West African studies

by Mary Henrietta Kingsley

The day I arrived, after waiting until I knew high water must have passed, I took my glasses, but there was not a soul visible. Not caring to risk our little vessel without the signal, I took a small boat we had with us and started over the bar into the river. What my surprise was you will readily understand when, arriving at the store, I found only one man, half-dead with fright, and crying like a child; all I could get out of him was that Ja Ja had been there and killed every one in the place. The first thing I did was to at once return to the vessel, and bring her in with the remainder of my people. We landed all our stores, then I immediately hoisted our English ensign on the flag-staff. I prayed to the Almighty to defend us and the country from the tyranny of these dreadful men who had caused so much misery for these poor people. Their wretchedness I was soon brought face to face with.

The morning after my arrival, if ever a man’s heart was softened mine was, and the tears came to my eyes when I saw crawling into the house from the woods a poor, half-starved cripple child, covered with sores, and in a dreadful state. We took it in at once and cared for it. Then I sent my people into the woods to see if they chanced to come across any one, and to tell them to come in under our flag, and I would see that no harm again befell them. In this we were very successful, for one after the other they arrived, more dead than alive, until some 700 of them were in and around our house. The next thing to be thought about was food for them. My last cargo fortunately was all rice and biscuits. This relieved me somewhat, and I felt we could at least manage for a short time.

To find food for such a great number gave me, as you may suppose, serious thought, for there was not a scrap left in the district; the land in this particular part being of a poor nature, the food grown at the best of times was very small, and this little had all been destroyed. But we had not to wait long before witnessing one of the greatest blessings that could have happened. As soon as the men had somewhat recovered from their fright, they began to go out into the river to fish, when such quantities were caught that never in the remembrance of any person in that country had such an amount of fish been seen. Load after load was brought to the shore, in fact, some had to spoil before it could be cured.

What did all this wonderful catch bring about? While a short time before these people had been in the greatest poverty and distress, now they are rejoicing and thankful for this abundance of food and wealth. I say wealth because fish in this part of Africa is more precious than gold with us. With fish anything can be bought in the market, from the smallest article to the largest slave. So you see here was our relief brought about by the ever bountiful Providence, whose all-seeing eye is ever near those who are in want and need and ask His aid, whether it be the poorest slave in Africa or the orphan child in England.

From this time we began to gather strength day by day. New arrivals came in who had managed to get away to some place of safety until they felt they could return to their native place with security.

As soon as Ja Ja and his men had destroyed the villages they returned to their town of Opobo, with the hundred prisoners, the whole of whom they massacred in cold blood, and exhibited to their townspeople, and, I am sorry to say, to some Europeans, for days. While this fearful murdering was going on twenty-five miles away from us I, with a few of the most courageous Ibunos, or Qua Iboe people, made a tour of the principal villages in the Ibuno country to let the inhabitants know of the deadly onslaught that had been committed on the people at the mouth of the river. They all swore to stand by us to a man, and to keep themselves free from Ja Ja’s tyrannical rule. After making this round we returned to the mouth of the river and turned our attention to the defence of the new villages that were about to be built.

A little accident occurred to us while leaving the last village, called Ikoropata, that may be worth mentioning as a warning to others who might be placed in a similar situation. We had just started after having a long palaver with the chiefs, our men, about twenty, marching in single file, I near the leading man. All at once I noticed he was carrying his gun in a very alarming and unsuitable way. Had it gone off by accident, which is not an unusual occurrence, the man behind him was bound to receive the contents, with perhaps fatal results. Having stopped them and explained the danger of carrying guns in this position, we started off again, every man with his weapon to his shoulder. Strange to say, a few minutes after the very man’s gun I had noticed at first blew off into the air with a tremendous report. Had this happened before, I fear we might have had to take one of our comrades back more dead than alive. The escape was a marvellous one, and not easily forgotten by any of us.

Now being back amongst our own people, we set about to get all the guns we could together, and all able bodied men I told off for gun practice and defence drill. This I carried on day after day, until we had quite a little band of well-trained men. All this time we were continually receiving rumours from the Opobo side as to what Ja Ja’s next intentions were, and to keep up the excitement he sent about 200 men as near the mouth of the river as he dared. They settled themselves in a creek two or three miles away from us, and here they used to amuse themselves by letting off now and again a regular fusilade of guns. This generally occurred in the middle of the night when every one but the watchmen had gone to sleep, and had such an effect on the frightened Ibunos that often two-thirds of them would rush off to the woods under the impression that the Opobos were again making a raid upon them. This went on for weeks, so much so that I was almost losing heart, and sometimes thought I should never get confidence in the people. At last, to my great surprise one evening in walked to my house the whole of the chiefs, who had just held a meeting in the village and passed a law that no person should again leave the town. They said they had come to tell me they felt ashamed of themselves for running away so many times and leaving me alone and unprotected in their country, and had decided to leave me no more, but that every man should stand and die if needs be for the defence of their towns. Whether Ja Ja’s people heard of this resolution I don’t know, but they soon dropped their gun firing at night, and eventually left their camping ground. Their next move was to get into the Ibunos’ markets, and worry them there. This I was determined should not be done if I could help it. It was a long time before there was any real disturbance, although I could see that the Ibunos were daily getting more frightened that the Opobo people would monopolise their markets, and in that case they knew there would be very little chance for them.

At last news came down the river that the Opobos had that afternoon sent a canoe to a market or town called Okot for the purpose of starting a trade with the natives. Now Okot was at that time one of the best markets the Ibunos had, and for them to be suddenly deprived of this trading station would be a terrible calamity to us all. I did not know what was to be done. The Ibunos would not go to the market to face the Opobos, neither would they go further up the river for fear of being molested by them. The only thing to do was to go myself and start a station at the same place, and which would enable me to keep an eye on their movements, so I at once made ready to start the same evening, and by five o’clock next morning I landed at Okot, and found the Opobo canoe there also, but like all Africans, time not being an object to them, they had not gone to the king or the owner of the land at the landing place. We did not wake the Opobos up on our arrival, but I immediately started for the village, and at daylight walked into the presence of the king of that part, who was so surprised to see a white man in his village that it took him some time to believe his eyes. Poor old chap! I fear he must have wished several times afterwards that he had never seen a white man, for he was taken prisoner by the Government in 1896 or 1897 for insisting, I believe, in carrying out some human sacrifice at one of the feast times, and died in prison. But to return to my mission. I soon made him understand that I had come to start a trading station at his beach, but before doing this I had to secure the land at the landing place for the purpose. This he readily consented to, telling me at the same time that although the land at that particular spot did not belong to him he would instruct the owner of it to sell me all I wanted. So after paying the usual compliments to the old king, I started back for the landing place with the owner, who had already sold his right to me, and was now only coming to show us the extent, which was the whole of the land of any use on this spot. Just as we got back we found our Opobo friends preparing to go to the village to see the king and also get permission to build on this land, but their surprise on being told by him that he had no land on the spot to give them I will leave you to imagine. But the Opobos at that time took a lot of beating, and they decided to build a house without getting the permission of any one, and an iron roofed house too, which was considered by the natives then a great thing. After the house had stood for some time, our consul being in the river, we had the disputed land brought before him and thoroughly discussed. After hearing evidence on both sides for two days, it was decided that it belonged to us, and the Opobos were ordered to remove their house. But before this settlement occurred we had a lot to contend with from them. They did all in their power to debar us from keeping our establishments open there, and for two or three years we had continual trouble with them, occasionally firing at our people; luckily they seldom hit any one. Then they tried competing with us in trading. This I did not mind, as I considered it a fair means of testing who was who. Ja Ja, I knew, was a very rich man, and if we attempted to follow them in their extravagant prices we should soon be ruined. My policy was to let them go ahead, which they did, paying almost twice as much for their produce as we could possibly afford to pay. This lasted a great deal longer than I anticipated, and I feel sure Ja Ja must have lost a deal of money. After about twelve months of this reckless trading we were left pretty much to ourselves at Okot, and being fairly well settled down I began to look about for a good beach to start my next establishment. I had not to look far. On the left bank of the river, about two and a half miles down from Okot, was the landing beach of Eket. Here there is a rising cliff about fifty feet high, and I had often remarked when passing this spot, “If I were going to build a house to live in here I should like to build it on this hill.” The situation was so good, as it was right in an elbow of the river, and from the top of the hill you had a view of the river branching off both up and down at right angles. An opportunity occurring for me to start a house at Eket, I went and saw the people, who were very pleased for me to come among them. So a little house was built, and a young coloured assistant named William Sawyer placed in charge, who proved to be one of the best men I ever had in the country. He needed to be, too, for the Ekets were the most trying of any of the peoples we had to deal with. I never left my stations for any length of time. Once or twice a week I visited them, but no matter how short a time I was away there was always a grievance to be settled at Eket. Poor Sawyer had a terrible time; the people had an idea they could do as they liked with the factory keeper, and would often walk off with the goods without paying for them, which Mr. Sawyer naturally objected to, usually ending in a free fight, sometimes my people coming off second best. The trade at that time at Eket was not large, although it was a good one, and I did not want to give it up if it could be helped. But my patience came to an end when I arrived upon the scene one day and found Mr. Sawyer had been terribly handled the day before. There had been a big row, and I could see by his face he had had very much the worst of the fight. I felt I could not allow this any longer, so summoned a meeting of all the chiefs and people. We had a very large meeting, one of the largest I ever remember, and after explaining to them my reason for calling them together, told them it was my intention to close the little house and go to some people higher up the river, who would be pleased for us to come among them, and would not ill-use my people as the Ekets were doing, and showing them how badly they had treated Mr. Sawyer, who had done nothing more than his duty in trying to protect the property that was under his care, and which they seemed to think they had a better right to than he. When they had heard my complaint and warning to close the house, the old and ever respected chief of all the Ekets rose to his feet. The people seeing this, there was silence in a moment (which every one knows who has happened to have been present at an African palaver is indeed a rarity), he being much loved and reverenced in his own town. As soon as he started I felt we were going to hear something worth hearing, and we did, for if ever there was a born statesman this was one. He said, “We have heard with sorrow of the way in which your people have been so ill-used by our people, and it is a shame to us a stranger should be so treated who is trying to do his best to bring business among us. Not only have you brought a business to us, where we can come and exchange our produce for our requirements, but you have opened our eyes to the light, as it were, and we have no intention that you should leave us. You have been sent to us by Abassy (which means God), and he will never let you leave us. Your trade will grow in such a way that you will see here on this beach far more trade than you will be able to cope with, so cast away from your mind the thought of leaving us. The disturbances that have been going on we will stop. It is not our wish that it has been so; it is the young boys of the village who know no better. We will put a stop to it in such a way that you will find your people from this time will have but little to complain about.” After such a speech you may be sure I gave up all thought of leaving the Eket people, and I need scarcely tell you that this same spot has become the centre of the whole of the trade of this river. The words spoken by the venerable and, I believe, good old chief came as true as the day. We did see often and often more trade than we could cope with, and the establishment grew in such a way that the natives themselves often used to wonder. I never had anything to do with a more prosperous undertaking in Africa, and to-day there are few establishments on the West Coast that can surpass it, either in its quiet, steady trade or healthy climate. I used to say one could live as long as they liked. On the hill there is a very fine house, with acres and acres of good land at the back of it, while at the foot of the hill are all the stores and the shop where the daily work and trade goes on year in year out.

Several very remarkable incidents happened here. One evening, just as we were going to dinner, a woman came and stood a little way from the house. I could see that she was crying bitterly and evidently in great distress. “What is the matter?” I said. “Affya (that is her brother) is dying, and I want you to come and see him before it is too late.” Now Affya was one of the finest young fellows at Eket, and one whom I felt would be a sad loss to a people who wanted so much leading and governing, as it were. So I lost no time, but went off at once with the woman to see if I could do anything. On our arrival at the house things looked bad enough, and I feared the worst when I saw him laid out, as every one there thought, for dead—the finest young fellow at Eket. I fell on my knees by his side and prayed as earnestly as man could to our Heavenly Father, and begged for this life to be spared to us. All at once he moved as though suddenly aroused from sleep, and in a moment I had him up and on the back of one of my boys, and away to Eket House as fast as possible, and laid him on the verandah to sleep and rest free from the close and stuffy hut he had been in before. After a little nourishment he slept all night. I kept watch near him, and next morning what was my surprise when he told me he was feeling quite strong and able to walk back to the village. This I allowed him to do after the sun had got well high, as I could plainly see the lad was out of all danger. Should these lines ever get into the hands of that lad, for lad he will always be to me, I feel very sure he will say, “Yes, this wonderful returning to life did indeed happen to me, Affya, son of Uso, at Eket, at the village of Usoniyong, in the month of July, 1892.” This is one of the many incidents that occurred whilst I was in charge at Eket and the Qua Iboe River. Another evening, just after dinner, my steward came to me saying there was a rat under the house (our house stood on iron columns). “A rat,” I said; “what do you mean?” “Well, a small woman.”