Paulo d’Angola: the Former Slave Who Became One of Greenwich Village’s First Landowners
In 1626, Paulo d’Angola arrived to New Amsterdam on the first ship bringing enslaved people to this region.
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Tag: Director General William Kieft
Anthony Congo, Freed Slave and Early Lower Manhattan Landowner
On March 26, 1647, Anthony (also referred to as Antony) Congo, a newly manumitted slave of the Dutch West India Company, was granted six acres of land by the Council of New Amsterdam just east of the Bowery. His was one of more than thirty land grants to freed slaves by the Dutch New Amsterdam […]
North America’s First Freed Black Settlement Right in our Neighborhood
In continuing our celebration of black history, we have a new and exciting entry to our Civil Rights and Social Justice Map: North America’s First Freed Black Settlement. According to historian Christopher Moore, the first legally emancipated community of people of African descent in North America was found in Lower Manhattan, comprising much of present-day […]