1841 — The Amistad Africans Win Their Freedom

On March 9, 1841, the United States Supreme Court ruled seven to one that the Mende Africans of the slave ship Amistad had been illegally enslaved and ought to be deemed free. Led by Sengbe Pieh, they had seized the schooner in 1839 and fought to sail home.

Former President John Quincy Adams, then seventy-three, argued their defense before the court. The surviving Africans sailed home to West Africa that November. Captives who had taken their freedom into their own hands on the sea now had it confirmed in law, and their long journey ended where it had begun, at home.