BUCHANAN’S ADMINISTRATION CONTINUED—DEATH OF KING BOATSWAIN—WAR WITH GAYTUMBA—ATTACK ON HEDDINGTON—EXPEDITION OF BUCHANAN AGAINST GAYTUMBA—DEATH OF BUCHANAN—HIS CHARACTER.
When a frontier rests on a savage territory, a “good look out” must be kept there, and upon every thing beyond it, as the Hollander watches his dykes and the sea. Liberia had to watch an early ally and friend of very equivocal character, already known as King Boatswain. He had founded a new Rome, like Romulus, of ragamuffins. He had made a kind of pet of Liberia, and perhaps intended to give up slaving, and take to better courses. Nothing better, however, came in his way, till all his courses ended.
The death of Boatswain, whose tribe was of his own creation, was followed by confusion among them. Gaytumba, an unscrupulous and ready man, with the assistance of Gotera, succeeded to the chief share of influence in the tribe. The Deys, from whom the colonial territory had been purchased, were near neighbors, and most convenient subjects for the slave-trade. An assault was accordingly made, and many secured. A small remnant of the tribe took refuge in the colony; and Gaytumba, not seeing any reason why they should not be caught and sold under colonial protection, as well as elsewhere, many were seized within the jurisdiction of the commonwealth.
The northern region was thus black with danger, and the vast woods which surrounded the settlements on the St. Paul’s, became suspicious as a wild, unknown source of difficulty. There was uneasy watchfulness for months; and such preparations as circumstances would admit, were made for resistance. The storm fell on Heddington, a village at the extreme north of the settlements.
A messenger sent to negotiate had been seized and put to death, and no mercy was to be expected. All hands were on the alert. Twenty muskets, which had been provided for the settlement, were prudently kept by the missionary, Mr. Brown, ready loaded in the upper story of his house, which had around it a fence of pickets. Two carpenters were at the time inmates of the dwelling: their names deserve record, for they, Zion Harris and Demery, constituted, with the missionary, the entire force at the point of approach. Suddenly, in the morning before the men began their work, they heard the yelling and crashing of three or four hundred savages through the bushes.
This was Gaytumba’s tribe: Gotera was at their head, bringing with him a pot to cook the missionary for his next repast. Harris and Demery placed themselves quietly at the fence, confronting the negroes as they came straggling in a mass, expecting no resistance, and exposing themselves amid the low green leaves of a cassada patch. The two men fired into the thickest of them, and Mr. Brown commenced a destructive slaughter with his muskets overhead. As the mass heaved backwards and forwards, a furious return of musketry, arrows, and spears was made. Gotera, with some skill, disentangled himself with a band of resolute men, broke through the pickets at one end, and came upon Harris, standing defenceless, with his musket just discharged. He toned to grasp a hatchet, as a last resource, but fortunately caught a musket, which a wounded colonist, in running for shelter, had placed against the pickets, and lodged its contents in Gotera’s breast. The death of their chief was the signal for a general retreat. But ashamed and indignant at not having secured the dead body, they attempted by a rush to recover it, and were again and again driven back, till they utterly despaired, and disappeared. This strange episode of war lasted an hour and twenty minutes.
The forest recovered its suspicious character from the prowling and threatening of the enemy spread through it; and there were reports of the gathering of more distant tribes to join Gaytumba, to make the work of destruction sure by an overwhelming rush upon the settlements.
The governor, full of warlike foresight, saw the remedy for this state of things; and, after screwing up the courage of his people, he planned an expedition against Gaytumba in his own den. For this purpose, a force of two hundred effective men, with a field-piece and a body of followers, assembled at Millsburg, on the St. Paul’s River. About thirty miles from this, by the air line, in the swampy depths of the forest, was the point aimed at. Many careful arrangements were necessary to baffle spies, and keep the disaffected at bay during this desperate incursion, which the governor was about to make into the heart of the enemy’s country. The fine conception had this redeeming characteristic, that it was quite beyond the enemy’s understanding.
The force left Millsburg on Friday, 27th of March. Swamps and thickets soon obliged him to leave the gun behind. Through heavy rains, drenched and weary, they made their way, without any other resistance, to a bivouac in an old deserted town. Starting at daylight next morning, they forced their way through flooded streams and ponds, “in mud up to their knees, and water up to the waist.” After a halt at ten o’clock, and three hours’ march subsequently, they learnt that the enemy had become aware of their movements, and was watching them. About six miles from their destination, after floundering through the mud of a deep ravine, followed by a weary pull up a long hill, a sharp turn brought them in front of a rude barricade of felled trees. A fire of musketry from it brought to the ground Captain Snetter, of the riflemen, who was in advance of his men. The men made a dash on the enemy so suddenly that soon nobody was in front of them. The line moved on without stopping, and met only a straggling fire here and there, as they threaded their narrow path through the bushes in single file. A few men were wounded in this disheartening march. At length those in advance came to a halt before the fortress, and the rear closed up. There the line was extended, and the party advanced in two divisions. The place was a kind of square, palisaded inclosure, having outside cleared patches here and there, intermingled with clumps of brush.
The assailants were received with a sharp fire from swivels and muskets, which was warmly returned. Buchanan ordered Roberts (the present president) to lead a reserved company round from the left, so as to take in reverse the face attacked. This so confounded Gaytumba’s garrison that they retreated, leaving every thing behind. The hungry colonists became their successors at the simmering cooking-pots. So rapid had the onslaught been, that the second division did not reach in time to take a hand in it. The operation was thus completely successful, with the ultimate loss of only two men.
The place was burnt, and a lesson given, which established beyond all future challenge, the power of civilization on that coast. The banks of the St. Paul’s River, with its graceful meanderings, palm-covered islands, and glorious basin spreading round into the eastward expanse of the interior, were secured for the habitations of peace and prosperity.
Great and corresponding energy was displayed by Buchanan in civil concerns. The legislature passed an act that every district should have a free school. Rules and regulations were established for the treatment of apprentices, or recaptured Africans not able to take care of themselves. Provision was made for paupers in the erection of almshouses, with schools of manual labor attached. The great point was, that the people had begun to be the government; and there, among colored men, it was shown that human nature has capacity for its highest ends on earth, and that there is no difficulty or mystery in governing society, which men of common sense and common honesty cannot overcome.
Buchanan died in harness. Drenching, travelling and over-exertion, brought on a fever when far from the means of relief. He expired on the 3d of September, 1841, in the government house at Bassa. Then and there was a remarkable man withdrawn from the work of the world. Ever through his administration he illustrated the motto of his heart: “The work is God’s to which I go, and is worthy of all sacrifice.” The narrative already given is his character and his eulogium. His deeds need no explanatory words—they have a voice to tell their own tale.
The blow given to King Boatswain’s successor, Gaytumba, nearly obliterated the predatory horde which he had collected: they were scarcely heard of afterwards. A small portion of them seem to have migrated northwards, so as to hang on the skirts of more settled tribes, and carry on still, to a small extent, the practice of slaving and murder, to which they had been accustomed. The Fishmen tribe still continued to raise some disturbance. Certain points on the sea-coast gave great uneasiness; these points were the haunts of slavers. Merchant traders, at least some of them, came peddling along, establishing temporary factories for the disposal of their goods, and not unfrequently having an understanding with the slavers for their mutual benefit.