Richard Alpert was sold into slavery in 1867.
The year appears in the flashback episode “Ab Aeterno,” which reveals Richard’s life before he became the Island’s ageless adviser. Known then as Ricardo, he lived in the Canary Islands with his wife, Isabella, who was suffering from tuberculosis.
After Isabella died and Ricardo accidentally killed a doctor while trying to obtain medicine, he was arrested and sentenced to hang. Before the execution, the prison priest sold him to the crew of the Black Rock. Ricardo was chained below deck with other enslaved people and was being transported toward the New World.
The Black Rock never completed its voyage. A storm drove the ship onto the Island, where Ricardo encountered Jacob and the Man in Black. Jacob later offered him an apparently impossible bargain: continued life in exchange for serving as Jacob’s representative and communicating with future arrivals.
The year can be confused with the Black Rock’s other recorded voyage dates, but Richard’s arrival and enslavement belong specifically to 1867.