New national era. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1870-1874, 1872-11-07
The slave Trade.
How DesIins In Human Flesh i. Conducted

valuable information respecting the traffic III
slaves, still carried on between the interior
of Africa and the Turkish Empire. He
SAYS:
The Abyssinan Envoy estimates the num-
Der Of slaves annually carried of from Africa
to the Arab and Turkish markets at 10000
to $1,000. These unhappy beings are taken
away at ages ranging from seven or eight to
sixteen years, older men aud women being
found more troublesome than valuable to the
dealer. They are brought down from the
center of the continent and the region OF the
White Nile to Kassala, and are hurried on
to the slave market at Metemmch, to he
resold for shipment to .Jedda. Foreign con-
sus at Khartoum check, so far as they pos
sibly can, the passage of slaves down the
Nile; while Sir Samuel Bakers expedition
has done much to increase the difficulties
which beset the transit of slaves along that
route. The ShankeltO country and that of
WoOlah Gallas are favOrite grounds for the
nefariOus and infamous practice of the traf-
fickers in human beings-these provinces
being close to BOgos, through which district,
since the annexation by the khedive, slaves
can be safely passed to Massowah, thence
to be shipped for the Arabian coast. Shank
elto is district bordering on Abyssinia
proper, and is inhabited by wandering tribe
resembling gpsies, who are regarded as the
DtupuItlo ol AbNSSllllu. sclisiuhCIlt, dttO1u-
ing to General Kirkham, belongs of right to
Abyssinia; and about eighteen months ago
Prince kassai had occasion to send down
thither one of his generals with a large force,
completely to devastate the country for the
murders that were frequently done there on
his merchants and priests-there being
churches there for the baptism of the people.
The following is the fashion in which the
slave dealers capture their victims They 90
into village, taking with them silks, or
beads, or bits of tin and ornaments. They
exchange these things for slaves or whatever
they can get. The merchants send the slaves
quietly away without much trouble, and event
ually they are trained as Mussulmans. They
are taken through Bogos to Massowah, and
they are sent thence TO Jedda, whence they
are sent to Turkey by land. As for price, if
a female be of copper color and good features,
she will bring as much as SliO, or about
e2S-that is, at the market in AIetemmeh,
which is a wholesale market. The retail price
is according to the state of the market in the
place to which they are first taken. When
sold in the second market, they vary in price.
If a man took fancy to a female slave he
would perhaps give a hundred dollars more
than another man. The ShankeltOs and Gal
las are much sought after for their beauty
and for their superiority to the other tribes.
A strong boy will sell for 500 to 800. The
girls fetch more, because they are wanted for
the harem. Traders will take away girls when
they can get them. When a chief makes
war on another he makes it an object to
carry of as many girls as he can. lie plum
ders the villages and kdnaps the younger
natives and sells them, retaining the older
ones to work as his own slaves. These peo-
pie are subject to the Abyssinian King, when
he finds it necessary to chastise them for
~;e1o j. h,,t
leave they are their own masters again.
These things occur in part of Abyssinia
which the King claims, but not among his
Christian subjects.
When asked whether he believed that all
the $4,000 or 10000 annual captives were
taken in the war and sold by the chiefs who
captured them to the traders, General Kirk
ham, in subs stance, answered: mo; YOU
must understand that after Mr.. Stanley re-
turned from the discovery of Livingstone he
brought much to light concerning the slave
trade of East Africa. DIR. Livingstone had
also informed the Foreign Office as to the
slave trade gong on in the interior. Her
Maiesty's guDboats kept so close a watch
that it was impossible to get slaves down to
the coast direct so they take them through
Bogos. AT the interview between the Sultan
and Ismail Pasha, when the latter was made
khedive, an understanding was, | believe,
come to respecting the slave trade. The
Mussulmans of Turkey and Egypt must have
supply of slaves to do their work, for the
real Turks will not do any mental service
These $4,000 or 10000 slaves are imported
and brought up to the M0hammedan faith.
and are employed IN doing the dirty work.
The slaves that are not taken in war are bar
tered for with the peasants, who will steal
and sell them. Suppose you are slave mer-
chant, and l know where there are three or
four good-looking girls / steal them and sell
them to you. One man, who NAV have
children of his own, will go and steal the
children of another person, as many as he
may get. The trader has attendants with
him, and mules and camels, and he knows
how to get slaves and carry them off. The
law is so strict that any man, whether
Christian or AIohammedan, found in Abys-
sinia selling slave is hanged on the first
tree without Judge or jury. Whoever catches
him hangs him up, and there is no more
about it =; and there he stays until he falls
away piece by piece. So long as Bo@os was
in the power of the King of Abyssinia they
could not 60 that way. If they were stopped
there they would have to take another and
dangerous road across the wilderness
They are checked on the one hand by the
British gunboats off Zanzibar, and would be
checked on the other in Bogos."
IL Il SldNc-utdltE taxes Slaves from one
village and carries them through another the
inhabitants of the second village have gem
orally no chance to rescue them, because the
leaders attendants are numerous and well
armed. A single leader will buy, according
to his means, from fifty to sixty slaves, and
bring them through the country in that way
They do not bring down many at once, for
fear white man should see them and give
information against them, and then they
would be stopped--because Ismail Pasha has
ordered ostensibly that the slave trade shall
be put down. General Kirkham is unre-
servedly of opinion that the Khediye secretly
favors the slave trade, while outwardly dis
avowing it. The slaves are brought down to
the coast from the w oolah Gallas country and
the White Nile-about forty-eight or fifty
days journey from the coast. The better
portion are treated very we'll on the way by
the ve-dealers, because they will fetch a
better price. If the slave is of the Nubian
race, he has to do all the dirty work for the
others; he is considered of an inferior class, !
and does not fetch so much as the copper !
colored The Nubians are iat-nOsed, thick |
Tipped, and culy-haired people. Strong MI !
bian girls, for servants, bring more than the |
boys. The Galas are of a reddish copper
color same nf Them ramarka ble for bpoutS |