More than 30 of these people, believed to be ethnic Yoruba, Ewe, and Fon, founded and created their own community in what became Africatown.

[3] In 2019, scholar Hannah Durkin from Newcastle University documented Redoshi, a West African woman who was believed at the time to be the last survivor of slaves from the Clotilda.

In 2019, researcher Hannah Durkin published new information about her: she documented that Redoshi Smith lived until 1937, making her apparently the last survivor of the slaves from the Clotilda.

Historians believe the start of the American Civil War contributed to the federal government's dropping the case.

After the Civil War (1861–1865) they were emancipated, but they continued to work Meaher's property in the delta north of Mobile on the west side of the river.

Cudjo Lewis's son Joe (Joseph) learned to read and write at the church which the settlers founded in Africatown.

The women raised and sold crops, and the men worked in mills for $1 a day, saving money to purchase the land from Meaher.

He was visited by American writers Emma Langdon Roche and Zora Neale Hurston, and educator Booker T. Washington, president of Tuskegee Institute.

During interviews, Lewis would tell about the civil wars in West Africa, in which members of the losing side were sold into slavery to Africans and Europeans.

Cudjo related how he and others from his village had been captured by warriors from neighboring Dahomey, taken to Ouidah and imprisoned within a large slave compound.

The community developed along the spine of Telegraph Road in the early 20th century, becoming known both as Plateau, for its high ground, and Magazine.

The Cudjo Lewis Memorial Statue was placed in front of the Union Missionary Baptist Church in 1959, in recognition of his leadership in the community.

In 1997, descendants and friends founded the AfricaTown Mobilization Project to campaign for the community to be designated as an historic district and to promote its redevelopment.

[1] In 2010, Neil Norman of the College of William and Mary conducted an archeological excavation and preservation project in Africatown.

[13] Among the descendants of Charles Lewis and his wife Maggie, who was also born in Africa, is a great-great-great grandson Ahmir Khalib Thompson, the 21st-century drummer and music producer known as Questlove.

Its people passed down the story of its founders and how they were brought to the United States, preserving their history through families, the church, and schools.

Part of the community's land was appropriated by the government for the development of the western approach of the Cochrane-Africatown USA Bridge, completed in 1992.

[3] In 2000 it submitted documentation as a Local Legacy Project to the Library of Congress, through Representative Sonny Callahan from Alabama's 1st congressional district.

"[10] Defined as roughly bounded by Jakes Lane, Paper Mill and Warren roads, and Chin and Railroad streets,[1] the historic district was designated in 2009 as a site on Mobile's African American Heritage Trail.

Residents say they have a serious industrial pollution and public health problem, which has caused a high rate of cancer since the late 20th century.

The environmental group claim that IP's improper handling of waste through the decades contaminated the land and water, and the company did not clean up the site as required after closing the plant.

[20][21][22] On March 5, 2018, Raines announced that the wreck he had discovered was likely not the Clotilda as the wreckage appeared to be "simply too big, with a significant portion hidden beneath mud and deep water".

One week later, Raines and Monty Graham, head of Marine Sciences at the University of Southern Mississippi, explored several of the 11 wrecks identified in the survey, along with Joe Turner and a team from Underwater Works Dive Shop.

The coordinates and survey data were shared with the Alabama Historical Commission, which hired Search Inc., to verify the find.

[20][24][25] In 2020, Alabama author Beth Duke featured Africatown in her novel Tapestry, which won a Southern Fiction medal from Publishers Weekly.

I urge people to read this book and visit the places it introduces, testaments to the strength and resilience of our ancestors,” said Frazine Taylor, President of the Elmore County Association of Black Heritage, Chair of the Black Heritage Council of the Alabama Historical Commission and President of the Alabama Historical Association