The south-eastern corner of the Gold Coast is occupied by another language known as the Ga or Accra, which comprises the Ga proper and the Adangme and Krobo dialects. Ga proper is spoken by about 40,000 people, including the inhabitants of Ga and Kinka (i.e. Accra, in Tshi, Nkran and Kankan), Osu (i.e. Christiansborg), La, Tessi, Ningua and numerous inland villages. It has been reduced to writing by the missionaries. The Adangme and Krobo dialects are spoken by about 80,000 people. They differ very considerably from Ga proper, but books printed in Ga can be used by both the Krobo and Adangme natives. Another language known as Guan is used in parts of Akwapim and in Anum beyond the Volta; but not much is known either about it or the Obutu tongue spoken in a few towns in Agona, Gomoa and Akomfi.
Fetishism (q.v.) is the prevailing religion of all the tribes. Belief in a God is universal, as also is a belief in a future state. Christianity and Mahommedanism are both making progress. The natives professing Christianity number about 40,000. Religion and education. A Moravian mission was started at Christiansborg about 1736; the Basel mission (Evangelical) was begun in 1828, the missionaries combining manual training and farm labour with purely religious work; the Wesleyans started a mission among the Fanti in 1835, and the Anglican and Roman Catholic Churches are also represented, as well as the Bremen Missionary Society. Elementary education is chiefly in the hands of the Wesleyan, Basel, Bremen and Roman Catholic missions, who have schools at many towns along the coast and in the interior. There are also government and Mahommedan schools. The natives generally are extremely intelligent. They obtain easily the means of subsistence, and are disinclined to unaccustomed labour, such as working in mines. They are keen traders. The native custom of burying the dead under the floors of the houses prevailed until 1874, when it was prohibited by the British authorities.
Towns.—Unlike the other British possessions on the west coast of Africa, the colony has many towns along the shore, this being due to the multiplicity of traders of rival nations who went thither in quest of gold. Beginning at the west, Newtown, on the Assini or Eyi lagoon, is just within the British frontier. The first place of importance reached is Axim (pop., 1901, 2189), the site of an old Dutch fort built near the mouth of the Axim river, and in the pre-railway days the port of the gold region. Rounding Cape Three Points, whose vicinity is marked by a line of breakers nearly 2½ m. long, Dixcove is reached. Twenty miles farther east is Sekondi (q.v.), (pop. about 5000), the starting-point of the railway to the goldfields and Kumasi. Elmina (q.v.), formerly one of the most important posts of European settlement, is reached some distance after passing the mouth of the Prah. Eight miles east of Elmina is Cape Coast (q.v.), pop. (1901) 28,948. Anamabo is 9 m. farther east. Here, in 1807, a handful of English soldiers made a heroic and successful defence of its fort against the whole Ashanti host. Saltpond, towards the end of the 19th century, diverted to itself the trade formerly done by Anamabo, from which it is distant 9 m. Saltpond is a well-built, flourishing town, and is singular in possessing no ancient fort. Between Anamabo and Saltpond is Kormantine (Cormantyne), noted as the place whence the English first exported slaves from this coast. Hence the general name Coromantynes given in the West Indies to slaves from the Gold Coast. Eighty miles from Cape Coast is Accra (q.v.) (pop. 17,892), capital of the colony. (Winnebah is passed 30 m. before Accra is reached. It is an old town noted for the manufacture of canoes.) There is no station of much importance in the 60 m. between Accra and the Volta, on the right bank of which river, near its mouth, is the town of Addah (pop. 13,240). Kwitta (pop. 3018) lies beyond the Volta not far from the German frontier. Of the inland towns Akropong, the residence of the king of Akwapim, is one of the best known. It is 39 m. N.E. of Accra, stands on a ridge 1400 ft. above sea-level, and is a healthy place for European residents. At Akropong are the headquarters of the Basel Missionary Society. Akuse is a large town on the banks of the Volta. Tarkwa is the centre of the gold mining industry in the Wasaw district. Its importance dates from the beginning of the 20th century. Accra, Cape Coast and Sekondi possess municipal government.
Agriculture and Trade.—The soil is everywhere very fertile and the needs of the people being few there is little incentive to work. The forests alone supply an inexhaustible source of wealth, notably in the oil palm. Among vegetable products cultivated are cocoa, cotton, Indian corn, yams, cassava, peas, peppers, onions, tomatoes, groundnuts (Arachis hypogaea), Guinea corn (Sorghum vulgare) and Guinea grains (Amomum grana-paradisi). The most common article of cultivation is, however, the kola nut (Sterculia acuminata), the favourite substitute in West Africa for the betel nut. In 1890 efforts were made by the establishment of a government botanical station at Aburi in the Accra district to induce the natives to improve their methods of cultivation and to enlarge the number of their crops. This resulted in the formation of hundreds of cocoa plantations, chiefly in the district immediately north of Accra. Subsequently the cultivation of the plant extended to every district of the colony. The industry had been founded in 1879 by a native of Accra, but it was not until 1901, as the result of the government’s fostering care, that the export became of importance. In that year the quantity exported slightly exceeded 2,000,000 ℔ and fetched £42,000. In 1907 the quantity exported was nearly 21,000,000 ℔ and in value exceeded £515,000. In 1904 efforts were begun by the government and the British Cotton Growing Association in co-operation to foster the growing of cotton for export and by 1907 the cotton industry had become firmly established. Tobacco and coffee are grown at some of the Basel missionary stations.
The chief exports are gold, palm oil and palm kernels, cocoa, rubber, timber (including mahogany) and kola nuts. Of these articles the gold and rubber are shipped chiefly to England, whilst Germany, France and America, take the palm products and groundnuts. The rubber comes chiefly from Ashanti. The imports consist of cotton goods, rum, gin and other spirits, rice, sugar, tobacco, beads, machinery, building materials and European goods generally.
The value of the trade increased from £1,628,309 in 1896 to £4,055,351 in 1906. In the last named year the imports were valued at £2,058,839 and the exports at £1,996,412. While the value of imports had remained nearly stationary since 1902 the value of exports had nearly trebled in that period. In the five years 1903-1907 the total trade increased from £3,063,486 to £5,007,869. Great Britain and British colonies take 66% of the exports and supply over 60% of the imports. In both import and export trade Germany is second, followed by France and the United States. Specie is included in these totals, over a quarter of a million being imported in 1904.
Fishing is carried on extensively along the coast, and salted and sun-dried fish from Addah and Kwitta districts find a ready sale inland. Cloths are woven by the natives from home-grown and imported yarn; the making of canoes, from the silk-cotton trees, is a flourishing industry, and salt from the lagoons near Addah is roughly prepared. There are also native artificers in gold and other metals, the workmanship in some cases being of conspicuous merit. Odum wood is largely used in building and for cabinet work.
Gold Mining.—Gold is found in almost every part of the colony, but only in a few districts in paying quantities. Although since the discovery of the coast gold had been continuously exported to Europe from its ports, it was not until the last twenty years of the 19th century that efforts were made to extract gold according to modern methods. The richness of the Tarkwa main reef was first discovered by a French trader, M. J. Bennat, about 1880. During the period 1880 to 1900 the value of the gold exported varied from a minimum of £32,000 to a maximum (1889) of £103,000. The increased interest shown in the industry led to the construction of a railway (see below) to the chief goldfields, whereby the difficulties of transport were largely overcome. Consequent upon the taking up of a number of concessions, a concessions ordinance was issued in August 1900. This was followed in 1901 by the grant of 2825 concessions, and a “boom” in the West African market on the London stock exchange. Many concessions were speedily abandoned, and in 1901 the export of gold dropped to its lowest point, 6162 oz., worth £22,186, but in 1902 a large company began crushing ore and the output of gold rose to 26,911 oz., valued at £96,880. In 1907 the export was 292,125 oz., worth £1,164,676. It should be noted that one of the principal gold mines is not in the colony proper, but at Obuassi in Ashanti. Underground labour is performed mainly by Basas and Krumen from Liberia. Of native tribes the Apollonia have proved the best for underground work, as they have mining traditions dating from Portuguese times. A good deal of alluvial gold is obtained by dredging apparatus. The use of dredging apparatus is modern, but the natives have worked the alluvial soil and the sand of the seashore for generations to get the gold they contain.
Communications.—The colony possesses a railway, built and owned by the government, which serves the gold mines, and has its sea terminus at Sekondi. Work was begun in August 1898, but owing to the disturbance caused by the Ashanti rising of 1900 the rails only reached Tarkwa (39 m.) in May 1901. Thence the line is carried to Kumasi, the distance to Obuassi (124 m.) being completed by December 1902, whilst the first train entered the Ashanti capital on the 1st of October 1903. The total length of the line is 168 m. The cost of construction was £1,820,000. The line has a gauge 3 ft. 6 in. There is a branch line, 20 m. long, from Tarkwa N.W. to Prestea on the Ankobra river. Another railway, built 1907-10, 35 m. in length, runs from Accra to Mangoase, in the centre of the chief cocoa plantations. An extension to Kumasi has been surveyed.
Tortuous bush tracks are the usual means of internal communication. These are kept in fair order in the neighbourhood of government stations. There is a well-constructed road 141 m. long from Cape Coast to Kumasi, and roads connecting neighbouring towns are maintained by the government. Systematic attempts to make use of the upper Volta as a means of conveying goods to the interior were first tried in 1900. The rapids about 60 m. from the mouth of the river effectually prevent boats of large size passing up the stream. Where railways or canoes are not available goods are generally carried on the heads of porters, 60 ℔ being a full load. Telegraphs, introduced in 1882, connect all the important towns in the colony, and a line starting at Cape Coast stretches far inland, via Kumasi to Wa in the Northern Territories. Accra and Sekondi are in telegraphic communication with Europe, the Ivory Coast, Lagos and the Cape of Good Hope. There is regular and frequent steamship communication with Europe by British, Belgian and German lines.