Copy letter from E. Sabine [Edward Sabine] to Carry [Caroline Browne, sister of Joseph and Edward Sabine]
Information
Title - Copy letter from E. Sabine [Edward Sabine] to Carry [Caroline Browne, sister of Joseph and Edward Sabine]
Record type - Archive
Original Reference - RHS/Col/2/Z1/20
Date - 26 Apr 1822
Scope & content - Written from HMS Pheasant off Accra [Ghana]
Marked 'copy' at the top of the first page
He has spent three pleasant days with Charles MacCarthy [British governor of Sierra Leone] at Cape Coast Castle [Ghana]; MacCarthy has learned about the coast from the officers of the African Company; he had hoped to be present for the arrival of messengers from the king of Ashanti [Osei Bonsu] who are on their way to 'compliment' the governor, but they were delayed; Mr Robertson [G.A. Robertson, merchant from Liverpool and author of 'Notes on Africa', 1819] told him as he was leaving that a man had arrived who had met the messengers, and that the king of Ashanti is sending 'a white man' to Cape Coast who has found his way to Coomnassia [Kumasi, Ghana] from the interior: 'curiosity is all alive to know who this man can be'; Governor Smith [John Hope Smith, British governor of Gold Coast], with whom he was staying, told him that he had heard for many months that such a man had arrived at Coomnassia and had been detained on the orders of the king ('whose jealousy and fear of the English is very great'); the king is averse to allowing even Moors who have been in the country beyond his capital to travel to the coast; he has enquired at length about the Ashanti, and he hears that if the king were opposed by an enemy of power, most of his force (the chiefs of the other states who he rules over and who are now forced to 'submit to his pleasure') would desert immediately; he considers this an 'almost intolerable joke: I see no reason to doubt but that an European force of 4 or 5,000 men landing on the coast at the proper season, and being preceded by 2 or 3 intelligent officers to establish their route & organise supplies, and by the employment of the 'native militia' (who are to be embodied forthwith) in widening the paths, would find no difficulty whatever, & run little risk from climate, embarking before the rain, in putting down his power, and 'leaving the natives in their original situation of petty states', none of which would have power to prevent the others trading with us; both their station and commerce in Africa would be improved by this dethroning; he believes that it will sooner or later be necessary if the British are to retain their possessions on the coast; if the messengers had arrived and had offered to take an officer to Coomnassia in return, he would have gladly undertaken it despite the delay; the reign of superstition at Ashanti is unparallelled, but 'the superior men, who are few in number, are said to be very superior', which he has found universally the case in Africa; very few of these men are ever seen by white men, as they do not visit the coast; at the Gambia, Sierra Leone and Cape Coast, 'the only superior men who I did see, were well worth conversing with'; at Cape Coast he visited King Aggrey [Nana Joseph Aggrey IV, king of Cape Coast], the chief of the Fantes, rumoured to be fond of astronomy, and found him putting up a clock which he had dismantled in order to affix a wooden ship which he had carved himself above the point of suspension of the pendulum, so that when it moved the ship would appear to roll on the sea; Aggrey knew that the ship would alter the clock's timekeeping, which he will fix by shortening or lengthening the pendulum until it agrees with another clock in the same room; Dr Nicoll [Andrew Nicoll, medical officer in Sierra Leone] asked Aggrey if he knew of the British voyages to the North Pole, which he did, and told him that Edward had accompanied them; Aggrey asked how many degrees from the Pole he had been, whether he had been beyond Greenland, whether the seas were iced over, how it was possible to sail through them, and (once told that the ice breaks up in the summer) how they did not get crushed by the masses of ice; Aggrey also understood the movement of the sun in those latitudes; Edward thought that 'surely these are remarkable questions to have been asked by a native African'; he is now on his way to St Thomas's [Sao Tome, Sao Tome and Principe] and will stop at Accra on the way to drop off letters; Robertson has just come from St Thomas's and says that the weather is good and the island is healthier than the Gold Coast, where they have come from; Robertson says that the governor will happily provide apartments in the castle there; he is anxious to see the result of another set of pendulum observations [to determine the ellipticity of the earth, the main purpose of Edward's expedition]; he is told by inhabitants that he has the disposition and constitution to live in a tropical climate, as he does not worry about exposure and still remains healthy; in his experience, those who are fitter and exercise more are healthiest in Africa, however he will still proceed with caution at St Thomas's; he is comfortable on board the HMS Pheasant, as the climate has been 'the most delightful imaginable'; although Africa carries significant risk of tropical disease, the risk is exaggerated in Europe, and disregarding those who bring about their own illness through overindulgence, fright, or poor accommodation, the risk is no higher than in any other country at similar latitudes; he is with Montgomery [?Alexander Leslie Montgomery, son of Henry Conyngham Montgomery], who is becoming 'quite a steady officer'; he wrote to Mr Browne [Henry Brown, Caroline's husband] from Cape Coast, and Sir Charles was to forward the letter through Lieutenant Bathurst [unidentified]; he sends his love to the 'dear girls' and to his sister Sally [Sarah Sabine, later known as Sarah Irton, sister of Joseph and Edward Sabine]; he will write to Sally himself when he is less busy
Extent - 4 page letter (1 sheet)
Repository - Royal Horticultural Society Lindley Library
Copyright - John J. Timothy Jeal
Credit Line - Courtesy John J. Timothy Jeal / RHS Lindley Collections
Usage terms - Non-commercial use with attribution permitted (CC BY-NC 4.0)