Africa and the American Flag

by Andrew H. Foote

The native chiefs not unfrequently proposed to the colonists to aid them in their wars, promising as an inducement the whole of the enemy’s country. This was of course declined, on the ground that the colony was established for the benefit, and not for the destruction of their neighbors; and that their military means were sacred to the purpose of self-defence. The kings were now favorable to the colony, and began to appreciate the benefits of legal trade.

The U. S. schooner Shark, and the U. S. sloop-of-war Ontario, arrived on the coast during the year 1827, and besides affording aid to the colony, rendered good service towards the suppression of the slave-trade.

A reinforcement of emigrants was received; the school system reorganized and put in comparatively efficient condition, under the superintendence of the Rev. G. M’Gill, a colored teacher. The schools were all taught by colored people: the number of scholars amounted to two hundred and twenty-seven, of whom forty-five were natives. The native children belonged to the principal men in the adjoining country.

The Chief of Cape Mount, fifty-two miles N. E. from Cape Mesurado, entered into stipulations with the colonial government to establish a large factory for legal trade between it and the interior. The land north of the St. John’s River, about sixty miles southeast of Cape Mesurado, was ceded to the colonists. In this extent of territory there were eight eligible sites, upon which comfortable settlements have been founded. Four schooners were built. The colony was mainly supported by its own industry. The life of this industry was, however, rather in trade and commerce than in agriculture, the fact being overlooked that men ought to seek in the latter the sources of their prosperity. Liberia has suffered from the want of steady agricultural effort. Industry like that of our Puritan fathers in New England, would, with the Liberian soil and climate, have prevented the recurrence of difficulty, and produced uninterrupted abundance.

On leaving Liberia, the commander of the “Ontario” permitted eight of his crew, colored men, to remain, furnishing them with a valuable collection of seeds, obtained in the Mediterranean and up the Archipelago. On his arrival in the United States, the captain bore testimony to the encouraging prospects of the colony, and its salutary influence over the native tribes.

Mr. Ashmun’s health failing from excessive labors in the administration of the government, he was seized in July, 1828, with a violent fever, and having been advised by his surgeon that a return to the United States afforded the only hope of his recovery, he left Africa on the twenty-fifth of March, 1828, and reached New Haven, where he died on the twenty-fifth of August. Of Ashmun it may be said, that he united the qualities of a hero and statesman. He found the colony on the brink of extinction: he left it in peace and prosperity. He trained a people who were unorganized and disunited, to habits of discipline and self-reliance; and to crown his character, when death approached, he met it with that unshaken hope of a blissful immortality, which the true Christian alone can experience.

The remains of this honored martyr to the cause of African colonization repose in the cemetery at New Haven. At his funeral the Rev. Dr. Bacon, preaching a sermon from the text, “To what purpose is this waste,” said:

“Who asks to what purpose is this waste? He is not dead to usefulness. His works still live. The light which he has kindled shall yet cheer nations unborn. His influence shall never die. What parent would exchange the memory of such a departed son, for the embrace of any living one! I would that we could stand together on the promontory of Cape Mesurado, and see what has been accomplished by those toils and exposures, which have cost this man his life. Years and ages hence, when the African mother shall be able to sit with her children under the shade of her native palm, without trembling in fear of the man-stealer and murderer, she will speak his name with thankfulness to God.”

CHAPTER XIII.

LOT CAREY—DR. RANDALL—ESTABLISHMENT OF THE LIBERIA HERALD—WARS WITH THE DEYS—SLOOP-OF-WAR “JOHN ADAMS”—DIFFICULTIES OF THE GOVERNMENT—CONDITION OF THE SETTLERS.