By Laura Harbold

 As the small motorboat approached the Sultana, a dozen people aboard the schooner turned and began waving their arms frantically. "Cut your engines," commanded a voice from a walkie-talkie. The motorboat's twenty-first century sound was marring the illusion of a nineteenth-century ocean voyage.

  The motorboat and schooner held cast and crew of Prince Among Slaves, an NEH-funded documentary now in production. In the waters off St. Mary's City in the Chesapeake Bay, the filmmakers were recreating an event that happened near Norfolk, Virginia, in 1829.

  The Sultana, a full-scale reproduction of a 1768 Royal Navy ship, was standing in for the Harriet, the schooner that returned Abdul Rahman, a prince and freed slave, to his native Africa. Prince Among Slaves chronicles Rahman's capture by British slave traders on the west coast of Africa, his life on a tobacco plantation in Natchez, Mississippi, the campaign for freedom that garnered the support of John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay, and his poignant return to Africa at the age of sixty-seven.

  "It's a universal story," says Alex Kronemer, executive producer of Prince Among Slaves. "It's paradise lost. We all wonder what would happen if we lost it all. Here's a story about someone who lost an entire empire and emerged intact."

  Prince Among Slaves is based on a book written by Terry Alford in 1977. Kronemer says he was drawn to the story in the spiritual turmoil that followed September 11. "In times of great tension and stress, people seek out their religious connections. But what was the spiritual life of the enslaved Africans? We don't know too much about that."An estimated 30 to 40 percent of enslaved Africans were Muslims, Kronemer says, including Rahman; the rest practiced indigenous religions.

  Rahman's story is particularly striking because his Muslim faith was never shaken during forty years of slavery, says Tierno Bah, a Muslim scholar and historian from Guinea. Though Rahman's schedule on the plantation may have been too rigorous to allow the Muslim practice of praying five times a day, and though white missionaries introduced him to Christianity, "he never gave in; he never renounced Islam," Bah says. "On his return to Africa, his first gesture was to pray, to reconnect to the religion of his ancestors."

  Rahman was literate and educated as well as devout. "Rahman's story dispels the myth about Africa as a land of no culture," Bah explains. "It shows that local elites in Africa, prior to European domination, had conquered reading and writing and built a tradition of literature that has survived today."

  Rahman was sold to British slave traders after being defeated and taken prisoner during a military campaign against non-Muslims in Guinea in 1788. He was transported on the Africa to New Orleans, where he was loaded onto a barge and taken upriver, eventually arriving at Thomas Foster's tobacco plantation in Natchez, Mississippi.

  Foster scoffed at Rahman's claim that his father, an African ruler, would pay a large sum for his return. Desperate, Rahman ran away from the plantation, only to return because he could not survive on his own. He eventually married and fathered nine children with his wife, Isabella, becoming Foster's most valuable and trusted slave.

  It was a chance meeting in 1807 that began Rahman's long campaign for freedom. While selling vegetables one day, Rahman encountered a white man he recognized. Dr. John Cox, an Irish immigrant to America, had spent nearly a year under the care of Rahman's father after falling ill in Africa. Cox's gratitude convinced him to fight for Rahman's freedom, but Foster refused to part with his valuable slave. Two decades later, Cox's son, William, enlisted the help of a local newspaper editor, Andrew Marschalk, whose articles about Rahman attracted the attention of Henry Clay, then secretary of state. Clay convinced President John Quincy Adams that freeing Rahman would be a diplomatic victory.

  The federal pressure to emancipate Rahman eventually convinced Foster to sell the prince for two hundred dollars on the condition that he return immediately to Africa. Rahman remained in America for a year, however, campaigning to free Isabella and his children. He toured northern cities, petitioning abolitionist groups and politicians for the money necessary to buy his family's freedom. Well-spoken and charming, he became a recognized figure throughout the United States.

  "I'm amazed at the number of contemporary reports about Abdul Rahman," says Andrea Kalin, director of Prince Among Slaves. "We have Foster's original purchase papers, we have samples of Rahman's handwriting, we have newspaper articles and journal entries from people close to him. The mass of resources is highly unusual for someone who was enslaved."

  The documentary draws heavily on these resources, as well as interviews from scholars and historical reenactments. According to Raki Jones, coproducer and cowriter of Prince Among Slaves, St. Mary's City was an ideal location for the film's reenactments because of its rugged topography and history of slavery. "Some of the buildings in St. Mary's are actually more accurate than the ones in Natchez," says Jones. "We found slave buildings that are still standing."

  St. Mary's City also offered plenty of water for filming two ocean voyages. "The sheer scale of the recreations is much bigger than anything else I've done," Kalin says. "Generally the rule for documentaries is to keep the set simple, but commissioning an eighteenth-century slave ship is not simple."

  The Sultana portrayed both the Africa, the ship that brought Rahman to America, and the Harriet, the ship that returned him to Africa as an old man. According to Jones, it is a relatively simple process to make one ship seem like two. The crew painted the ships' names on the Sultana's hull and added riggings, but "most of it is done through creative composition," Jones explains. "Psychologically, things that go from left to right signal eastward movement, and things that go from right to left signal westward movement. So, if we want to portray the slave ship, we'll show it going left. If we want to portray the Harriet, we'll show it going right." The viewer will see two different ships, Jones says.

  "The old-fashioned way of doing historical reenactments was nothing more than showing a wagon wheel turning, or a hand holding a quill moving across a page. Those things will just not hold an audience anymore," says Kronemer. Prince Among Slaves goes further and includes dramatic recreations of Rahman's voyage chained below deck on the Africa, his escape from Foster's plantation and his subsequent return, his loving relationship with Isabella and his emotional return to Africa.

  The Prince Among Slaves crew was careful, however, that dramatic recreations didn't overwhelm the true history of Rahman. "There's a tension between getting the facts down and trying to make programs that can compete against other programs," Kronemer says. Kronemer, Kalin, and Jones, along with the actors and the documentary's set and costume designers, consulted historians and scholars at every step of the process, from drafting the script to shooting scenes to editing the film.

  Tierno Bah worked with Marcus Mitchell, the actor playing Abdul Rahman, to achieve an ease in performing Muslim rituals. "We want to make sure that the authenticity is there, because Islam as a universal religion is always implemented culturally," Bah explains. "It takes place not in a vacuum, but in a cultural background. We want the American audience as well as the audience back in Guinea to assess it and authenticate it." According to Bah, public officials in Guinea are proud of Rahman and eager to see a film about his life.

  Tragically, Rahman never reached Futa Jallon, Guinea, the seat of his father's kingdom. Only able to raise enough funds to free Isabella, Rahman sailed with his wife to Liberia, the nation bordering Guinea. Shortly after landing, and before word of his arrival reached Futa Jallon, Rahman contracted a serious illness and died. Isabella remained in Liberia, where she was eventually reunited with two of her sons. Back in America, the tensions that would lead to the Civil War were building, and the African prince was quickly forgotten.

  "It's a page of history that fell out of the history books," says Kalin. "In reconstructing the historical record, we want to be as vigilant and accurate as we can.

  "This is one of those rare stories in which the human spirit is unconquerable," Kalin adds. "You don't need to spin that-you don't need to gild the lily. Rahman's story is inherently compelling."

Unity Productions Foundation received $689,997 in NEH funding for PRINCE AMONG SLAVES, which is expected to air in 2007.