Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
file which includes the original illustrations.
See 54086-h.htm or 54086-h.zip:
(https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/54086/pg54086-images.html)
or
(https://www.gutenberg.org/files/54086/54086-h.zip)
Images of the original pages are available through
Internet Archive. See
https://archive.org/details/humanleopardsacc00beatuoft
Transcriber’s note:
Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
HUMAN LEOPARDS
[Illustration: SACKVILLE STREET, FREETOWN.]
HUMAN LEOPARDS
An Account of the Trials of Human Leopards Before the Special
Commission Court; With a Note on Sierra Leone, Past and Present
by
K. J. BEATTY
Of the Middle Temple, Barrister-at-Law for Some Years Resident in
Sierra Leone
With a Preface by Sir William Brandford Griffith
33 Illustrations
London
Hugh Rees, Ltd.
5 Regent Street, Pall Mall, S.W.
1915
Printed by
Hazell, Watson and Viney, Ld.,
London and Aylesbury.
PREFACE
Captain Beatty, just before leaving for the Dardanelles, asked me to
write a preface. I think that the best preface will be to answer, as far
as I am able, several questions which were frequently put to me on my
return to civilization after the conclusion of the Special Commission
Court. These questions were, “What was the object of the Human Leopard
Society? Were its members cannibals for the purpose of satisfying an
appetite for human flesh, or was it some religious rite? Would the
sentences inflicted by the Special Commission Court have the effect of
stamping out the horrible practice?”
The first question can be answered with some confidence. The trend of
the whole evidence showed that the prime object of the Human Leopard
Society was to secure human fat wherewith to anoint the Borfima. The
witnesses told us how the occasion of a murder is used to “blood” the
Borfima, but the potency of this terrible fetish depends upon its being
frequently supplied with human fat. Hence these murders.
The question as to cannibalism it is not possible to answer with any
degree of certainty. The Commission sat for over five months, had before
it hundreds of witnesses, and the notes of evidence ran into thousands
of pages; but the Court was a judicial tribunal, and it was anxious to
bring its labours to an end as speedily as possible, so that no question
was asked or allowed by the Court which was not relevant to the issue.
Again and again answers given by witnesses opened up avenues which it
would have been most interesting to investigate, but, unless the
investigation was relevant to the case in hand or would have served to
elucidate some other part of the evidence which was doubtful, the Court
could not allow it to be pursued. Nor would it have been seemly for the
members of the Court to make private investigation into a matter before
them judicially. Consequently we could not probe down and ascertain the
reason of things, but had to be content with the bare facts which came
out by way of evidence.
Moreover, although it was possible to have a fair idea as to whether a
witness was generally speaking the truth or not, it was extremely
difficult to lay one’s finger on any detail and be satisfied as to its
reasonable correctness. Furthermore, whenever a witness approached
cannibalism he palpably made reservations or additions, whilst at all
the more interesting junctures we had to keep severely in mind that we
were not holding a scientific inquiry but were a judicial tribunal
having as the sole issue before us whether the deceased was murdered by
the prisoners in the dock in connection with an unlawful society.
Consequently, notwithstanding the time spent over the different trials,
and despite the fact that whenever the subject of cannibalism came up
the Court was keenly on the alert to fathom its objects, it is not
possible to state definitely why the members of the Human Leopard
Society ate their victims. There was, however, one outstanding fact: all
the principal offenders were men of mature age, past their prime; they
were the ones who, so to speak, managed the concern, who arranged for
victims, and who received the most coveted portions of the slaughtered
bodies; and I formed the opinion that when they devoured the human flesh
the idea uppermost in their minds was that they were increasing their
virile powers.
There is no sentence in the notes of evidence which I can quote in
support of this theory, but after an extended experience of the point of
view of the West African mind, and with some acquaintance with the
subject on the spot, I venture the opinion that the Human Leopards eat
the flesh of their victims, not to satisfy any craving for human flesh
nor in connection with any religious rite, but in the belief that their
victims’ flesh will increase their virility.
Whether that was the original idea when the first person fell a victim
to the Human Leopards may be questioned. Cannibalism is probably only a
bye-product in these murders. Originally it may have been to bind the
murderers together and so preserve inviolable secrecy that each member
of the Society partook of a portion of the flesh; or it may have been to
continue the leopard-acting, i.e. by devouring the prey; or it may have
been with a combination of these ideas that cannibalism originated.
Gradually, however, the notion arose that human flesh had specific
virtues; as the Borfima’s energy was replenished with human fat so would
the cannibal be reinvigorated with other parts of the human body; and
possibly during the last few decades the value placed upon human flesh
was equal to or even exceeded that set upon human fat. Such an
explanation would help to account for the expansion and increased
activity of the Society during the past twenty years.
Then comes the question whether the punishments inflicted by the Special
Commission Court will have the effect of stamping out the Society. In
considering this question the environment of the people must be taken
into account. I have been in many forests, but in none which seemed to
me to be so uncanny as the Sierra Leone bush. In Mende-land the bush is
not high, as a rule it is little more than scrub, nor is the vegetation
exceptionally rank, but there is something about the Sierra Leone bush,
and about the bush villages as well, which makes one’s flesh creep. It
may be the low hills with enclosed swampy valleys, or the associations
of the slave trade, or the knowledge that the country is alive with
Human Leopards; but to my mind the chief factor in the uncanniness is
the presence of numerous half-human chimpanzees with their maniacal
shrieks and cries. The bush seemed to me pervaded with something
supernatural, a spirit which was striving to bridge the animal and the
human. Some of the weird spirit of their surroundings has, I think,
entered into the people, and accounts for their weird customs. The
people are by no means a low, savage race. I found many of them highly
intelligent, shrewd, with more than the average sense of humour, and
with the most marvellous faculty for keeping hidden what they did not
wish to be known—the result probably of secret societies for countless
generations. But beyond such reasoning powers as are required for their
daily necessities their whole mental energies are absorbed in fetish,
witchcraft, “medicine” such as Borfima and the like. What they need is a
substitute for their bottomless wells of secret societies, for their
playing at being leopards or alligators and acting the part with such
realism that they not only kill their quarry but even devour it. In my
opinion the only way to extirpate these objectionable societies is the
introduction of the four R’s—the fourth, Religion, being specially
needed to supply the place of the native crude beliefs. No doubt the
energetic action of the Government, and in a lesser degree the labours
of the Special Commission Court, will have a good effect; but, I fear,
only a temporary effect. The remedy must go deeper than mere punishment:
the Human Leopard Society must be superseded by Education and Religion.
W. BRANDFORD GRIFFITH.
2, ESSEX COURT, TEMPLE,
_September, 1915_.
CONTENTS
_PART I_
CHAPTER I
PAGE
INTRODUCTORY 1