No. 206.
Mr. Turner
to Mr. Evarts.
Monrovia, Liberia , September 3, 1877. (Received October 23.)
Sir: I have read in the New York Semi-weekly Evening Post of the 17th July this paragraph, viz:
The promoters of a Liberian emigration scheme in Charleston assert that they have enrolled the names of two thousand live hundred colored persons in that city, and thirty thoutand in the State, who consent to emigrate.
And in the New York paper Le Messager Franco-Américain, of Tuesday, 17 July, 1877, viz:
Il parait que les Sud-Caroliniens ne voient pas avec plaisir cette entreprise d’émigration négre.
[Translation.]
It seems that the South Carolinians do not view with pleasure this enterprise of negro emigration.
I found also in the Washington National Republican, July 20, the following, viz:
* * * Nevertheless some families did go, hut from the report which they sent back they found Liberia anything but an El Dorado. A few of them wrote urgent appeals to their friends at home to assist them to return, and by means of subscriptions so obtained managed to make their way back. * * *
The reasons which have influenced me to omit in ray correspondence to notice the scheme for the emigration to Liberia of negro citizens of the United States, as propagated by the organizations in the United States known as the American Colonization Society, &c., are manifold; the principal one of which is, no doubt, obvious to the Department. But as the determined agitation of the agents of those associations appears of late to attract the attention of a class of Americans whose ignorance of all the real facts in the case leaves them exposed to ex parte statements, which, in many instances, may induce them to leave homes and situations in life where they enjoy, at least, comparative comfort, and are able at the same time to supply an important demand for labor, only to experience disappointment in a foreign land, without hope, in nine cases in ten, of even being able to acquire the means to return to their homes, it now suggests itself as my duty to give only a very few of the more cogent reasons why I cannot advise or encourage the emigration by subscription of negro citizens of the United States to Liberia.
American philanthropists, influenced by the belief that they are assisting the elevation and well-being of an unfortunate class, and at the same time aiding the evangelization and civilization of Africa, contribute of their means to support a scheme which is not alone impolitic, but, in a majority of instances, absolutely injurious in results. It is far from my purpose to condemn or cause to be misunderstood the well-meaning intentions of persons who merely contribute their money to be used by others in this enterprise to colonize the American negro in Africa. This entire enterprise is kept alive in the United States by a few active agents of those societies who represent, usually, to the more inexperienced of the class they desire to operate upon as emigrants, only what is of a nature best adapted to deceive the unwary into the belief that the abundant wealth which nature has lavished upon Africa is not locked securely within the environs of these deadly climatic influences. These agents speak the truth when they represent that emigrants will find the soil fertile; that constant summer prevails; that there are mineral wealth, beautiful landscapes, luxurious vegetation, tropical fruits of every description, &c. But they should add that the most primitive agricultural appliances are used for tilling this fertile soil, such as cutlasses, hoes, bill-hooks, &c. Such a thing as a plow is not to be found in use in Liberia. It has been demonstrated that neither horses, mules, nor donkeys can withstand the climate on the sea-coast. Horses are found in the interior, but, when brought to the coast, they sicken and die. Although constant summer prevails, as to temperature, the miasmatic influence, caused by the heavy rain alternating with hot sunshine, causes sickness during six months of the year, and, during the [Page 372] remaining six months of the year the power* of the sun is such that it is almost impossible for any one except a native to work, as it produces inertia, lassitude, want of energy. Indeed, after a man has once had the fever, he never, in Africa, regains the energy he was possessed of before. Only a very few of the most robust constitutions ever regain, after leaving the climate, their former physical status. It is impossible to direct the sight any where without its resting upon the “beautiful landscapes,” and upon hills and dales covered with virgin forests, the sea and rivers margined with that” luxuriant vegetation” always peculiar to the deadly mangrove-swamps. It is true there is mineral wealth, but the procuring of this wealth is more than counterbalanced by the sacrifice and difficulty necessary for a people poor in the knowledge of the economy of government, and poor as well in individual competence. Rich as the country is naturally, Liberia has never been independent to loose herself from other countries enough to produce food sufficient for her daily home consumption. Although a rice-growing land, rice is imported from England and other countries and sold at $4 per bushel, when better rice can be grown and sold at half the price. Rice is the principal breadstuff. I have never seen flour of a less price than $14 per barrel; butter, at $1 per pound; hams, from $5 to $8 each; other provisions proportionably high. In the face of these facts the American emigrant has to compete with the native for labor. The native is strong and hardy, with a very few wants, and able, at fifty cents per day, to perform the labor usually assigned to horses in other countries.
When these agents, by reason of such ex parte representations, have succeeded, first, in producing discontent, thereby inducing these unsuspecting persons to quit homes and surroundings, already known and possessed, and to migrate across an ocean to a land unknown to themselves and the world, impossible hopes are afterward raised, superinduced by these distorted statements of empire and national greatness. They are left, at the expiration of six months of (so-called) support, without money or any means of livelihood, with little, if any, communication with their former friends and homes, without knowledge of the customs and nature of the country to which they have come, suffering from the despair and discouragement occasioned by the acclimation fever, and, alas! in too many cases, mourning the loss of perhaps their entire families, save the one thus left a mourner; such are only anxious to return from whence they came. I may here remark, I have never known of the departure of a vessel to America, without receiving, frequently, a dozen applications to be sent back. Under the law I am powerless to help them. If, perchance, the children of a family survive, as is frequently the case, the guardians are alarmed when they discover that they have left a country where a public-school system prevails for one where their children will be deprived of this benefit. Thus, confronted on every hand by discouraging circumstances, the emigrant naturally turns to the agent in the United States, whose representations led to this condition of things. I have been sorry before now to believe that the agent loses much of his zealous interest in the emigrant with the conclusion of the contract for the provisions for the support of the emigrant for six months. The agent generally replies, with the gratuitous advice to the emigrant to push his way as far to the interior of Africa as possible and there settle.
Travelers to the interior of Africa agree that some distance interior [Page 373] ward from the sea-coast we may reach healthier localities. Bat when we reflect that there are no roads, only foot-paths cut by the natives, and the only means of transporting their goods is on the heads or backs of native carriers, we are not surprised to find that after so long a time as sixty years, the emigrant has not penetrated the interior more than four or five hours’ travel, especially considering that the forests are almost impregnable, being matted together with a thick undergrowth of vines. The facts show that these poor people cannot go to the “high hills and undulating plains” said to be in the interior of Africa, without means to provide themselves with roads, and without treaties of commerce and friendship with the numerous petty kings, who are, in many instances, either openly or covertly hostile. It would frequently be necessary to enforce these treaties by means of an armed force, as England and all European powers who have colonies find from experience, as witness the recent difficult march of the English upon Coomassie, and the capture and execution of four or five African kings by the colonial government of Sierra Leone for obstructing the roads.
It is worthy of observation that even the majority of those powers have not been able to conquer the dense obstructions, which lie on the way to the interior of Africa, but comparatively short distances. And I would also remark that the theory that the negro of America, after three centuries of absence from Africa, the long weary years of which were not altogether devoted to training him in the things which pertain to the higher walks of knowledge, is better prepared than other foreigners, physically or otherwise, to carry civilization to this unfortunate people, is in my opinion and experience as fallacious as it is unreasonable. In fine, my experience has been that when the American negro is brought face to face in contact with this work, he is, for all practical purposes, as much a foreigner as any other people, and can only extend to the barbarous African the same philanthropic sympathy. It is not to be wondered at that when the emigrant is met by the unexpected obstructions referred to, his interest and ardor to realize the dream of evangelizing, civilizing, and colonizing Africa, himself being the immediate means, often changes into the desire to return to his home. After sixty years we find that those who have remained with praiseworthy determination, if possible, to conquer these obstructions, have not assimilated a single tribe of native Africans, but have caused the extinction as such of perhaps as many of the aborigines. Instead, the continual cry is for “more, more” from America to come, and, I suppose, do as they have done toward the grand consummation—nothing. Without a census in the country it is easy to observe that our mortality is greater than our increase from all sources; our children born in the country are weaker, therefore, more short-lived, than their parents, and our need to-day is more men. Would it not be reasonable to suppose that after another sixty years, the number supplied being equal, the want of Liberia will then, as now, be “more men”? Now, seeing that the result of these trying experiences is not the furtherance of the object aimed at, does it not seem advisable that philanthropy should be discouraged rather than promoted in this mistaken direction? None would have American benevolence discontinue the effort to make “sunshine in the shady places” of this republic, nor cease seeking to mitigate the wants of the unfortunate children of Africa; on the contrary, would it not seem time for that benevolence to show increased effort in the development of Africa’s vast resources, and that this effort should not only be increased, but take to itself an interest in Africa as broad as charity, kind as sympathy, and as comprehensive as the work is extensive [Page 374] and just. Neither is it intended to disparage the Spartan-like patriotism and stoic indifference to suffering, put forth so persistently by the first settlers of Liberia. They gained a foothold upon the shores of this country by persuasion when possible and by conquest when necessary. When taken comparatively, the policy employed by the English and other Europeans seems productive of as great, if not greater results than the plan adopted by Americans. They seem to realize the necessity of supplying light from without Africa; but at this point their policy appears to diverge from the plan of Americans, inasmuch as they intrust the continuation, indeed the completion, of the work to the indigenous inhabitant himself. At first it was their policy to take from the tribes the children of greatest intellectual promise and place them in the universities of Europe that they might become qualified to train their fellow-countrymen. It was discovered that this method furnished the pupil with ideas of civilization ill adapted to the purpose for which he was destined. Then the English adopted the plan of the Fourah Bay College, of Sierra Leone, where the student may acquire that kind of education necessary without leaving Africa. The result of this and other efforts in like direction is the production of men suitable for the work. For example, from schools thus established hundreds of young Africans with common training are graduated every year. It is pleasant to notice that Bishop Crowther,* of the Church of England, takes to the new field of labor which he has opened on the Niger many young men and women from these schools, who in their turn become co-laborers for the elevation of their people. The students from these schools may be found in all the professions, in commerce, and in all the several vocations of life. Africa is their home, and for them the climate possesses beauties, where others find only terror and premature death.
It does seem that the mission of Liberia is to form the nucleus about which to culminate the very tractable tribes residing upon their territory. Since the want of Liberia at the present time is men, would it not be a better economy to expend the moneys now being used for the migration of the class of emigrants described, in the establishment of manual-labor schools which would supply the class of men needed in the country, free from all the drawbacks consequent upon emigrating from America?
We have at our very doors, only forty miles from Monrovia, at Cape Mount, the Vei tribe, with perfect physical organization, and with an inventive genius which has won for them the reputation of being the only tribe known on this coast to have invented an alphabet, by means of which they were found in communication with the interior. Their language has been reduced to grammar. This tribe desires to learn. Often when any of them were employed about this legation they would require in payment pens, ink, and paper; not, as the other nations, gin, rum, tobacco, cloth, &c.
After examining their traditions we find that this tribe has absorbed others, and that the Vei language is more extensive than that of any of the neighboring tribes. Vei is spoken by more of the surrounding aborigines than any other language. Therefore, I think this tribe the best vehicle for the propagation of civilization to the interior tribes of Africa.
One-half of the cost of colonizing the 30,000 emigrants (if that were possible) would, within a very short space of time, prepare as many men from this people who are exactly suited to the kind of work required. And I may add that if Christian philanthropists loiter much longer in manipulating this chiliahedronic idea into shape, the Mandingoes, who, [Page 375] as Mohammedans, are indefatigable missionaries, will probably very soon disseminate the dogmas of their religion among this desirable people, and thus place their evangelization at least another half century farther in the future. This is evident when it is considered that the Mandingo teaches his religion at the same time he pushes forward his commerce; with him the two go hand in hand. The Mandingoes and Veis are in intimate communication, and this intimacy grows daily pari passu with their commerce.
Momorah, a Mandingo chief, from the interior, with a caravan of trade, usually to Sierra Leone, is often visiting this legation. He is a man noble in his deportment, six feet in height, as all his tribe are, athletic and well proportioned, with straight features, having none of the characteristics usually ascribed to the African; intellectual, speaking English, French, German, and Portuguese, from contact with the people of those colonies, where he has been accustomed to trade. He also reads Arabic from the religious training peculiar to his people, and Vei, acquired during his intimacy with that tribe. What I have ascribed to Prince Mamorah is true of many of his tribe. It is impossible to look upon this perfect type of manly physique and intellectual strength without being impressed by the superiority of the material of which his tribe is composed. They are the men of conquest in Africa, the commercial races dwelling far in the interior, making pilgrimages to Mecca across the continent, and whose treaty of friendship and whose passport over the domains of hostile tribes who dwell between their home and the sea-board are the Koran and the sword.
Speaking to this man of commerce, of the Koran, and of the sword, upon the subject upon which I am writing, his evident disposition to commiserate rather than admire the American negro as he sees him here, convinces me that it will be long before the abnormal can mold the normal man. His language forces upon me the recollection that human slavery is as old as human conquest; that it was the custom of the victor to enthrall the vanquished, and that many are slow to value the fact that human slavery was not the crucible to refine and enable human nature and oefit it for grand undertakings.
While my object is not to encourage the persuasion of citizens of the United States to exchange their homes and country for Liberia, neither is it desired to dissuade any from coming to Liberia who may wish to do so. It is merely desired to present the facts and difficulties attendant upon such a course, with a view that none, if possible, may emigrate without full knowledge of the probable result. And I may add, that a fact generally recognized by many thoughtful and prominent Liberians, and one in which I thoroughly acquiesce, is that men of any consequence to the wants of Liberia are able to pay their own expense of travel, and if desirous to come, would be willing and would prefer to do so.
Whether Liberia succeeds or fails, she cannot be accepted as a fair test of the negro’s capacity or incapacity for self-government.
This dispatch has exceeded the length intended. There are many things of interest which might be mentioned on a subject so important, but I must not occupy the time of the Department unnecessarily; hence, I have avoided any allusion to the condition of the Government of Liberia—as to the security or insecurity of life and property; whether or not crime can be committed with impunity; whether the financial system employed is potent or impotent, &c.
Upon such topics the government is doubtless already informed through my previous correspondence.
I have, &c.,