The Narrative of Robert Adams is a memoir by American sailor Robert Adams first published in 1816. The narrative is the story of the adventures of Adams, then a twenty-five-year-old American sailor who claimed to be enslaved in North Africa for three years, from 1810 to 1814, after surviving a shipwreck. He was said to have finally been ransomed by the British Consul, where he eventually made his way to London. It was there that, as a random beggar on the streets, he was "discovered" by the Company of Merchants Trading to Africa, where he narrated the full details of his adventure.
Adams claimed to have visited Timbuktu during his enslavement, which would have made him the first Westerner to reach the city. Upon his stated liberation, and return to Europe, Adams' story was published in two heavily edited and divergent accounts, most notably The Narrative of Robert Adams.
Because his story was sanctioned by some of the most distinguished men in England, including members of government, who had a noted financial interest in Africa, his narrative(s) gained credibility despite "its most glaring absurdities".
Often cited as an example of white slavery, today Adams's story is widely known to have been fabricated, lending to the dismissal of his story within general history discussions and recordings.
Significance
Europeans had sought the supposed golden riches of Timbuktu for many years, sending expedition after expedition to conquer the remote city. Despite this, no reliable Western witness had returned from Timbuktu to share his experience, and the last update Europeans had received was from Leo Africanus in the sixteenth century. Leo Africanus was a Christianized Moor from southern Spain, and not a "true" Westerner himself. By the early nineteenth century when Robert Adams dictated his Narrative, Timbuktu had become an elusive dream for Europeans, an unattainable goal. It was the African El Dorado. Yet foreigners who dared set foot within the city or the surrounding region were forced to choose between adopting the local faith or suffering decapitation.
Many failed expeditions to the remote city of Timbuktu were attempted by the following explorers: the American John Ledyard, the Englishman Simon Lucas, the Irishman Major Daniel Houghton, the Scotsman Mungo Park, the German Frederick Hornemann, an Englishman named Nicholls, and the Swiss explorer Johann Ludwig Burckhardt. They all failed in one way or another, mostly by either disappearing in the middle of the expedition or by dying before reaching the city. Most did not return home.
Robert Adams' tale of his visit to Timbuktu was highly significant for two reasons: being a tale of Westerner finally managing to arrive at the famed city, long coveted for its supposed wealth and extensive reserves of gold, and because he was said to have arrived there by accident, and not through an organized exploration.
Despite the controversy regarding the veracity of Adams' story, the publication of his Narrative was deemed a triumph for British science and exploration. Though Adams was said to have been an American, his tale was told in England, and it was there that the Narrative was published, granting an international victory to England.
In contemporary times, Adams' tales is often cited as an example as white slavery; however given he was stated as being mulatto in his tale, due there is no record accounting for him or his family on either side of the Atlantic, and due to numerous other discrepancies in his tale, his story is accepted as having been fabricated.
Narration
Early life
Robert Adams was an American of mixed black and white ancestry. It was written that he was "born up the river of New York, where his father lived when he quitted America;" and that his mother was a Mulatto. However, there is no record of a man under either of his known aliases, or fitting his general description, in Hudson during this period. Joseph Dupuis, the British Consul in Mogador who eventually ransomed Adams, wrote of Adams' appearance:
Dupuis wrote that Adams left America to avoid being prosecuted for refusing to legitimize his relationship with a young woman. However, nothing else is known of his early life until 1810 when, under the name "Benjamin Rose," he signed onto the ship Charles as a merchant seaman. While he used the name "Benjamin Rose" leading up to his time on the Charles, he exclusively went by name, "Robert Adams," after his release from slavery. It is not known which, if either of these names was his real one, though at the time it was not uncommon for sailors, especially "distressed seamen", to change their names.