The Sierra Leone Protectorate
By 1888 the British, French, Germans, Portuguese, and Liberians had completed laying their claims to the coast of West Africa. In order to ensure British claims the Sierra Leone governor began construction of a road system that was to be built parallel to the coast to give access to the adjacent interior region. He also created the Frontier Police to keep the peace in the entire region, including the coast, although British sovereignty had not yet been extended to these areas.
The Frontier Police, a force of fewer than 300 men and twelve British and Creole officers, were scattered in posts over a large area with few roads. Composed of half-trained men from each tribe, the often unsupervised units did not maintain a good reputation and frequently meddled in tribal politics to the advantage of the individual soldiers.
In 1895 the new Conservative government came into power in Great Britain led by Marquess of Salisbury, who was favorable to imperialist ideas that were in accord with the hopes of the newly appointed governor, Fredrick Cardew. He promptly expanded the Frontier Police and began work on a railroad into the interior. On August 31, 1896, in accordance with powers granted him by the home government the previous year, he proclaimed a formal protectorate over the entire mainland.
The terms of the Sierra Leone Protectorate and even the legal meaning of the word protectorate were left undefined. What was clearly intended was that British administration would be as limited as possible, all internal affairs being left to the existing chiefs. Even the institution of domestic slavery was left intact, and it was not formally abolished until i926. Although the objective of the Protectorate was proclaimed to be the improvement of the country for the benefit of its inhabitants and its legal basis the existence of treaties between many of the chiefs and the British, not even a pretense was made of consulting the Africans.
The Protectorate was not to be united with the Colony. Cardew was opposed to Creole involvement in British rule anywhere. He was a firm believer in the civilizing mission of the British and felt that only they should rule. As nationalism reached its peak and as improvements in medicine made it possible for Europeans to live comfortably in the tropics, a new racism appeared that emphasized the purported superiority of the British over all others, particularly the nonwhite races. The idea of racial purity was also becoming popular in Europe, so that for many the “pure” African was to be preferred to the Creole. Although most Creoles were entirely of African blood, their Europeanized culture led many British to consider them “contaminated.” These new ideas made it no longer possible for most Englishmen to regard the Creoles as people whose education and culture could raise them to a par with Europeans. At the same time it was presumed that the backward tribal people had to be protected from the evil ideas the Creoles might introduce.
Cardew and his successors removed the Creoles from all posts of influence not only in the Sierra Leone Protectorate but throughout West Africa. The same new racial attitudes affected the Creoles’ position in the British missionary churches and the business world. At the same time improved trade conditions in West Africa made local busi- ness more attractive to large British companies. Their resources allowed them to squeeze out the private Creole traders, and the new employees of the companies were nearly all British. The result was that the Creoles' economy and their self-esteem fell into a decline from which the relatively small community never recovered.
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