British Gambia - 20th Century Colony
Banjul was settled in 1820 and a year later Britain declared the Gambia River a British Protectorate and acquired St Mary’s Island (Bathurst Island) and Lemaine Island (Janjanbureh Island) as crown lands and colonies. End of slave trade led to the introduction of groundnuts as main cash crop. The French settled Dakar in 1857 and constructed the railroad between St and Louis and Dakar in 1886. Round about the same time the Gambia became a crown colony and France and Britain drew the boundaries between Senegal. Between 1890 and 1900 both powers expanded their rule across the territories with the demarcation of the 740km border and violent confrontation with a number of Islamic rulers and Kingdoms. The 1902 Ordinance incorporated Fuladu into the protectorate system and gave more powers to the travelling Commissioners. Accordingly they were made the chief executives of their districts thereby negating the policy of indirect rule.
The area, reckoning the colony and protectorate together, was 4,132 square miles. At the 1911 census the population was 146,101. St. Mary's Isle, at the mouth of the Gambia, on which is Bathurst, the capital, had 7,700 inhabitants (compared with 8,807 in 1901). European residents numbered 186 in 1911 and 112 in 1918. Estimates made in 1920 put the total population as high as 240,000. The cultivation of the ground-nut, the chief occupation of the people, proved so lucrative that the efforts of the administration to widen the basis of prosperity meet with little success, though since 1913 there had been an increased production of food crops, African fcoos (millet) and rice, for home consumption.
The climate of the Gambia, like that of other West African colonies, is unhealthy for Europeans, although perhaps in a less degree. It is impossible to employ white labour in the Colony. The cost of living in the Gambia is much higher for both Europeans and Africans than in any of the other West Coast colonies. For example, a case of Sauerbrunnen, which could be bought at Lagos for 15s., costs 25s. in Bathurst.The wages of mechanics are proportionately high, while their work is of a very poor quality. Owing to the high cost of living, it is difficult to induce good workmen from the other colonies to come to the Gambia.
The land was all handworked, attempts to induce the farmers to adopt modern methods having failed. Up to 1915 the ground-nuts were nearly all purchased by French firms at Bathurst and sent to Marseilles. France in 1914 took 78% of the total crop. Changed conditions created by the Great War and the establishment of large oil mills in England led to a diversion of the trade, and in 1916, for the first time for 58 years, Britain received a larger proportion of the crop than was shipped to France. In 1919 Great Britain took most of the total crop. In that year France took only 2.5 percent.
Trade in ivory, wax and rubber, formerly considerable, had by 1915 sunk to negligible proportions; besides ground-nuts the chief exports are palm kernels and hides. The restriction of shipping during and after the war caused a contraction of trade; nevertheless the value of exports in the period 1909-19 (excluding specie) rose from £351,000 to £1,229,000. They had dropped to £430,000 in 1915. The rapid recovery was due to increased prices rather than increased production. In 1900 the export of frround-uuta was 53,600 tons, valued at £373,000; in 1918 the export was 56,400 tonsand the value £800,000. ^The most striking contrast was shown in 1914-5. In 1914 the export of ground-nuts was 66,000 tons, fetching £650,000; in 1915 the export was 96,000 tons, but the value fell to £400,000. In 1919 the export was 70,000 tons valued at £1,154,000.
In the period 1909-10 the value of imports, also excluding specie, rose from £258,000 to £1,179,000. In 1915 they had fallen to £302ooo. The chief imports are cotton goods, kola-nuts, rice and hardware. Most of the imports come from the United Kingdom but up to 1914 France had a considerable share in the trade (27 % in 1913) and Germany a smaller part (10% in 1913). In 1919 France and French possessions supplied only 8 % of imports; the United Kingdom over 57%; British possessions 14%; the United States 19%. The American export is mainly rice, sugar and fuel oils. The United States imports rose from £12,000 in 1915 to £235,000 in 1919. America had in that time captured as large a share of the Gambia trade as Germany had had before the World War. It was entirely onesided, as there were no exports from the Gambia to the United States. The bulk of the imports from British possessions was represented by kola-nuts from Sierra Lcpne,—valued at £157,000 in 1919.
Shipping was mainly in British hands. Total tonnage rose from 495.000 in 1909 to 625,000 in 1913. In that year British tonnage was 371,000. French 76.000, German 60.000, Greek 33.000. A great restriction followed and in 1918 the total tonnage was only 282,000. Of this total 262,000 tons were British. In 1919 the tonnage entering and clearing at But hum was 441,000. Of this 354,000- tons were British, 40,000 American and 19,000 French.
An import duty on kola-nuts and an export duty on ground-nuts were the chief sources of revenue, which rose from £72,000 in 1909 to £180,000 in 1919. In the same period expenditure increased from £56,000 to £143,000. There was no public debt. Education remains in the hands of various Christian missions, except for a Mohammedan school at Bathurst, which is maintained by the Government. For the whole of its length in the protectorate the Gambia is navigable and forms a sufficient means of communication, few places in the protectorate being more than 10 miles from the river. There are neither railways nor inland telegraphs, but there was cable connexion with Europe and other parts of W. Africa, and in 1915 the Admiralty erected a wireless station at Cape St. Mary. By going to Dakar, 90 miles from Bathurst, the passage to Europe by the French packet can be made in eight days.
Since the pacification of the protectorate by Sir George Denton (governor 1901-11) in 1901, the country had been peaceful. The ground-nut industry was entirely in the hands of the natives, who also owned large herds of cattle — the symbol of wealth. In 1917 plague carried off fully 75% of the cattle, but as the country was overstocked, many of the cattle being kept simply for show, the effect was not as serious as might have been thought. Much of the petty trade was in the hands of Syrians.
In September 1911 Sir H. L. Galway became governor, his tenure of office witnessing a great development of commerce. In April 1914 he was succeeded by Mr. (afterwards Sir) E. J. Cameron, under whose guidance the economic crisis caused by the war (restriction of shipping and consequently of food supplies, with violent fluctuations in the price of ground-nuts) were successfully overcome. During the war the natives gave many proofs of their loyalty to Great Britain, and the Gambia Co. of the West African frontier force served with distinction both in Cameroon and German East Africa.
An important step taken to standardise the system of protectorate rule was the institution in 1944 of an annual chief's conference, held for the first time in Janjangbureh in the Central River Division (CRD). This gathering of the now 35 chiefs was to provide a forum for them to make suggestions and to criticise programmes initiated by the central government or the Commissioners. It also allowed a forum for the central government to introduce proposals for development within the protectorate area.
The main aim of British rule up to the start of World War II was to create and maintain peace in the area with the minimum of expense. The work of the chiefs and Commissioners was to generate revenue to run the administration rather than provide social services. The system of government excluded educated Gambians from taking an active part in the government. For these reasons the system of indirect rule in The Gambia contributed to the social and political stagnation that prevailed in the rural areas up to the time of independence from Britain.
The Gambia served the crown by providing soldiers during World War II to the Burmese Campaign. Many Gambians were forced into service by district chiefs wishing to meet the established military quota. Veterans were promised compensations they never received. Two hundred eighty-eight members of the Gambian Regiment died in the Burmese Campaign. The country was also used as an air staging post for the U.S. Army Air Corps and served the Allied naval convoys as a port of call.
The Gambia played an understated role in world history during WWII. On January 14, 1943, aboard a small seaplane, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt stopped overnight on his way to meet with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in Casablanca. Casting his eyes for the first time on the colonial world, Roosevelt was shocked by its appearance. He told his son, Elliott, of the conditions he saw in Bathurst when he arrived in Casablanca the next day. It was this night that Elliott remembers his father first speaking of a “United Nations” that should help in the role of “bringing education, raising the standards on living, improving the health conditions of all the backward, depressed colonial areas of the world”. This visit, and subsequent naggings of Churchill, inspired the Colonial Office to begin development projects in the colony.
The colonial masters in The Gambia constructed ports, harbors, roads, bridges, hospitals, and institutions such as banks, police, army, built schools, introduced modern currency to replace commodity based money such as cowries, manila and exposed Africa to the capitalist world. They further argue that The Gambia received new and more efficient forms of political, educational and economic organization. Warring communities were united into a modern nationstate with greater opportunity of survival in a competitive world than the numerous mini entities that existed before.
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