Skip to content
newBWS
The Ledger
On this day

August 20th

1 event recorded on The Ledger.

  1. 1619
    Context

    First enslaved Africans arrive at Point Comfort

    The English privateer White Lion arrives at Point Comfort, Virginia, carrying roughly twenty Africans taken from a Portuguese slave ship. The colonial governor records them as purchased in exchange for provisions, the first documented sale of Africans in the English North American colonies.

Timeline data: 159 events across The Ledger. See the full 400-year timeline →