The Royal African Company (RAC) was an English trading company established in 1660 by the House of Stuart and City of London merchants to trade along the West African coast. It was overseen by the Duke of York, the brother of Charles II of England; the RAC was founded after Charles II ascended to the English throne in the 1660 Stuart Restoration, and he granted it a monopoly on all English trade with Africa. While the company's original purpose was to trade for gold in the Gambia River, as Prince Rupert of the Rhine had identified gold deposits in the region during the Interregnum, the RAC quickly began trading in slaves, which became its largest commodity.
Cape Coast Castle is one of about forty "slave castles", or large commercial forts, built on the Gold Coast of West Africa by European traders. It was originally a Portuguese "feitoria" or trading post, established in 1555, which they named Cabo Corso.
The Dutch Gold Coast or Dutch Guinea, officially Dutch possessions on the Coast of Guinea was a portion of contemporary Ghana that was gradually colonized by the Dutch, beginning in 1612. The Dutch began trading in the area around 1598, joining the Portuguese which had a trading post there since the late 1400s. Eventually, the Dutch Gold Coast became the most important Dutch colony in West Africa after Fort Elmina was captured from the Portuguese in 1637, but fell into disarray after the abolition of the slave trade in the early 19th century. On 6 April 1872, the Dutch Gold Coast was, in accordance with the Anglo-Dutch Treaties of 1870–71, ceded to the United Kingdom.
The Portuguese Gold Coast was a Portuguese colony on the West African Gold Coast along the Gulf of Guinea. Established in 1482, the colony was officially incorporated into Dutch territory in 1642. From their seat of power at the fortress of São Jorge da Mina, the Portuguese commanded a vast internal slave trade, creating a slave network that would expand after the end of Portuguese colonialism in the region. The primary export of the colony was gold, which was obtained through barter with the local population. Portuguese presence along the Gold Coast increased seamanship and trade in the Gulf, introduced American crops into the African agricultural landscape, and made Portuguese an enduring language of trade in the area.
Fort Prinzenstein is a fort located at Keta, Ghana, which was used in the slave trade. Many such forts were built in Africa, but Prinzenstein is one of the few that lie east of the Volta River. Keta served as an open port until the Tema Harbour commenced its operation to the west in 1962. The fort has been designated a World Heritage Site because of its historical importance and testimony to the Atlantic slave trade.
Osu Castle is a castle located in Osu, Ghana, on the coast of the Gulf of Guinea in Africa.
The Treaty of Butre between the Netherlands and Ahanta was signed at Butre, Dutch Gold Coast on 27 August 1656. The treaty regulated the jurisdiction of the Netherlands and the Dutch West India Company over the town of Butre and the surrounding country of Upper Ahanta, creating a Dutch protectorate over the area, and permitting the establishment of Fort Batenstein. The treaty lasted until the Dutch departure from the Gold Coast in April 1872.
Fort Patience is a Dutch-built fort located in the township of Apam, in the Central Region of Ghana. Originally built in 1697, it served as a defensive fortification and a trading post. Because of its testimony to European pre-colonial and colonial influence in West Africa, the fort was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List along with several other forts and castles in Ghana.
Fort Saint Anthony was a fort built by the Portuguese in 1515 near the town of Axim, in what is now Ghana. In 1642, the Dutch captured the fort and subsequently made it part of the Dutch Gold Coast. The Dutch expanded the fort considerably before they turned it over, with the rest of their colony, to the British in 1872. The fort is now the property of the Ghanaian state and is open to the public.
Ussher Fort is a fort in Accra, Ghana. It was built by the Dutch in 1649 as Fort Crèvecœur, and is two days' march from Elmina and to the east of Accra on a rocky point between two lagoons. It was one of three forts that Europeans built in the region during the middle of the 17th century. Fort Crèvecœur was part of the Dutch Gold Coast. The Anglo-Dutch Gold Coast Treaty (1867), which defined areas of influence on the Gold Coast, transferred it to the British in 1868. Because of its significance in the history of European colonial trade and exploitation in Africa, the fort was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1979.
Fort Batenstein was a fort and trading post established by the Dutch on the Gold Coast in 1656. It was situated near Butre. The fort was ceded with the entire Dutch Gold Coast to Britain in 1872.
Fort Orange was built as a trading post on the Dutch Gold Coast in 1642, near Sekondi in the Western Region of Ghana. It functioned as a lodge for a while during the 1670s and that was the original purpose for the fort before it was used as a trading post. The trading post was enlarged into a fort in 1690. It was joined by an English Fort Sekondi in 1682. It was sold with the rest of the Dutch Gold Coast to the United Kingdom in 1872, and now serves as a lighthouse. Because of its historical importance in trade between Europe and Africa, Fort Orange was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1979 along with several other castles and forts in Ghana.
Fort de Goede Hoop or Fort Good Hope was a fort on the Dutch Gold Coast, established in 1667 near Senya Beraku.
Fort William is a fort in Anomabu, Central Region, Ghana, originally known as Fort Anomabo and renamed Fort William in the 1830s by its then-commander, Brodie Cruickshank, who added one storey to the main building, and renamed the fort after King William IV.
Fort Komenda was a British fort on the Gold Coast, currently preserved as a ruin. Because of its testimony to the Atlantic slave trade and European economic and colonial influence in West Africa, the fort was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1979, along with several other castles and forts in Ghana.
The Komenda Wars were a series of wars from 1694 until 1700 largely between the Dutch West India Company and the English Royal African Company in the Eguafo Kingdom in the present day state of Ghana, over trade rights. The Dutch were trying to keep the English out of the region to maintain a trade monopoly, while the English were attempting to re-establish a fort in the city of Komenda. The fighting included forces of the Dutch West India Company, the Royal African Company, the Eguafo Kingdom, a prince of the kingdom attempting to rise to the throne, the forces of a powerful merchant named John Cabess, other Akan tribes and kingdoms like Twifo and Denkyira. There were four separate periods of warfare, including a civil war in the Eguafo Kingdom, and the wars ended with the English placing Takyi Kuma into power in Eguafo. Because of the rapidly shifting alliances between European and African powers, historian John Thornton has found that "there is no finer example of [the] complicated combination of European rivalry merging with African rivalry than the Komenda Wars."
John Cabess was a prominent African trader in the port city of Komenda, part of the Eguafo Kingdom, in modern-day Ghana. He was a major British ally and was a supplier to the British Royal African Company. As a trader, he became a strong economic and political force in the coastal region in the early 1700s, playing an active role in the Komenda Wars, the rise of the Ashanti Empire, the expansion of British involvement in West Africa, and the beginnings of large-scale Atlantic slave trade. Because of his combined economic and political power, historian Kwame Daaku named Cabess one of the "merchant princes" of the Gold Coast in the 1700s. He died in 1722, but his heirs continued to exert economic power in the port for the remainder of the 18th century.
Fort Frederiksborg, later Fort Royal, was a Danish and later English fort on the Gold Coast in contemporary Ghana. It was built in 1661, with the approval of the King of Fetu, a few hundred yards from Cape Coast Castle, which was at that time in Swedish hands, on Amanfro Hill. Along with several other castles and forts nearby, Fort Frederiksborg was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1979 because of its testimony to European economic influence on West Africa and the Atlantic slave trade.
The documented history of Elmina begins in 1482 with an agreement between the Portuguese navigator Diogo de Azambuja and the ruler of Elmina, called Caramansa by the Portuguese. In it, the Portuguese were allowed to build the first European fortress in sub-Saharan Africa. For the next 150 years until the conquest by the Dutch in 1637, Elmina was the capital of the Portuguese bases on the Gold Coast, then for about 250 years the capital of the Dutch Empire in West Africa. Since the capture of the lease for the two fortresses of Elmina by the Ashanti in 1701, the city was also important to the Ashanti Empire. Until the 19th century, Elmina was one of the most populous cities in the Gold Coast, surpassing Accra and Kumasi. The trade in gold, slaves and palm oil brought the city into direct contact with Europe, North America, Brazil and, through the recruitment of soldiers, also with Southeast Asia. It was not until the takeover and destruction of the city by the British in 1873 that Elmina lost its prominent position in the Gold Coast.
