Read about the Yoruba Slave Who Became Goddaughter to the Queen of England (Photos)

 

Lady Sara Forbes Bonetta (1843-1880) was a Yoruba Egbado Omoba who was orphaned in intertribal warfare, sold into slavery, and in a remarkable twist of events, was liberated from enslavement, and became a goddaughter to Queen of England, Queen Victoria.

 

Originally named "Aina", Sara was born in 1843 at Oke-Odan, an Egbado village. In 1848, Oke-Odan was raided by a Dahomean army; during the attack Sara lost her parents and ended up in the court of King Ghezo as a slave. Intended by her Dahomeyan captors to be a human sacrifice, she was rescued by Captain Frederick E. Forbes of the Royal Navy, who convinced King Ghezo of Dahomey to give her to Queen Victoria; "She would be a present from the King of the Blacks to the Queen of the Whites," Forbes wrote later.

 

 

He named her Sara Forbes Bonetta, Bonetta after his ship the HMS Bonetta. Victoria was impressed by the young princess's exceptional intelligence, and had Sara raised as her goddaughter in the British middle class. In 1851 Sara gained a long-lasting cough, believed to be caused by the climate of Great Britain.

 

She was sent to school in Africa in May of that year, at the age of eight, but was unhappy and returned to England in 1855 at the age of 12. In January 1862 she was invited to and attended the wedding of the daughter of Queen Victoria, Princess Alice.