WHO SOLD NIGERIA TO THE BRITISH FOR £865K IN 1899?

This is the story of the first oil war, which was fought in the 19th century, in the area that became Nigeria.

All through the 19th century, palm oil was highly sought-after by the British, for use as an industrial lubricant for machinery. Remember that Britain was the world’s first industrialised nation, so they needed resources such as palm oil to maintain that.

Palm oil, of course, is a tropical plant, which is native to the Niger Delta. Malaysia’s dominance came a century later. By 1870, palm oil had replaced slaves as the main export of the Niger Delta, the area which was once known as the Slave Coast. At first, most of the trade in the oil palm was uncoordinated, with natives selling to those who gave them the best deals. Native chiefs such as former slave, Jaja of Opobo became immensely wealthy because of oil palm. With this wealth came influence.

However, among the Europeans, there was competition for who would get preferential access to the lucrative oil palm trade. In 1879, George Goldie formed the United African Company (UAC), which was modelled on the former East India Company. Goldie effectively took control of the Lower Niger River. By 1884, his company had 30 trading posts along the Lower Niger. This monopoly gave the British a strong hand against the French and Germans in the 1884 Berlin Conference. The British got the area that the UAC operated in, included in their sphere of influence after the Berlin Conference.

When the Brits got the terms they wanted from other Europeans, they began to deal with the African chiefs. Within two years of 1886, Goldie had signed treaties with tribal chiefs along the Benue and Niger Rivers whilst also penetrating inland. This move inland was against the spirit of verbal agreements that had been made to restrict the organisation’s activities to coastal regions.

By 1886, the company name changed to The National Africa Company and was granted a royal charter (incorporated). The charter authorised the company to administer the Niger Delta and all lands around the banks of the Benue and Niger Rivers. Soon after, the company was again renamed. The new name was Royal Niger Company, which survives, as Unilever, till this day.

To local chiefs, the Royal Niger Company negotiators had pledged free trade in the region. Behind, they entered private contracts on their terms. Because the (deceitful) private contracts were often written in English and signed by the local chiefs, the British government enforced them. So for example, Jaja of Opobo, when he tried to export palm oil on his own, was forced into exile for “obstructing commerce”. As an aside, Jaja was “forgiven” in 1891 and allowed to return home, but he died on the way back, poisoned with a cup of tea.

Seeing what happened to Jaja, some other native rulers began to look more closely at the deals they were getting from the Royal Nigeria Company. One of such kingdoms was Nembe, whose king, Koko Mingi VIII, ascended the throne in 1889 after being a Christian schoolteacher. Koko Mingi VIII, King Koko for short, like most rulers in the yard, was faced with the Royal Nigeria Company encroachment. He also resented the monopoly enjoyed by the Royal Nigeria Company and tried to seek out favourable trading terms, with particularly the Germans in Kamerun (Cameroon).

By 1894, the Royal Nigeria Company increasingly dictated whom the natives could trade with, and denied them direct access to their former markets. In late 1894, King Koko renounced Christianity and tried to form an alliance with Bonny and Okpoma against the Royal Nigeria Company to take back the trade. This is significant because while Okpoma joined up, Bonny refused. A harbinger of the successful “divide and rule” tactic.

On 29 January 1895, King Koko led an attack on the Royal Niger Company’s headquarters, which was in Akassa in today’s Bayelsa state. The pre-dawn raid had more than a thousand men involved. King Koko’s attack succeeded in capturing the base. Losing 40 of his men, King Koko captured 60 white men as hostages, as well as a lot of goods, ammunition and a Maxim gun. Koko then attempted to negotiate a release of the hostages in exchange for being allowed to chose his trading partners. The British refused to negotiate with Koko, and he had forty of the hostages killed. A British report claimed that the Nembe people ate them. On 20 February 1895, Britain’s Royal Navy, under Admiral Bedford attacked Brass and burned it to the ground. Many Nembe people died and smallpox finished off a lot of others.

By April 1895, business had returned to “normal”, normal being the conditions that the British wanted, and King Koko was on the run. Brass was fined £500 by the British, £62,494 (NGN29 million) in today’s money, and the looted weapons were returned as well as the surviving prisoners. After a British Parliamentary Commission sat, King Koko was offered terms of settlement by the British, which he rejected and disappeared. The British promptly declared him an outlaw and offered a reward of £200 (£26,000; NGN12 million today) for him. He committed suicide in exile in 1898.

About that time, another “recalcitrant King”, the Oba of Benin, was run out of town. The pacification of the Lower Niger was well and truly underway. The immediate effect of the Brass Oil War was that public opinion in Britain turned against the Royal Nigeria Company, so its charter was revoked in 1899. Following the revoking of its charter, the Royal Niger Company sold its holdings to the British government for £865,000 (£108 million today). That amount, £46,407,250 (NGN 50,386,455,032,400, at today’s exchange rate) was effectively the price Britain paid, to buy the territory which was to become known as Nigeria.

N.B: This post was originally published on May 19, 2014.

Credit= igbo History

They never bought Igboland...

They didn't buy Igboland...

We gave them wotowoto back to back in 1883 and 1901 till 1914.

Even Mungo Park couldn't handle it..Ediot had to commit suicide right there in onitsha river..

Ndi ala

Interesting read.

nigeria story its touching i swear https://benumbccshop.ru/

They never bought Ala Igbo, that's why none of our towns was named after an English or European town or person.

Some dey claim Deltan, Lagosian or PH, Lagos ia a Portuguese town, while PH is named after a Rapist Mr. Harcourt, as for Delta, na English word meaning Delta soap , Delta state names after the owner of Delta Soap and Delta Airlines (na play o)

Topics like this won't hit frontpage

Faber:
They never bought Ala Igbo, that's why none of our towns was named after an English or European town or person.

Some dey claim Deltan, Lagosian or PH, Lagos ia a Portuguese town, while PH is named after a Rapist Mr. Harcourt, as for Delta, na English word meaning Delta soap , Delta state names after the owner of Delta Soap and Delta Airlines (na play o)

LoL, My man the Delta State means riverline area

The eternal fact remains that NIGERIA WAS far BETTER OF youUNDER BRITISH RULE.
ANY AFRICAN COUNTRY WITHOUT WHITE PEOPLE IN GOVERNMENT CAN NEVA DO WELL. Go check out e.g SA,Madagascar,Etc.
THIS IS because THE MIND OF BLACKMAN IS BLACK FULL OF IDOL WORSHIP CLOGS FOR MATERIALISM TO GAIN POWER TO LIVE LARGE LIKE EMPERIOR, BUT NOT TO GAIN POWER TO SERVE HIS BLACK SOCIETY TO BE A DEVELOPED PLACE. ARE U PPL NOT WORSHIpiNG OBJ own soutome, buha own niger and chad,ATIK own dubai,IS SAD TRUTH OF LIFE.

Nice history...
And the same things is still playing out today..
This time it's oil..

History is part of African Americans

Many things don happen

OyeofIkoTuN:
They never bought Igboland...

Lol, the question should be what was/is there to buy?

Good read @OP

OyeofIkoTuN:
They didn't buy Igboland...

We gave them wotowoto back to back in 1883 and 1901 till 1914.

Even Mungo Park couldn't handle it..Ediot had to commit suicide right there in onitsha river..

Ndi ala

Which Onitsha river.

The guy died at Jebba, river niger

Faber:
They never bought Ala Igbo, that's why none of our towns was named after an English or European town or person.

Some dey claim Deltan, Lagosian or PH, Lagos ia a Portuguese town, while PH is named after a Rapist Mr. Harcourt, as for Delta, na English word meaning Delta soap , Delta state names after the owner of Delta Soap and Delta Airlines (na play o)

You should get some history lessons before commenting on history threads. Stop embarrassing your old age on public forums without prior knowledge of matters you know nothing about!

Back to the topic- Delta State was created out of Bendel State (Defunct Edo State) in 1991. Stop saying “Na play”. You don’t know your history

PARADIZEPRIEST:
The eternal fact remains that NIGERIA WAS far BETTER OF youUNDER BRITISH RULE.
ANY AFRICAN COUNTRY WITHOUT WHITE PEOPLE IN GOVERNMENT CAN NEVA DO WELL. Go check out e.g SA,Madagascar,Etc.
THIS IS because THE MIND OF BLACKMAN IS BLACK FULL OF IDOL WORSHIP CLOGS FOR MATERIALISM TO GAIN POWER TO LIVE LIKE EMPEROR, BUT NOT TO GAIN POWER TO SERVE HIS BLACK SOCIETY TO BE A DEVELOPED PLACE. IS SAD TRUTH OF LIFE.

Fact is the black is still battling to understand what reality is, in our evolutionary spiral we never fully evolved with our own kind of education because it was all superimposed by an external force. The Religion, Education and Language we inherited are our greatest disservice to our continent. We must come out of or be re-enslaved.

Nigeria means nothing as word. it has no base or taste, it has no feeling or idea in it's construct. The way I see Nigeria it is a business enterprise owned by the West. the more we grasp this reality the clearer we see why things ain't working.

PARADIZEPRIEST:
The eternal fact remains that NIGERIA WAS far BETTER OF youUNDER BRITISH RULE.
ANY AFRICAN COUNTRY WITHOUT WHITE PEOPLE IN GOVERNMENT CAN NEVA DO WELL. Go check out e.g SA,Madagascar,Etc.
THIS IS because THE MIND OF BLACKMAN IS BLACK FULL OF IDOL WORSHIP CLOGS FOR MATERIALISM TO GAIN POWER TO LIVE LIKE EMPERIOR, BUT NOT TO GAIN POWER TO SERVE HIS BLACK SOCIETY TO BE A DEVELOPED PLACE.IS SAD TRUTH OF LIFE.

Sad truth indeed

When the oba of benin was defeated, the whole Nigeria went down under the British control


The edo people fought gallantly but their rival never underestimated them...


The maxim machines after the benin war was what was used to bring down neighboring Ghana and other part of Nigeria

Wow, I should take history more seriously.

I tackle black people more on religion, I feel we are just stupid to have abandoned our culture and embraced other people's faith to the extent of killing our own brothers for some Arabian God.

They came and told you your culture is not clean and gave you something worse, claimed your service to Islam isn't complete until you visit their country. Claim their language is the most superior.

Our leaders loot money and still take it to the white man's country to squander.
We need our brains checked.

Godtemi:

Which Onitsha river.
The guy died at Jebba, river niger

Mungo Park died in Brass, Rivers state.

SouthSouth1914:


You should get some history lessons before commenting on history threads. Stop embarrassing your old age on public forums without prior knowledge of matters you know nothing about!

Back to the topic- Delta State was created out of Bendel State (Defunct Edo State) in 1991. Stop saying “Na play”. You don’t know your history

.
If him say na play na play na

Godtemi:


Which Onitsha river.

The guy died at Jebba, river niger

where you there?

Aproko

AndroBlaze:


Lol, the question should be what was/is there to buy?

Good read @OP

psheww...minority speesh

Godtemi:


Which Onitsha river.

The guy died at Jebba, river niger

True that,,,

The Brits were stuck-up, arrogant assholes.

Imagine buying a land without regard for the natives and inhabitants of that land, I'm sure they saw us as too inconsequential to even bother with.

All for the advancement and progress of the empire and glory of the Queen

Europeans have done alot of harm during the colonial era.

how come the ancient stories had no modern traces or did war wipe them all of

dFroshie:
Topics like this won't hit frontpage

Na breast and snakes them go carry go front page. Shame.

I support you

Moneyboyz:
Wow, I should take history more seriously.

I tackle black people more on religion, I feel we are just stupid to have abandoned our culture and embraced other people's faith to the extent of killing our own brothers for some Arabian God.

They came and told you your culture is not clean and gave you something worse, claimed your service to Islam isn't complete until you visit their country. Claim their language is the most superior.

Our leaders loot money and still take it to the white man's country to squander.
We need our brains checked.