The Kansas City sun. (Kansas City, Mo.) 1908-1924, 1916-12-30
row KING SANS SHIP BACK.
Negro Leader Sold Both That Was to
Make subjects" Rich.
The sarnaele crusted Vessel Is Now In
the Port From Which It Sailed to
Establish Dream Empire
Two Years Ago.
From the Brooklyn Eagle.

From the Brooklyn Eagle.
with the arrival in Erie Basin on
the end Of an S00-foot towline the
other day of the barnacle crusted
steamship Liberia, pitted with rust
and sticky with tropical mildew from
tossing many months at anchor off the
African Gold Coast, the last chapter
of the mani of an African negro's
dream of a black empire in Africa was
closed.
The Liberia was back within three
hundred feet of the spot from which it
sailed in March, 1914, laden with negro
men and women whom king Sam
was to lead to a new promised land.
Two years and eight months from the
day it lifted anchor the ship was home
again, and king Sam" and those of
his followers who escaped drowning
and disease are scattered among the
villages of the west coast of the con-
tinent of their ancestors, glad if they
can scrape together a living, their
dream of empire turned to memories
VI a Hail lOl SOlNth hlSuluidi6s
King Sam" himself, according to
officers who were sent out to bring
the ship home, has married his dusky
s~tenographer he took with him and has
had himself elected "omahin," chief
of a village in the bush" where he
lives, clad in one garment, and does a
small business buying and selling CO.
coa beans.
Handful of Nations His Empire.
His empire" consists of a tiny
group of African natives living in
mud huts in the jungle.
The Liberia came in towed by the
Zealandia, a ship Of the Universal
Transportation Company, after a pass
age that in itself was one of the great
romances of the sea. When the Uni
versal Company, in securing the seas
for ships with which to carry the
wealth creating cargoes that followed
the beginning of the war, learned that
King Sans ark was lying deserted off
the African coast, they offered, it is
said, a prize of sos, 900 to anyone who
would go out and bring it back the six
thousand miles to Brooklyn.
Wrecking and towing companies,
whose business it is to take hazards
in salvaging ships, and even the mush-
room navigation companies ready for
almost any wild adventure from which
money was to be gained, passed the
offer by.
EFrrnnfTTa11 Tho = ny NTArCA
wooden tug, started out on the long
trip loaded with less than half enough
coal for the voyage. 1t was never
heard of again, and shipping men be-
ieve that the tug, its captain, his wife
and the crew are lost.
Finally the officers of the company
made a proposition to the crew of the
Zealandia, their own vessel. The crew
accepted. The Zealandia itself had
been engaged in some of the widest
of the wars attempts to evade the
British blockade of German ports and
its men were ready for anything.
Crew of Rescue Ship Deserted.
Two Brooklyn men were sen out
ahead to disentangle the Liberia from
the snarl of maritime litigation in
which King Sans peculiar system of
financing had involved it. They were
Capt. William A. T. Miller and Chief
Officer Henry Heidelberg. The two
went to Liverpool and from there to
a port on the African coast. The rest
of the trip to Animaboe, where the
Liberia was lying, they made in a ma
tive surf boat. There they met King
Sam, and after weeks of figuring
cleared up the debts hat held the
ship a captive.
For months they tossed on the
swells outside the mud village of Ami
mabo, waiting for the Zealandia to
come for them. Disease came and
five times Chief Officer Heidelberg
was taken to the British government
hospital up the coast suffering from
tropical fever.
The Zealandia left Brooklyn on Sep
TENDER IL last, commanded by Capt.
A. w. Barlow, with supplies for the
Liberia and iron piping and tools for
making repairs in the crippled ship
llICy WSl6 W DiinS nOLHS' al Ddl va
does the crew of the Zealandia sick
ened Of the venture and left the ship.
Another crew was shipped, and the
vessel went on to the Azores, where
again the ship was left without men
to man it. A number of "bravos,"
natives mixed with Portuguese blood,
were signed on and the rest of the
voyage was made with them.
Natives Couldn't Endure Shoes.
In October the Zealandia drew up
beside the rusty lark" off Animaboe
and October IS the long return pass
age began. Captain Miller and his
chief officer stayed on the Liberia
with a crew of seven "Fantees," coal
black surf men from a ~neighboring
African settlement, who wore one
small blanket and no shoes, and who
were so lazy that "a hookworm is
chain lightning beside them" accord
ing to one of their white s%uperiors.
An S00-foot, 8-inch hemp hawser
was made fast to the bits of the two
ships, with the "bravos" watching the
end aboard the Zealandia and the
'Fantees" on board the salvaged YES