Melania Trump walks through ‘Door of No Return’ in Ghana
CAPE COAST, Ghana — Melania Trump walked out the infamous “Door of No Return” at a onetime slave-trade outpost Wednesday and gazed over the crashing ocean waves that carried millions of Africans to lives of servitude. She later called her visit “a solemn reminder of a time in our history that should never be forgotten.”
“It’s very emotional,” she said.
“The dungeons that I saw, it’s really something that people should see and experience,” she told reporters.
The setting was Cape Coast Castle, a 17th century structure overlooking the Atlantic on the coast of the West African nation of Ghana.
Swedes built the castle for use in the trade of timber and gold. But along the way it became a warehouse for Africans as they were rounded up and shipped to the New World and into lives of servitude.
The castle is a familiar stop for
U.S. dignitaries visiting Ghana. Then-president Barack Obama brought his family in July 2009. U.S. lawmakers have come, too.
Adding her name to the list Wednesday was the wife of President Donald Trump, who isn’t unanimously seen as a friend of Africa.
The first lady arrived at the castle after a two-and-a-half hour drive over bumpy roads from the capital, Accra. She spent a few minutes meeting privately with her guide, Kwesi Essel-blankson, and getting an introductory history of the castle before they emerged into an open area in 80-degree heat and humidity.
Essel-blankson showed the first lady an old cannonball and then escorted her to the “male slave dungeon.”
They spent about 10 minutes inside the mostly dark, cramped holding area before the first lady walked down a pathway that led to the Door of No Return.
It was through this door — and others like it all along the coast of West Africa — that Africans were loaded onto vessels that then took them across the Atlantic with little hope of ever returning to their homeland.