Firearms in Africa: An Introduction

Firearms in Africa: An IntroductionAuthor(s): Gavin WhiteSource: The Journal of African History, Vol. 12, No. 2 (1971), pp. 173-184Published by: Cambridge University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/180878 .

Accessed: 12/07/2014 07:56

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Cambridge University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to TheJournal of African History.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 31.148.218.97 on Sat, 12 Jul 2014 07:56:28 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cup

http://www.jstor.org/stable/180878?origin=JSTOR-pdf

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


Journal of African History, XII, 2 (1971), pp. 173-I84 I73

Printed in Great Britain

FIREARMS IN AFRICA: AN INTRODUCTION

BY GAVIN WHITE

THAT firearms have had an impact on African history cannot be denied, but the nature of that impact is more questionable. There has been little research on the subject and no way in which to assess assertions about the influence of guns on any particular period or area. Partly for this reason, firearms were made a subject for study in African History seminars at the University of London from 1967 to I970. It was possible to undertake this study since quantities of archival material were already being covered for theses on other subjects, and references to firearms could be noted as they appeared. The result was a formidable body of papers.

Initially the seminar heard papers on firearms in other regions. Pro- fessor J. Lynch of University College, London, dealt with 'The role of firearms in the Spanish conquest of America'. If an entire paper can be reduced to one sentence, he concluded that firearms were too primitive and too few to account for the Spanish success, though they did provide a psychological advantage. This conclusion was to be paralleled in more than one paper about Africa. Mr J. V. Parry led a discussion on 'Guns and firearms in the Ottoman Empire', and it became apparent that firearms were of little use without appropriate tactics. Finally, Mr Claude Blair of the Victoria and Albert Museum opened up a new field in 'The History of Firearms'.

It might seem premature to state conclusions in an introduction, but, however tentative they may be, it is as well that the reader should have them in mind whilst studying the particular situation in each region. First, the impact of firearms in African warfare was not as decisive as had been expected. Perhaps the expectation itself was the product of some unhistorical ideology. The collection and lore of firearms have attracted impartial scholars and enthusiasts, but they have also attracted devotees who regard firearms as symbols of industrial or social or other prowess. To such devotees it is impossible for those with firearms to lose battles to those without firearms, and to some it is impossible for those who have not developed or made firearms to maintain or use them properly. Something of this may be found in accounts of Amerindian trade guns, and it may well have found its way into accounts by foreign travellers of the use or abuse of firearms in Africa.

A second tentative conclusion is that firearms in war had an initial success but rapidly declined in significance. This might be through the enemy acquiring equivalent weapons, or evolving tactics to cope with them, or through the original weapons deteriorating or being deprived of ammunition. The third conclusion relates to tactics and training. Not



174 GAVIN WHITE

only did individual soldiers require experience in using and maintaining new weapons, but entire societies sometimes had to be restructured. In Africa, as in Europe and the Ottoman Empire, mounted knights or spearmen were unwilling to lose the prestige of a hard-earned skill which had suddenly become obsolete.

One factor to which reference will be made in many papers is that of local manufacture. In Africa this was very limited. Powder and shot were produced, and guns were repaired, but we have only found reference to the manufacture of complete weapons in relatively few and late instances. This contrasts markedly with the manufacture of guns in India, Afghan- istan, China, and Japan.' In assessing this fact, technical skill is not the only factor of importance. It may be that arms were only manufactured where cheap imports were not available, and that manufacture, whether in West Africa or China or Afghanistan, was more an indication of embargo than of technical competence.2

Gunpowder was more widely made in Africa, though most observers note that the quality obtained was poor. This was sometimes just as well. Since the African trade was largely in muskets intended for a special form of powder, some mention of powder-making is necessary here. Briefly, gunpowder is a mixture of saltpetre (nitre, or potassium nitrate), sulphur, and charcoal. Saltpetre is organic, and is found in compost heaps or stables; its oxygen unites in explosion with charcoal (carbon) to form carbon oxide gases of great mass which push the musket-ball down the barrel. The actual chemical reaction is complicated, but the sulphur unites with the potassium which would otherwise inhibit the other elements. Sulphur need not be used, but to omit it reduces the force of a musket charge by about half. On the other hand, increased saltpetre content causes a more forceful and rapid explosion, sometimes too rapid for a cheap musket, which therefore bursts. To produce a forceful but slow explosion, it is possible to use 'brown' powder, as is done in cannon, in which the charcoal was mixed with wood-fibre and the 'powder' was in lumps which thus burned even more slowly. 'Lighty' powder for

1 The Museum of Artillery at Woolwich has a large collection of Asian-made firearms and other weapons, but for Africa they have only swords, spears, and battle-axes.

2 'Artifex' and 'Opifex', The Causes of Decay in a British Industry, London, 1907, 163, attribute the arms industry of 'Cabul' and 'Foo-chow' to a British refusal to allow guns to be shipped there. British bans on 303 calibre sporting guns in India, lest they should be purchased by rebels who would then use army ammunition in them, led to a petition by Birmingham gunmakers in I899, mentioned by Artifex and Opifex, pp. I97-8, pointing out that rifles of lesser calibres could be altered to take *303 cartridges 'by an average native workman with a very simple tool'. While no doubt exaggerated, this statement puts many assertions about the difficulties of making or repairing guns in a new perspective. Artifex and Opifex were gunmakers, being C. E. Greener and W. 0. Greener, grand- sons of William Greener, a patriarchal figure in British gunmaking. Their book was an argument for government aid to Birmingham gunmakers, specifically by repealing all legislation against the gun trade and allowing to every Briton his right to possess a revolver. W. 0. Greener also wrote, under the name of Wirt Gerrare, A Bibliography of Guins and Shooting, Westminster, I894, which has been used as the ultimate source for this article.



FIREARMS IN AFRICA 175

cheap muskets was made with the bark on the wood burned for charcoal. This bark was only fully reduced to carbon during the initial stages of the explosion. It was thus only available for combustion at a later stage and the explosion was prolonged and less violent. For the full benefit of such a musket charge, it may have been advisable to have a very long barrel on the musket. 'Lighty' powder was similar to blasting powder, in which sawdust was sometimes mixed with the charcoal to slow the combustion.3

As gun-barrels became stronger in Europe, military powder could be and was safely increased in strength. British military powder had only 50 per cent saltpetre in I56o, 66 per cent saltpetre in I647, 7I per cent saltpetre in I670, and by I78I the classic combination had been reached of 75 per cent saltpetre, I5 per cent charcoal, and io per cent sulphur. In the nineteenth century saltpetre content fell slightly to 70 per cent in Britain, though in Prussia it rose to 78 per cent. But powder of such quality could not or should not have been used in cheap trade muskets. For these, either imported 'lighty' powdet or local powder was far safer. A fairly satisfactory powder could be made wherever sulphur was found, and the skills were not too daunting. Seemingly almost anyone could make powder if he had some guidance, though not everyone, even in an industrial society, could make good powder. But that mattered little where trade guns were concerned; bad muskets needed bad powder.4

It is not certain if gun-flints were ever cut on a commercial basis in Africa; even in America there never seems to have been any regular gun-flint industry. Until i8oo France led the world in gun-flint trading, but by I837 the flint-knappers of Brandon in England claimed a world- mnonopoly. Black flints were best, but Brandon had different qualities. In i 865 their 'common African gun-flint' sold at is. gd. or 2s. per thousand, while other varieties cost up to 5s. per thousand.5 In the I950S Brandon re-commenced mining and knapping flints for the African trade, as well as for American collectors. Since a flint could only be used for an average of twenty shots, or perhaps fifty at most, it would be discarded after a short period of use. In America this has proved useful for dating camp sites, and the same may prove true in Africa.6

3 John Braddock, A Memoir on Gunpowder, etc., Madras and London, I832, 2, 24-29,

i I I. Braddock's instructions for powder-making read like those in a modern cookery book. 4 Tables of ingredients for various nations are to be found in the article on 'Gunpowder'

in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, iith edition, i 9i I. 5 J. N. George, English Guns and Rifles, Plantersville, N.C., z23. 6 Arthur Woodward, 'Some Notes on Gun Flints', and T. M. Hamilton, 'Additional

Comments on Gunflints', in Missouri Archaeologist, Columbus, Mo., vol. 22, Dec. I960, are the best sources on this subject. Though I970 telephone directories show flint-knapping still undertaken at an address in Brandon, tantalizingly enough at a house or works called 'Lagos Palm', it is understood that the practice has again been discontinued. This may radically alter the position in those areas where flintlocks are in regular use. These areas are mainly within Africa-the present writer remembers seeing a musket ball removed from the corpse of a lioness, shot in self-defence, in I962. But new flint-lock muskets were sold in the Province of Quebec until the early 195os, and no doubt elsewhere as well.



I76 GAVIN WHITE

Identification of firearms is a problem for the historian. Terminology is inexact, and this is particularly so in translation. Those who have left accounts of what they saw were not always informed about types of firearms. But quite apart from this there is the question of counter- feiting. 'Dane guns' seem to have been originally bought by the Danes in Germany; in Birmingham they took orders for 'guns called sham Danish'.7 Some Birmingham gunmakers stamped their guns 'London', while Belgians used Birmingham trade names, slightly misspelt.8 In I892 Belgian gunmakers told their government that Liege products would not sell in Africa 'unless they are marked with the English proof mark'.9 This could be arranged quite legally; in I890 Birmingham produced I76,000 Africa barrels of which ioo,ooo were duly proof-marked and then sold to be finished in Belgium with Belgian locks and stocks.10 Finally, in the I89os there was a small factory in Spain 'in which they made cheap imitation Winchester rifles', complete with patent numbers, mainly for the African market.1' But however misleading the markings or vague the reports, it should still be possible to draw general and valid conclusions from contemporary mentions of firearms. But first one must have some idea of what the various terms are or were meant to imply.

There are books on this subject,12 and what follows can be only a superficial account. It is not helpful with respect to firearms made specifically for the African trade, but it will assist the reader in identifying military cast-offs sold in Africa.

Beginning with smooth-bore muzzle-loaders, these may be divided into three main types. The earliest was the matchlock, developed as 'fuse-lock' through the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. In its final form the burning fuse was applied to the powder by a trigger mechanism; this had obvious disadvantages, but was fairly reliable and simple and this type was produced in quantity. Around I540 the Spanish 'musket' was produced, mechanically similar but heavier than earlier 'arquebuses'. The word musket was later used for any muzzle-loading gun firing a single ball.

The second type of muzzle-loader was the 'wheel-lock', dating from about I52I and having a wheel spinning against iron pyrites to ignite the powder by sparks. These were too expensive to be widespread, and were probably never traded new to Africa. But from about I540 the third

7B. M. D. Smith, 'The Galtons of Birmingham: Quaker Gun Merchants and Bankers, 1702-I83I', Business History, IX, 2, July I967, 136.

8 C. E. Hanson, The Northwest Gun, Lincoln, Neb., 1956, 36, 74. 9 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, 124. 10 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, 130, quoting S. B. Allport, presiding at the

I89I annual meeting of the Birmingham Gun Trade. 11 H. S. Maxim, My Life, London, 1915, 236. 12 Books for gun collectors virtually ignore trade guns of any sort, and completely

ignore African trade guns; some are primarily concerned with firearms as works of art. The cheapest introduction is probably F. Wilkinson, Guns (Hamlyn all-colour paper- backs), London, 1970, and for library use there is H. L. Peterson (Editor), Encyclopaedia of Firearms, London, I964.




type appeared; this was the 'flintlock'. At first this had a 'snaphaunce' or S-shaped arm holding the flint, but by I635 this had evolved into the mature flintlock with a covered pan of powder, safe, simple, reliable, cheap, and fairly waterproof. These rapidly found their way into every market and remained substantially unchanged for two centuries. From I650 to I700 one should expect Africa to receive a flood of new trade flintlocks, together with old matchlocks released by European armies.

There were many factors influencing the flintlock trade. The British army adopted the 'Brown Bess' musket in I706, and that may have ren- dered older models obsolete and surplus. These 'Tower' muskets, so- called as they were proofed with charges of powder by government inspectors at the Tower of London, were stronger than trade muskets and preferred for war, though not always for peaceful pursuits. Later versions of Brown Bess, such as the India Pattern of I794 and the New Pattern of I8I4 and the Light Infantry of i8I4, only partly replaced earlier models and did not render them obsolete. Another type of flintlock was the 'carbine', similar to the musket but shorter and normally used by mounted troops; the word was later applied to short-barrelled rifles. The 'blunderbuss' was a large-calibre weapon, usually with a flared mouth, loaded with a number of projectiles all fired at once; it was essen- tially a defensive weapon, popular in the Ottoman Empire but rarer elsewhere. Although a specific type of musket had developed by I805 for trade purposes in North America, the 'Northwest gun' or 'Hudson's Bay fuke', it is impossible to determine whether it had any influence on African trade muskets. In any event, the North American trade was on a very small scale compared with that to Africa; even the Hudson's Bay Company never shipped more than a few hundred muskets a year through- out the eighteenth century.'3

Rifling spun the projectile for greater accuracy and range; muzzle- loading rifles had existed since early times, though they only began to be used in war from about i 6II. By the American Revolution there were corps of elite riflemen, and for their rifle regiments the British adopted the Baker rifle in i8oo, followed by the Brunswick in I838. In i85i came the Minie rifle with an expanding bullet, leading to the Enfield of I855; these were no longer weapons for special units but were intended for general infantry use.

Breech-loaders really began with Dreyse's Prussian needle-gun or bolt-action rifle, adopted in I848. Other nations followed suit, and in I867 the Snider breech was added to the British Enfield. In I87I the Snider was itself replaced by the Martini-Henry, which combined a Martini breech with a Henry barrel. France adopted the Chassepot breech-loader

13 S. J. Gooding, 'A Preliminary Study of the Trade Guns Sold by the Hudson's Bay Company', Missouri Archaeologist, 22, Dec. I960, 88. The Hudson's Bay Company first copied 'ye African Compa' by buying Dutch muskets, but the quality was poor and they switched to London gunmakers.



I78 GAVIN WHITE

in i866, while in 1877 the Prussians advanced to a breech-loading Mauser. In I874 the French Gras, with its metal cartridge, replaced the Chassepot. The switch to breech-loaders and to metal cartridges, in an age of international tension and rapid obsolescence, released vast quantities of older models for sale abroad.

The magazine rifle, firing a succession of cartridges, first became practical with the Winchester of I867 in America. The Mauser of I884 was a conversion of older rifles to this principle. New magazine rifles were the Austrian Mannlicher of I885, the British Lee-Metford of i888 which led to the Lee-Enfield, and the French Lebel of i886, which was the first rifle to enter service with smokeless powder and a small bore. The Lebel was altered in I893, the earlier version being called the 'Modele i886' and the latter the 'Modele 86/93'; its adoption allowed France to discard 6oo,ooo breechloaders (Modele 74, or Gras) which were sold in small lots over a period of time in order not to flood the market.14 That other nations discarded similar numbers of arms may be assumed.

The machine-gun dates in practice from the Gatling of the American Civil War, but the first machine-gun to effect African history was the Maxim, adopted by the British army in I889. This was the first machine- gun to be operated by propellent gases instead of a hand-crank, but it was really only a defensive weapon.

Such were the military weapons which became available, but the reader who has endured thus far is warned of more technology to come. It is, however, a different type of technology, agricultural rather than mechan- ical, for by no means all, or perhaps even most, of the firearms shipped to Africa over the past few centuries were military. Nor is it to be assumed that they were even intended or used against human beings. And even when they were used for military purposes, the question of training leads us to consider agriculture and hunting.

Briefly, if a king locked up all his stocks of arms until he was at war, he could not expect his supporters to use them to advantage. A few African states did have standing armies, but even some of these must have found it expensive to provide musketry practice. The same problem existed in Europe from the age of the long-bow; bowmen were first drawn from hunters and foresters, and archery was then encouraged as a sport. North American Indians used guns primarily for hunting and thus acquired skills for use in war. As for Africa, we find some references to firearms used in hunting, though this is mainly in southern Africa. But there is another possible use of firearms which remains quite unchron- icled, and that is the protection of crops. This use may have been critical in Africa. That it was once a critical factor in Europe is seen in the origins of sport.15 In Africa it was the duty of the women, in most societies, to

14 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, I 39. "I H. L. Peterson, Encyclopaedia of Firearms, 138, suggests that fowling in Europe

began with small farmers 'who increased their food supply both through consuming the




cultivate. It was the duty of the men to hunt and to clear the land, and presumably to eliminate or intimidate animals excluded from a patch of former bush in a slash-burn or citamene system of agriculture. These animals would seek to return to their former habitat. Firearms to prevent them might well tip the balance to make new crops profitable; in particular the introduction of Indian corn (maize) may have been related to firearms. And a body of men who habitually used firearms to protect their crops, not to mention those who used firearms to protect their livestock, would be incidentally available for war.

However, the type of firearms most suitable for keeping pigs and baboons out of the crops would not be military. The trade musket, not intended for rapid reloading, cheap to buy, simple to repair, light in weight, and with no delicate parts, would be more popular than either a military musket or a later military weapon dependent on imported parts and cartridges. Possession of a sufficient number of trade muskets might enable one people to move into territory otherwise too overrun with game, thus outflanking another people who had few firearms. If they stayed in that one area, the importance of guns for agriculture would decline, but they could well have been essential for the initial planting. On the other hand, it may be that in some areas Africans acquired firearms for hunting, and then as time passed they so reduced the wildlife that agriculture became not only possible but necessary. Little is known on this subject, but its importance is seen in the immense quantities of trade muskets which were shipped to Africa through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

The African trade musket, while produced in greater quantities than every other type, or almost every other type, of firearm, has been largely ignored by historians and experts in the field. Its history must be written, if it ever will be written, by researchers in Africa. But some of the ground- work for writing that history may be provided by a brief study of the Birmingham gun-trade.

Until the i68os British gunmaking was virtually confined to London, and trade guns were made there or bought in Holland. The earliest Birmingham order for 'slave-trade guns' was filled in I698; these muskets were known, according to length and model, as 'Long and Short Danes, Dutch, CarGlinas, and Spanish'.16 After the peace of I714, Birmingham gunmakers were obliged to turn to export orders on a large scale. At least one gunmaker also dealt in slaves."7 At some point muskets were called 'male' or 'female', and it is claimed that 'male' guns were run up in London from military discards and used to buy male slaves, while

birds themselves and through preventing them from consuming crops'. This later became a sport, as did fox-hunting and stag-running, but still endowed with an aura of virtue. That football evolved from kicking pigs to death or cricket from stoning crows is less certain. 16 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, I28.

17 B. M. D. Smith, 'The Galtons of Birmingham', 138.



i8o GAVIN WHITE

'female' guns were made in Birmingham and were valuable only for buying female slaves.'8 More probably, the different titles merely referred to the shapes of gun-stocks. Certainly 'Buccaneer guns', so named as they were copied from French muskets sold to Haiti, were called 'Buccaneer male' and 'Buccaneer female' depending on their stocks.'9 It was probably in an earlier period that muskets for the African Company bore the mark of an elephant and howdah;20 these were probably of London or Dutch origin. But the connection with slaving was so close that in I8o6 gunmakers asked that military musket prices should be increased, since they could no longer sell sub-standard military muskets in Africa due to the coming abolition of the slave trade.2' It may have been abolitionist sentiment which lay behind a move to prohibit Birmingham parts from the London commercial proof-house in I8I3. If so, the move backfired, for in that year Parliament set up a commercial proof-house in Birming- ham.22

The establishment of a proof-house in Birmingham was doubtless also the result of conditions in Birmingham before I8I3 when 'immense numbers of guns were made, with the knowledge and certainty, that if they were ever fired out of, they were certain to burst in the discharge. These guns were made for one market-that of the coast of Africa.' The writer of these words, in I829, added that 'the guns now made, and which our merchants now exchange for the gums and ivories of Africa, are as sound and secure as the musquet used by the English soldier, or as the fowling-piece used by the English gentleman in the sports of the field'.23 If this were true, it did not remain so for very long. In I845 William Greener wrote against the 'legalized hypocrysy' (sic) of the Birmingham proof-house in passing guns 'made from iron unfit to make firearms', and 'horribly dangerous'. In fact they passed inspection as they had thick barrels which withstood the proofing explosion, but these were later ground down before the gun was finished.24 Elsewhere Greener calculated that a safe musket cost slightly over i6s. to make, while 'African guns', whether muskets or fowling-pieces, were being produced from 'Sham Damn Iron' at a cost of '5sh. 31d.'.25 But even Greener considered

18 J. N. George, English Guns and Rifles, 240.

19 Livrustkammaren (Journal of the Royal Armoury, Stockholm), v, 1950, Summary of J. Alm, 'Handelsgevar', I05, with illustrations.

20 C. E. Hanson, 'Trade Guns', Encyclopaedia of Firearms, 322. 21 H. D. Blackmore, British Military Firearms, I650-I850, London, I96I, 139. 22 C. Harris, (Editor), The History of the Birmingham Gun-Barrel Proof House, Bir-

mingham (I946?), 27. 23 B. Parsons (Attributed), Observations on the Manufacture of Firearms for Military

Purposes, etc., London, I829, 45-46, Parsons's reliability is attacked in an anonymous history of Birmingham quoted by B. M. D. Smith, 'The Galtons of Birmingham', I39 n., but the author of this tract, if he really was Parsons, seems thoroughly informed and impartial.

24W. Greener, The Present Proof Company. The Bane of the Gun Trade: A Letter Addressed to the Masters, and Journeymen Gun Makers of the Kingdom, Birmingham, I845, 4. 25 W. Greener, The Science of Gunnery, London, I846, 96, I96-200.



FIREARMS IN AFRICA

continental products to be generally worse than British, and after I855 the proofing regulations in Britain required another test 'in the white', or just before the barrel was darkened by 'bluing'. For most of the nineteenth- century Birmingham guns enjoyed a better reputation than those of Liege, the only real competitor in this field. Yet no one would deny that Birmingham's muskets were 'of the cheapest quality', and only intended to be 'used with a special very bright grained powder of low strength' .26

The importance of the Birmingham industry for Africa was its decentral- ization. Guns were not made by single firms, but by many sub-contractors, all working by hand. The so-called 'gunmaker' might be only an assembler, buying a barrel, having it bored, sending it to be fitted with a lock, and so on. The gunmakers did not employ most of those who did the work, and they had little influence over them. This made the industry slow to adjust to new methods, particularly the Blanchard copying lathe which mechanized American gunmaking in the early nineteenth century but was ignored at Birmingham.27 The British army needed machine-made guns with interchangeable parts, and it was largely to this end that they began making their own at Enfield in I854, importing an American as manager. In i86i eight Birmingham gunnakers joined to found Birmingham Small Arms, using machinery for interchangeability of parts, but other gunmakers remained outside. Thus Birmingham spent forty years pro- ducing muskets which were only tolerated by the army because few were needed and none were likely to be used, the country being at peace. For another forty years a large proportion of the Birmingham gunmakers still made such muskets. But hand-made muskets were ideal for Africa, since they could be hand-repaired. Generally speaking, this was not possible with modern weapons requiring machine tolerances. It was only where range was a major consideration that rifles proved most popular, but, whether these rifles were sporting models or military, they could only be used where lines of commnunication were such as to guarantee parts and ammunition. In addition, intermediate weapons, such as muzzle- loading rifles or paper-cartridge breech-loaders, were only in use for short periods, and did not generate enough spares for the isolated user to find them at will.

The quantities of trade muskets were immense. In the period 1775-

i8oo Birmingham seems to have averaged only 30,000 guns a year,28 but millions were produced for the Napoleonic Wars. Nearly a

28 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, 128. 27 B. M. D. Smith, 'The Galtons of Birmingham', 140. The nature of the industry

is demonstrated by the trade directories of the period. In I850, as one typical year, Birmingham had 124 gunmakers but 368 sub-contractors listed. By comparison London, already declining and superior only in the quality trade, had 85 gunmakers and a mere 45 sub-contractors. Many London 'gunmakers' were actually dealers who had guns made up for them. These directories provide fairly complete lists from which any gunmaker may be identified.

28 C. Harris, The History of the Birmingham Gun-Barrel Proof House, 24.



I82 GAVIN WHITE

million were in stock at the end of the wars, and Birmingham had to export again.29 In I8i6 they turned out 127,43I barrels, though by I822 production had fallen to half that number, and the average to mid-century seems to have been about Ioo,ooo barrels a year.30 Over a million guns were sent to America in the Civil War, but thereafter American gunmakers competed in world markets, exporting three million guns between I865 and I9o7.3' But most of these were comparatively costly, and even this figure was small compared with those of Birmingham or Liege. In the declining years of Birmingham, I880-I905, half a million guns were made each year, while Liege had increased to a million a year.32 It is said that the vast majority of Birmingham guns went to Africa; in I864 it cannot have been more than half, since only II9,503 oUt of 221,726 barrels produced were of 'plain iron' such as might be found in trade guns. By I866, after the American Civil War, it was estimated that Birningham sent to Africa between I00,000 and I50,000 guns per year; the same source adds that these guns had a variety of names, since 'each district has its own peculiar taste' in Africa.33 By 1907 the entire Birmingham trade in African guns was estimated to have been 20,000,000 guns, while that of Liege, only recently active in the African market, had only reached 3,000,000.34

Germany, France, and America were clearly seen to be exporting much smaller numbers, especially to Africa. It is impossible to estimate how many surplus military guns went to Africa, but it must have been high in the millions. For what it is worth, Birmingham gunmakers complained that military guns were dumped so cheaply that they actually undersold trade guns.35

Liege only took the African market from Birmingham late in the nineteenth century, having 65 per cent by 1907.36 Gunmaking in Liege dated from I672, when proofing was required, but in I8I9 at least proofing was supposedly not required for guns 'intended for the slave trade'.37 Greener regarded Liege proofing as better than that of Birmingham in the

29 B. Parsons, Observations on the Manufacture of Firearms, 23. 30 C. Harris, The History of the Birmingham Gun-Barrel Proof House, I52. 31 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, 227-8. The Victoria County History of Warwick-

shire, II, 230, gives a figure of 6,iI6,305 barrels proofed in England between I855 and I864, but this is artificially inflated by the Crimean War and the American Civil War.

32 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, 279. 33 J. D. Goodman, 'The Birmingham Gun Trade', article in S. Timmins (Editor),

The Resources, Products, and Industrial History of Birmingham and the Midland Hardware District, London, i866, 4I5, 4I9.

34 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, I29. By inference we may assume that all twenty million Birmingham Africa muskets did go to Africa, but the authors are not clear on this point; certainly the vast majority of them went to Africa. Whether there really were twenty million may be doubted, though the authors seem generally reliable in their arithmetic, if not in their politics. Extrapolation from such figures as are currently available leads, however, to a rough total of only thirteen million for Birmingham, and rather more than the three million stated for Liege.

35 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, I39. 36 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, i8. 37 J. D. Goodman, 'The Birmingham Gun Trade', 408.



FIREARMS IN AFRICA I83

I840s, when Birmingham averaged 250,000 barrels and Liege 300,000.38

A reference, presumably to African muskets, gives Liege production in I839 as a mere io,ooo, which was doubled in I849 and reached 50,000 by i86o;39 Birmingham was preoccupied with military contracts during the Crimean War. In I884 Liege produced 205,903 trade muskets alone, though some or even most of these could have had some parts which were worked-over military surplus.40 Unlike Birmingham, Liege exported vast numbers of cheap revolvers, and this makes its export statistics difficult to interpret.

Prices varied according to the military market, for which gunmakers worked by preference, thus driving up the price of trade muskets in times of war or crisis. African muskets were priced in Birmingham at gs. in I845, 7s. 6d. in i850, ios. 6d. in I855, and 6s. gd. in i865.41 In I907 the cost of an African barrel was zs. 3d. in Birmingham, and of the whole gun 6s. gd.42 Statistics relating to a more sophisticated Birminghan weapon, not identified, state that the cost in West Africa was I9s. in I900,

but Belgian competition forced it down to ios. by 1905. Guns shipped to South or East Africa were of higher value. In I900 exports of this un- identified gun to West Africa were 8,803, and to East Africa a mere 352,

with Cape Colony taking 566, and Natal I,294. In 1905 all figures were half as high again, save for the Cape which stood at 3,989.43 These small quantities would be unworthy of mention were it not for the regional breakdown; the cheapest trade guns would probably lean even more to West Africa if statistics could be had.

Despite the emphasis in this paper on trade muskets and the non- military use of firearms, the subsequent articles in this issue refer to military muskets more often than to trade guns. It may be that the Euro- peans who wrote about guns were more concerned with military and political events than with hunting or agriculture. It may be that Tower muskets were mentioned when any muzzle-loader was meant. Or it may mean that, enormous as were the quantities of trade muskets, there were equal or greater quantities of surplus military weapons. This does seem to have been the case on the open grasslands of southern Africa, if not elsewhere.44

Finally, none of these studies of firearms in Africa may be considered as 38 W. Greener, The Present Proof Company, 7. 3 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, 129.

40 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, I29. 41 J. D. Goodman, 'The Birmingham Gun Trade', 420. 42 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, I 3 . 43 Artifex and Opifex, Causes of Decay, 285. 44 Whether it is better to use a musket or a rifle depends partly on whether one is

hunting or being hunted. In open country the range of a rifle is an advantage. In bush country range is little use, but one is more likely to be attacked by wild animals. A small rifle bullet passing through an lion or even a wart-hog at high speed may fatally injure it, but an ounce musket ball is more likely to stop the animal in its tracks. This factor may partially explain the early switch to rifles in Southern Africa as distinct from areas of forest.



I84 GAVIN WHITE

definitive. There is much to be done, and most of it is to be done in Africa. Museums in Africa have to build up collections of firearms, and from the types they find it will be possible to determine something about the use to which they were put and the dates at which they were intro- duced. (International collectors have so far ignored African firearms, but rising prices for rarer weapons will soon force collectors to move towards Africa.) Old flint-locks used for striking fires may be found, together with flints themselves. New archival sources may be uncovered, and old ones re-read with firearms in mind. Most important, there must still be many thousands of people who have used old firearms in Africa and who may still do so. More than a few of these will be mechanically-minded and ready to discuss the technical points of each model; others will prefer to relate them to contemporary events in their own history. But time is short, for the long history of trade guns in Africa is drawing to a close.45

SU MMARY

Studies of firearms in Africa undertaken at the University of London, I967- 1970, tentatively suggest that their initial impact was less than had been expected, and that their success in war rapidly declined thereafter. Local manufacture of firearms was very limited, perhaps through lack of necessity, though gunpowder was widely produced. Identifying types of firearms is a problem, though general conclusions may be drawn from contemporary references to certain types of weapons.

Effective use of firearms by Africans in war often depended on muskets being used primarily for hunting and crop protection. Availability of firearms may well have made agriculture possible in areas otherwise overrun with game. For these purposes, military arms would be less suitable than the African muskets cheaply manufactured at Birmingham, all parts being handmade and thus capable of being hand-repaired in the field. Twenty million are said to have been shipped from Birmingham, and another three million from Liege; millions of surplus military weapons must also have found their way to Africa.

Yet the subject can be properly studied only in Africa, where old firearms may still be found, often with their owners still available to describe their use.

45 Board of Trade, Annual Statement of the Trade of the United Kingdom, London, I83I onwards, provides valuable statistics for the export of firearms to each African territory and may prove vital in more local studies.



Documents

Firearms in Africa: An Introduction