It is not surprising that the name of the great Elizabethan hero, Hawkins, is not held in reverence by the inhabitants of Freetown, who assert that, far from being a national hero, if he had lived in the present day he would have been hanged for some of the acts committed on their forbears. In this connection a story is told of a prominent Sierra Leonean who, on hearing the words “Britons never shall be slaves” sung, remarked with some feeling, to a near neighbour, “But they have been—Julius Cæsar took them as slaves to Rome.”
Captain Keeling, who visited Sierra Leone in August, 1607, wrote the following account of his visit:
“About 7 p.m. we anchored in twenty fathoms on hard sand, the south part of Ilha Verde bearing E. and the Cape of Sierra Leone, which is a low point, N. by E. about eight leagues distant. But the land over the Cape is very high, and may be seen fifteen leagues off in clear weather. About six next morning we made sail for the road, and had not less than 16, 15, 10 and 9 fathoms till we ranged north and south with the rocks which lie about one and a half miles west of Cape Sierra Leone; and when one mile from the nearest shore we had seven fathoms good shoaling between us and the rock. Immediately when past the rock we had 20 fathoms, and shoaled to 18, 16, 12 and 10 fathoms all the way into the roads, keeping very near the South shore; for a sand lies about two miles from the North shore or a league from the South shore, and upon it the sea continually breaks. We came to anchor in ten fathoms on good ground, the point of Sierra Leone bearing W. by N., the north point of the bay N. by W., and the sand or breaker N.N.E. In the afternoon we were waved by some men on shore, to whom I sent my boat, which, leaving two hostages, brought off four negroes, who promised us refreshments. My skiff sounded between our anchorage and the breakers, finding fair shoaling, with two fathoms water within two boats-length of the beach or sand on which the sea breaks. All the previous observations of the variation, since our coming from 2 N. latitude to this place proved erroneous; for to each distance, having reference to any Meridian eastwards, there must be added 30 leagues, and from such as referred to western Meridians 30 leagues must be subtracted; for it appeared, by our falling in with the land, that the ship was so much more westerly than we supposed; myself, notwithstanding this error, being as much if not more westerly than any of the Mariners. Yet every man must trust to his own experience; for instruments may deceive, even in the hands of the most skilful. The 7th August some negroes of a superior appearance came aboard in my boat, for whom, as for all others, we had to leave one of our men in hostage for every two of them. These made signs that I should send some men up the country, and they would stay as hostages; I accordingly sent Edward Bradbury and my servant William Cotterell with a present to the Captain or chief, consisting of one coarse shirt, three feet of bar iron, a few glass beads, and two knives. They returned towards night, and brought me from the Captain one small gold earring worth some eight or nine shillings; and as it was late the hostages remained all night on board without any one in pawn for them. I sent my boat, and brought off five tons of water, very good and easily come by.
THRESHING RICE, SIERRA LEONE PROTECTORATE.
“I went ashore on the 11th, when the people came to us, accompanied by their women, yet feared we might carry them away. We got plenty of lemons very cheap, as they gave us 200 for a penny knife. The 13th I bought an elephant tooth of 63 pounds weight for five yards of blue calico and seven or eight pounds of bar iron. The 15th in an hour and a half we took Six thousand excellent small fish called Cavallos. That afternoon we bought two or three thousand lemons at the Village. It rained so much at this place that we esteemed it a dry day when we had three hours of fair weather. The 16th I allowed our weekly workers to go on shore with me for recreation. In our walk we saw not above two or three acres sown with rice—the surface of the ground being mostly a hard rock. The 16th and 17th were quite fair; and on the latter I caused a quantity of lemon-water to be made. The 20th John Rogers returned and brought me a present of a piece of gold in form of a half-moon, worth five or six shillings. He reported the people to be peaceable, the chief without state, the landing to be two leagues up the river, and the chief’s village eight miles from the landing. The 22nd I went on shore and made six or seven barricos full of lemon juice; having opened a firkin of knives belonging to the Company wherewith to buy limes. The afternoon of the 7th September we went all on shore to try if we could shoot an elephant, when we shot seven or eight bullets into him, and made him bleed exceedingly, as appeared by his track; but night coming on we had to go on board without effecting our purpose. The best road and watering place is the fourth bay to the east of Cape Sierra Leone. The tide where we rode flowed W.S.W., and the highest water upon a spring tide was at the least 12 feet. I made no observation of the sun in this road, neither aboard nor on shore, though I proposed to have so done several times; but the Master made the road where we lay 8 36 N., Cape Sierra Leone being west, a league or four miles off. He also made the variation 1 50 eastwards; but my instrument was out of order, and I had not time to put it in repair. We weighed from Sierra Leone the 14th September, with the wind all easterly; but it soon fell calm, and we drove to the north, but drifted again S.W. by S., with the ebb, and when the flood again made, we anchored in 15½ fathoms, Cape Sierra Leone bearing N.E. by E. about seven leagues off. We had not less than ten fathoms all this day. The 16th we found the current setting N. by W.”
William Finch, a British merchant who also visited Sierra Leone during the year 1607, wrote the following lengthy and interesting account of his visit:
“The island which we fell in with lieth some ten leagues south from the bay of Sierra Leone in lat. 8 N., has no inhabitants, neither did I learn its name. It has some plantains, and, by report, good watering and wooding for ships; but about a league from the shore there is a dangerous ledge of rock, scarcely visible at high water. The bay of Sierra Leone is about three leagues broad, being high land on the South side, full of trees to the very edge of the water, and having several coves in which we caught plenty and variety of fish. On the farther side of the fourth cove is the watering place, having excellent water continually running. Here on the rocks we found the names of various Englishmen who had been there. Among those was Sir Francis Drake, who had been there twenty-seven years before; Thomas Candish, Captain Lister, and others. About the middle of the bay, right out from the third cove, lieth a sand, near about which there are not above two or three fathoms, but in most other parts eight or ten close in shore. The tide flows E.S.E., the highest water being six or eight feet, and the tide is very strong. The latitude is 8 30 N.
“The King of Sierra Leone resides at the bottom of the bay, and is called by the Moors Borea, or Captain Caran, having other petty kings or chiefs under him; one whom he called Captain Pinto, a wretched old man, dwells at a town within the second cove; and on the other side of the bay is Captain Bolone. The Dominions of Borea stretch forty leagues inland, from which he receives a tribute in cotton cloth, elephants’ teeth and gold; and has the power of selling his people as slaves, some of whom he offered to us. Some of them have been converted to Christianity by the Portuguese priests and Jesuits, who have a chapel, in which is a table inscribed with the days that are to be observed as holy. The King and a few of his principal attendants are decently clothed in jackets and breeches; but the common people have only a slight cotton-cloth round their waists, while the women have a kind of short petticoat or apron down to their knees; all the rest of their bodies, both men and women, being quite naked; the young people of both sexes having no dress whatever. All the people, both men and women, have all parts of their bodies very curiously and ingeniously traced and pintred (tattooed), and have their teeth filed very sharp. They pull off all the hair from their eyelids. The men have their beards short, black, and cropped, and the hair on their heads strangely cut into crisped paths or cross alleys; while others wear theirs in strange jagged tufts, or other foolish forms; the women’s heads being all close shaved.
