This is a continuation of a series on Captain George Cannon. For the initial post and an index, go here. George Cannon and the ship Eliza may have been involved in an incident described hereafter while in the roads at Anomabu. This incident has been referenced in three books I’m aware of, one in passing, one with more detail and one with substantially more detail. All three sources interpret the incident differently and give somewhat different facts. I don’t have access to the original source material, so I have put the events together in a way that makes the most sense to me, based primarily on the most detailed reference, with some added facts from one of the other references. I visited Anomabu Fort and Fort Amsterdam with Judy and my cousin and his wife, Russ and Shelley Cannon, in 2014.
On, or shortly before, April 9, 1791 an Anomabu Fort canoe was carrying a load of firewood to the ship Betty[1] anchored in Anomabu Road. The canoe overturned in the surf and the firewood washed up on the beach. The canoemen righted the canoe and came back to the beach to retrieve the firewood, but at the same time, boys from the town were also grabbing the firewood. The bomboy, a Fante employee of the fort, who was charged with supervising the loading and unloading of canoes at the beach, watched over the canoe and did nothing to stop the boys grabbing the wood. Sergeant Swann, a British soldier from the Fort who was watching, ordered the bomboy to leave the canoe and stop the boys from stealing the wood. The bomboy refused, stating that the canoe was more valuable than the wood. So Sergeant Swann struck the bomboy and drew blood. It happened to be a fetish day, sacred to the Fante, and striking the bomboy on that day in that fashion was a sacrilege. So the bomboy contacted his bendefoe company, the Fante militia, and they consulted priests who put a fetish on the gates of the fort, forbidding anyone from going into or out of the fort. [Fetish men and women were priests or priestesses that were oracles for the gods. They were consulted about major events. A fetish could be a tied bag with gold, single beads, little shells or teeth of an animal. A fetish on a door would bar anyone from entering.][2]
This, in effect, initiated a palaver. [Palavers brought together parties in a dispute which they tried to resolve by talking to each other. Anomabu had a Palaver House like other towns on the Gold Coast.][3] A crowd subsequently gathered at the fort to throw stones at the soldiers and forced them to stay inside.
Amoony
Coomah, chief caboceer of Anomabu, heard of this incident and sent his heir
along with the head of the bendefoe soldiers, Cobea, to settle things. They
arrived at the fort to find Governor Thomas Miles was absent. A Mr. Tower was
in charge in his place. The Fante delegation demanded that Tower give
compensation to the town to resolve the palaver. Governor Miles, who had been
at another fort conducting business, returned during these discussions and was
angry that a palaver had been initiated in his absence. So he panyarred
these Fante men (took them hostage) and demanded that Amoony Coomah pay two bullocks
as a fine for the Fante initiating the palaver while he was away. [Panyarring
was a seizure of goods or people by an aggrieved party in a dispute. The goods
or people were held until the dispute was resolved or payment was made. It
differed from pawning because it was not a consensual agreement. It was
sometimes a means to force a palaver. This was done by both the English and the
Africans.][4]
Then Governor Miles had the fort guns loaded and turned on the town of Anomabu.
The Fishing Town pynins offered two pawns to settle the dispute and have the panyarred
men released, but Miles refused.
The Fante in Anomabu sought the protection of the nearby town of Agah, two miles to the east on the coast. [Agah was the governing town of the Fante.] The people of Agah sheltered the people of Anomabu and in an attempt to force the palaver, panyarred two fort canoes carrying 22 slaves to British ships in the Road.
So Miles asked the captains of the British ships in the Road for help. In addition to the Eliza with her eight crew members, other ships that may have been in the the Anomabu roads at the time were: (a) the Young Hero, 80 tons, out of Liverpool, also owned by John Dawson, the owner of the Eliza, and captained by John Ainsworth with 14 crew; (b) the Maria, out of London, also owned by John Dawson, with an unknown captain and number of crew; (c) the Thomas, 228 tons, out of Liverpool, also owned by John Dawson and captained by William Quarrier with 31 crew; (d) the Molly, 279 tons, out of Liverpool, with 35 crew; (e) the John, 128 tons and out of London, captained by Patrick Ryan and an unknown number of crew; (f) the Fly, 143 tons, out of London, captained by Richard Coley with an unknown number of crew; (g) the Mermaid, 96 tons, out of Bristol, captained by Mungo Wright with 17 crew; (h) the Dragon, 45 tons, out of Bristol, captained by John Scasbrick, with 11 crew; and (i) the Jupiter, 296 tons, out of Bristol, captained by John Smith, with 42 crew.
Captain John Smith of the ship Jupiter sent 20 of his 42 seamen to the fort to help defend it. Then, without consulting the governor or council at Cape Coast, Governor Miles ordered the destruction of Agah.
Thomas Eagles, a British merchant, had a factory in Agah operated out of the largest building in town, a two story white-washed building built on a hill. Captain Fraser and Thomas Owens, the captain and mate of the ship Mercury, happened to be meeting with Eagles when guns from the ship Betty opened fire on Agah. It appeared to them that the Betty was using the factory as their target. They rushed to move goods from the upper floor to the lower floor when the guns from Anomabu Fort also began firing. Cannon shot was peppering the upper floor. Eagles and his Agah workers, along with the men from the Mercury, got the goods moved from the upper floor of the factory, but the people of Agah would not allow them to remove the goods from the building, thinking that as long as Eagles had property in town, Governor Miles would not burn it. However, the firing on Agah continued intermittently through the night from the fort and from the Betty.
The next morning, April 10th, Governor Miles sent soldiers from Anomabu Fort, assisted by sailors from British ships, marching toward Agah, two miles along the beach. As they neared Agah they were ambushed by the Fante of Agah who were hiding behind a pond near the approach to the town. Fighting ensued. During the fight, the British soldiers and sailors set fire to Agah. Two of the British were killed, others were wounded, and four sailors from the ship Betty were captured by the Fante and held as prisoners. A number of Fante were also wounded, including sons of Coffee Dansu, the leading caboceer of Agah, and Yellow Joe, an important gold-taker in Anomabu.
Around noon, the men from the Mercury, who had been with Eagles in his factory, fled east along the beach to the Dutch Fort Amsterdam. Captain Fraser had five slaves and a box with 30 ounces of gold and papers. Another Englishman, a Mr. Drysdale, tried making his way to Fort Amsterdam through the bush and was captured by the Fante. He was stripped naked and beaten and bruised very badly before the governor of Fort Amsterdam intervened and was able to get him to the fort.
The British soldiers and sailors returned to Anomabu from Agah and started looting the town of Anomabu. They also started digging up Fante graves to search for valuables. The Fante believed that the dead carried the wealth buried with them into the after-life and this desecration really inflamed the Fante.
Some time after the looting stopped and the soldiers and sailors returned to the fort and their ships, Governor Miles allowed four men out of the fort and they were captured and killed by the Fante. Amoony Coomah indicated that the Fante would no longer deal with Governor Miles and also determined that if they could capture him, they would take him into the interior and force him to suffer a painful death.
An investigation was launched by Governor William Roberts of Cape Coast Castle and the CMTA council. Governor Miles was eventually condemned for refusing the offer of the Fishing Town pynins to settle the dispute and for using seamen from the ships. The desecration of the Fante graves was particularly criticized. Miles was dismissed from his post. Thomas Eagles estimated his losses at £1,700 to £1,800.
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| Fort Amsterdam on the top of the hill. |
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| Walking up the hill to Fort Amsterdam. Russ, myself and a young local. |
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| The ground floor inside the fort. |
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| The upper level. |
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| Guns on the upper level. |
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| The coast on the northeast side with lots of canoes from one gun portal. |
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| The coast on the east side. |
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| The coast on the southwest side. |
[1] The ship Betty (or Betsy?) does
not show up in the slave trade database. As noted, four of its crew were
panyarred for three years and it probably never did deliver any slaves to the
Caribbean.
[2] Negroes are Masters, p. 26
[3] Negroes are Masters, pp. 20-21
[4] Negroes are Masters, p. 31
Good story. Talk about a little spat getting out of control! I loved having the locals join us in the castle, but as kind and friendly as they were, it was hard not to feel like the entitled white tourist.
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