768 



WEST AFRICA. 



of the golden stool. The search for the 

 golden stool and for King Prempeh's buried hoard 

 of gold has been going on ever since the British 

 established themselves in Kumassi. Both natives 

 and British ollicials have been active and persistent 

 in the quest . When Sir Frederic Hodgson heard 

 of the rediscovery of the golden stool he deter- 

 mined to get possession of it lest the Ashantis 

 should set up a king and begin a serious rebellion. 

 He determined also to get the royal hoard if it 

 WM round. He heard that the natives had twice 

 -oil money to Prempeh in Sierra Leone, and 

 \varned them that if they did it again their former 

 king would be taken farther away. He called for 

 the pavment of 50,000 ounces of gold that the 

 British' Covernment had demanded in 1874, to 

 \\liidi the cost of the expedition of 1896 would 

 be added, and he peremptorily demanded of the 

 chiefs the delivery of the golden stool, on which 

 he should sit as the representative of the British 

 Cro\\n. When the chiefs failed to bring him the 

 golden stool the Governor sent out detachments 

 to search for it. The natives organized parties 

 that resisted and attacked the detachments, killing 

 some of the men and wounding others. Then the 

 (iovernor. sending for re-enforcements, which 

 speedily arrived, attempted to arrest some of the 

 chiefs iis ringleaders, upon which the whole Ku- 

 massi tribe rose in rebellion. The Governor retired 

 to the strong stone fort that the British had built 

 when they first occupied the country. It was 

 aimed w it'h (i 7-pounders and 4 Maxims command- 

 ing the town, and was defended by 300 Hausa 

 soldiers, having provisions for three months. The 

 nearest British posts on the north were Kintampo, 

 100 miles, and Gambaga, 340 miles away, and the 

 march from the coast was over 100 miles through 

 a continuous morass, for it was the rainy season, 

 when native troops could move but slowly and 

 Kuropean troops not at all. In addition to the 

 West African frontier force, numbering at the time 

 over 4,000 men, the greater part of them stationed 

 in Nigeria, there was an armed constabulary of 

 1.300 men in the Gold Coast colony, one of 800 

 Kansas under 20 British officers in Lagos. By 

 orders from Kngland 300 of the frontier force were 

 sent from Nigeria overland through the Gaman 

 country to the relief of the Kumassi garrison and 

 200 more by way of Forcados to the Gold Coast. 

 A contingent of the Lagos constabulary set out 

 at once when news of the siege arrived. From 

 Sierra I^eone 52 of the frontier force and 250 

 Hausas were sent later. Major A. Morris, commis- 

 sioner of the northern territory, commanding the 

 garrison at Gambaga, started on April 18, when 

 he received an appeal from the Governor for aid, 

 with his whole force of Hausas. Moshi cavalry, 

 and native auxiliaries, and at Kintampo he picked 

 up the detachment stationed there, so that his 

 force consisted of 7 white ollicers. -2:50 noncom- 

 missioned officers and men, and native levies, with 

 machine guns. 



When the insurrection lx>gan many of the people 

 took the side of the British, and there was lighting 

 among the tribes before the rebels became strong 

 enough to lay close siege to the fort. The Bekwais. 

 whose country lies next to that of the Knmassis 

 on the side toward the coast, undertook to keep 

 communications open, lint ceased aggressive acts 

 when the Kuma^is came ami killed .")()() of their 

 number. On April 2:; ('apt. I'armenter. who com- 

 manded the garrison, sent a force to clear the way 

 to the eastward which killed a great many rebels, 

 but two days later they closed in on the fort, and 

 'tt to build a ring of stockades around it. which 

 wen- made proof against the light ordnance with 

 which it was armed by means of earth embank- 



ments. They first made a determined attack on 

 the town in such strength that the Hausas were 

 driven from their cantonments and compelled to 

 concentrate round the fort. The garrison lost 

 heavily, while inflicting on the rebels losses so 

 severe that in spite of their numerical superiority 

 they remained on the defensive thenceforth, camp- 

 ing behind the stockades that they erected and 

 gradually strengthened, and keeping the Hausas 

 closely confined within their own works. The 

 besiegers numbered about 10,000, many of them 

 good marksmen with their breech-loading rifles, for 

 which they made cartridges themselves that were 

 destructive in their effect. The line of intrench- 

 ments held by the Hausas surrounded the fort at 

 a distance of 300 yards. The Lagos constabulary 

 entered the fort on April 30, after two days of 

 severe fighting, in which they had 135 casualties. 

 The Ashantis, 8,000 strong, had erected a stockade 

 across the road at Asagu, 2 miles from Kumassi, 

 which they defended with pertinacity with their 

 native weapons and some rifles. The Knmassis 

 were joined in the rebellion by the Unansis, 

 Ofensus, Atchumas, Beposus, Ajasus. Nkoran/as, 

 Mampons, Nsutas, Kokofus, Abadones, and As- 

 suatuns, all determined to throw off the British 

 yoke and able to muster 50,000 fighting men. 



Major Morris sent messages to the Nkoran/.as, 

 before resuming his march from Kintampo on 

 May 9, to induce them to remain loyal. When he 

 reached their town he found that the Ashantis 

 had come and seized the King to compel him to 

 take their side, but that the King's sister had 

 persuaded him still to hesitate, and thus the ad- 

 herence of this powerful tribe was secured by the 

 fortunate arrival of the British force at that mo- 

 ment. The Ashantis contested the way from that 

 point. At Sekedumassi the relief column encoun- 

 tered the enemy, who made an ambush in the tall 

 grass, from which they were easily driven by the 

 machine guns. The British force marched so 

 rapidly that the Ashantis were not well prepared. 

 Every town and village that the British passed 

 through they burned. Most of them were de- 

 serted, the Ashantis falling back to concentrate 

 near the capital. On May 14 the native auxil- 

 iaries walked into an ambush. There was in- 

 cessant fighting on May 15 as the force ap- 

 proached the capital. The Ashantis had prepared 

 a strong stockade across the road, which was 

 carried after a cannonade by a charge in which 

 Major Morris, leading his men, was wounded 

 badly; but from a hammock he continued to di- 

 rect the operations. A second stockade, (i feet 

 high, on which the 7-pounders made little impres- 

 sion, was likewise taken by assault, and the ad- 

 vance of the Hausas was so rapid that the Ashan- 

 tis were disconcerted and did not defend 1 heir 

 third and strongest stockade. A further march of 

 10 miles brought them to the line of stockades 

 with which the Ashantis had invested the fort. 

 There were none of the enemy at the particular 

 stockade encountered, and in the evening the relief 

 force marched into the fort without further op- 

 position, having in the day's fighting killed sev- 

 eral hundred Ashantis, including some import ant, 

 chiefs. 



The town was invested on every side with a 

 circle of very strong stockades with a radius of a 

 mile, each one facing the fort, (5 feet in height. 

 and loopholed at the top. They were made of 

 heavy timbers hanked up with earth, each con- 

 nected with the next ones by paths, so that every 

 fort could be quickly re-enforced. Other columns 

 endeavored to press on to the relief of the gar- 

 rison when it became known that it was short 

 of provisions, but the Ashantis resisted the ad- 



