Author: Jill Schuler, Research Fellow
The first research trip of the Tale of Two Ships (TOTS) project was to France, from January 19 to February 2, 2024. I was joined by Dr. Tamara Brothers, Director of Program Outreach & Engagement in the Office of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources Secretary and Vice-Chair of the NC African American Heritage Commission. We spent ten days in Nantes, where La Concorde and its owner, René Montaudouin were based. Then we flew to Marseille, to spend our last four days at the Archives National d’Outre Mer, where the national archives related to France’s overseas activities are located.
We spent our first full day in Nantes visiting the Château des ducs de Bretagne, one of the most iconic buildings in the city. Inside the château is the city’s history museum. Nantes was the capital of the French slave trade during the first half of the 18th century. Our tour of the exhibits that relate to the slave trade helped prepare us for our time in the archives. The museum is also the starting place of a historic trail that features the city’s historic sites with connections to the slave trade.
A stop on the historic trail was the Feydeau District, where Montaudouin and many other slave traders had homes. One of the street signs in the Feydeau District, “Rue Kervégan,” was named for Christophe-Claire Danyel de Kervégan, a merchant who engaged in the slave trade in the 18th century. Under the street sign, there is another sign explaining that the city has decided to keep its street names with connections to the slave trade to acknowledge and reconcile with its history.
The last site on the trail is the Mémorial de l’Abolition de l’Esclavage or Memorial to the Abolition of Slavery. Opened in 2011, the memorial represents the city’s efforts to bring about reconciliation with its past involvement in the slave trade. The memorial is split into two levels and runs along the Loire river. The top level is paved and features glass plaques embedded in the concrete. Each plaque contains the name of a slave ship and the year it left Nantes. The lower level contains signs with quotes from famous figures influential in the history and abolition of the slave trade.
We spent most of our time in Nantes reviewing documents at the Archives départementales de Loire-Atlantique (ADLA). After many months reviewing the archives’ online inventory, I had a long list of materials that I wanted to review. I met with Luce Gaume, chief curator at the archives, who provided me with guidance. Over the course of five days, I reviewed hundreds of documents and took pictures of any documents I thought may be important. I took well over a hundred pictures! More information on what was found in the archives will be explored in a future blog post.
Next, we flew to Marseille to visit the Archives Nationales d’Outre Mer (ANOM) in Aix-en-Provence. ANOM has the largest collection of documents related to France’s overseas activities. Like ADLA, I spent a lot of time going through the archives’ online inventory before arriving. As many of the documents were in the process of digitization, I spent most my time in the microfilm room, reviewing reel after reel of microfilmed documents. While I did not have as much time in Aix-en-Provence as I did in Nantes, I still found a lot of valuable information, which was a great way to end a successful trip.
Images:
-A sculpture by Christophe Charbonnel called “Esclave,” meaning slave, located in the lobby of our hotel in Nantes. Each hotel location commissioned a sculpture inspired by the history of the city where the hotel was located. Image by NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
-[From left to right] Dr. Tamara Brothers and Jill Schuler standing outside the historic Château des ducs de Bretagne in Nantes. Image by NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
-The lower level of the Memorial to the Abolition of Slavery. Each green plaque contains quotes from famous figures throughout the history and abolition of slavery.Image by NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
Tale of Two Ships is a project of the NC African American Heritage Commission and funded by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences. The project strives to uncover more about Queen Anne’s Revenge’s previous life as the slave ship La Concorde.