No. 653.
Mr. Comanos to Mr. Evarts.
Consulate-General of the United States.
Cairo, Egypt, August 20, 1880. (Received September
16.)
No. 444.]
Sir: In continuation of Mr. Farman’s dispatches
No. 399, of May 5, No. 403, of May 22, and No. 431, of July 31 last,
concerning the slave trade, I have the honor to inform you that Mr. Azar
Abd-el-Malûk, our consular agent at Khartoum, the capital of the
equatorial provinces,-reports, under date of July 19, 1880, as follows:
Nothing new has occurred of late for me to write about, except
that two days before the date hereof certain Sonakinites were
arrested in the district of Berber, in the Soudan governorship,
and with them were found about 130 human male individuals,
negroes; and the governor of the said region reported their case
to his excellency the governor-general. The report gives the
names, and the names of the partners of the aforesaid
Sonakinites who dwell in Khartoum. The government at once
ordered their places of business and their dwellings to be put
under sequester; and whatever was found of the nature of
enslaved persons, merchandise, and hard money, was seized also.
And the aforesaid were put into prison with irons. The necessary
investigation was commenced, but it has not yet been terminated;
and it is rumored that their case will be submitted by his
excellency the governor-general to the precious feet [scil of
the Khedive]. Whatever happens further I shall report to
you.
On the 7th instant Mr. Yan Dyck was instrumental in obtaining free papers
for a bright negro named Mûsa, and on the 10th instant he successfully
interested himself to the same end in behalf of a eunuch, by the name of
Rûsim, who belonged to Hassan Pasha’s slave-staff, mentioned in Mr.
Farman’s No. 431 of the 13th of July last.
I herewith inclose an excerpt from the London Times of Wednesday, the
28th of July, anno currente. It has special
reference to slave-traffic as carried on between Africa and Arabia
across the Red Sea. From this excerpt and from the foregoing report of
our agent at Khartoum, it will be seen that Sonakin and the Sonakinites
play a prominent part in this hateful business, and that consular agents
are especially needed at that port for stopping it.
* * * * * * *
I beg, sir, to refer the Department to Mr. Farman’s unnumbered dispatch,
dated at Warsaw, N. Y., on the 17th of September, 1879, and
[Page 1024]
to his unofficial letter to
Mr. Payson, dated at Cairo on the 29th of November, 1879, in which
letter he expresses the hope that he will soon receive instructions to
conclude the convention for the suppression of the slave-trade proposed
in his No. 297 of May 1, 1879. I also refer to my suggestions contained
in paragraph 7 of my dispatch No. 329 of August 19 of last year
concerning white Circassian and Georgian female slaves for concubinage,
and respecting the suzerainty of the Sultan.
If we have had no part in the liquidation of Egypt’s debts for the
benefit of European creditors, it is all the more fit and proper that
our best efforts be here in this land thrown in with those of Great
Britain in the cause of freeing the enslaved.
The translation herewith inclosed of a circular letter addressed by his
excellency Riaz Pasha, in his character of minister of the interior, to
the district governors of Egypt, on the subject of slave dealers and
purchasers of slaves from the dealers, shows the good that is resulting
from the Anglo-Egyptian convention of August 4, 1877.
I have, &c.,
N. D. COMANOS,
United States
Vice-Consul-General in Charge.
[Inclosure 1 in dispatch No. 444.—From
the London Times of Wednesday July 28, 1880.]
slave trade in the red sea and
africa.
To the Editor:
Sir: Our correspondent in Djeddah, writing
on the 30th of June, gives a deplorable account of the increase of
the slave trade in the Soudan and the Red Sea since the departure of
Colonel Gordon. If you can find room in the Times for the extracts
it will do more to enlighten the English public and to alarm the
Egyptian and Turkish officials than anything short of action in
Parliament. The Times is a power in Egypt, and is feared by pashas
and their underlings more than all the laws enacted by their own
government against this iniquitous traffic.
I have drawn a veil over some of the horrors related to us, as they
cannot be even named in civilized countries. Our correspondent thus
writes:
“No one can be more utterly disgusted than I am at the state of
affairs at present, and I sincerely regret that Colonel Gordon has
gone from the country where he was working such good. He has gone,
and I do not think there is a respectable inhabitant of the Soudan
that is not sorry, and may look back to the times when justice and
law reigned in the country under his rule, and wish that he or some
other Englishman were again appointed as governor of the African
dominions of Egypt.
“The slave trade is just as brisk as ever it was; and I am convinced
that expeditions have already started for slave raiding. As now the
Soudan is split up again into different pashalics, each pasha only
being respéonsible for the country he governs, there is no supreme
head to put a stop to lawlessness, and the few soldiers and the
utter want of police and preventive service make it an easy matter
for the slave-dealers to get their slaves down to the coast and ship
them.
“The soldiers on the coast of the Soudan are mostly Egyptians, who,
having been convicts, have worked their time out and now serve in
the army; they are underpaid, underfed, and underclothed. If when on
duty they come across a slave caravan, is it likely they would stop
it and conduct it to the authorities, who would likely enough say
nothing about it and take backsheesh from the owners themselves?
Would they not much more probably pocket a reasonable bribe and
allow the slave-dealers to wend their way to the coast and never
report to their officers what had taken place?
“The slave trade is being carried on in the most open way, and every
steamer that leaves Sonakin has slaves on board. In the steamer
Yembo, in which I crossed the sea, there were nineteen, eighteen of
whom, however, had liberation papers. A man from Mecca, whom I know
very well by sight, and a noted slave-dealer, had five with him,
four boys and a girl, who were supposed to be his domestic slaves.
To my certain knowledge this man goes backwards and forwards nearly
every month. He can carry on his trade with impunity, and he is only
one of the many that do the same. He goes to the governor or
official in charge, and says: ‘I have so many slaves that I have
bought, I want them liberated.’ Papers are made out for them; he
leaves for
[Page 1025]
Djeddah,
passes the slaves at the quarantine, Walks them into the town,
destroys the papers of liberation taken out at Sonakin, sells the
slaves, and returns by next steamer to Sonakin to buy more. There is
no law to touch him, no treaty with England whereby he does an
illegal act, and he can snap his ringers in the faces of the
officers of our cruisers. This sort of thing is done weekly, not
only to Djeddah, but to Suez from Sonakin, and from Massowah to
Hodeidah, and from Hodeidah to Djeddah. This is the easiest way for
slave-dealers to work, but still the majority are carried by buglas.
I have a well authenticated case of 800 slaves being ‘run’ from
Shiek Barghut, just north of Sonakin, to Djeddah, about ten days
ago. The three buglas that took them away were partly loaded with
mother-o’-pearl, and also took cargo that belonged to the
slave-dealers.
The present governor of Sonakin is the same man that told me in 1876,
when I was vice-consul, that the slave trade did not exist and there
were no slaves in Sonakin. He is a bigoted, fanatical, old
reprobate, and he ordered a man to be tortured quite lately to try
to make him say he was implicated in a murder that took place. He
had him strung up by his thumbs till they were cut to the bone, and
the man had witnesses to prove that he was nowhere near the place
when the murder was committed. I tell you this just to show you the
specimen of men that now have power in the Soudan as soon as Gordon
has left.
The African slave trade, and especially the Soudan traffic, is a
disgrace to the civilized world in general, and that the Turks and
Egyptians should be allowed to carry it on, now they have been so
many years in intercourse with the European powers, is inexplicable
to me. The very rulers and officials of Turkey and Egypt that
conduct the affairs of state with foreign powers have all of them
slaves and eunuchs in their houses, and are more to blame than the
slave-dealers themselves, who only pander to the lust of those who
buy what the slave-dealers have stolen. I dislike the sight of a
well-fed and sleek pasha, and I think every Englishman ought to hate
them, not for their dishonesty and corruptness alone, but for owning
servants and small boys that are unsexed, and therefore being
accessory to the crime of murder, mutilation, and every brutality
that a strong race can use against a weaker one.
I do not believe it is known by many in England that hundreds of boys
that are taken in slave raids every year are subjected to the
barbarity that is inflicted on them. The operation is performed
unskillfully, and the poor children are buried in the sand to
prevent extensive bleeding. What percentage of them lives no one
knows, but it is said to be very, very small.”
After discussing the proper steps to be taken to put down the
enormities that now exist, our correspondent continues:
“I think a very good thing would be to start a colony of slaves under
English missionaries in some of the healthy places in the Soudan,
say the Bogos country, or on the highlands adjoining the Abyssinian
frontier. There is not a single establishment of the Church Mission
Society in the Soudan, and the places I have mentioned are quite
adapted to Europeans, as they are healthy and the soil is good.
“A good English agent is required at Siout, or at one of the towns on
the Nile, to report what goes on there to the consul-general in
Egypt, and one consul to be appointed to the Soudan, with a roving
commission and residence at Khartoum, to protect commerce and watch
the slave trade. Khartoum is now not out of the world; it is only
eighteen days by post from England, the post going every week, and
it is in direct telegraphic communication with Cairo. An agent or
trading-consul for Sonakin and Massowah is likewise needed, to be
also under the consul-general in Egypt, with residence at either
post which he might think fit. I should say Sonakin, as there is
most trade there and it is only thirty-six hours between the two
posts.
“You may make any use you like of this letter, if you think fit.”
Can I make better use of this letter than by requesting its insertion
in the Times?
I am, sir, yours, faithfully,
CHARLES H. ALLEN, Secretary.
British and Foreign Anti-Slavery
Society,
27 New Broad Street, E.
C., July 23.
[Inclosure No. 2 in No.
444.—Translation from the Moniteur Egyptien of Tuesday, August
3, 1880.]
Circular letter addressed to all the mudirs
(provincial governors).
Official Part, Ministry of
Interior.
In spite of the rigorous measures taken with a view to stopping trade
in slaves, and regardless of the punishments prescribed in respect
to importers (djellabes, i. e.,
[Page 1026]
bringers, merchants),
who dare still to carry on this traffic, these latter do not
hesitate to undertake the bringing of persons as slaves.
It is not to be disputed that importers (djellabes) continue this
commerce only because they find purchasers who buy their goods, and
who thus keep up, for their benefit, a source of considerable
profit. When there is no demand there will be no supply, and without
buyers the importers (djellabes) would have long ago given up this
business, and the government would not have found itself under the
necessity of overcoming many difficulties and being at so much
expense. The application of the heavy punishments that fall upon the
importers (djellabes), and upon others, to the end of completely
suppressing the slave trade, would also be thereby avoided.
Consequently, and in consideration of the terms of the convention
stipulated between the Government of Egypt and the Government of Her
Britannic Majesty, whereby every person that shall take part in the
traffic of individuals, brought under the aforementioned conditions,
is considered as an accomplice of the importer (djellabe), both as
to the crime itself and as to the penalty it carries with it, it has
been deemed necessary to give notice that every person who shall buy
slaves, brought and fraudulently sold by the importers (djellabes),
is subject to the same punishments that fall upon the latter by
virtue of the regulations relating to the suppression of the slave
trade.
The present notification is given to the public in order that it may
be known by all that every person who shall render himself liable
for having committed the crime here above mentioned will draw down
upon himself the application of the same penalty that is prescribed
towards importers (djellabes).
Cairo, July 31,
1880.
The minister of interior:
RIAZ.
