Cotton, Samuel (1947–2003)

Samuel Cotton was a fearless and articulate spokesman within the United States for the eradication of contemporary slavery in Mauritania and Sudan. Cotton graduated with a B.A. degree in sociology from Lehman College, the City University of New York, in 1993. He obtained his M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University's School of Social Work and began teaching there in 1998.

Cotton first learned of the existence of slavery in Mauritania and the Sudan from the American Anti-Slavery Group in the early 1990s. His conscience was profoundly disturbed, and his life took a new turn. By 1995, he was sufficiently informed to write several articles on slavery for The City Sun, an African American weekly newspaper published in Brooklyn. [Page 397]With his exposition of the situation in the two North African countries, where Black Africans were routinely being bought and sold, and with his description of the mental and emotional suffering the slaves underwent, Cotton caused a deep stir.

In March 1995, he called Black Africans from all over the United States to a consultative meeting at Columbia University. They agreed to work together to draw the attention of the American public to this 20th century human bondage. Cotton then founded and became executive director of the Coalition Against Slavery in Mauritania and Sudan, made up of abolitionists and human rights groups from Mauritania, Southern Sudan, and North America.

In December 1995, Cotton traveled to Senegal, from where he was taken undercover to Mauritania. He gathered testimonies from slaves and ex-slaves;these testimonies formed the basis of a book and a documentary. Silent Terror: A Journey Into Contemporary African Slavery (1998) was recognized as a powerful, truthful, and passionate indictment of slavery in Mauritania, and it soon became a college set text.

Cotton's next initiative was to create a Freedmen's Bureau to educate, feed, clothe, and house runaway slaves in Mauritania. In March 1996, he testified before the U.S. Congress about his findings regarding slavery. He continued writing articles, holding meetings at universities and churches, and speaking at public forums throughout the United States. He appeared in a series of radio and television programs, including debates with members of the Nation of Islam who had made anti-Islam allegations against him.

Cotton's premature death of a brain tumor in December 2003 put an end to these activities. While still alive, he was honored with a Human Rights Fellowship by the Petra Foundation. The American Anti-Slavery Group has established the Dr. Samuel Cotton Memorial Fund to continue the work of this modern-day abolitionist.