It was his birthday but as he lay dying of fever, Jameson was in no state to celebrate. Throughout the day he had swung in and out of delirium, trying to please his friend by sipping some liquid off a spoon and responding to solicitous enquiries after his health with a whispered “Splendid” and “Oh! In-fin-itely better” before falling back into unconsciousness. By early evening he was shaking with cold, despite the hot bricks that were stacked around his body and on hearing the drums of the station marking the end of the working day, he struggled to ready himself for a fight “Ward! Ward! They’re coming; listen! Yes! They’re coming – now, let’s stand together” before fading at the same swift rate as nightfall. As the last light passed, he did too.
James Sligo Jameson was exactly 32 years old when he died in the arms of fellow explorer and artist Herbert Ward at the small village of Bangala on the south bank of the Congo river on 17 August 1888. Although it was a tropical fever which claimed his life, his spirit was already utterly broken by the terrible experience he had gone through. Amongst his possessions were two volumes of his diary and a handful of small notebooks and sketchbooks into which he had been recording details of his African experience, but they contained a terrible secret that was about to be exposed to the world. After overseeing his burial, Ward carefully packed Jameson's papers and sent them back to his family in England. What nobody realised, was that the first volume of Jameson’s diary had been left behind in a remote village on the Aruwimi river where it was found by Stanley on his arrival there, co-incidentally on the same day as Jameson died some 500 miles downriver.
Although Jameson filled his diaries and notebooks with drawings, he was no more than an observant amateur without artistic training and let us be honest, he struggled to paint people. His skills did improve after Herbert Ward arrived at Yambuya camp in August 1887 because Ward was a naturally gifted artist who helped develop Jameson’s technique by allowing him to copy some of his own drawings. By the time Jameson was sent off on an errand to find Tippu Tib on the upper reaches of the Congo River, he had become more confident and better able to cope with the crowds of curious children that appeared whenever he tried to paint anything. Some of Ward’s own drawings are preserved in America and among them are a handful of subjects he and Jameson painted together, including of one particularly gruesome trophy.
On 4 February 1888, Arabs in the vicinity of Yambuya made a punishment raid on the local tribe in reprisal for the kidnap of one of their men, after Major Barttlot failed to persuade the locals to give up their captive. Although none of the white men at the camp were directly involved in the raid, they watched the village burn on the other side of the river and when the Arabs returned, Jameson was given the village chief’s head as a trophy. Ward made a pencil drawing of it before Jameson skinned, painted it, preserving the skin in salt for its journey back to London. His technique was primitive and Jameson’s wife had to arrange for it to be properly preserved and stuffed by the taxidermy firm run by Ward’s father and uncle. |
Jameson’s papers were finally reunited two years after his death and just before Christmas 1890 his family edited them for publication under the title “Jameson’s Story of the Rear Column” in order to satisfy a public which demanded to know exactly what had happened on the controversial expedition. The original papers stayed in the family until 1927 when his widow, now remarried and known as the Contessa de Villamarina and their daughter Mrs MacDonnell, donated Jameson’s ethnographic collection to the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford. Although not separately catalogued, it seems likely that the diaries and papers may have arrived at the museum at the same time.
In this drawing, Major Barttelot sits rather sadly on the large tree trunk which was also the village drum . Jameson painted a colourful picture of the strange huts into his sketch book but when he came to write up his "fair copy" journal, he redrew the painting in pen and ink and added in the Major. This was one of only two of his drawings and paintings that were ever published, because his family took the decision to get another professional artist to rework his originals. Some of the paintings and drawings are of very considerable importance and shed light on one of the darkest episodes of European exploration in Africa.
Jameson painted some village scenes which are curiously empty of people – for two reasons. Jameson struggled to make his drawings of people look realistic and he reduced the number of people he would otherwise have put into his village-scapes, but he also encountered some resistance from the local tribesmen who viewed the act of capturing their image on paper as a magical attempt to gain supernatural power over them. It was a far from uncommon reaction throughout the history of European exploration and even today there are people from a range of cultures who are reluctant to submit themselves to being painted and photographed.
Jameson’s original black and white drawing of Yambuya was redrawn by Charles Whymper for the published version of the diary. He added an African who is in fact dressed in what he assumed was an Arab style rather than that which would have been worn by the local people.
The camp at Yambuya was a wretched place and the men suffered terrible shortages of food. Manioc was a staple crop grown by local tribes but it is dull and tasteless and contains a deadly poison unless it is properly prepared and all the men, especially the White officers, craved higher protein like meat and fish. Many of the men died of starvation and dysentery as well as tropical fevers and were buried in the ever-expanding burial ground just to the East of the main gate of the camp.
Jameson's drawing is of Soma(i) wadi Tofik,one of the Somali soldiers who had accompanied the expedition from the other side of Africa. He is wretchedly thin because nourishing food was in short supply in the forests around Yambuya. The tortoise whose decapitated head Jameson painted was eaten by the men who were desperate for something other than starchy manioc and plantains. Ward's drawing of Somai wadi Tofik is identified as NMNH-99-23_40 in the Smithsonian collection of his drawings.
It is however the paintings Jameson made on a journey along the upper reaches of the Congo river between March and May 1888 that are so important. Major Barttelot and Jameson had travelled over to Singatini (modern Kisingani) in order to talk to Tippu Tib, only to find that he had returned to his main trading base 500 miles further south. Jameson took the time to paint some of the scenes and people around Singatini station, including a painting of an attractive, plump local woman who was known as Thelani, or “Curry Eyes”.
The sense one has from reading Jameson’s diary is that Thelani was a rather bold young lady since he refers to her as “One of the Lights of the Harem of Mr Jahid bin Hamis, not kept in the shade”. This was a tongue in cheek reference to one of the parts of an epic verse romance “Lalla Rookh” written by Thomas Moore in 1817 which was a still well-known but much ridiculed poem in late Victorian England 70 years later.
Frustrated by Tippu Tib’s absence, Barttelot decided to send Jameson on the long journey to find him. By any standard this was a remarkable expedition-within-an-expedition, since Jameson was travelling by native canoe through virtually uncharted territory and he was the first White man many of the forest tribesmen had ever have seen. A number of tribes along the upper reaches of the Congo river were believed to practise cannibalism and Jameson was evidently keen to find out as much as he could about it, but his curiosity seems to have got the better of him and when news reached Europe that he had become directly implicated in the cold blooded murder and dismemberment of a little girl before she was eaten, his post mortem reputation was utterly destroyed. What follows is the most accurate account of that incident.
Jameson had finally tracked Tippu Tib down to his station at Nyangwe and persuaded him to return to his base at Singatini, so the two men were travelling down-river together with a small army of at least 400 men who were intended to be the force necessary to move the Rear Column forward from Yambuya. There are a number of formal studio photographs of Tippu Tib in existence which were taken of him in middle and old age in Zanzibar, but Jameson was able to draw him while he was on safari in the remotest region of the Congo.
in Jameson's drawing, Tippu Tib is wearing a beautifully simple white gown and skull cap, with none of the rich and expensive robes which he wore in photographs . He looks pensive but still gives an air of great power and command despite the simplicity of his clothes. His first language was Swahili and he could understand and read some Arabic but his English was limited, so communication between him and Jameson was necessarily through their personal interpreters.
On 11 May 1888 they had reached the small Arab trading settlement of Riba Riba on the bank of the Congo River. It was within the territory controlled by the Arab slave trader Mohammed bin Hamed who owed local allegiance to Tippu Tib who in turn derived his authority from the Sultan of Zanzibar.
The local tribe around Riba Riba were known as the Waklusi, Wacusi or Wacaloosi (Jameson spelt it several ways) whose chief was a man Jameson knew as Longa Longa. It seems likley that he would have participated in the cannibal feast.
Tippu Tib’s interpreter was a native Zanzibari called Salim Masudi and Jameson' interpreter was Assad Farran who was from Palestine and had been recruited in Aden. Truth to tell, Jameson and Assad Farran disliked each other and Jameson describes him on the portrait he made as “a useless Jerusalemite”. It was Assad Farran who brought the cannibalism story to world attention.
After Tippu Tib, the most important Arab travelling in the caravan was Muni Somai who was second in command of Riba Riba. He agreed to take charge of the 400 carriers for the huge sum of £1,000 which Jameson personally guaranteed. In Jameson’s painting he sits on a cushion on the ground with a sword across his knees. The men under his command were from the Manyema region and were wild and undisciplined and he struggled to maintain control over them, since they were far more interested in capturing ivory and enslaving the local population than they were in carrying loads for the expedition.
The party arrived at Riba Riba and had settled into the village after their tiring journey. Jameson had wandered over to see Mohammed bin Hamad when some local drummer and dancers arrived to perform an interesting ritual. Jameson described it in his diary
"As Tippu-Tib was very busy, I went over to the old chiefs house to have a talk with him, when presently a band, consisting of four drummers, arrived with three pedetal-shaped side-drums, and one wedge shaped chondo. The players, whose heads were covered with thick white clay, and ornamented with a coronet of white feathers, knelt in front of the house, one a little in front of the others. The upper part of their bodies was streaked with the same white clay, and their dress consisted of strips of fresh palm-leaves hanging from a green branch fastened round their waists. Presently there danced into the reception house two men and a woman; the first man was dressed like the drummer but the other man and the woman were clad in the ordinary Tamba-Tamba cloths. The first man held a large bunch of small branches and leaves in each hand, which he struck together over the head of each of us, dancing all the time, and all three singing a wild sort of chant. The woman had a knife in one hand, and a bunch of leaves in the other, with a circle of saffron-colour surrounding each eye. The other man held a spear and a bunch of leaves. These were followed by six men and the same number of women, with heads whitened, and dressed the same as the drummers.
They danced in, and, each in turn, clapped their branches of leaves together over our heads, and danced out again. The man and woman with the spear and knife, as well as a small boy holding two chickens with their throats cut, and two youths, all dressed the same as the others, went and stood behind the drummers. The other men and women then danced forward in a line, the men first, then the women, the drums striking up a lively measure. They now moved round the band in a circle, their bodies bent forward in a half-sitting posture, going through the most extra-ordinary contortions. This was kept up for some time by the men and women alternately, but at last they all stood still in a half-circle round the band, and sang a wild chant.”
Jameson realised that he was witnessing something which few white men had ever seen and he was keen to ensure that he would remember his experience. The Arabs on hand helped him to understand what he was witnessing
“The chief then presented them with a gun, and explained to me all about them. They are slaves from the Wacusu, and a good many of them have been dying lately, so these men and women went away into the bush for two months, during which time they have not been seen by anyone. They only returned to-day, having finished their medicine-making. Tippu-Tib, who came in before it was over, told me that they usually kill several people, and have a grand feast, for the Wacusu are terrible cannibals. He then told me, amongst other stories, that long ago, when fighting near Malela, they killed a great many of the enemy. The natives who were with him were cannibals, and not a body could be found next morning. (He tells me that two men will easily eat one man in a night.) He sent for water in the night to wash his hands and to drink, the water there being in a well. When it was brought, he could not make out why it stuck to his hands, and was so oily and bad to drink. Next day he and several Arabs went up to see what was the matter with the water, and there they saw a most horrible sight. The top of the water was all covered with a thick layer of yellow fat, which was running over the side, and he found out that his natives had taken all the human meat to the well to wash it before eating. At the next place he camped by a stream, and made the natives camp below him.”
So far so horrible, but what happened next was to go down in history as one of the most appalling incidents in the history of African exploration. Jameson can continue to tell the story in his own words.
“I told him that people at home generally believed that these were only travellers' tales," as they are called in our country. In other words, lies. He then said something to an Arab called Ali, seated next him, who turned round to me and said, " Give me a bit of cloth, and see." I sent my boy for six handkerchiefs, thinking it was all a joke, and that they were not in earnest, but presently a man appeared, leading a young girl of about ten years old by the hand, and I then witnessed the most horribly sickening sight I am ever likely to see in my life. He plunged a knife quickly into her breast twice, and she fell on her face, turning over on her side. Three men then ran forward, and began to cut up the body of the girl; finally her head was cut off, and not a particle remained, each man taking his piece away down to the river to wash it. The most extraordinary thing was that the girl never uttered a sound, nor struggled, until she fell. Until the last moment, I could not believe that they were in earnest. I have heard many stories of this kind since I have been in this country, but never could believe them, and I never would have been such a beast as to witness this, but I could not bring myself to believe that it was anything save a ruse to get money out of me, until the last moment. The girl was a slave captured from a village close to this town, and the cannibals were Wacusu slaves, and natives of this place, called Mculusi. Then I went home I tried to make some small sketches of the scene while still fresh in my memory, not that it is ever likely to fade from it. No one here seemed to be in the least astonished at it."
This extended quote is taken from the published version of Jameson’s diary which is assumed to have been the most contemporary account, and therefore the version of the story which is most likely to be accurate. However, in his original diaries the same passage has been cut out along with the original paintings made and it is impossible to be sure that the published version followed the original word for word.
Nobody seems to have considered whether Jameson's intentions and interest might have been misunderstood in the process of translation from English to Arabic to Swahili and back again, but even allowing for misunderstanding, there is no doubt that this incident was a very low point in the history of the European exploration of Africa.
Text and photographs © Marcus Rutherford 2024. The photographs are of Jameson’s original papers in the Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford.