Episode 1 of 3

First American Squadron Deployment

When: 1819
Where: West African Coast
Part of: Founding of the African Slave Trade Patrol

The first American squadron was sent to Africa in 1819 to suppress the slave trade, marking the start of the patrol.

The first American squadron was sent to Africa in 1819. However, after the ships were rotated out, there was no constant American naval presence off Africa until the 1840s. This initial deployment established the framework for the African Slave Trade Patrol.

Sources

African Slave Trade Patrol Wikipedia, revision of 2026-08-21

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.