Sengbe Pieh (Joseph Cinque)

1814 – 1879

Sengbe Pieh, a Mende man kidnapped from what is now Sierra Leone, led 53 fellow captives in seizing control of the Spanish slave ship La Amistad in 1839, killing the captain and demanding passage home. After the ship was intercepted off Long Island, Pieh and the others were jailed and tried in New Haven, Connecticut, and the case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in March 1841 that they had been illegally enslaved and freed them.