoo

I want to be clear, I know full well how fortunate I am to have the job that I do. As a part of the curatorial staff at the William L. Clements Library at the University of Michigan, I have the great privilege of spending my days organizing, describing, reveling in, and teaching with incredible, one-of-a-kind historical materials relating to early America. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t some tasks that are just dead boring.

I had been delaying one such chore for years after trying and failing to muster the time, energy, and perseverance to complete it. The Clements holds the papers of Charles Townshend (1725-1767), who served as Secretary of War during the Seven Years’ War and the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the decades leading up to the American Revolution. These days, he is mostly known as the straw man for incendiary British taxation policies due to his role in sponsoring the infamous Townshend Acts. Internally at the library, however, we mostly grumbled about him under our breath because his papers were in a complicated arrangement, the finding aid was difficult to navigate, and the boxes even harder to pull for researchers. It needed someone to puzzle out what was in each box and add descriptive information to the finding aid to make it more manageable. Unfortunately, I don’t have a penchant for economic history, so figuring out how to describe the contents of “Miscellaneous Treasury Papers” meant trying to disambiguate a great many reports on tariffs, duties, and excises.

 

Figure 1: More than just eighteenth-century portraiture trends connect Charles Townshend, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and William Ansah Sessarakoo, the son of a leading West African caboceer. The Miriam and Ira Wallach Division of Art, Prints, and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library. “The Right Honble. Charles Townshend Esqr. Late Chancellor of the Exchequer, and One of His Majesty’s Most Honble. Privy Council.” 1777-1890. New York Public Library Digital Collections and Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Photographs and Prints Division, The New York Public Library. “William Ansah Sessarakoo.” 1749. New York Public Library Digital Collections.

There are always joys while going through manuscripts—an unexpected doodle, a funny quote, beautiful papers—but most of what I was encountering was financial document after financial document–Until one stopped me right in my tracks. It referred to expenses “for the two African Gentlemen at Barbadoes.” Written in 1747, the use of “Gentlemen” to describe African peoples was eye-catching enough, but glancing down at the accounts, the entries for making waistcoats, providing pocket money, buying ruffled shirts, and more signaled something extraordinary.

 

Figure 2: While seeming to be an innocuous-looking financial account at first glance, the title of this document shows it relates to the “two African Gentlemen” and an intriguing historical moment. Charles Townshend Papers, Box 15, Folders 21-36, William L. Clements Library, The University of Michigan.

Turns out this was a clutch of some twenty documents relating to the financial transactions of a man named David Crichton in 1747 and 1748 while he was in Barbados—receipts for goods purchased, lodging expenses, bills of sale for enslaved people, and associated legal fees. The lawyers’ bills were made out to Crichton, “on Account of the African Company of England,” indicating he was operating in at least a semi-formal capacity with one of the largest slaving enterprises of the day. So paying a tailor to make a bespoke suit out of scarlet fabrics for African men seemed . . .  out of character. And these documents’ presence nestled in a top bureaucrat’s archive next to paperwork relating to trade with Russia, fishery expenses in Nova Scotia, and goods captured by Algerines was unexpected at best. I shuffled through them several times trying to figure out how they were connected.

And then, a document written from Bridgetown, Barbados, laid it all out:

“Whereas John Corrantee and the Caboceers of Annamabo are at present exceedingly well disposed towards the British Nation, and beg the resettlement of that place by the English, and the fort to be rebuilt And whereas a Son of John Corrantee’s Named Ansah was sold here by Captain Hamilton who he (Corrantee) is very anxious to have redeemed We hereby give it as our Opinion that the Redemption of the said Ansah will be very acceptable to John Corrantee (who is the leading man at Annamabo) . . . and will be a means to conciliate Corrantee to, and rivet him in the Interest of the British Nation in opposition to the French, who have been aiming for some Years past at the aforesaid settlement.”

OH.

OH NO.

This pile of paperwork, then, was all related to a flurry of activity by agents of the Royal African Company to fix a colossal betrayal.  Eno Baise Kurentsi, commonly referred to by the British as John Corrantee, was a prominent trader and political figure at the important Gold Coast port of Anomabo. Adept at playing the French and British against each other to advance his trading interests, Kurentsi had previously sent one of his sons to visit France. In the early 1740s he agreed to allow another of his sons, William Ansah Sessarakoo, to accompany a British merchant who offered to take Sessarakoo to England to be similarly educated and feted when he was done trading on the Gold Coast. The captain of that ship, however, instead sold Sessarakoo into slavery in Barbados. In light of this treachery, Eno Baise Kurentsi’s willingness to trade with the English was understandably diminished. The Royal African Company would have to do some MAJOR damage control in a desperate attempt to fix the situation, appease Kurentsi, and keep a foothold in this critical West African region in the face of active French competition. It’s a dramatic event and it has rightfully garnered scholarly attention, including in Randy Sparks’ notable history Where the Negroes are Masters: An African Port in the Era of the Slave Trade. Glancing at the footnotes, though, the materials I had stumbled across had not been consulted and the clues they provided promised to shift our understanding of the events.

Figure 3: This map depicting the British King’s dominions shows Anomabo on the eastern edge and Barbados on the western, underscoring the key role the triangular trade played not only in British government and politics in the era but also Sessarkoo’s life story. A Map of the King of Great Britain’s Dominions in Europe, Africa, and America (London: s.n., ca. 1740). Courtesy of the American Antiquarian Society.

The unexpected bundle of documents in Townshend’s archive tells us that it was David Crichton, an agent for the Royal African Company who had spent significant time in West Africa, who got involved to locate William Ansah Sessarakoo, secure his freedom, and uphold the original promise to bring Kurentsi’s son to London. The financial documents paint a very clear picture of exactly how Crichton tried to fix the problem. By October 1747, Crichton was in Barbados and had begun purchasing finery for William Ansah Sessarakoo, also referred to as “Cupid,” and his companion, a young man named “Frederick” who had been sent from Anomabo with Crichton as a sign of faith in the endeavor and to ensure the success of the mission. By February 1748, Crichton had finalized Sessarakoo’s freedom, and for the next several months he provided lodging, food, fine clothing, and pocket money for the pair. Studying the receipts, you get a clear sense of just how much crow Crichton knew that the Royal African Company had to eat to repair the situation. By the time William Ansah Sessarakoo departed Barbados for London in the summer of 1748, his new wardrobe consisted of at least the following:

  • two pairs of pumps
  • six pairs of stockings
  • two waistcoats
  • breeches
  • buckles and knee buckles
  • a full suit of clothing made from broadcloth, durant, linen, and two types of scarlet cloth, adorned with silk twist and thread, white metal coat buttons, and whitewashed breast buttons
  • a hat with silver lace
  • ruffled shirts
  • more stockings and another hat

Meanwhile, his companion Frederick also received pocket money, though less frequently, and was provided with shoes, knee buckles, tailored clothing, a feathered hat, and a velvet cap.

Figure 4: This tailor’s receipt from 1747 shows in great detail the quality of clothing Crichton was providing as he worked on Sessarakoo’s redemption.

When William Ansah and Frederick arrived in London in the late summer of 1748, it was under the protection of George Montagu-Dunk, 2nd Earl of Halifax and the President of the Board of Trade. While there, expenses documented in the clutch of receipts indicate that the purchases of fine fashion continued, with entries for a peruke maker, drapers and tailors, more shoes, a surtout, stockings, another hat. The British were well aware of the power African leaders had over their access to goods and enslaved people, and the luxuries offered in apology were intended to be visually recognizable as such to Sessarakoo’s father.

Figure 5a: 18th-century views of London like these depict the high society world William Ansah Sessarakoo and Frederick would have entered upon their arrival in England. “Vue et Perspective du Parc de St. James, avec une partie de la Ville de Londres prise du Côté de Rosomonds.” William L. Clements Library Digital Collections.
Figure 5b: “La Vüe de la Grande Allée du Jardin de Vauxhall prise de l’Entrée. Prospectus Majoris deambulatorii horti Vauxhall ab Introitu.” William L. Clements Library Digital Collections.

William Ansah Sessarakoo and his companion Frederick became minor celebrities during their stay in England. They met King George II and attended a party hosted by the Duke of Richmond. Their attendance at a performance of Thomas Southerne’s tragic play Oroonoko was reported in The Gentleman’s Magazine. A short, anonymously written book The Royal African was printed, spinning the story into one that favored the Royal African Company, and William Dodd wrote poetry loosely based on the saga. In 1749, Sessarakoo had his portrait painted by Gabriel Mathias, in which he appears well dressed in a red coat and possibly a finely coiffed peruke. I cannot know if any of these goods were the ones provided by Crichton in Barbados and London to smooth ruffled feathers, but it is telling just how prominently fine fashion continued to matter in the public relations campaign to redeem the British from being seen by African traders as deceitful and untrustworthy partners. They signaled that concessions were being made, respect was being offered, and that it was worth Kurentsi’s time to come back to the table to engage with the British.

Figure 6: William Ansah Sessarakoo’s portrait very deliberately shows him in exquisite finery, paralleling the clothing expenses that appear in Crichton’s accounts. Gabriel Mathias, Portrait of William Ansah Sessarakoo, son of Eno Baisie Kurentsi (John Currantee) of Anomabu (fl. 1736-1749), 1749. Menil Collection, Gabriel Mathias, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

This story made it into both printed and handwritten records, and scholars have studied it for a wide range of reasons. A quick search of Google Books for “William Ansah Sessarakoo” brings up titles about African politics and diplomacy, Black portraiture, religion in the age of slavery, British theatre and literature, and more. But these histories don’t reference the rich grouping of documents in the Charles Townshend Papers, and why would they? Who would think to winnow through the British Chancellor of the Exchequer’s archival footprint to find anything about this case?  Many of the researchers who travel to the William L. Clements Library to consult Townshend’s papers are studying high law and politics, financial policies, the evolution of the British state and empire, and the lead up to the American Revolution. That’s all for a good reason. The Library of Congress Subject Headings assigned to the collection are terms like “Customs administration,” “Finance, Public–Great Britain” and “Great Britain. Treasury.” In describing large collections, curators and archivists regularly must use standardized language that best encompasses the whole. The trick is trying to remember what might lay hidden in between those broad strokes.

Because as it turns out, as much as this clutch of papers is about a specific story of Atlantic slavery it still absolutely relates to British finance and national politics. David Crichton paid for his portion of all this out of his own pocket, and at this point the struggling Royal African Company was not great at paying their debts. Crichton was imprisoned for the ones he incurred while serving as their agent, and he is directly named in the 1750 African Company Act that dissolved the insolvent company, reorganized it into the African Company of Merchants, and tried to wrangle all the lingering financial messes. One presumes that in Crichton’s desperate attempt to get repaid in this hubbub, his proof of expenditures made it all the way to the Treasury and Charles Townshend, among whose papers they still reside. The British government would want to keep tabs on how the Royal African Company was addressing a diplomatic crisis that threatened their access to enslaved people that fueled a brutal and highly lucrative plantation economy. The stories of Atlantic slavery, African trade politics, and British finance are all intertwined. Curators must keep their attention sharp for hints of such interconnection in the collections they care for, and historians must remain ever curious about what might be nestled within troves of paperwork that feel too far afield to be worth considering at first glance.

Now that these materials have been spotlighted, they promise to help further flesh out this dramatic historic moment. The identity of the captain who initially sold William Ansah Sessarakoo into slavery in Barbados has been disputed, but the papers here clearly name a Captain Hamilton. The exact date of Sessarakoo’s enslavement is vague, but printed portraits of him state that it occurred in 1744. It was also known from reports that by October 1747 a Royal African Company officer, John Roberts, had spoken with Eno Baise Kurentsi, who tasked Roberts “to redeem his son who had been sold at Barbadoes for a Slave in the case of the death of Mr. Crichton.” This statement has previously been interpreted to mean Crichton was the ship captain and his death instigated the debacle. Now, having David Crichton clearly named as a Royal African Company agent, we know this instead means that Kurentsi was actually making a contingency plan. Should Crichton die, Roberts was to take up the work of freeing Sessarakoo.

These records give us a narrowed window from William Ansah Sessarakoo’s reputed sale into slavery around 1744 to Eno Baise Kurentsi’s awareness that the Royal African Company’s agent David Crichton was trying to secure his son’s freedom in 1747. Searching the Slave Voyages databases within this general timeframe, there is seemingly only one relevant hit—Captain Thomas Hamilton of the Valentine, who departed Liverpool in April 1742 and disembarked 282 enslaved people in the West Indies in March 1743, a little earlier than the portrait captions indicated. Directly naming Hamilton as having actively sold Sessarakoo also indicates this was not a mix-up caused by the death of a captain during an Atlantic voyage, but a deliberate act. Knowing the name of the ship that likely carried Sessarakoo into slavery also raises other intriguing questions. While The Royal African contended that Sessarakoo’s alias “Cupid” stemmed from English traders’ appreciation for his “sweet and amiable Temper,” the romantic name of the vessel that bore him into slavery suggests a possible alternative origin grounded instead in the sardonic cruelties of renaming enslaved peoples upon their arrival in the West Indies.

Figure 7: In June 1750 The Gentleman’s Magazine published “An account of 2 African princes,” featuring Ayuba Sulieman Diallo and William Ansah Sessarakoo, both of whom had been sold into slavery and eventually redeemed. Their portraits accompanied the article, suggesting the public’s interest in the cases. “Two African Princes,” Gentleman’s Magazine and Historical Chronicle (London: 1750). CC0. Courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution.

We now have a better lead on who had sold Sessarakoo, but who had purchased him has also been unclear. The Royal African only stated that the person who held Sessarakoo in slavery was “a Gentleman of Distinguished character.” In Townshend’s Papers, however, we now have a bill of sale that shows Crichton redeemed “Ansah Sassaracoo alias Cupid” from Jonathan Blenman, “Attorney General at Barbadoes.” This pinpoints Sessarakoo’s enslaver as Jonathan Blenman (active 1710-1766), who had joined the English Bar in 1717, moved to Barbados by 1718, and worked as a lawyer before serving variously as the island’s Attorney General and Judge of the Vice Admiralty Court. By 1735 he had purchased a plantation in St. George’s Parish and had a townhouse in Bridgetown. A “Gentleman of Distinguished character,” indeed.

Figure 8: This bill of sale indicates Jonathan Blenman, Attorney General of Barbados, held Sessarakoo in slavery and provides a concrete date for when he was redeemed. Courtesy of the William L. Clements Library.

The bill of sale shows that Sessarakoo was formally redeemed on February 11, 1748, by the Royal African Company agent David Crichton for £120. The flurry of financial activity in June 1748 suggests this may have been close to when Sessarakoo and Frederick departed Barbados for England, as Crichton finalized plans and closed accounts. Receipts for lodging and clothing appeared again in England in August 1748, giving us a firmer date of their arrival. It was also previously unclear who Sessarakoo’s companion was, but the repeated presence of Frederick in these financial documents provides us with at least a first name. This clutch of documents in Charles Townshend’s papers, then, gives us a much clearer timeline of events, names of individuals involved, and potential for future research to more fully tell William Ansah Sessarakoo’s story while in Barbados. They also give us another window into just how entwined stories of human enslavement are to the histories of British empire, finances, and politics. Perhaps finding Sessarakoo and Townshend in conversation shouldn’t have felt as surprising as it was.

Indeed, by 1752, the Board of Trade put forth a memorial about rebuilding the fort at Anomabo, with the consent and aid of Eno Baise Kurentsi. They consulted a committee of merchants who asserted that “they considered Annamaboe as the Key to the whole Trade of the Gold Coast.” They conferred with David Crichton, “formerly Chief Agent for the old Company at Cape Coast Castle, and a Person well acquainted with the Situation and Circumstance of the Place.” The Board ultimately agreed to recommend the fort’s construction, because it would “tend to promote Trade—by serving the Friendship and Assistance of John Corrantee and his Family, upon which this Trade so greatly Depends.” On that committee sat Charles Townshend, who likely knew all too well the particular details of what it took to secure the friendship of the Corrantee family. And now, thanks to his papers, so do we.

The finding aid for the Charles Townshend Papers at the William L. Clements Library has been updated to include an explicit statement about the documents relating to William Ansah Sessarakoo, in the hopes they draw more researchers to them. Scans of this material are provided in the Further Reading section to encourage further study.

 

Further Reading: 

“Mr. Crichton’s Papers,” Charles Townshend Papers, Box 15, Folders 21-36, William L. Clements Library, The University of Michigan. (View Scans)

“An act for extending and improving the trade to Africa,” in Danby Pickering, The Statutes at Large, from the 23d to the 26th Year of King George II. Vol. 20. Cambridge: Joseph Bentham, 1765.

“Blenman of Barbados,” in Vere Langford Oliver, Caribbeana: Being Miscellaneous Papers Relating to the History, Genealogy, Topography, and Antiquities of the British West Indies, Vol. 5 (London: Mitchell, Hughes & Clark, 1919): 153-155.

Rob S. Cox and Shannon Wait, “Finding Aid for the Charles Townshend Papers,” William L. Clements Library, The University of Michigan, Accessed November 8, 2024. https://findingaids.lib.umich.edu/catalog/umich-wcl-M-1773tow

John Faber, eng., after Gabriel Mathias, “William Ansah Sessarakoo,” ([London]: [mid-18th century]), National Portrait Gallery, London, Accessed November 8, 2024. https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw13960/William-Ansah-Sessarakoo

Ruth A. Fisher, “Extracts from the Records of the African Companies [Part 3],” The Journal of Negro History 13, no. 3 (July 1928): 343-367.

Ruth A. Fisher, “Extracts from the Records of the African Companies [Part 4],” The Journal of Negro History 13, no. 3 (July 1928): 367-394.

Ryan Hanley, “The Royal Slave: Nobility, Diplomacy and the ‘African Prince’ in Britain, 1748-1752,” Itinerario 39, no. 2 (2015): 329-47.

Journal of the Commissioners for Trade and Plantations From January 1749-50 to December 1753 (London: His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1932): 260.

Gabriel Matthias, Portrait of William Ansah Sessarakoo, son of Eno Baisie Kurentsi (John Currantee) of Anomabu, Oil on canvas, 1749. The Menil Collection.

The Royal African: Or, Memoirs of the Young Prince of Annamaboe (London: W. Reeve, 1749).

SlaveVoyages, Voyage ID 94787. Accessed November 8, 2024. www.slavevoyages.org

  1. D. Smith, Slavery, Family, and Gentry Capitalism in the British Atlantic: The World of the Lascelles, 1648–1834 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006).

Randy J. Sparks, Where the Negroes are Masters: An African Port in the Era of the Slave Trade (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2014).

“A Young African Prince Sold for a Slave,” The Gentleman’s Magazine, 19 (February 1749): 89-90.

 

This article originally appeared in June 2025.

Jayne Ptolemy received her Ph.D. in African American Studies and History from Yale University in 2013. She has since worked in various roles at the William L. Clements Library, The University of Michigan, where she currently serves as the Associate Curator of Manuscripts.