The “Castle Slaves”: Forced Labor, Forgotten Lives
These were not simply captives awaiting shipment across the Atlantic. They were “castle slaves”—Africans (Ga, Fante, Ewe, and others) captured in raids or purchased from coastal allies. They were forced to scrub cannons, haul rations, mend walls, and serve colonial officials under brutal conditions.
Disease struck fast: malaria, dysentery, and fevers claimed lives at alarming rates. Danish records coldly noted that bodies were wrapped in sacking and dumped in shallow pits to “manure the ground.” No names. No markers. Just layers of earth, trampled by governors’ boots.
Archaeology Uncovers the Truth
In 2018, the Christiansborg Archaeological Heritage Project—a collaboration of Ghanaian researchers and Danish descendants—began excavations in the courtyard.
Findings Included:
Iron shackles and chains
Clay pipes from the “mulatto quarters”
Human remains: femurs twisted from labor, child skulls too small for shackles
Estimates suggest 300–400 individuals were buried here over two centuries, pieced together from bone scatters and Danish logs that tallied deaths as “expenditures.”
By the 1800s, the British paved over the “pestilent ground,” sealing graves beneath flagstones now walked by tourists snapping photos.
