Recaptive number 11,407
Poet Raymond Antrobus traces the lost story of a deaf man freed from slavery.
An astonishing series of documents in Sierra Leone named the Registers of Liberated Africans record details of Africans freed from slavery by the British Royal Navy in the 19th Century. There is one entry in the registers that simply says 'Recaptive Number 11,407, without name, deaf and dumb'. In this documentary mixing poetry and new historical research, award-winning deaf poet Raymond Antrobus goes on a personal journey to Sierra Leone to trace a piece of forgotten history and try to find out what became of this deaf man without a name.
Producer: Ant Adeane
Editor: Damon Rose
Historical consultants: Suzanne Schwarz, professor of history, University of Worcester and Henry Lovejoy, associate professor of African diaspora, University of Colorado Boulder.
(Photo: Raymond Antrobus (L) and Bosedeh George (R) sitting in front of the Cotton Tree)
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- Tue 25 Oct 202201:32GMTBBC World Service
- Tue 25 Oct 202208:06GMTBBC World Service
- Tue 25 Oct 202212:32GMTBBC World Service South Asia, East Asia, East and Southern Africa & West and Central Africa only
- Tue 25 Oct 202219:06GMTBBC World Service except East and Southern Africa & West and Central Africa
- Sun 30 Oct 202205:32GMTBBC World Service except Australasia, East Asia & South Asia
