Survivors

Dr. Hannah Durkin is a historian specialising in transatlantic slavery and African diasporic art and culture. She holds a Ph.D. in American Studies from the University of Nottingham and a Postgraduate Diploma in Journalism from Leeds Trinity University. She has taught at Nottingham and Newcastle universities, and recently served as a Guest Researcher at Linnaeus University in Sweden. She is an advisor to the History Museum of Mobile, which is working to memorialise the Clotilda survivors, and was the keynote speaker at Africatown’s 2021 Spirit of Our Ancestors Festival founded by the Clotilda Descendants Association. She is the recipient of more than a dozen academic prizes, including a prestigious Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship.

‘Gripping … a remarkably wide-ranging book taking in everything from science to soft drinks to show how slavery’s insidious hand wormed its way into the very fabric of American life' The Times 'Hannah Durkin lets the enslaved speak for themselves, and they tell a story not only of unimaginable suffering but also of courage and survival' Wall Street Journal 'A powerful, moving and revelatory account of the African captives taken aboard the Clotilda, the last ship of the Atlantic slave trade. Durkin draws on meticulous research to shed light on the survivors’ personal stories, demonstrating how they faced loss and adversity with strength and resilience, and calling our attention to their legacy' David Cannadine, chair of the Wolfson History Prize judges 'Devastating and visceral… Durkin’s exhaustive, exhilarating research has created something new – something personal, emotional, almost tangible – from the history of this collective trauma' Literary Review ‘A very powerful piece of historical writing because it is both thorough and reflective but also because it also provides us with a mirror to our own times’ Aspects of History ‘Absorbing and affecting … Sheds new light on the experiences of female survivors of the slave trade… The author captures the complexities of the survivors’ experiences’ Christian Science Monitor 'It's a book that combines very rigorous and I would say painstaking research with compelling storytelling. It expertly reconstructs the personal stories of the protagonists, reveals their sufferings, their courage and their resilience, and how they never gave up believing in themselves, or believing in the traditions from which they originated. And it is a book – and I think this is also very important – that highlights how the search for justice was passed on to their descendants and continues to be a source of inspiration today' Wolfson History Prize judge Sudhir Hazareesingh (this was Prof Hazareesingh's award announcement speech)