Olaudah Equiano has all the credentials to be a hero in the annals of African American history; and now, one more feather in his cap: he is depicted in the new movie “Amazing Grace” as a powerful, ex-slave and author whose famous 1789 autobiography describing the horrors of the Middle Passage was key in abolishing the British slave trade.

But a University of Maryland scholar has a different version of history, and his controversial theory is upsetting Equiano fans from Harvard University to Nigeria.

Dr. Vincent Carretta, a University of Maryland English professor and author of a book and several papers on Equiano, says that he has discovered evidence showing that Equiano may have lied about his background and in fact never even crossed the Atlantic in a slave ship. Carretta claims to have found evidence that Equiano was, in fact, born in South Carolina.

It’s a hypothesis so controversial, that even Carretta was hesitant about bringing it forward.            

“He’s a Nigerian national hero, so saying he may not have been born in Nigeria is like us saying George Washington may have been born in Paris.”

Carretta’s hypothesis has gained additional prominence with the release of the major motion picture, “Amazing Grace” and with the bicentennial anniversary in England of the end of the slave trade this year. His detractors seem just as unwavering.

“It’s certainly possible; lots of things are possible,” says Dr. Werner Sollors, a Harvard professor and editor of a Norton edition of Equiano’s book. “There’s no one who knows as much about this work as Carretta. But I just think in terms of getting the last nail down—I’m not convinced.”

Equiano is considered one of the earliest African American authors. In 1789 his first and only published book was entitled “The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, The African, Written by Himself.”