It was only in the 21st century that we learned about a settlement on the Manatee River that was a community of freedom-seeking people. Archaeology and archival research found that from the 1770s to 1821, maroons lived south of the Manatee River in a community known as Angola.
Archaeology revealed material traces of Angola, a history so erased by the 20th century that it was unthinkable. The research into Angola was sparked by Vickie Oldham, a community scholar who wanted the history better known. Archaeology needs supporters and enthusiasts like her.
Angola is designated part of the Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, which denotes sites that freedom-seeking people used as hideaways in the early 19th century.
On July 27, 1816 US Naval forces destroyed the fort at Prospect Bluff on the Apalachicola River, which was a refuge of African Seminoles, self-emancipated people of African heritage, and formerly enslaved African Americans (maroons). Survivors fled to the Suwannee River, but the 1818 Battle of Suwannee pushed some of them further south to the Tampa Bay area. In 1821, the Maroon communities were attacked again, this time survivors fled inland, or to Cape Florida, or to the British Bahamas where their descendants lived in freedom.
Excavations recently revealed traces of Angola, an early 19th century maroon community on the Manatee River. Angola is a chapter in a decades-long history for peoples of African heritage that stretches from the Apalachicola River to Tampa Bay at the end of the Second Spanish Period (1783-1821). For the Black Seminoles, also known as exiles, formerly enslaved, and free blacks, African Seminoles, and freedom-seeking people, the period from 1816-1821, which is less well-known than the earlier Fort Mosé and the later Second Seminole War eras, includes several locations on the Gulf Coast.
The “Looking for Angola” project was initiated by Vickie Oldham, a Sarasota resident and producer of local historical documentaries, after she heard mention of Angola while working on a documentary about African Americans in Sarasota. Cuban fisherfolk once referred to the area as "Angola". The Angola settlement may have been named after Anglicized title for rulers, Ngola, of the Ndongo kingdom in what is present-day Angola. There is still much to uncover of its history.
LEARN MORE ABOUT WHERE ANGOLA WAS AND SEE THE FREEDOM SEEKERS EXHIBIT
SEE VIRTUAL RECREATIONS OF ANGOLA