828 



WEST AFRICA. 



and Angola in the south, including Anibriz, Ben- 

 guela, Mossamedes, and the Portuguese Congo. 



Spain claims the coast region south of Morocco, 

 where are the settlements of Rio de Oro and Adrar, 

 near Cape Nun the station of Ifni, and farther 

 south the island of Fernando Po, with Annabon, 

 Corisco, Elobey, and San Juan, on the Guinea coast. 



Revolt in Sierra Leone. The colony of Sierra 

 Leone, consisting of the peninsula on which Free- 

 town is situated, the island of Sherbro and some 

 other islands, and a strip of coast about 20 miles 

 broad extending 180 miles, has an area of about 

 4,000 miles. The British sphere of influence behind 

 the colony, a thickly populated territory of 30,000 

 square miles, was proclaimed a protectorate after 

 the Anglo-French delimitation agreement of Jan. 

 21. 1895 ; and to meet the expense of a frontier 

 force of 600 men and an administrative and judi- 

 cial system without calling on the colony or the 

 Imperial Government for aid, Sir Frederick Cardew, 

 who was administrator of the protectorate as well 

 as Governor of the colony, proclaimed, in addition 

 to a system of trade and spirit licenses, a native 

 hut tax, to go into practical operation on Jan. 1, 

 1898. with the other provisions of the protectorate 

 ordinance. A great protest was raised against the 

 tax, not only among the negroes of the protectorate 

 on whom it was imposed, but among the merchants 

 and in the press of Freetown. Formerly the col- 

 ony itself was subjected to a tax of 5 s. on every 

 house, and many poor people had their household 

 goods seized by the bailiffs and sold at auction, or 

 were sentenced to work in the chain gang because 

 they could not pay; but when Sir John Pope Hen- 

 essy came out as Governor he repealed the tax in 

 1872. His memory is celebrated to this day, and 

 now the colonists feared the reimposition of direct 

 taxes. In the protectorate some of the Timanis of 

 the north Fulah Arabs in race, superior in intelli- 

 gence and character to the Mendis of the south 

 determined that they would not or could not pay 

 the tax, which was imposed at the start only in 3 

 of the 5 districts, those nearest to the coast, and 

 only at the lowest rate. 5 s. & hut per annum, with 

 exemption of the smaller villages. Bai Bureh, a 

 champion of the natives who had already made 

 himself obnoxious to the Government, headed the 

 opposition and intimidated those who were prepar- 

 ing to pay by threatening to kill any man who did 

 so. The commissioner of the Karene district, Capt. 

 Sharpe, began the collection of the tax at Port 

 Lokko. The traders were prepared to pay, but 

 said they dared not do so on account of the natives, 

 who threatened to burn their houses if they paid. 

 The commissioner summoned the five head men, 

 who not only refused to pay, but said they had 

 agreed to kill the first man who did. On this they 

 were arrested and sent to Freetown jail. After 

 this a leading native, Sorie Bunkey, was declared 

 Alicarli, or paramount chief, at Port Lokko by 

 Commissioner Sharp, and was intrusted with the 

 collection of the tax. He collected a great part of 

 the tax assessed on the town, but he was killed 

 when on the way to deliver the money at Free- 

 town. Capt. Sharpe sent a message informing Bai 

 Bureh that he was coming to collect from him, and 

 received a defiant reply threatening to kill the first 

 man who set foot in his town. The commissioner, 

 having obtained re-enforcements from Freetown, 

 sent a detachment of frontier police to arrest him. 

 This small force encountered several thousand well- 

 armed natives, who compelled the police to retreat 

 to Karene town, where they were closely besieged 

 and reduced to the last stages of hunger. The na- 

 tives had not rebelled against the order forbidding 

 the slave trade or against the wholesale freeing of 

 the slaves whenever these sought refuge with the 







British commissioner or in the colony, although 

 slaves were the only laborers in the country and 

 the only source of wealth for the chiefs and supe- 

 rior natives. The hut tax bore on the common 

 people, who regarded it as so unjust and oppres- 

 sive and impossible to meet that they would rather 

 burn their huts, many of which were not worth 5 s., 

 than pay such a heavy tribute to their white mas- 

 ters, whom they did not yet acknowledge and had 

 never seen ; for the frontier police, now at their 

 mercy, were natives like themselves. When the 

 Governor learned of the plight of the police be- 

 sieged in Karene, he dispatched a company of West 

 Indian troops to their relief. The black soldiers 

 proceeded up the Great Scarcies river in a steamer 

 to Robat, and then 50 miles across country by way 

 of Karene to Port Lokko, on the Sierra Leone 

 river. All the villages between Robat and Port 

 Lokko were burned by the soldiers. From Karene, 

 which was now occupied by a sufficient force of 

 frontier police, Major Norris had to fight his way ; 

 and at Port Lokko he was compelled to throw up 

 intrenchments, which his company had difficulty in 

 defending against the incessant attacks of the na- 

 tives. On learning of the precarious situation of 

 the troops, the Governor dispatched a second West 

 Indian company direct up the Sierra Leone river 

 with a convoy of armed boats. The naval gunners, 

 arriving on March 5, soon raised the siege of the 

 camp at Port Lokko by shelling the village and 

 burning it to the ground, upon which all the na- 

 tives ran away. One of the companies held Port 

 Lokko as a base of operations, while the other pro- 

 ceeded up country to aid the frontier police. A 

 third company was dispatched from Freetown, and 

 others were sent later, until by April 1 there were 

 6 companies of the West India regiment in the 

 Karene district. Bai Bureh, who was an able com- 

 mander, maintained a stout resistance, and even in- 

 flicted considerable losses upon the British troops. 

 Encouraged by his success, other chiefs of the Ti- 

 mani tribes revolted. Further re-enforcements 

 arrived from St. Helena, bringing the number of 

 troops up to 800. This force was strong enough 

 to traverse the disturbed district in all directions, 

 clearing from before them the natives who fought 

 from behind trees with trade guns; so that by the 

 end of April the country was reported by Col. Mar- 

 shall, commanding the troops, to be tranquil. Bai 

 Bureh was still at large, but the natives were suffi- 

 ciently cowed, and all the houses on which the tax 

 had been levied had been destroyed by the soldiers 

 to enforce the lesson. 



More serious difficulties, however, followed in the 

 wake of the Timani rising. The more numerous 

 and more barbarous Mendi tribes, which had paid 

 the hut tax uncomplainingly, upon seeing how a 

 comparatively few natives could hold at bay all the 

 British forces in the country, entered into a con- 

 spiracy to exterminate all the whites and Sierra 

 Leone people. Such a widespread plot was ren- 

 dered possible by the secret society called the Poro, 

 to which all the Mendis, Timanis. Konnos, and 

 Kissis belong. War against the whites was planned 

 in the Poro bush at Bompeh, and the signal of the 

 burned leaf was sent forth to all the Mendi -chiefs. 

 The outbreak was arranged to take place at the be- 

 ginning of May, as before troops could be sent up 

 the rains would have set in, rendering difficult, the 

 movements of large bodies of men. The disturb- 

 ances began at Kambia. in the Bandajuma district. 

 on April 27. Factories in that district were looted. 

 and native traders murdered. When the insurrection 

 became general throughout the (list rid and spread 

 to the frontier neighborhood of Iinperri, opposite 

 the island of Sherbro, troops were withdrawn from 

 Karene to re-enforce the frontier police of this part 





