Designations
Official nameRio Pongo
Designated18 November 1992
Reference no.574[1]

The Pongo River or Rio Pongo is a river that flows into the Atlantic Ocean near Boffa, Guinea. Its source is located in Fouta Djallon.[2] The surrounding area has also been known as "Pongoland" or "Bongo Country".[3] The estuary has been designated as a Ramsar site since 1992.[1]

History

Rio Pongo became a significant area for the setting up factories in the transatlantic slave trade.[4] Sir George Collier listed 76 surnames of families involved in the slave trade in 1820.[5]: 35  He was commodore of the British West Africa Squadron between 1818 and 1821 and as such organised anti-slaving patrols up the Pongo River and other surrounding areas.

In literature

Part of the plot of the historical novel Anthony Adverse – and the film made on it – is chiefly set on the Pongo River, in the last years of the 18th century and the first years of the 19th. The book's eponymous protagonist – an adventurous and highly capable young man – arrives from Cuba and in a brief time takes personal control of slave trading along the river. He amasses a considerable personal fortune, but at the price of becoming increasingly corrupted. Finally being sickened by slaving, he departs for other adventures in other continents.

References

  1. 1 2 "Rio Pongo". Ramsar Sites Information Service. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
  2. ↑ "Africans, African Americans, Great Britain and the United States: The Curious History of the Rio Pongo in the Early 19th Century". Black Past.Org. Retrieved 4 May 2015.
  3. ↑ See Samuel Crighton's Baptismal entry in the All Saints, Poplar, parish register of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets referring to the baptism of Samuel Crighton, son of William Fernandez, a local Luso-African King.
  4. ↑ Mouser, Bruce L. (1973). "Trade, Coasters and conflict in the Rio Pongo from 1790 to 1808". The Journal of African History. 14 (1): 45–64. doi:10.1017/s0021853700012160. JSTOR 180776.
  5. ↑ Mouser, Bruce L. (2016). "Towards a Definition of Transnational as a Family Construct: An Historical and Micro Perspective". In Knörr, Jacqueline; Kohl, Christoph (eds.). The Upper Guinea Coast in Global Perspective. New York: Berghahn Books. pp. 21–39. Retrieved 15 October 2016.

10°3′N 14°4′W / 10.050°N 14.067°W / 10.050; -14.067


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