POSSESSED: A History of The Crown Colony of Lagos 1861-1906

By Olasupo Shasore

Lagos was already POSSESSED by Britain when in 1862, Henry Pelham-Clinton, Duke of Newcastle and Secretary of State for Colonies agonised; he worried that "the original sin of taking possession of Lagos" would lead to meddling by force of arms of the British government. He couldn't have realised how prophetic his concerns would be. From 1851 up

• Language: English
• Publisher: Quramo Publishing
• Release date: Nov 18, 2019
• ISBN: 9783498063382

Book preview

Acknowledgement

I set out to tell one story through a series of smaller stories – all somehow connected – in the hope of providing a different view of a middle age to early twentieth century West African society in a legal context. But the original idea for this book and the need to write it came from one of the several late night conversations with my dear friend BRF a.k.a Governor Mr. Babatunde Fashola (SAN) from then on he prodded and cajoled me. As he often does he saw a need and a possibility when others did not – I owe him a debt and gratitude for his vision. My thanks also to my editor and chief whip Lanre Shasore who all too often surpasses herself in frankness and attention to detail.

This book is special to me for a number of reasons not least being that it is a product of my curiosity. The seeds of this curiosity were sown in my childhood while visiting our farm village at Ijoyi (east of Lagos) with my father Mr. T. A.O. Shasore, a senior Nigerian career diplomat and later Chief, The Sasore of Lagos, and there coming to the understanding that our predecessors’ settlement from 1841 onwards arose from the Lagos civil war between kings. Once I realised the consequential connection with the Lagos Colony and Nigeria my interest became boundless. I have often been challenged about the dearth of history within schools and amongst young adults, while this is by no means a children’s book, I believe selected accounts in this book will give credible foundation for further concise rendition (or expanded) study by scholars and leisure readers alike.

I must give special acknowledgment to Nakunda Katangaza for all the useful advice and encouragement and also Folorunsho and Aisha

Folarin-Coker for their belief and encouragement. For initial reviews and editorial suggestions, I thank Aduke Gomez, Rotimi Oyekan and Molara Wood. On account of this book I have incurred other debts of gratitude: to my friends at the British Library London for the material on the privy council, thank you Jay for the advice and research on John Holt and Co; to the memory of Bolaji Othman, the late Director General of the Lagos State Records and Archives Bureau, for sharing the rare photographs for publication; Lanre Akewula for often sacrificing his weekends to ensure the script moved on from stage to stage; to Anwuli Ojogwu, Sola Kuti and to my publishers and everyone at CLRN Publishing and Q Books for all the hard work.

Finally to Gbemi, Dara, Folarin and Jibby who endured my unreasonable devotion to the study/office at home during the long hours of writing. Naturally any omissions or errors in this book are regretted but they are my sole responsibility.

Olasupo Shasore, SAN

Foreward

This book by my friend, brother and counsellor, a distinguished colleague and a self-confessed amateur historian brings to light fresh insights and new information about our national lore. We should all agree that the old South African system of apartheid was abhorrent. It is undeniable that colonisation was equally denigrating to the native people of these shores.

Not only does this book share new information, it assists us all with a clear picture of the special status of Lagos in the creation of our country. It sets the scene of a bitter battle fought by the people of Lagos to resist conquest by foreigners and presents a more accurate view of the infamous but false giving-away of Lagos by one of its rulers. It even gives us a sense of the lack of certainty in the mind of the colonisers as to how to execute the plan of possession.

Finally, the author points to differences of opinion within the colonisers about methodology–some heroic and fair, others much more calculating and desperate.

I am pleased to contribute to this work. The following pages have come into being at a timely period in our national life. I have said elsewhere that the 2014 celebration of Nigeria’s centenary year is puzzling for it is strange that one would celebrate the day 1 January and the year 1914, which effectively and yet incongruously celebrates the commencement of being colonialised.

I say it is strange because it seems to me contradictory to have recently rolled out the drums to celebrate 50 years of independence in 2010, laced with statements of promise of a better 50 years ahead, only to turn around four years after to proclaim a centenary of an amalgamation day, of which there was not a 99th anniversary.

It is, to say the least, an undeserving act of ingratitude to the sacrifice of our early nationalists who gave life, liberty and dignity to free us from dominion. In the same vein, it would be immensely ungrateful for Lagosians to celebrate 6 August 1861, the day Lagos became a possession of the British Empire or May 1906 when the colony of Lagos was amalgamated into Southern Nigeria and ceased to be and the colony of Nigeria became a reality.

At this time I would like to suggest that we interrogate the centenary year; and by that I mean to conduct a constructive, collective remembering. To do this is significant for the lessons to be learnt from such a constructive remembering, and from a collective understanding of our communities and indeed for our precious republic.

We should celebrate our distinct and current circumstance of freedom, pursue the promise that the future offers in a democratic Nigeria, and not our conquest and colonisation. To do as I suggest is significant, or there are lessons to be learnt from such an interrogation.

One lesson to be learnt is that the agitation for resource control did not start with the discovery of oil. It started with the trading resources of Lagos, the immigrant human capital it attracted and the productive enterprise that its people and territory have spawned.

Real students of history will find from records in colonial archives that it was the need to harness the resources of Lagos that led to its amalgamation with the Southern Protectorate and it was the absence of funds to operate the Northern Protectorate that was the justification for the creation of Nigeria by amalgamation, in order, it would appear, to run the whole country with resources from Lagos.

The current financial viability of Lagos is historic and not accidental.

Truly, I am convinced that with passionate and committed management, Eko o ni baje. Lagos will continue to prosper.

I recommend this book to us all for a better understanding of where we are coming from, for an even better understanding of where we would like to go, together as a strong, virile democracy always learning from our rich past to build a better and brighter future!

Babatunde Raji Fashola SAN

Lagos

January 2014

Preface to First Edition

The original sin of taking possession of Lagos¹

Provocative as the title of this book may appear, I found I could not get away from it the moment the word suggested itself to me. First, I realised that the central objective of British policy on the West Coast of Africa in the mid 1800s was directed at its handling of its settlements. Then I recalled the approval delicately given by Lord John Russell at London to the Consul Foote of Lagos on the 22 June 1861:

In a former despatch, I informed you that the question as to whether the Island of Lagos should be taken possession of as a British Dependency was still under consideration of Her Majesty’s Government and I have now to inform you that this question has been decided in the affirmative.

Today, it should seem incongruous to design policy to ‘possess’ by ownership a nation, but people and the land–but imperial era governments in the nineteenth century did just that, to their own economic benefit.

On close study it became clear that possession of Lagos was the thrust of British colonial policy towards a small port Kingdom; possession which resulted in the crown colony of Lagos² from 1861 to 1906 became the central theme in this book.

Lagos was formally taken on 6 August 1861, a regrettable possession day; even though the real seeds of colonial occupation were sown ten years earlier, on Christmas Eve, 1851, with the commencement of the bombardment of Lagos – the five day war. Many Lagosians and Europeans died over the period of five days that it took to subdue the kingdom. It was a strong and decisive measure indeed; as much of an assault on legality and justice as it was against the Lagos Africans. The British-controlled narrative of the justification for the bombardment and related events has consistently been the taking over of a slave trade haven; deposing a usurper king and the saving grace of the British invaders. That narrative is not without some self-serving interest. In any event we do however see an alternative narrative, that is, a dynastic struggle and legitimate claim for the throne; an imperial quest for an important developing economic harbour and the determined, resistant people of Lagos.

The minute records of Lord Palmerston, then Prime Minister and former Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, shows that the actual overwhelming objective in Lagos was trade:

The extension of our trade on the west coast of Africa generally and upon the Niger in particular is an object which ought to be actively and perseveringly pursued but it cannot be accomplished without physical effort for the protection of that trade. It may be in one sense that trade ought not to be enforced by cannon balls but on the other hand trade cannot flourish without security and that security may often be unattainable without the exhibition of physical force.³

In the course of the almost half century existence of the Colony of Lagos, with the use of force, the law, lawlessness, justice and injustice created its own narrative.⁴ The facts show the contrast, inconsistency and contradictions imposed by occupation; the facts show a random justice.

In fact, law and justice within the colony tell their own story; in the same way, I am sure that press, politics, architecture or culture all tell their own stories. But I have chosen law and justice for obvious reasons, largely to do with my principal vocation as a lawyer. I am privileged to be able to write on history and law, subjects for which I have considerable curiosity and passion, but this is by no means intended to be a comprehensive history of Lagos; it is merely an account through records, of the interplay between pride, prejudice, power, liberty and the struggle for the independent development of Lagos.

The decided judicial cases, the public inquiries and the parliamentary hearings are priceless in giving real insight into the motives and motivations of the principal persons that brought about and sustained the colony during its existence.

In this book, I have tried to employ narrative history for several reasons, not least being the desire to tell the story from recorded facts, to avoid interpretative ambiguity.

Olasupo Shasore SAN

Lagos, January 2014

Notes

Duke of Newcastle See (CO 147/6) Freeman to Newcastle also reported in Slavery and the Birth of an African City – Kristin Mann.

A Crown Colony is defined in the colonial regulations as a colony in which the crown has total control of legislation while the administration is carried on by public officers under the control of the home government. Under this system of government, the governor acting under the instructions from the Secretary of State is supreme in matters of legislation. See also Lagos Weekly Record August 17 1895.

See the report of a minute by Palmerston, Prelude to the Partition of West Africa by John D. Hargeaves (page 36). Professor Hargreaves notes about Lagos: ‘This port which commands the only easily navigable entrance to the Niger.’

On the contrary, see Sir Ralph Combe Chief Justice in R v Jackson: ‘One of the greatest blessings brought to this country by the British Administration is the establishment of an absolutely impartial judiciary; and I have every reason to believe that the inhabitants of this colony and protectorate have complete confidence in the British courts which have been established, and rejoice in having courts to which they can come with certain knowledge that justice will be administered with fear and without favour.’

Preface to Revised Edition

Welcome to the second edition of Possessed. It’s been four years since the first publication, during which time I gratefully received encouraging feedback from far and wide. Firstly, it became necessary to change the subtitle of the book because of the fact that law and justice used as the single focal access to Lagos history ensured that a significant amount of research had been left out of the initial book. The limitation presented by that access also left some readers unaware of the inter connectivity of Lagos history with the rest of colonial Empire history. And so the revision was to restore old research to this new book and to reflect that in the title. The title is now slightly amended to ‘Possessed: A History of the Crown Colony of Lagos’ - the reader will still find Law & Justice in the framework of the story, even though we have decided that broader context will give better access.

This second edition is a significant revision of the early chapters in the first edition with a substantial enlargement of the introduction which sets the tone of the book. The reason for this was to restore the connection between West Africa’s so called early European ‘explorers’, the slave trade, the seizure and occupation of Lagos as British possession leading to Nigeria and the larger Empire.

I have tried not to alter the books soul with new information or second thought perspective, I prefer that the book remains in its own time context as the innocent work undertaken at the time and with the knowledge available then not now.

Everything in the preface to the first edition particularly the statement of the Duke of Newcastle ‘The original sin of taking Lagos’ as Palmerston’s Secretary of State for the Colonies remains relevant and appropriate.

Finally I must thank many readers for all the words of appreciation for the first edition I was greatly rewarded by the glad wishes many readers gave. This has contributed in no small measure to the desire to embark on this revision.

Olasupo Shasore

Lagos, October 2018

Contents

Acknowledgement

Foreward

Preface to First Edition

Preface to Revised Edition

Contents

INTRODUCTION

The ‘Mother’

Lagos-The Entrepôt to a Nation

The ‘Mother Town’

CHAPTER 1

Sins of our Fathers

The 'Guinea' Coast

Sins of our Fathers

The Human Cargo

Berlin–Scramble or no scramble:

CHAPTER 2

‘Eko’ - The Kingdom

The Old House of Eko

CHAPTER 3

26 Upper King Street

The King of Lagos

The Chief

The Akarigbere

The Idejo

The Ogalade

The Abagbon

The Apena

The Ward-Price Enquiry

The Hearings

The Commission’s Terms of Reference

Rivalry between the Chiefs

The Overbearing Colony

The Expert

The Enquiry’s Findings–Not the Usual Way

Implementation

26 Upper King Street

First October – The Wall Came Down

To Assist and to Defend

CHAPTER 4

The Bombardment of Lagos, 1851

The Kingdom of Lagos – ‘Leave us alone’

Lagos before 1851 - A nation had emerged, but for how long?

The Human Tragedy - The Atlantic Slave Trade.

Civil War in Lagos

The Attack and Bombardment of Lagos

The Slaughter was Awful

The Royal Navy–The Armed Flotilla

The White Flag of Truce

The Royal Navy account continues:

The enemy amused himself

Her Majesty’s Government Regrets

The Unfortunate Affair in Lagos Should be Made Public!

The Flaming-Red Scotsman

‘Fair dealing’

He Failed to Protect Trade–the European Debts

The Consulate Kept The Peace

Captain Richard Burton – Return the Rule of the Native King

The Select Committee’s Verdict

CHAPTER 5

The Nineteenth Century Treaties

1897 - Inward Visit to The Colony

The 1852 Slave Trade Ban Treaty

Stop Slave Export

Article 1 – For Ever Abolished

Article II – Suppression of the Slave Trade

Article III – Subject to Severe Act of Discipline

Article IV – Baracoons to be destroyed

Article V – Persons Expelled

Article VI – Free Trade

Article VII – No Human Sacrifice

Article VIII – Embrace the Christian Faith

Article IX – Reserved for the French

The Treaty of Cession 1861 – The Prometheus

A Natural Entrepôt

A Denial

The 1861 Treaty

To Assist and to Defend

King in its Usual African Signification

The Pensioned King

More Money

CHAPTER 6

To Do Justice to This Place

First Legal Framework

Justice for the Africans?

The Slave Courts

An Early Trial – No Reasonable Doubt

The Assize Court

A Cell For A Home

A Serial Killer

The Broad Street Property – Lagos…is not a Foreign Country

The ‘Krooboys’ on the ‘Dodo’

Human Nature

No African Courts

CHAPTER 7

The Eleko and The Colony

The Staff of Eleko

Native Law and Custom Requires The King to Leave

Naturally, after very exhaustive arguments, judgment was reserved by Justice Tew.

The Return of The Eleko

CHAPTER 8

Whose Acres of Land?

John Holt

Amodu Tijani

Oluwa at the Law Lords - the Judicial House of Lords

CHAPTER 9

The Sun Sets on the Colony of Lagos

The Lagos Tram Service

Beating their Drums

The Drumming Question

Native Labour

The End Game for the Colony – ‘Purchasing the Charter’

Afterword

The Lagos African.

APPENDIX

BIBLIOGRAPHY & REFERENCES

INDEX

INTRODUCTION

The ‘Mother’

'The African is not Clay to be cast into a western mold' J. H. Oldham

The captured slaves fought their enemy, the crewmen of the French merchant ship Regina Coeli, for their lives and for liberty; they fought with everything they had–hastily made cutlasses, knives, cudgels, and even bare hands. Improvising, they did all they could to overpower the crew and gain control of the ship. It was an uncommon and astounding mutinous recovery by the African cargo of men, otherwise destined to a life of slavery.

One African survivor, ‘Peter’, spoke in English when he revealed the marks on his ankles and wrists where irons and manacles had been used to restrain him to the deck of the ship. Peter and over 200 other ‘emigrants’–men kidnapped into slavery–all whooped, expressing utter joy when they saw Joseph Jenkins Roberts, then already former president of Liberia, board the ship to investigate their circumstances and question the men.

Peter’s story was an increasing occurrence along the West Coast of Africa because while it had become more difficult by the 1850s to capture Africans solely for slave trade, it was still possible to promise work and travel while surreptitiously clamping the slave irons on the unsuspecting Africans by stealth, deception and outright fraud.

For weeks in the April heat, Captain Simon and his crew had been collecting labourers to travel aboard the Regina Coeli. No sooner had the number of men been established on board and the hatches closed did captivity become clear and present to the Africans. Peter and his compatriots became agitated and desperate but the Coeli continued on its real journey to Havana, Cuba, where the cargo was destined for sale.

As the Regina Coeli arrived at Cape Mount, the captain, purser and three crewmen disembarked, leaving eleven crew on board. It was then that the African cargo struck, freeing their chains and mortally attacking the crew. The rebellion entered full swing and by its end all the crew, except the ship’s doctor, were killed. With the ship now under the African slave control, it idled along the shore.

When the Royal Mail Steamship Ethiope arrived at Monrovia, officers of the free Republic of Liberia prevailed on the Ethiope’s Captain Croft to head out to sea to search for the Regina Coeli. The Ethiope found the Coeli, her decks crowded with men; the foresail, canons and swivel guns by then rendered superfluous, a white shirt flapping in the wind serving as a flag of truce. The Ethiope then guided the retrieved ship back to shore.

From about the year 1850, the Royal Mail Steamer Service ships were frequent callers at the port town of Lagos some 900 miles east of Cape Mount. The same Royal Mail Steam Ship Ethiope was a main vessel in this intercontinental transport, mail and news bearer. It had carried the news of the mutiny aboard the Regina Coeli of some emigrants turned unsuspecting slaves, many of whom were later arrested by the captain for the revolt.¹ The Coeli news was received in Lagos and London with alarm.

Fortunately, the Ethiope’s other journeys in the 1850s from Liverpool to Lagos were less eventful, typified by the frequent task of carrying a burden of cargo, cotton, gin, guns, medicine, mail and passengers. It would frequently anchor at the Lagos port.

At that time, the notorious Lagos sandbar across the mouth of the habour was known to be dangerous, and would require the steamship Ethiope to communicate with the town only by signals at first due to the impossible, immediate approach. Only in the early hours of the morning would the local Lagos Africans, under instruction to serve the newly arrived vessel, approach the vessel from the island by canoe to deliver outgoing mail and supplies. The small boats would also carry any passengers and goods scheduled to land safely on shore. The canoe ride was by no means an easy venture–the strength of fourteen experienced Lagos Africans powered the journey; twelve of the men paddling, one steering, another in front facing seaward and directing the steering through the maze of sand and silt. The hourlong paddle often in early morning mist brought passengers up to the town of Lagos in the Bight of Benin straddling latitude 6:24 North and longitude 3: 29 East, approximately 360 miles from Fernando Po which was literally at the armpit of Africa.

The locals shared the Lagos kingdom’s inland territory with elephants, leopards, antelope, hyena and other wildlife. Already visibly below sea level, Lagos was a predominantly flat land with some mud brick, a smattering of clay brick buildings and keen factory activity. Some parts of the island were richly fertile with luxuriant vegetation and mangrove growth; it was also fertile for produce–sugarcane, coconuts, palm and fruits.

In 1850, the population was estimated at about 30,000. They spoke several languages—the Oyo language dialect which was later widely referred to as Yoruba; Egun, Portuguese and English–the kingdom already had some 1,500 emigrants from Sierra Leone, Brazil and Cuba.

Robert Campbell’s description of the population² of the Lagos Kingdom (apart from the Isheri and other indigenous Lagos people) is as follows:

All these (others) are themselves native Africans brought from the interior and sold on