FACTORY LIFE ON THE GUINEA COAST
Factory life in Africa is no desirable lot for a civilized being, but I
passed five years at Rio Basso without much tediousness. My uncle made a
liberal contract for my services and allowed me three negroes per month
to ship on my own account. I made myself familiar with King Vinegar’s
people on the river and visited many black nations further inland. Don
Miguel Barca, the factor, was a hasty tempered man but on the whole we
got on very well together. Under his management we had a couple of
hundred darkies constantly at work cutting down trees and assisting our
white force which numbered twenty—Spaniards, Portuguese and Dutchmen.
Besides being surgeon, I was accountant and paymaster and had to settle
with King Vinegar and the other chiefs for the provisions they sent in.
All this time we were loading and trans-shipping cargoes of slaves from
various parts of the coast. As soon as our barracoons were ready they
were filled with stock and no vessel had to wait an extra day for lack
of negroes.
Our first accomodations were poor enough, tents and hovels being the
only shelter; but before the rains we got under a commodious roof and in
the course of a year I had a house to myself. The factor, Don Miguel,
had a larger house than mine, for his family was extensive in the female
line. He had two quarteroon wives from the Verds and I don’t know how
many favorites, of mulatto and even darker hues.
Our barracoons, as the slave pens were called, were located close to the
river. They were built of cane, matted with vine and plastered with mud,
the whole strengthened by uprights and picket barriers. Here the slaves
were driven, on arrival, and placed in charge of gangsmen of their own
color. The gangsmen superintended the head-shaving, washing and branding
and saw that the blacks were duly secured every night to posts driven in
the ground. There was a gangsman to every twenty slaves and they took
turns through the night standing guard, with whips, to keep order.
We had a quarantine hospital built on a little island further down the
river, for treatment of sick stock, and a burial place in the sand
behind. I instructed a dozen of the more intelligent blacks in the
mysteries of simple drugging, cupping and blistering and in a short time
could boast of quite a medical board. We were generally lucky and lost
only a small average among the slaves. Out of seventy-two thousand
slaves received and transshipped from Rio Basso, in five years, we lost
only eight thousand and this included deaths by accidental drowning,
suicides, and a smallpox epidemic in 1811, when our barracoons were
crowded and when we shipped 30,000 blacks to Brazil and the West Indies.
My uncle always gave reasonable care to his slaves but some of the
traders that came to our factory for water and supplies were ruthless.
The _Pongas_, owned by an American trader, came in one day for water and
I went aboard. She was loaded on the Gambia and the poor blacks were
packed like herrings on the sitting plan instead of the horizontal
stowage adopted by the French captains from the Senegal settlements. She
was crammed with a thousand blacks, wedged in her three-foot
between-decks. In one partition of her bulkhead, sixteen by eighteen
feet, two hundred and fifty women were squeezed and many of the wenches
were big with child. The men were stowed in each other’s laps, without
an inch to move right or left. The vessel stank horribly and Don Miguel
predicted that she would lose half her cargo.
The French slavers were fitted up at that time with more regard to the
comfort of their living freight. They were amply supplied with bread,
salt and allspice, for slave diet, and each black was provided with a
pewter plate and spoon and a tobacco pipe. The slaves slept horizontally
on the decks and in fine weather were made to exercise and were kept
employed in making ropes, hats and baskets for which they received
rations of brandy and tobacco.
[Illustration:
CAPTURE OF THE SLAVER “HENNA,” OCT. 26, 1843, OFF MERCURY ISLAND, S.
W. COAST OF AFRICA, BY H.M. SCHOONER “ARIEL”
From a water color in the Macpherson Collection
]
In August, 1814, I was at a trading station on the Kambia trying to make
life tolerable during a dismal rainy season, with no society but the
overseer, a Brazilian Portuguese, and a few Foulah girls, our household
handmaidens. One day news arrived of a vessel at the river’s mouth, and
shortly after my worthy uncle appeared. “Phil,” he said, very abruptly,
“I have a love affair on hand.” “A love affair!” I repeated, in great
astonishment, and when he related the details, I found that Don Ricardo,
instead of being a mere money-getting, callous-hearted slave trader, was
quite a chevalier in the way of romantic amours. He wanted my assistance
on a short expedition having for its purpose the possession of a Spanish
beauty as a companion to make his life in Africa more agreeable. Of
course I agreed to go with him and when I reached the brig and saw his
cabin fitted up luxuriously for a lady’s occupancy, I began to realize
how a “love affair” can polish a slave trader into something very tender
and make a slave brig’s cabin fit for other purposes than packing negro
women for the middle passage.
Our destination was the island of Teneriffe and we cast anchor in the
harbor of Oritava. The next day my uncle took me to a convent where he
had an interview with his young lady, a splendid specimen of Spanish
beauty. That she was in love with him I hadn’t the least doubt, though
our interview took place in the public parlor. He told me that she had
been devoted by her parents to take the veil and was then in her
novitiate, but there was nothing of the nun about her, it was plain to
see. The convent was a gloomy prison-house, with iron-grated windows and
gates strong enough for a fort.
That night we went ashore in the yawl with a dozen of the crew. Eight of
them stayed on the shore and the rest followed us to the convent. My
uncle climbed the wall and soon after a fire broke out in the building.
A bell began to ring and immediately we heard shrieking of women. Then
my uncle appeared with Donna Emelia in his arms. We all hurried back to
the boat and with his lady and two men to row he went out to the brig.
He directed me to return with the crew to the convent and assist the
people. It was a frightful scene. The nuns were flying in all
directions, most of them completely naked as they slept without
clothing. Some in the upper cells could be seen through the windows,
unable to escape and tearing about in their despair. I heard, before I
left, that seven had been burned to death and also the rumor that the
fire was caused by coals spilled out of an earthen stove, but I have
always had other suspicions. At any rate, my uncle secured his
sweetheart, who seemed to be about seventeen, a queenly type with
something of the look of a sorceress. Donna Emelia appeared on deck the
next day, as merry as a cricket and as splendid as a bird of paradise
and all on board soon heard that she was the captain’s wife. My uncle
appeared to be the happiest of men.
When we arrived at the Kambia, I found Diego Ramos ready to sail for
Cuba in our American ship _Miranda_. He had taken advantage of the first
week of dry weather to bargain for a kaffle brought in by one of the
neighboring kings and had got the slaves stowed aboard during the last
days of our absence. We said nothing to him about the result of our trip
and as I had been thinking of taking a run to the West Indies, it was
soon arranged that I should go with Ramos. Don Ricardo wished to use my
bachelor house as a place in which to spend his honeymoon, as he
laughingly expressed it. “Its the only place on the coast not yet run
down by negro traders and I want Emelia to get accustomed to this life
before she meets with Don Miguel and his rough companions.” So Diego
Ramos and I took possession of our shed on the _Miranda’s_
quarterdeck—all between decks being packed with her cargo—and soon were
off, with a flowing sheet, for the isles of profitable speculation.
Our blacks were a good-natured lot and jumped to the lash so promptly
that there was not much occasion for scoring their naked flanks. We had
tamborines aboard, which some of the younger darkies fought for
regularly, and every evening we enjoyed the novelty of African war songs
and ring dances, fore and aft, with the satisfaction of knowing that
these pleasant exercises were keeping our stock in good condition and of
course enhancing our prospects of making a profitable voyage. It was
after one of these musical evenings, when the tired performers had been
stowed again between decks, to sweat through another stifling night,
that our hopes were dashed to nothing. I had turned in and was sound
asleep when there was a sudden cry of “fire.” When I came on deck the
sailors were throwing buckets of water down the forecastle gratings and
the air was soon full of the shrieks and half-stifled groans of the
suffocating blacks. In spite of every effort the flames increased and
soon broke out by the main gratings.
“All is lost,” said Diego, to me, and then raising his voice he shouted,
“Bear away, lads! lashings and spars for a raft, my hearties!” The men
at once sprang to the work of cutting away the masts and bowsprit and
hoisting out the boats. Regardless of the yells and shrieks of the
doomed blacks, Diego ordered wet tarpaulines to be thrown over the
gratings to keep down the fire. The men worked for their lives and in a
very short time we had a well-secured raft, with two casks of water on
it and a supply of provisions. Our more valuable possessions were placed
in the two boats. Fortunately the sea was calm and we got away from the
burning brig without difficulty, having first shifted the hatch gratings
and flung down the shackle-keys to the slave gangs below. I shall never
forget the dreadful screech that rung in our ears as the panic-stricken
blacks scrambled on deck and discovered that we were leaving the vessel.
Some of them jumped overboard and began to swim towards us. The shouts
of the men and the screams of the women rose in horrible discord.
The raft was large enough to accommodate nearly a hundred of the blacks
and we took on about that number after which sailors, stationed on each
side, kept off the rest with handspikes. Morning came at last with a
grey fog covering the ocean. It was then found that one of the water
casks was only half full and the other leaked. A rum keg was emptied and
filled with the precious water and then transferred to one of the boats.
In a few hours the fog dispersed and the hot sun began to beat down on
us. We had no protection from it and could only obtain a measure of
relief by wrapping wet clothing around our heads. Before night came
every white man was wild with the torture of the heat. The negroes
seemed to suffer but little, but every now and then the overseers
drenched their naked backs with buckets of salt water. The next day was
a repetition of the first and when the third began to brighten with
sickening heat, Ramos called a council of his officers and myself. Not a
sail had been seen and our men were becoming as feeble as children. It
was determined that we should abandon the raft which anchored us, as it
were, in the ocean and by taking to the boats, endeavor to reach land.
Accordingly another round of a few drops of water and a stout dram of
rum was served to each of the eager blacks, under cover of which our
bread bag and the few gallons of water left were transferred to the
boats and we then quietly shoved off, letting the raft fall astern.
The negroes were evidently bewildered, at first, on finding themselves
free of their white masters, but soon the idea that they were being
deserted seemed to penetrate their black heads and they jumped to their
feet with loud cries and frantic motions of their arms, tearing their
wool and beating their heads. Diego Ramos looked at me and showed his
white teeth. “It’s a hard case,” said he; “but the poor devils must go!
and that breaks up our year’s profits, amigo!”
Just at this moment, a joyful cry broke from one of our seamen. “Sail
ho!” he screamed at the top of his lungs. “Sail ho! on the weather
quarter!” Sure enough, there was a square-rigged vessel looming up with
every bit of canvas set and bearing right down on us. Every man stood up
in the boats and began to wave jackets and hands and it was not long
before we saw a signal run up in token that we had been seen and a
little later we were safely on board H.B.M. transport ship _Indus_.
Diego Ramos and I were received by her commander very politely and we at
once made confession of our business, the raft of negroes, still in
sight making all evasion useless. Nothing was said, of course, in
reference to our abandonment of the negroes and so we obtained
considerable credit from the Briton, for our humanity in constructing a
raft for the negroes and keeping their company so long.
As plain Philip Drake of Stockford, I should have fared hard on the
royal transport and taken the place of one of my own blacks, as far as
shackles were concerned; but as Don Felipe Drax, a Brazilian merchant
and passenger on board the lost brig of Don Diego Ramos, I was allowed a
seat at the cabin table, with my partner, and treated with every
forbearance that a British officer could exhibit towards foreigners
rescued from shipwreck. Captain Simmons shook his grey little head at
Don Diego’s arguments, but laughed at his jokes and altogether we had a
pleasant mess daily till the _Indus_ cast anchor in Cape Coast harbor,
at the Sierra Leone settlement, where our negroes were to be adjudicated
by the resident commissioners. The darkies were landed in canoes and
placed in the Royal Yard and in a few days the commissioners decided
they should be apprenticed among the settlers for a term of a dozen
years, by which time Don Diego said they would be christianized and worn
out. Captain Simmons and his officers were ordered salvage and my
partner and I pocketed our losses with as good grace as possible. Ramos
looked up a coaster for our passage to New Tyre, my Kambia settlement,
and not long after we sailed. This was the end of our speculation in the
_Miranda_. The firm of Ramos and Drax remained extant, but the profits
of its last venture were mostly divided between fire, water, and British
philanthropy.
On reaching the Kambia settlement I found that my uncle’s honeymoon had
changed the appearance of my thatched house. Handsome additions had been
made; verandas, balconies and lattice-work, after the Spanish style,
making the rough outside look like a palace. Great alterations had also
been made in our barracoons and a number of negro gangs were still at
work bringing timber from the forest. Piles had been driven in the shore
making an outer support for a pier. We soon learned the reason for my
uncle’s efforts toward the establishment of a regular trading factory on
the Kambia. During our absence a noted Foulah king, named Moussy, had
made overtures for a regular alliance for the purposes of traffic, and
as New Tyre was a capital location for a depot for caravans from all the
Kambia country, my shrewd uncle had lost no time, during our absence, in
enlarging the capacities of the settlement. He had also made
arrangements for the speedy delivery of a large kaffle at our
barracoons, so that, if the _Miranda’s_ voyage had turned out well, on
our return we would have been surprised by a freight that would have
sent her back to the West Indies in short order. After learning these
facts I consulted with Diego and the result was a partnership between
Don Ricardo Villeno and ourselves under the firm name of Villeno and
Co., which in time became widely known in Africa and the West Indies.
I took up my quarters in the house of Pablo Crux, our Brazilian
overseer, leaving Don Ricardo and his creole wife in possession of my
old residence. Preparations for the reception of King Moussy’s caravan
went on actively. By January 1816, our large barracoon was nearly
complete and I had opened new accounts in the name of the firm.
Before long I learned that Donna Emelia was not my good uncle’s first
lady love,—by several. It appeared there had been a Fayal girl who had
died on the Congo, a few years before, and that a light quadroon, now
with Don Miguel, was formerly the favorite of Don Ricardo. As for Donna
Emelia, she was a splendid creature. When we dined at the “residency,”
as he called his house, she would play on the harp and sing for us. Her
voice was like a nightingale’s. Booby that I was, I felt my eyes pipe,
and the young lady, I thought, enjoyed my emotion. Diego pretended that
he believed her to be only a school girl, but I though her a deep one.
My uncle was certainly infatuated with his new love and ran her errands,
picked up her handkerchief and watched her as a cat does a mouse. They
seemed to be exceedingly happy together.
[Illustration:
VIEW OF A TOWN OF THE FOULAH TRIBE OF NEGROES
From an engraving by Basire, in Astley’s _Collection of Voyages_,
London, 1745
]
About the middle of the month we had news of the caravan, coming on the
direct trail from King Moussy’s chief town. It was said to consist of
about twelve hundred picked slaves, Mandingoes, Soosoos and condemned
Foulahs. The entire caravan numbered about two thousand persons and my
uncle and Diego went out to meet it leaving me in charge of the
residency. No one was to go near his lady’s apartments, on any pretence.
The donna was a nun again and I was to guard her convent door, by
swinging my cot in the saloon. During the first night of their absence,
I was suddenly awakened by Yunga, the Foulah girl, with a message from
her mistress who was very ill with cramps. I looked up my hot drops and
hurried to the Donna’s apartment. She appeared to be in great pain and I
administered the medicine which seemed to give no relief. The Foulah
girls were sent flying in all directions for new remedies and I found
myself alone with the Donna. She flung her arms around my neck, kissed
my lips and passionately begged me to save her. I tried to calm her but
she clung to me till the returning girls nearly discovered us. Twice
during the next day I had to attend her summons and for the life of me I
couldn’t make out if she was really in pain or danger. The next day,
however, she was rational enough and insisted that I had saved her life.
She patted my check and seemed simplicity itself.
The caravan arrived on the 18th with much noise and rattle, cracking of
guns and beating of tomtoms and drums. The Foulah king was a noble
specimen of his nation; over six feet tall and dressed in a white
_tobe_, with scarf and head dress of dyed cotton cloth mixed with silk.
I was the principal interpreter at the _palabra_ and a grand kickup it
was. Some seven hundred Foulah warriors armed with clubs, swords and
bows and arrows, many also having guns, were drawn up on our plaza and
negro traders, from the interior, numbering about a score, squatted in
front and around the king and his officers. Our retainers fired a grand
salute which was followed by an opening chorus by a band of black
singers, with cymbal-strikers to accompany them. Then came the grand
feast. Our slaughtered bullock, rum, and pipes kept the savages in
admiration all day long and King Moussy became our fast friend. Donna
Emelia was in high glee at the strange sight and the Foulahs thought her
a white fetish.
The day after the grand _palabra_, the ship _Cabenda_ arrived at our
moorings, bringing a heavy cargo of goods for trade—just in time. She
was my uncle’s best vessel, a ship of 300 tons burden. We also had three
other vessels anchored off the factory, one of them named _La Senora
Emelia_, in compliment to our lady of the residency. King Moussy and his
troops were camped in a fine palm valley, about a mile from the
residency, and the slaves, in gangs, under their various owners, were
fastened by cords of twisted bamboo fibres to stakes in the ground.
Donna Emelia accompanied my uncle and Pablo Crux on a tour of inspection
and was not at all put out of face at the spectacle. I thought at the
time that the sight of over a thousand stark naked blacks was hardly the
most delicate amusement for a young “school girl,” as Diego called her.
The cargo of the _Cabenda_ was landed as rapidly as possible and two
days after her arrival our great market was in full operation. It
reminded me of the square in Fandu. In addition to the thousand or more
slaves, several tons of African merchandise was displayed,—ivory, gold
dust, rice, cattle, skins, bees-wax, black wood, honey and many other
articles of inland production. In exchange we had cotton cloth, powder,
rum, tobacco, cheap muskets and a variety of pinchbeck trinkets, corals
and the like, to please the taste of savages. This barter was only on
the side as the main business was slave buying. We allowed for a stout
negro of twenty, a value of about fourteen English shillings or three
Spanish dollars, in merchandise. Women and boys brought less. Our powder
was coarse and the guns were roughly made in England for this market.
The spirits, cotton, powder and guns came in my uncle’s coasters from
English trading stations on the Congo. We bought on the coast and paid
higher prices for these goods, in order to prevent the old factories
from breaking up as sometimes they were very convenient as a temporary
slave depot.
King Moussy and I became great cronies. It quite won the old fellow’s
heart because I could understand his lingo. He owned about two hundred
of the slaves in the caravan. The rest were ventures of smaller caravans
that paid him a tribute for the escort of his warriors. He got a
percentage on all the sales, whether slaves or goods and we paid him a
bonus of one hundred muskets, twenty kegs of powder, two pieces of
cotton and a soldier’s red coat, as his dasch or present, in
consideration of the treaty made with my uncle. He was not a bad fellow,
but cunning as a fox, and moreover he had decidedly good taste for a
savage, as he hinted to me that he would be willing to give up the
dasch, and throw in a hundred darkies, if the _Moneego_, Don Ricardo,
would sell him his wife, Donna Emelia. Our market was over by the 25th
of January and we were well rid of the negro king and his army of
cormorants who threatened to eat us out of house and home. As a result
we had bought eleven hundred first-class slaves, enough to freight two
vessels to the Brazils.
New Tyre continued to thrive. With the assistance of King Moussy we were
able to dispatch a full dozen cargoes from the Kambia alone and
including my uncle’s settlement at Rio Basso, we sent to Cuba and the
Brazils, during the year 1816, a total of 43,000 slaves, and Villeno &
Company soon became equally well known to native kings, West India
traders and European brokers. If one of our coast schooners poked her
nose up the Gambia, the Congo, the Calabra, or Bonny, almost immediately
negroes were in motion to the shore in gangs of all sizes.
Donna Emelia remained charming. She seemed never to tire of my accounts
of African life as I had seen it during my captivity with the Dahomans
and Foulahs. Diego Ramos was away most of the time, as captain of one of
our vessels, and Don Ricardo remained with his lodestone—Donna Emelia.
He built a cottage for her in Palm valley, about two miles from the
river, in a natural garden of tropical flowers and fruits. Quite an
extensive area was inclosed with high pickets and gates, like a
stockade, which was watched by several black sentinels armed with loaded
muskets.
Toward the close of 1816, my uncle went to Rio Basso and took Donna
Emelia with him. When they returned, in a few weeks, the Spanish
favorite was accompanied by a quadroon girl and her mother, a good
featured mulattress. The girl was about twenty years old and had one of
the rich, rosy faces that are sometimes seen on the coast. Her figure
was superb. My uncle introduced her to me, laughingly, as my
housekeeper, and as I was no novice to the customs of Africa, I accepted
both her and the mulattress as acquisitions to my household. But to my
surprise, that same day the quadroon made a most eloquent appeal to my
generosity, accompanied by a protestation of her love for Don Ricardo.
This opened my eyes and I called to mind what Diego Ramos had told me
concerning some of my uncle’s former favorites and of a quadroon that
had been transferred to Don Miguel, at Rio Basso. On questioning the
mulattress, I learned that her daughter had lived with Don Ricardo for
three years and borne him a child which survived but a short time.
Marina, the quadroon, was passionately attached to him and had attempted
to drown herself at Rio Basso, which caused Don Miguel to interest
himself and prevail on my uncle to allow her to return with him to New
Tyre, as a companion of Donna Emelia. But Don Ricardo, always jealous in
everything that had to do with his creole, thought best to transfer the
cast-off quadroon to his twenty-six year old nephew. On learning the
facts about her, I permitted the grateful woman to take charge of my
quarters, much to my apparent gain in point of comfort and attentive
service.
When I next dined with my uncle in Palm valley, it was to be joked
considerably by Donna Emelia, concerning my “handsome wife,” all of
which I took in good part and laughed with Don Ricardo, over our wine,
as if I was very well satisfied with his Rio Basso present.
A short time after this, Diego Ramos arrived from the Verds for a cargo.
He reported a fleet of British vessels bound for Cape Castle and a
voyage of survey up and down the coast and rivers. They had been
empowered to make descents upon all places suspected to be dependent, to
any extent, upon English men or English capital and to break up slave
factories wherever British complicity could be proven against the
managers. This was serious news for Don Ricardo and myself for we were
both British subjects, though time and change of name had made us able
to pass for Spaniards, Brazilians or creoles, as we had chosen to
appear. My uncle was well fitted to sustain either character and to
deceive the closest scrutiny, but I was not so sure of my own
versatility and neither was he. After reflection it was decided that I
must go with Diego Ramos, on his next voyage, and so be out of the way
in case the British vessels should appear before New Tyre.
We sailed Feb. 13th, 1817, in the _Cabenda_, our largest ship, loaded
with 850 slaves, a quantity of ivory and gold dust, and bound direct for
Rio de Janeiro. Nothing of importance occurred during the voyage and we
landed our slaves on April 6th, with only a small loss during the
passage. Soon after our arrival I met with my old friend Doctor Maxwell
and had a chat with him over old times. He was as grey as a badger and
portly as a porpoise. The next day we went out to the estate of Mr.
Floss, to whom our slaves were consigned, and were entertained by him.
He lived in grand style and gave concerts and balls to the neighboring
gentry. That evening there was a sumptuous entertainment, the dons and
donnas wearing their richest clothing. The men shone in all colors and
the ladies’ taffeta petticoats were fringed with gold lace and their
tight velvet jackets were laced and buttoned with pearl tassels.
The next day the very deuce was to pay and we found ourselves barricaded
in Doctor Maxwell’s house with the negroes collected in a state of
insurrection. All communication with the mansion was cut off and risings
on neighboring plantations were expected. The negroes began by setting
fire to the cane fields, devastating crops and smashing machinery in the
_ingenios_. Troops were ordered out and a battle was fought, and the
blacks dispersed to the hills from which they made sallies and burned
several country houses—including the mansion of Mr. Floss. We had been
shut up in the doctor’s house for two days when Mr. Floss reached us
pursued by a gang of negroes. He had been skulking in the fields since
his mansion was destroyed and barely succeeded in reaching our house.
Hardly had he been admitted before we were surrounded by hundreds of
yelling blacks. It was near night and they had lighted torches and
numerous weapons. We tried to parley with them but they demanded the
delivery of Floss alive into their hands, something that could not be
thought of and so we prepared for defence hoping that troops might
arrive to our assistance. We had half a dozen faithful blacks in the
house, with two Brazilian overseers, Doctor Maxwell, the superintendent,
Mr. Floss, Ramos and myself, to oppose the enraged slaves whose numbers
were constantly increasing.
Finding us resolved to defend the house, the blacks tried to set it
afire. We shot several of them but at last they succeeded in piling up
loads of dry cane and we were compelled to retreat from doors and
windows to the central court. The house was built like a hollow square,
with the _corral_ or yard in its center and there we stood at bay when
the blacks entered. I gave up all for lost when I saw the yelling devils
jumping through the fire to get at us. They were led by a gigantic negro
who sprang upon Floss. Poor Maxwell was seized by another and Ramos and
I would have shared their fate if I had not suddenly recognized the
leading savage. It was my old acquaintance, the Ashantee Quobah, whom I
had last seen after his fight with the lions at Yallaba. I knew him at
once and called out to him in the negro tongue just as he had dashed
Floss to the ground and placed his foot on him. The negroes heard what I
said and hesitated, when I quickly asked for an armistice.
Quobah flourished an enormous club, motioning the savages back, and then
turned to me. I spoke rapidly as I saw that it was a matter of life and
death and fortunately the Ashantee remembered me and ordered his furious
followers not to molest us. Ramos and I were bound with cords and
dragged out of the burning building and Floss and Maxwell were roped
about the neck and cruelly beaten with clubs and whips. The insurgents
hurried us in front of the burning house and then began a dreadful
torture and massacre. The Brazilian overseers and their negroes were cut
to pieces. Floss and Maxwell were stripped, fastened to stakes, and
sugar sap was poured over their naked bodies. The blacks then piled cane
around them and tortured them with slow fire. It was a horrible sight.
The wretched victims begged in vain for mercy until they fainted under
their agony. Then Quobah struck the Doctor a blow with his club, which
dashed his skull open, and this was a signal to the blacks to finish
their work. They scattered the burning cane and tore the charred bodies
of their victims into a thousand pieces, as they danced and trampled on
the embers. Quobah then came and cut the cords from Ramos and me and
told us to escape. His voice was hoarse and his eyes were like two balls
of fire. “Go and tell the white King how Quobah has avenged himself on
these dead brutes,” he said to me. “Quobah is ready to die, but he will
be a slave no more.” We lost no time in getting away from the scene of
the massacre and wandered about the woods until morning when we fell in
with a troop of soldiers from the presidency barracks.
The insurrection lasted for three days and Quobah, the Ashantee, it
afterwards turned out, was the head of the conspiracy. He had lately
been brought from Africa and sold to Mr. Floss and by his order, flogged
several times, to break him in. This had been Floss’s usual custom with
high-strung darkies. Poor fellow! it cost him his life. Doctor Maxwell
had also been unpopular with the blacks and I recalled some of his
former opinions. “Niggers must be treated like niggers,” was one of the
unfortunate surgeon’s maxims which I remembered.
The year 1817-1818 was marked by many other negro insurrections. In
Barbadoes, Trinidad and St. Thomas, the whites lived in constant fear of
massacre. This was said to be due to the numbers of savage Africans that
were smuggled into the British colonies from Spanish and Portuguese
islands. Laws were passed for registering all slaves, but were enforced
in only a few islands.
Quobah, the Ashantee, was never taken by the Brazilians. He fled to the
wild plains, with a few followers, and was either killed or adopted by
the Indians. It was noticed at the time, that both Brazilian and West
Indian insurgents adopted flags and were apparently organized and there
was little doubt that some plan had been concocted for a general rising
of the slaves. I afterwards heard that a negro flag was found in
Barbadoes, divided into three colors, one bearing the figure of a white
man hanging by the neck; the second, a black chief standing over a white
woman; and the third, a negro with a crown on his head and a beautiful
white woman seated by his side. It was thought at the time that some
negro agents from Hayti had stirred up the slaves both on the continent
and the islands. The Barbadoan rebels burned whole parishes and similar
devastation was done on other islands. The result was that thousands of
slaves were shot, hanged, or starved in their retreats and many sugar
estates were left without laborers. All this enhanced the price of
negroes and improved the market and Diego Ramos predicted more than
average luck for us during the next twelve months. Fortunately, the
_Cabenda’s_ freight had been settled for before the death of Mr. Floss.
His drafts were on Paris houses and were as good as gold at the French
factories on the Senegal river. France had before this abolished the
slave traffic—on paper, but her citizens were not so scrupulous or timid
as H.B.M. subjects.
We cast anchor again in the Rio Pongo about the middle of the rainy
season. All things were as before, though the settlement had been
honored by two visits from the British squadron, then very active along
the coast. My uncle, however, had passed muster. Our barracoons were
empty; the storehouses full. Don Ricardo had exhibited his Portuguese
permits which allowed him liberty to engage in such African trade as he
pleased. The Don had, moreover, exercised diplomacy in another way. He
had dispatched one of his negro agents to the Congo river, where a
British expedition of discovery was in trouble, and there contrived to
negotiate some favors from the native kings which were of special
importance to the English explorers. This had gone a great way with our
bamboozled countrymen and the house of Villeno & Company instead of
suffering spoliation, became of greater importance than ever on the
African coast.
[Illustration:
CAPTURE OF THE SLAVER “BORBOLETA,” MAY 26, 1845, BY THE BOATS OF H.M.
BRIG “PANTALOON,” AFTER A TWO DAYS’ CHASE OFF LAGOS, WEST AFRICA
From a colored lithograph, after a drawing by H. John Vernon, in the
Macpherson Collection
]
We had accounts of British severities on the Calabar, the Congo and
Gambia rivers, as well as near Cape Palmas. Captain Fraley’s old Bangara
factory on the Congo, had been destroyed and its manager, an American
factor named Curtis, had been summarily ejected. Another American, named
Cooke, had been carried to Sierra Leone and then sent in irons to
Portsmouth. Another factory, near the town of a native king, Mungo
Cattee, had been destroyed and nearly twenty tons of elephant’s teeth
had been seized. Other depredations had been committed by the British
but thus far both New Tyre and Rio Basso had escaped scot free.
My private establishment seemed like home again, after shipboard life,
but I noticed a change in the quarteroon girl, Marina, as soon as I set
eyes on her. The bright flush was gone from her cheeks and her black
eyes, which had been as brilliant as stars, were heavy and half closed
under their long lashes. She smiled faintly in welcoming us but soon
appeared to grow stupid and forgetful. Donna Emelia, at Palm Valley,
gave me a warm greeting and my uncle was in the best of spirits with
her, himself, and everybody.
We met two strangers at my uncle’s table,—Pedro Blanco, a Malaga sailor,
and Blas Covado, a Mexican. The first, afterwards amassed a million and
a half of silver dollars in the African trade and made a position for
himself much more important than was my uncle’s at that time, and this
was accomplished during a time when nearly every government was in arms
to suppress the traffic. As for Covada, he was obsequious to everybody
and seemed a white-livered dog. He was an accountant or factotum to my
uncle and appeared to have his confidence.
Marina’s condition puzzled me more and more. I could get little out of
the old woman save that the white lady in Palm Valley had an evil fetish
that had bewitched Marina. I also learned that the girl had passed all
the time of my absence in the cottage of Donna Emelia, as her personal
attandant. I had heard before that time, of a strange African distemper,
commonly known as the “sleepy disease,” and Marina’s appearance answered
to some of its symptoms; but her old mother, who knew of this malady,
would not believe her daughter was its subject and I soon found that she
was right. The old woman insisted that Marina always came home
“bewitched” after a visit to the Donna’s house. This startled me and I
made a search among the quarteroon’s little articles of toilet and soon
discovered evidence of what I had begun to fear. There was a small vial,
half full of a fluid; some pills; some mango pickle; all of which I
found to be impregnated with _strychnine_.
The matter of a slave girl dying, even by slow poison, was not of much
rarity in Africa, and had Marina been one of our marketable blacks, it
would have been only a consideration of our loss in dollars and cents.
The “witchcraft,” as the mulattress believed it, would have been
attributed to some malevolent fellow slave and the case forgotten in a
day or two. But my interest in the quarteroon, as my uncle’s former
favorite, coupled with her passion for him and her late residence at
Palm Valley, furnished me with grounds for conjecture and I resolved to
closely question Marina. The next day, however, her spasms returned and
in spite of all my remedies, increased in violence and in three days she
was dead. The mulattress was crazy with grief and survived her
“bewitched” daughter only a few weeks. My uncle expressed astonishment
and apparent grief and Donna Emelia was profuse with expression of
sympathy for what she called _my_ bereavement. After Marina was buried,
the Donna insisted that I should live at Palm Valley, an invitation that
Don Ricardo seconded and from that date my misfortunes in after life
commenced.
As I became better acquainted with the Donna I found that her mind was
well cultivated. She had a choice library and fascinated me with her
conversation and pretty manners. Palm Valley soon became a little
paradise for me, notwithstanding Ramos’ remark that there was an angel
and a devil in it. And this I found to be true, within a week of the day
when I went to live there. She could tempt an angel, I believe, and I
became a fool and a villain. She swore that she had loved me from the
day when we first met, but there was something in her eyes that made me
feel uneasy. She seemed at times as artless as a child and at others,
artful beyond all scrutiny. Though not twenty years of age, her head was
older than mine or my uncle’s and it was no wonder we were both
fascinated and both deceived.
The fine weather brought activity to New Tyre as to all the coast. Diego
Ramos went coasting to the Congo and Pedro Blanco with our good-natured
Dutchman, sailed for the Senegal, in a French trader. Toward the end of
the year it became advisable to send to Rio Basso for a vessel or two to
relieve us of our large stock of negroes, waiting in the Kambia
barracoons for shipment. My uncle was unwilling to leave the attractions
of Palm Valley and the Mexican, Blas Covado, was dispatched with
confidential instructions. He left New Tyre in a small sloop and
returned in due time, but instead of bringing a slave vessel he made his
appearance on the deck of a British cruiser which cast anchor opposite
our factory, landed a hundred men, and took possession of the station in
the name of the Governor of Sierra Leone.
The blow was like a thunderclap and Don Ricardo could hardly believe his
senses when he found himself with me and our three other white men,
summoned before the captain of H.B.M. sloop-of-war _Princess Caroline_,
charged with maintaining a slave establishment “contrary to the peace
and dignity of H.M. Government.” He protested his innocence, of course,
and demanded under what plea they invaded a station over which the
Portuguese flag was flying.
“Because,” the English officer replied, “you are no Portuguese, but a
cursed English renegade and slaving vagabond!”
My uncle started back and his eye flashed mischief, as I had often seen
it before, but he controlled his temper wonderfully.
“May I ask what you intend to do in my house and under _that_ flag?” he
asked, pointing to the colors on our flag-staff in front of the piazza
where we were standing.
“Burn one and pull down the other,” answered the British captain
savagely. “But first, we shall send you and your under-devils aboard
ship! Here, Mr. Bayley,” he continued, addressing a midshipman, “give
these outlaws ribbons on their wrists and take ’em to the boats.”
The young officer touched his hat and a movement was made among the
marines and sailors drawn up on the grass before the large piazza of the
residency, when suddenly my uncle thrust his hands in the bosom of his
loose marino shirt and drew out two pistols.
“Captain,” he said, speaking through his set teeth, “I demand your
authority for this, and if a man of you attempts to handcuff one of us,
I’ll blow his brains out if I die the next minute!”
The Englishman’s blue face lost some of its color for a moment, as he
saw his breast covered by one pistol-barrel while the other was levelled
at his subaltern. With an oath, he pointed to the Mexican, Blas Covado,
who had just come up between two sailors.
“There’s the King’s evidence to hang you!” he blustered. “He’ll tell you
there’s not a stone left of your Rio Basso slave-pens, as there wont be
of these by tomorrow morning, by the Lord Harry! Men, do your duty!”
[Illustration:
CAPTURE OF THE SPANISH SLAVER “FORMIDABLE,” DEC. 7, 1834, OFF SIERRA
LEONE, BY H.M. BRIG “BUZZARD”
From a colored aquatint, after the painting by W. J. Huggins, in the
Macpherson Collection
]
We saw at once how matters stood and no sooner had the British officer
given his last order, than Don Ricardo’s pistol exploded and he sprang
into the open door of the residency, crying, “Follow me, Philip!” It was
a desperate chance, but we made it, with the British yelling like
bloodhounds close at our heels. We had the advantage of a knowledge of
the paths and had nearly reached Palm Valley, when we saw a dozen
soldiers emerging from a cross-path only forty rods behind us. They were
led by the treacherous Mexican, Covado. By that time, however, we were
close to our shelter and could hail our black sentinels, but we didn’t
reach the gate before we received the sailors’ fire. I felt a bullet
graze my cheek and rushed headlong through the open gateway expecting my
uncle to follow. Just then one of our negro watchmen gave a loud screech
and I heard a musket shot. Turning quickly I saw Don Ricardo stagger in
with the sentinel’s gun in his hand. He had snatched it, as he reached
our gate, and fired at our pursuers, shooting the Mexican traitor
through the head. In another moment we had closed and barred the gate
and were as secure as our stockade defences could make us. Then I
discovered that my uncle was wounded. He had been struck by a bullet in
the right breast and I had hardly time to extend my arms before he fell
into them like a log.
Don Ricardo’s wound was dangerous, I saw at once, and I staunched and
dressed it as well as I was able. He grew weaker, but about midnight was
able to speak and told the Donna and me that he was bleeding internally
and couldn’t survive. He spoke with great earnestness and asked me to
promise to protect Emelia, if necessary, with my life. She became
frantic and it was necessary for me to call the Foulah wenches and have
her taken away. My uncle then gave me the keys of his chest and told me
to take the money and papers which it contained. Soon after his mind
began to wander. I called Pablo to take my place and went to Donna
Emelia, to tell her what my uncle had said. She threw herself into my
arms, kissing and fondling and swearing that she would never leave me
and that we should live and die together. She had never appeared more
beautiful than on that night, with her dishevelled but glossy ringlets
flowing over her heaving breasts and her large black eyes sparkling with
tears. But she was far more practical than I was and soon began to speak
of escaping from Palm Valley.
I was loath to abandon my uncle, but the creole persuaded me there was
no help for it and that we should only sacrifice ourselves by remaining.
With Pablo’s assistance I packed up a few valuables and necessaries,
including all my uncle’s papers, and such ready money as I had, and then
loaded a couple of our kroos with provisions and Donna Emelia’s clothing
and went to a pleasure boat that lay in a little cove about a quarter of
a mile away in a sheltered part of the river some two miles above the
factory. Here I left the Brazilian with four kroomen and one of the
Foulah girls, while I returned for the Donna. I didn’t dare go into the
room where my uncle lay raving, in charge of the other women, but
carried Emelia in my arms, out by our rear pickets, and followed by two
blacks with more of the creole’s goods, we reached the boat which was a
pinnace that had been fitted up for short excursions on the river.
It was after midnight when we got under way with half a dozen kroos to
row, and pushed up the river under a brilliant starlight. It was not
until we were pushing off that the Brazilian became aware that Don
Ricardo had been left behind; but I satisfied him, as best I could, of
the necessity of the case. At daybreak we ran into a small creek and lay
concealed among the dense growth of sedges until night when we rowed up
the stream to a small negro village where Pablo expected to find a
friendly chief of King Moussy’s nation. We found the town deserted,
except for a few old men and children, the warriors having been called
to a great slave hunt inland. Here, in vacant bamboo huts, we found
accommodations and the creole was obliged to content herself with
quarters much less luxurious than those which my poor uncle had
furnished.
One of our faithful kroos was dispatched in a canoe to reconnoitre. The
next day he came back and reported that our storehouses, barracoons and
dwellings were in ashes. The cottage in Palm Valley had not been spared
and New Tyre was again a wilderness. But the British sloop-of-war had
gone and we soon followed in a coasting schooner belonging to our house,
which arrived just in time.
After leaving the Kambia we ran along the coast for a hundred miles,
till we spoke a French brig bound for the Senegal. By this time the
creole had made me promise to leave Africa at once. I found among my
uncle’s papers ready cash, in Bank of England notes, to the amount of
£8000, and accepted drafts of the Villeno partnership, on Spanish and
French houses, to the amount of nearly £8000, which, added to my own
cash in gold, gave me over $80,000. I directed Pablo to take the
schooner to the Congo station and await the arrival of Diego Ramos and
took passage in the French brig and shortly after reached the Senegal.
There we succeeded in finding a Bordeaux brig, the _Elisée_, bound to
her owners, with a general cargo of African products, and I engaged a
cabin for Donna Emelia, who passed as my wife, under our assumed name of
Morillo. On arriving at Bordeaux we obtained passports, as Spanish
travellers, and ten days afterward found ourselves in Paris.
My first business in Paris was to negotiate my uncle’s securities and in
a week I had turned everything into cash and in another began to spend
it. Our money was a passport better than rank or title. Before we had
had six weeks of fashionable life, we had had fully as many quarrels,
and the creole developed a temper that I had not expected. In six
months, we had spent nearly £7000, and the greater part of it on Donna
Emelia’s extravagant fancies. Nearly half of our fortune had been
squandered, but when I spoke to my wife about it she laughed. I then
insisted that we should leave Paris and at last she consented. Six
months later found us settled on a handsome _ranche_, in the
neighborhood of Matanzas, Cuba, which I had purchased for twenty
thousand Spanish dollars.
The business of sugar-growing was new to me, but I had an experienced
overseer and for a few months everything worked to my satisfaction. But
the restless disposition of Donna Emelia demanded change. We made
occasional trips to Havana but she always returned dissatisfied until,
at last, she discovered a new amusement at home. One day when I returned
from Matanzas I was met by my groom with a frightened look and when I
demanded the reason was told that my lady had been flogging his wife, a
good-looking house servant who had charge of the laundry. The girl had
offended Donna Emelia three days before and had been flogged every day
since, always in my absence. She was now in prison. The word “prison”
startled me and I went to my wife. The Donna was in good humor and
laughed and said the girl had carelessly torn a costly lace vandyke and
so had been punished and shut up, but should be released and go to her
husband that evening. I smoked my cigar and forgot about the matter
until three days afterward my groom threw himself on his knees and told
me his wife was dead or dying. This shocked me and I asked where the
wench was and he led me to an out house where I pried open the locked
door and found the negress lying absolutely naked, her back completely
flayed and covered with flies. She was fastened by an iron chain to a
post. Near by was hanging a slave whip stiff with blood. The chain had
eaten into the girl’s flesh, ulcerating her hips and stomach. She was
past relief and died that evening.
I was bewildered on learning that the slave had been beaten by Donna
Emelia’s _own hand_, to the condition in which I found her. My wife had
been in the habit of shutting herself up alone with her victim and
beating her until she became insensible. At least a score of floggings
had been administered. At once I taxed her warmly with the affair,
telling her of the girl’s death, and she wept and swore the wench had
insulted and greatly provoked her and that she had no idea of punishing
her until greatly aggravated. Her tears and seeming sorrow at last
disarmed resentment and I agreed to say no more.
Our visitors were numerous. The Donna arranged concerts, dances,
serenades and boating parties. Among other amusements, gaming was not
forgotten, and I was initiated into its mysteries by heavy losses in
which my guests profited. Among them was a youth named Da Souza, who
claimed to be a Brazilian officer of the Imperial Guard of Dom Pedro,
but I believed him to be a mulatto. He was Donna Emelia’s constant
attendant and tried to ingratiate himself with me in every way and in
time I began to tolerate him so that we came to be partners in gaming
bouts.
[Illustration:
FEMALE SAMBOE SLAVE GIVEN TWO HUNDRED LASHES
From an engraving in Stedman’s _Narrative of an Expedition to
Surinam_, London, 1796
]
One day I was asked to see a Congo girl who was sick and found her in
spasms that reminded me of the strange disease of my quadroon Marina.
When I asked what the girl had eaten, she showed me some candied limes
which her mistress had given her. This fruit I took away to analyze and
soon found it to be impregnated with strychnine, like the mangoes that
Marina had eaten before her death. There could be no doubt concerning
Donna Emelia’s devilish character. It was evident that she delighted in
cruelty and crime. Unable to think or act, I resorted to my usual
stimulus of spirits until I lost all control of myself.
What I next did I never knew, but I came to myself to realize that I was
at a gaming table with Da Souza and other of my wife’s companions. They
told me afterwards that I had been playing all night and my swindling
companions showed my signature to more than twenty notes of hand
amounting to nearly $40,000. or more than the value of my plantation and
everything else that I could call my own. It was then that my wife
showed her true character and taunted me with being a drunkard and with
gambling away my all. I retorted by accusing her of murder and she
became quite beside herself with rage and fright. We had a fearful
quarrel. She even confessed that the child with which she was pregnant
was Da Souza’s and not mine, and then I cursed the brazen woman and fled
from the house in search of the mulatto. Fortunately for him, he was not
to be found.
Three weeks after this I recovered from a miserable round of dissipation
in Havana, with less than a hundred dollars in my possession and just
then I suddenly came upon my uncle Ricardo, haggard in face and thin in
body like one in the last stage of consumption. “A word with you,” he
said, and I followed him, shaking like a leaf, to a room in a public
house on the Mole, where he faced me and asked what I deserved at his
hands. “Death!—a dog’s death!” I answered recklessly and as he had a
knife in his grasp I expected to feel its point; but he seemed suddenly
to change his purpose and covering his face with his hands he burst into
a flood of tears. I threw myself on my knees and tried to take his hand.
At first he spurned me but when I chanced to mention Emelia’s name he
listened. I made a clean breast; told him every circumstance to the last
wretched scene at our Matanzas plantation.
Don Ricardo heard me out and then asked that I swear to the truth of all
I had told him and this I did. Then he asked if I would go with him to
Donna Emelia and in a short time we were driving at post-haste for my
late _ranche_. We rode all night.
On entering the plantation grounds I met a slave who conducted us
quietly to the house which was ablaze with candles. The rooms were
crowded with men and women, the new guests of my late home. I remained
under the orange trees but Don Ricardo went forward and stepping through
the casement crossed the saloon to a sofa where Donna Emelia sat with
the mulatto, Da Souza, beside her. I saw her eyes flash and heard her
scream, which was followed by the sudden report of a pistol. My uncle
had shot himself through the heart.