© Mystic Seaport, Mystic, CT [1992.119.1]

Cape Verdeans were the first sub-Saharan Africans to immigrate voluntarily to the United States. As American sailors left the whaling industry when profits started to decline in the 1860s, ship captains hired sailors from Cape Verde to fill their places. Antoine DeSant was a whale ship's captain, a frigate pilot, and a gold miner in California. He was a wealthy businessman, well known in the sailing trade.