The Chooks of Darkest Africa

[Chieftain]

Many years ago I was fortunate enough to inherit a number of boxes of old books that belonged to both sets of my grandparents, and over the years, some of these books have been constant surprises to me as I finally get around to reading some of them at long last. Many of them are in poor shape due to age, and I have a very skilled artisan lady here locally who has restored a number of really prize books for me. I have another that needs to go to her but I am (very carefully) reading it first, and it is fascinating.

The book in question is "In Darkest Africa or The Quest, Rescue, and Retreat of Emin Governor of Equatoria" by Henry M. Stanley. ("Dr. Livingstone I presume?" Yes, THAT Stanley...) published in New York, Charles Schribner's Sons, 1890, First Edition...

In 1879, Henry Stanley was commissioned to lead a rescue party into the very heart of equatorial Africa, on foot, up the length of the Congo River. He started out with multiple expeditions to drop off and guard supplies at key points along the way, while he started out from the West Coast of Africa leading 600 bearers and soldiers on foot up the Congo River. At the time there were numerous wars and civil wars racking the Continent, and Africa was one of the most dangerous places imaginable.

It took them over 18 months. They packed in sections of a steel boat, forty loads by itself, and used it along with a couple of other very decrepit steamers and barges to haul relief supplies into some of the most hostile territory in the World at that time. The steamers and canoes were able to leapfrog some of the supplies, but the men all had to hoof it. We're talking about routine cannibalism among numerous native tribes who also hunted intruders with viciously poisoned arrows...the works! They had 300 men whose sole purpose was to hack through the jungle with billhooks and axes so that the bearers could keep moving. Some days they went 2 miles. Most days they were lucky to make it 200 feet.

Although they packed in a good deal of dry goods like rice, the plan all along was to subsist off of the land, and to try to trade for food along the way or take it by force if necessary. One of the only staple foods that they were able to depend upon, were able to find consistently, and that is mentioned over and over again is the eggs and "fowl" of all descriptions that these natives were keeping throughout the heart of Darkest Africa. We're talking about people who did not share a common language with anyone, and who enjoyed a tasty slice of fresh human meat as well as anything else, but they all kept chickens and traded in eggs extensively, and even treated eggs like currency of a sort...

It's interesting that these natives didn't have coops, chicken wire, hardware cloth or even a proper roost, but somehow their chickens managed to thrive and propagate widely in what could easily be considered one of the most predator-dense places on the globe...

Great reading...

 

[haTHOR]

so, any idea if they were similar to the "jungle fowl" breeds of today?

 

[MagsC]

I was wondering that too.....very interesting!

 

[Chieftain]

Quote:
No, he doesn't identify the species because that isn't the focus of the expedition, but he keeps referring to the many different kinds of fowl they find, as well as the eggs.

 

[Rosalind]

High school history teacher told me that in fact the cannibalism story was a bit of psychological warfare, not reality. The time period you're talking about, the Zulu Empire was fighting British colonists, and they were brilliant strategists who would have used every advantage they had--including threatening to eat POWs. Although now that I think about it, cannibalism has been used (either as a threat or a reality) as a weapon of war for a very long time in lots of cultures: the first Crusaders in the 11th century, Aztecs and Toltecs, Japanese soldiers against Western POWs in WWII, more recently during the civil wars in DRCongo and Liberia.

Always thought it was pretty impressive how a bunch of dudes armed with little more than pointy sticks came thisclose to beating the best-equipped army in the world at that time, mostly by being a heck of a lot more intelligent than the best-equipped army generals expected them to be.

 

[Chieftain]

General Smuts and his Boers along with their excellent Mauser hunting rifles taught the British Army a similar lesson in South Africa around the turn of the Century, more than once. Those boys were used to shooting game at 1000 yards, and they regularly picked the British to pieces before the British were in range with their Lee-Enfields....

The cannibalism Stanley talks about in this book sounds real enough, and he cites too many examples for it to be just rumor; and none of the quotes would be appropriate to post here, so unfortunately you'll have to take my work on it....it's pretty graphic (we are talking about real "Hero sandwiches"...). And although the expedition Stanley led up the Congo was certainly well armed, it was not an Army operation per se. It was led by a handful of men with military experience, being led by a man with a Commission from a British Lord to underwrite the whole thing. Just the underpinnings and logistical details of this are staggering.

I've read accounts of Wellington's battles against Napoleon, and the British Army required 250,000 head of ox just to move. One 24 pound siege gun required 64 oxen to pull it, and each of those beasts carried 6 cannon shot on their back (the shot is what weighed 24 pounds, the gun weighed considerably more...). Of course it took other oxen to pull the carts full of powder and other supplies, and still more to pull the carts with just forage to feed them all.

And all of the horses were an entirely different problem....

Great stuff...