Category: Cape Mount

Resident Albert Dondo Ware was restored to all right and privileges of citizenship, having been an “upright” citizen since his release from prison.

In 1938, the legislature stipulated the rates that could be charged by the Wakolo Ferry Transport Company Incorporated, county of Grand Cape Mount, keeping the maximum charge at 24 cents between Robertsport and Sawilor and 12 cents between Robertsport and Mecca Point and between Twelve Point and Sulima but reducing the maximum charge between Robertsport and Deah from 48 cents to 24 cents.

Footnote: Acts of the Liberian Legislature, 1938, p. 15; Acts of the Liberian Legislature, 1938, pp. 15-16.

British buyers usually bought most of their slaves along the Sierra Leone coast, then filled up their vessels with slaves from the Windward Coast, mainly from Bassa, followed by Cape Mount.

Most Windward slaves went to the Caribbean, 146,096; Brazil received 2,795; other regions of Africa, 2,595; and the Spanish American mainland, 120. Within the Caribbean, the biggest recipients of Windward captives were Jamaica, 34,162; Barbados, 15,180; Grenada, 14,545; Antigua, 12,175; and Dominica, 10,963.

In 1614-1616 or 1620, rice was one of the few goods available for sale at Cape Mount.

Footnote: Vos, 2010, p. 33; Vos, 2012, pp. 1-2; http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/index.face; Brun, 1983, pp. 74-75, n. 185.

By 1700, traders documented an emerging trade in ivory and trickles of gold. Both of those commodities would be overtaken fifty years later by the traffic in Africans. As European interest in slaves grew, they stopped buying African products, like cotton cloth, for sale to Europe and other regions.

Cape Mount was one of 13 slave-exporting ports in Liberia. Others were  Bassa, Cess, Grand Bassa, Little Bassa, Grand Junk, Little Junk, Grand Mesurado, Petit Mesurado, Grand Sestos, Rock Sestos, St. Paul and Trade Town.

Within Liberia, Cape Mount supplied the largest number of enslaved persons, 42,521.

Footnote: Vos, 2010, p. 32; Vos, 2012, p. 3; Ehret, 2013, p. 469; http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/index.faces.

A major record of what is now the Liberian coast was produced by William Smith, a surveyor sent in 1726 by the Royal African Company of England.

On Dec. 29, 1729, Smith’s ship anchored off Cape Mount and remained for four days, but he apparently did not venture onshore. From his vantage point aboard, he reached two conclusions about local people. First, they seemed “very industrious” because “they all go clad with their own manufactures.”

Second, those who came aboard to trade “were mighty timorous,” especially if any weapons were visible, “for fear of being panyar’d” or kidnapped.

Footnote: Smith, 1744, p. 104.

As for the relationship between the sexes, Bosman noted, each man was allowed as many wives as he could maintain, which wasn’t very difficult since women maintained themselves through their own hard work! “They seem also to live very contentedly with their Wives.”

The husbands, he added condescendingly, were not “much concerned if they venture on unlawful Pleasures with other Men.”

This alleged willingness to overlook adultery might have selectively applied to European visitors, but Bosman wasn’t in a position to know that.

Footnote: Bosman, 1967, p. 474.

Asked about the local religion, residents allegedly told Bosman that “it principally consisted in Reverencing and obeying” their government and “without troubling themselves with what was above” it.

Rather than accurately reflecting local beliefs, this account depicts the difficulty of translating abstract concepts from one language (Dutch) to another (Vai) through a third (Portuguese), which neither of the communicating parties probably spoke very well.

Had the question been put by residents of Cape Mount to the common seamen aboard Bosman’s ship, the response would probably not have corresponded with the views of Dutch clergy.

As the Dutch tightened their control of world trade, their presence increased in the area now known as Liberia. In the early 1700s, a detailed account of West African life was published by William Bosman, a Dutch merchant. From the age of 16, he spent 14 years in West Africa.

He noted the presence here of pineapples, bananas and “Paquovers” (very likely papayas or guavas. All other foodstuff were in short supply, including “great Milhio” (meaning corn or millet), yams and potatoes.

Footnote: Bosman, 1967, pp. 473-474; John Ralph Willis, “Introduction, in William Bosman, A New and Accurate Description of the Coast of Guinea (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1967), pp. xvii; vii, xviii, viii-ix; William Bosman, A New and Accurate Description of the Coast of Guinea (New York: Barnes & Nobles, 1967),, p. 471; Jones, 1990, pp. 171-209.

Villault “could perceive” that many of the men were circumcised. Many husbands spent hours “with their heads in their Wives lapps” having their hair combed and platted.

Although Villault tried to learn as much as possible about the local religion, a local person reportedly told him that “the Whites pray’d to God, and the Blacks to the Devil.”

Social status apparently defined, not only differences in dress, but also in housing. In contrast to the nondescript huts of salt-makers, the “houses of their Nobility” contained “a distinct appartment where their beds are made either upon plancks, or mat; about a yeard from the ground, about which they hang a cloth.”

Footnote: Villault, 1670, pp. 62-65.

Regarding foodstuff at Cape Mount, Villaut noted citrons, oranges, berries, melons, gourds and “a sort of plums, not much unlike our Brugnons,” but not as tasty. He noted the presence of rice and millet and said maize was “more plentifull, and grows in greater quantity, than in any other part of Guinee whatsoever.”

A wide variety of fowl was available and cheap, including hens, pidgeons, ducks and mallards. In addition to tortoises that yielded “excellent meat” but worthless shells, there was a “great store” of both saltwater and freshwater fish. He also noted a good supply of goats, hogs and apes, “but ugly ones.”

Villault was struck by how careful the local people were in roasting meat over wooden spits, “turning them with great care, and observing very curiously least one side be more roasted then the other. He also pronounced them “very neat in their feeding.”

Footnote: Villault, 1670, pp. 61-62.

One of the first detailed accounts was left by French nobleman Nicolas Villault de Bellefond. He sailed as comptroller of the 400-ton frigate Europa in 1666-1667, sponsored by the French West Indian Company.

In the midst of trade negotiations, the local people began running “Pell-mell” from their houses and abandoned their merchandise. It turned out, that they were rushing to welcome their ruler, Falam Boure, and his entourage. The thaba or ruler wore a blue robe while the men of his entourage were dressed in blue-and-white striped gowns.

Villault estimated the local ruler’s age to be above 60 years and described him as “grave and venerable” at one point and “sensible and majestick” at another. Falam Boure told his guest in Portuguese it had been four years since any “Whites” had visited.

Footnote: Villault, 1670, pp. 57-59.

Dutch merchant William Bosman described the inhabitants of Cape Mount in the early 1700s as “industrious to the last degree,” mainly in growing rice and extracting salt from sea water.

At Cape Mount around 1701, the men’s attire was “like a Surplice,” which was a knee-length overgarment with full sleeves worn by European clergy or choirs. Women, on the other hand, wore a narrow cloth around their waist, “tucked in at their sides to fasten it,” but without the girdles worn by women on the Gold Coast

“Sometimes they shamelessly go around naked,” he added, “as if they were proud of what Nature bestows on them in common with the rest of their Sex.”

Footnote: Bosman, 1967, pp. 474, 472, 480-481.

Samuel Brun of Basel, Switzerland, left one of the earliest descriptions of local culture and people in 1611 and 1620. Living among the Vai in 1620 were several Dutch sailors, survivors of a ship wreck one year before.

According to Brun, “Flamore,” the thaba or monarch, spoke French. The thaba’s wife (whom the Dutch called Maria) was a native of Cameroon and spoke “good Dutch.” She had come to Cape Mount with a Dutch trader, who had taught her his native tongue.

Throughout the 1600s, Cape Mount is said to have been ruled by men with similar names. Their names were written as “Faramborey,” “Faran Bure,” “Frambore,” “Flambourre,” and “Falam Bûrre.” All of these suggest the family whose name is now spelled “Fahnbulleh.” 

Footnote: Brun, 1983, pp. 74-75, n. 185; Sieur de Bellefond Nicolas Villault, “A relation of the coast of Africa called Guinea,” in John Green, A New General Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 2 (London: Thomas Astley, 1745-47), pp. 382-383; Villault, 1745-47, p. 379; Barbot, 1732, p. 108.