Historians lauded the discovery as a crucial missing piece of the broader American story. In Africatown, a semi-isolated clutch of cottages three miles north of downtown Mobile, the news carried a particular kind of heft. Something physical, something measurable, was now attached to the tale they had heard all their lives. “We think it could be something like Jamestown,” said Joe Womack, 68, referring to the early colonial settlement and tourist draw in Virginia. “Jamestown and Africatown.”The story of the Clotilda’s final voyage began with an Alabama plantation and steamboat owner, Timothy Meaher.

Source: New York Times May 26, 2019 20:48 UTC