In 1808, the United States banned the import of slaves, effectively putting an end to the transatlantic slave trade. Or so the history writes, though the residents of Mobile, the African neighborhood of Ala know otherwise: Human trafficking continued for decades to come. More than half a century later, in 1860, many of their ancestors were smuggled into the port city on a ship called the Clotilda by white men who gambled they could get away with it — and they did, destroying the evidence. With no ship or statement available, federal investigators dropped their case against the perpetrators, Timothy Maher and Captain William Foster, though the evidence had been there the whole time, told by survivors and their families and retold.
Director Margaret Brown honors those voices in her stunning Sundance Award-winning documentary “Descendant,” which distinguishes between what goes through history (the version written by those in power) and the grim reality that eyewitnesses have kept alive for generations via word of mouth. The film delves deeper into many of the themes that Brown explored in her extraordinary 2008 film “The Order of Myths,” which is about Mardi Gras celebrations on mobile that are still separate. Back now where the wreckage of the Clotilda has been found, I notice how this bomb discovery leads some to close and a million questions to others.
Apparently the last known slave ship in America was the first to be on American soil. Finding it has enormous symbolic significance. By the time the ship was missing, some might have questioned the accounts told by survivors. Even worse, according to local judge Carlos Finlay, the freed Africans and their relatives were warned, “Do not repeat this story…because you could be killed, you could be lynched for making this accusation”—a chilling illustration of how the authorities enforce their version. From History in Jim Crow South.
Brown, who is white, honors and amplifies the decades-old work of late black author and director Zora Neale Hurston, whose book “Barracoon: The Story of the Last” Black Cargo” focuses on Africanatown founder (and Clotilda survivor) Cudjoe Lewis. From Hurston—who has chronicled the area’s oral history—and Lewis serves as inspiration for Brown in her approach, which is deeply involved in how to frame what happened and the voices of whom to focus.
This is a changing and sometimes contradictory conversation, covering everything from what a memorial looks like to talking about reparations. But Brown accepts the complexity of the situation, just as she did in The Order of Myths. In this project, I explored the opposing forces of white supremacy and black solidarity in Mardi Gras celebrations that remain separate from the world. Here, she testifies as these two halves – descendants of both Lewis and Foster – come together for a moment of healing at the site where Clotilda was found.
Missing from the conversation is the family of Timothy Maher, who orchestrated the one-off smuggling mission, dividing the 110 lives Clotilda carried among three farms. The Meahers remain prominent members of the Mobile community – one even served as Queen Mardi Gras in “The Order of Myths” – and recent documents reveal that while the crews have been searching for the shipwreck for years, the family has been well aware of its whereabouts. Recent forensic research indicates that someone tried to destroy what was left with dynamite. “I have a feeling this wreck hasn’t been completely lost, at least for some,” says marine archaeologist Jim Delgado.
That past is still present, Brown explains, with activists explaining how the land on which Africatown (formerly Magazine Point) was built belonged to Mehr, who sold some of it to former slaves. But the family maintained control of the surrounding estate, which was intended for factories, and whose polluting practices have been linked to high rates of cancer in the area. Talking about racial injustice calls for nuance, and it’s impressive how many aspects of the conversation Brown is able to include in her film.
The Mehrs may be silent, but the director speaks to an older white neighbor, who struggles to reconcile his personal values with the fact that his family kept slaves. “They don’t name schools after loser generals, but we do in the South,” the man notes, trying to untangle the “lost cause” myth he grew up on. For decades, the fallen Confederacy has erected statues of its heroes—Brown shows here a handful of them.
With the descendants of Clotilda strategizing what their own museum might look like, Brown follows the organizers to similar sites in Montgomery and Washington, D.C. Underestimate them. Not Brown, who lets fans make whatever they want out of rich texture. Consider a cemetery meeting between Emmett Lewis and a visiting historian, in which a direct descendant of Kodjo chats with a white scholar of African American history. The survivors finally have a role in the public narrative, thanks to Hurston’s efforts, the discovery of Clotilda, and Brown’s brilliant film.
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