Honoring
Cudjo Banquante

April-May 2025

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

Cudjo Banquante was born sometime in the 1820s in the Gold Coast (now Ghana), West Africa into a family of royal heritage. As a youth he was taken by European slave traders across the Atlantic, eventually being purchased by the wealthy Coe family of Newark, New Jersey.

During the American Revolution, Benjamin Coe sent the enslaved Cudjo to fight as a substitute for himself in the war against the British. Cudjo served in the Essex County and Morris County militias. He took part in the Battles of Monmouth and Germantown. He was with George Washington at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777 and later served with General Sullivan at the Battle of Yorktown in 1781.

After the war Cudjo was emancipated for his military service. The Coe family gave him land in Newark on which he established a nursery selling ornamental plants. Cudjo was the first African American businessperson in Newark. He died in 1823 at around 100 years of age. He was buried in the cemetery of Newark’s Trinity Church, located where the New Jersey Performing Arts Center now stands.

For more information about Cudjo Banquante’s life, go to the website of the New
Jersey Historical Society: www.jerseyhistory.org/cudjo/

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

Apr – May 2025
(and permanent)
Special exhibit at the Newark Museum of Art, including the Coe well curb installation, redesign of the Newark Slavery Mural to include Cudjo’s story, and public programs/tours/in-gallery teaching
Apr – May 2025
Special exhibit at the Greater Newark Conservancy about “fancy and exotic plants” of the 18th-19th century that Cudjo might have sold
Saturday Apr 26
Funeral ceremony held by Ghanaian royal family
Sunday Apr 27
Possible service at Trinity Church
Monday – Friday
Apr 28 – May 2
Enrichment activities at local public and charter schools
Thursday – Friday
May 1 – 2
Academic symposium sponsored by Rutgers & NJ Institute for Social Justice
Friday May 2 (2 tours)
Saturday May 2 (2 tours)
Bus tours of Cudjo-related sites: site of Cudjo’s property, site of his “owner” Benjamin Coe’s property, Trinity Episcopal Church and Old Presbyterian Church where Cudjo worshipped, Abraham Lincoln statue, Harried Tubman Square, Military Park, Krueger-Scott Mansion, Clinton Memorial AME Zion Church, Grace Church, Fourth Precinct, murals in Lower Newark, drop off at Greater Newark Conservancy to view flower exhibit of “fancy and exotic” plants of the era that could have been grown and sold by Cudjo.
TBD
Showing of Junius Williams film, “Rise Up Newark”
TBD
Showing and possible moderated session of “The Price of Silence” (4 parts)
Friday Evening
May 2
Reception by Rutgers at Ruth Bader Ginsberg Hall, with musical performance of special piece written by Courtney Bryan to honor Cudjo and unveiling of painting of Cudjo by John Phillip Osborne
Saturday May 3 11AM
Historic marker unveiling ceremony
Saturday (before or after ceremony)
Full program by Black Revolutionary Soldier reenactor Noah Lewis
Friday or Saturday
Public workshop by Akuma Entertainment, African drum and dance troupe, at NJPAC