INTERVIEW BY MR. W. T. STEAD WITH THE REV. JOHN H. HARRIS, BARINGA,
CONGO STATE, IN THE ENGLISH REVIEW OF REVIEWS FOR SEPTEMBER, 1905.
For the somewhat startling suggestion in the heading of this interview,
the missionary interviewed is in no way responsible. The credit of it,
or, if you like, the discredit, belongs entirely to the editor of the
_Review_, who, without dogmatism, wishes to pose the question as a
matter for serious discussion. Since Charles I’s head was cut off,
opposite Whitehall, nearly two hundred and fifty years ago, the sanctity
which doth hedge about a king has been held in slight and scant regard
by the Puritans and their descendants. Hence there is nothing
antecedently shocking or outrageous in the discussion of the question
whether the acts of any Sovereign are such as to justify the calling in
of the services of the public executioner. It is not, of course, for a
journalist to pronounce judgment, but no function of the public writer
is so imperative as that of calling attention to great wrongs, and no
duty is more imperious than that of insisting that no rank or station
should be allowed to shield from justice the real criminal when he is
once discovered.
Footnote 4:
The above article which came to hand as the foregoing was in press is
commended to the king and to readers of his Soliloquy.—M. T.
The controversy between the Congo Reform Association and the Emperor of
the Congo has now arrived at a stage in which it is necessary to take a
further step towards the redress of unspeakable wrongs and the
punishment of no less unspeakable criminals. The Rev. J. H. Harris, an
English missionary, has lived for the last seven years in that region of
Central Africa—the Upper Congo—which King Leopold has made over to one
of his vampire groups of financial associates (known as the A.B.I.R.
Society) on the strictly business basis of a half share in the profits
wrung from the blood and misery of the natives. He has now returned to
England, and last month he called at Mowbray House to tell me the latest
from the Congo. Mr. Harris is a young man in a dangerous state of
volcanic fury, and no wonder. After living for seven years face to face
with the devastations of the vampire State, it is impossible to deny
that he does well to be angry. When he began, as is the wont of those
who have emerged from the depths, to detail horrifying stories of
murder, the outrage and torture of women, the mutilation of children,
and the whole infernal category of horrors, served up with the
background of cannibalism, sometimes voluntary and sometimes, incredible
though it seems, enforced by the orders of the officers, I cut him
short, and said:—
“Dear Mr. Harris, as in Oriental despatches the India Office translator
abbreviates the first page of the letter into two words ‘after
compliments,’ or ‘a.c.,’ so let us abbreviate our conversation about the
Congo by the two words ‘after atrocities,’ or ‘a.a.’ They are so
invariable and so monotonous, as Lord Percy remarked in the House the
other day, that it is unnecessary to insist upon them. There is no
longer any dispute in the mind of any reasonable person as to what is
going on in the Congo. It is the economical exploitation of half a
continent carried on by the use of armed force wielded by officials the
aim-all and be-all of whose existence is to extort the maximum amount of
rubber in the shortest possible time in order to pay the largest
possible dividend to the holders of shares in the concessions.”
“Well,” said Mr. Harris reluctantly, for he is so accustomed to speaking
to persons who require to be told the whole dismal tale from A to Z,
“what is it you want to know?”
“I want to know,” I said, “whether you consider the time is ripe for
summoning King Leopold before the bar of an international tribunal to
answer for the crimes perpetrated under his orders and in his interest
in the Congo State.”
Mr. Harris paused for a moment, and then said:—“That depends upon the
action which the king takes upon the report of the Commission, which is
now in his hands.”
“Is that report published?”
“No,” said Mr. Harris; “and it is a question whether it will ever be
published. Greatly to our surprise, the Commission, which every one
expected would be a mere blind whose appointment was intended to throw
dust in the eyes of the public, turned out to be composed of highly
respectable persons who heard the evidence most impartially, refused no
_bona fide_ testimony produced by trustworthy witnesses, and were
overwhelmed by the multitudinous horrors brought before them, and who,
we feel, _must_ have arrived at conclusions which necessitate an entire
revolution in the administration of the Congo.”
“Are you quite sure, Mr. Harris,” I said, “that this is so?”
“Yes,” said Mr. Harris, “quite sure. The Commission impressed us all in
the Congo very favorably. Some of its members seemed to us admirable
specimens of public-spirited, independent statesmen. They realized that
they were acting in a judicial capacity; they knew that the eyes of
Europe were upon them, and, instead of making their inquiry a farce,
they made it a reality, and their conclusions must be, I feel sure, so
damning to the State, that if King Leopold were to take no action but to
allow the whole infernal business to proceed unchecked, any
international tribunal which had powers of a criminal court, would upon
the evidence of the Commission alone, send those responsible to the
gallows.”
“Unfortunately,” I said, “at present the Hague Tribunal is not armed
with the powers of an international assize court, nor is it qualified to
place offenders, crowned or otherwise, in the dock. But don’t you think
that in the evolution of society the constitution of such a criminal
court is a necessity?”
“It would be a great convenience at present,” said Mr. Harris; “nor
would you need one atom of evidence beyond the report of the Commission
to justify the hanging of whoever is responsible for the existence and
continuance of such abominations.”
“Has anybody seen the text of the report?” I asked.
“As the Commission returned to Brussels in March, some of the contents
of that report are an open secret. A great deal of the evidence has been
published by the Congo Reform Association. In the Congo the
Commissioners admitted two things: first, that the evidence was
overwhelming as to the existence of the evils which had hitherto been
denied, and secondly, that they vindicated the character of the
missionaries. They discovered, as anyone will who goes out to that
country, that it is the missionaries, and the missionaries alone, who
constitute the permanent European element. The Congo State officials
come out ignorant of the language, knowing nothing of the country, and
with no other sense of their duties beyond that of supporting the
concession companies in extorting rubber. They are like men who are dumb
and deaf and blind, nor do they wish to be otherwise. In two or three
years they vanish, giving place to other migrants as ignorant as
themselves, whereas the missionaries remain on the spot year after year;
they are in personal touch with the people, whose language they speak,
whose customs they respect, and whose lives they endeavor to defend to
the best of their ability.”
“But, Mr. Harris,” I remarked, “was there not a certain Mr. Grenfell, a
Baptist Missionary, who has been all these years a convinced upholder of
the Congo State?”
“’Twas true,” said Mr. Harris, “and pity ’tis ’twas true; but ’tis no
longer true. Mr. Grenfell has had his eyes opened at last, and he has
now taken his place among those who are convinced. He could no longer
resist the overwhelming evidence that has been brought against the Congo
Administration.”[5]
Footnote 5:
Mr. Grenfell’s station is in the Lower Congo, a section remote from
the vast rubber areas of the interior.
“Was the nature of the Commissioners’ report,” I resumed, “made known to
the officials of the State before they left the Congo?”
“To the head officials—yes,” said Mr. Harris.
“With what result?”
“In the case of the highest official in the Congo, the man who
corresponds in Africa to Lord Curzon in India, no sooner was he placed
in possession of the conclusions of the Commission than the appalling
significance of their indictment convinced him that the game was up, and
he went into his room and cut his throat. I was amazed on returning to
Europe to find how little the significance of this suicide was
appreciated. A paragraph in the newspaper announced the suicide of a
Congo official. None of those who read that paragraph could realize the
fact that that suicide had the same significance to the Congo that the
suicide, let us say, of Lord Milner would have had if it had taken place
immediately on receiving the conclusions of a Royal Commission sent out
to report upon his administration in South Africa.”
“Well, if that be so, Mr. Harris,” I said, “and the Governor-General
cuts his throat rather than face the ordeal and disgrace of the
exposure, I am almost beginning to hope that we may see King Leopold in
the dock at the Hague, after all.”
“I will comment upon that,” Mr. Harris said, “by quoting you Mrs.
Sheldon’s remark made before myself and my colleagues, Messrs. Bond,
Ellery, Ruskin, Walbaum and Whiteside, on May 19th last year, when, in
answer to our question, ‘Why should King Leopold be afraid of submitting
his case to the Hague tribunal?’ Mrs. Sheldon answered, ‘Men do not go
to the gallows and put their heads in a noose if they can avoid it.’”
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