King Leopold and his Rubber

Today we talk about Leopold II, King of Belgium from 1865-1909, and his personal empire in the African Congo. This is the story of a man who put his pocketbook ahead of a people, the nation he enslaved, and the global cast of writers and advocates that worked to bring him down.

Image

In The Rubber Coils. Scene - The Congo 'Free' State" Linley Sambourne depicts King Leopold II of Belgium as a snake attacking a Congolese rubber collector. Published on 28 November 1906

Edward Linley Sambourne, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Bibliography

Adam Hochschild, King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa. Mariner Books, United States, 1999.

David Renton; Seddon, David; Zeilig, Leo.  The Congo: Plunder and Resistance. London: Zed Books, 2007.

“General Act of the Berlin Conference on West Africa, 26 February 1885”.  Signed by the representatives of the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Spain, the United States of America, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Russia, Sweden-Norway, and Turkey (Ottoman Empire).  Berlin, February 26, 1885. 

George Washington Williams. “Appendix 1: An Open Letter to His Serene Majesty Leopold II, King of the Belgians and Sovereign of the Independent State of Congo.”  Stanley Falls, Central Africa, July 18th 1890. 

George Washington Williams. “Report upon the Congo-State and country to the President of the Republic of the United States of America, ” 1890. 

“In the Rubber Coils.” Punch, 1906 from King Leopold’s Ghost, 120.

“The Guilt of Delay.” Punch, 1909. In King Leopold’s Ghost, p. 120.

Joseph Conrad. Heart of Darkness. Originally published 1899.  Independently published, December 9, 2019

Inventory of the Stanley Archives.  “Henry Morton Stanley: correspondence.” 

Maps from the Belgian Congo and Congo Free State. 1921.  Internet Archive. 

Mark Twain.  King Leopold’s Soliloquy: A Defense of His Congo Rule.  Boston: The P.R. Warren Co., 1905. In King Leopold’s Soliloquy.The University of New Orleans Press Edition, 2016.

David Renton; Seddon, David; Zeilig, Leo (2007). The Congo: Plunder and Resistance. London: Zed Books.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The Crime of Congo. New York Doubleday, Page & Company, 1909.

Vachal Lindsay (1914). The Congo and Other Poems.  New York: The Macmillian Company. OCLC 40402773

Accounts and Papers: Sixty-Five Volumes.  (14) Colonies and British Possessions—continued.  Africa—continued.  Session: 2 February 1904-15 August 1904.  Vol.  LXLL. Correspondence relating to the Recruitment of Labour in the British Central Africa Protectorate for Employment in the Transvaal.  [In continuation of “Africa No 2 (1903.] “Correspondence and Report from Hist Majesty’s Consul at Boma Respecting the Administration of the Independent State of the Congo.”  Presented to both Houses of Parliament by Command of His Majesty.  February 1904.  London: Printed for His Majesty’s Stationary Office, by Harrison and Sons, 1904.  Found in Project Gutenberg eBooks.

Episode Transcript

Robyn (00:00):
It seems strange to see a king destroying a nation and
laying waste a country for meresordid money's sake.
And solely and only for that.

Thad (00:32):
Who was King Leopold II?
Where was he a king of?
And uh what's going on withhim?

Robyn (00:40):
This is he's from Belgium, and this is the mid to
late 1800s.
And I think it's important tounderstand what was going on in
the world.
So where he was coming from,just set setting the scene.
So, first of all, he wasrelated to Queen Victoria of
England.
Uh, she thought he was reallyboring.

(01:01):
She liked his wife, but no,really, like she told people to
the effect that he was reallyboring.

Thad (01:08):
She went around and was like, you know what, King
Leopold II, that guy, snoozer.

Robyn (01:14):
The worst.
No, um, but yeah, she she likedhis wife though, which
incidentally he didn't like hiswife, but you know, that's
that's a story for another time.
His sister became Empress ofMexico, and she was Austrian, so
that's a fun story.

Thad (01:31):
Well, this is very this sounds like people are getting
around a lot here.

Robyn (01:35):
Well, they really are.
Like relatives were connectedeverywhere in places of power,
but I think what's reallyimportant to look at here is
there were a lot of kings,queens, you know, what we would
look at as like the executivebranch, and then like they were
just kind of testing out allover the world how a

(01:57):
constitutional monarchy wouldwork.
And you see it in Germany, andyou see it in England and
Belgium, and oh my gosh, theUnited States was just chaos
because that was the end of theCivil War, and it was like,
well, who knows what'shappening, especially since half
of the country called it thewar of northern aggression, and

(02:18):
some people still do.

Thad (02:20):
I mean, it it was, right?
Yeah, they were veryaggressive.
They were.
I being from the south, I feellike I was aggressed upon.

Robyn (02:28):
Yeah, I was oppressed.

Thad (02:29):
Yes.

Robyn (02:34):
Well, it is it is interesting to look at the
different names that people givewars.
For example, which we're gonnatalk about soon, the opium war,
which was, of course, overopium.
Um the Chinese prefer to callit the Anglo-Chinese War.

Thad (02:49):
Uh scene for scene.

Robyn (02:50):
Yeah.
So, you know, you have theSpanish-American War, and the
Spanish are like, yeah, this wasthe year of devastation or
something like that.

Thad (03:00):
It's so really it depends on which side of the word you're
on as to what you would callit.

Robyn (03:04):
Yeah, everyone has like their own thing going on.
But we have with Leopold thesame type thing.
There were he had a cabinet anda parliament underneath him,
and they actually had more powerthan in a lot of places.
There was actually a paradeonce in Belgium, if you turned
to Wilhelm, the Kaiser ofGermany, and said, There's

(03:27):
really nothing left for us kingsbut money, because he was just
frustrated that parliamentwouldn't pass some of the
military things he wantedpassed.
But under him, a lot of reformsdid happen.
They were passed by parliamentand the cabinet.
And of course, differentparties were in charge at
different times.
The Labor Party, theConservative Party, the Labor

(03:50):
Party was all for, you know,public education, free for
everyone.
Conservatives, not so much.
Um, so it only lasted aboutfour years in there.
But while he was king, therebecame the the work week that
they got Sundays off.
And he instituted or wereinstituted child labor laws and

(04:13):
uh for in factories and things.
And he um and there were alsowell, universal male suffrage
happened under his time.
And we need to see, like, inthe world at that time, you
know, I I just talked aboutfactories and stuff.
This was around the time thatthe second industrial revolution

(04:35):
was happening.
The first one was with textilesand just beginning to get the
factory process started.
Um, but there was a lot of youknow problems within countries
all over the world because theywere getting to the point of
mass production and chemicalsand electricity.

(04:57):
And so that's why the factoryreforms meant so much.
He was called the Builder Kingbecause, well, he built a lot of
stuff.
He built statues of himself.
As one does, as one is want todo, and museums and a cathedral.
So when we look at him, we'relooking at basically an

(05:22):
executive branch guy who isn'thappy with Parliament and the
cabinet.
They wouldn't pass some of themilitary things that he wanted
passed, was looking for a way tomake more money for himself,
just himself, not to share withBelgium or anything.
And so that's the context thatwe have Leopold in right now.

Thad (05:42):
So a guy who was, yeah, sounds like he was doing quite a
bit of good things back home.

Robyn (05:48):
They were getting done under him.

Thad (05:50):
Okay, so so maybe he doesn't deserve all the credit.
Uh he you have a parliamentthat's doing a lot of the and
cabinet.
But but he's the guy, he's thehe's the figurehead, and things
are going okay.
But he said he looks around andsays, Man, I've got a lot of
great stuff and I've got a lotof great statues, but what I
really could use is some moremoney.

Robyn (06:09):
Yes.
And the way he sought to getthat was through getting
colonies, which a lot ofcountries had around the world,
a lot of European countries.
Africa, like even in 1870, wasowned, like 80% of it was under
African rule.
They didn't have like thecolonies and things that they

(06:31):
had like right before World WarI.
So he saw going in there intoAfrica as making a colony.
In fact, he uh he told theBelgian people, um, quote, the
homeland may be ourheadquarters, but our objective
must be the world.
There are no small countries,there are only small minds.

(06:53):
When people are great, theycan, no matter how narrow the
boundaries, achieve greatthings.
So, lucky for Leopold, that wasa common theme around the world
in Europe.
And in 1884, Ottawa andBismarck, who was from Germany,

(07:13):
set up a conference in Berlin.
Now, Germany at this time waskind of in the same boat where
it's a small country, it'smainly landlocked, and they were
also trying to get colonies.
Uh, Belgium had only been aconstitutional monarchy since
like the 1850s, and Germany wasjust getting established in the

(07:36):
early 1870s.
So they were kind of in thesame boat.
Bismarck, who we'll talk about,I'm sure, at some point, people
make him like say he'sresponsible for the treaties and
things that started World WarI.
So he he was very involved inthis.
They called, like, I think 14white men to come carve up

(07:58):
Africa into differentterritories.
And what Leopold said to anaide, I think when he was in
London, was quote, I do not wantto miss a good chance of
getting a slice of thismagnificent African cake.
So he sent someone to theBerlin conference to go carve

(08:20):
out a piece of this for Belgium.

Thad (08:22):
So at the time, it sounds like was this mostly the
European powers getting togetherand deciding that, hey, you
know what?
It it's time to make coloniesbecause that's where it's at.

Robyn (08:33):
Um, yeah.
Russia was there, but you know,not not too much of the Asian,
definitely, you know, notCanada.
It was under Great Britain, youknow, Greenland, no part of it.

Thad (08:47):
All right, it's a good thing.
Canada's clear.
Like, nope, nope.

Robyn (08:50):
And Greenland.

Thad (08:51):
Uh Greenland.
Yeah.
Okay, right.

Robyn (08:52):
Absolutely.

Thad (08:53):
Just want to make it clear that those guys were not
involved in this carving up theAfrican cake situation.

Robyn (08:58):
Right.

Thad (08:58):
Okay.

Robyn (08:59):
Yes.

Thad (08:59):
All right.
So they went, they went intothe conference.
What did Leopold get his cake?
I'm assuming since since thisis the show about Leopold and he
he got something out of it.
What what did he get?

Robyn (09:12):
Well, so he sent uh a guy, Henry Morton Stanley, whose
real name was John Rollins, buthe changed it because he
thought it sounded better.

Thad (09:22):
Um Henry Morton Stanley?
Yes.
That's like three first names.

Robyn (09:25):
Right.
I I know he was a veryinteresting guy, very into
himself and the things that hehad done.

Thad (09:34):
And it's for in his three first names.
No, that's fantastic.

Robyn (09:37):
Um and he had already gone on an expedition to Africa
in I think the early 70s, 18,1870s, to go look for the
Scottish missionary and Dr.
Um Dr.
Henry Livingstone.
And I mean, you y'all may haveheard the story of the man who
went up and to him and said tothe only other white man he'd

(09:59):
seen, you know, in days, Dr.
Livingstone, I presume.
Well, Henry uh Henry MortonStanley said that he was the guy
that said that, and he's theone that wrote it down, I think,
in his uh like I think it'svolume one of his expeditions in
the dark continent, or one ofthe many, many things he wrote.
But he credited himself withsaying that.

Thad (10:20):
So he sounds like a presumptuous guy.

Robyn (10:24):
Uh yes.
But you know, he he had apretty good well grasp on
things.
Well, let me let me read youactually something he wrote to
Leopold as he was getting intothe Congo, as he was meeting the
Congolese people.
Right.
Oh, quite okay.
Quote We shall require but merecontact, he wrote, to satisfy

(10:48):
the natives that our intentionsare pure and honorable, seeking
their own good materially andsocially, more than our own
interests.
We go to spread blessings,arise from amiable and just
intercourse with people who havebeen strangers to them.
So this was written by uhpublished later by uh Sir Arthur

(11:13):
Conan Doyle, who talked aboutStanley and said that he was a
hard man, but he he would saywhat he meant when he wrote
things.
And so it's worth it's worthlooking at here that Stanley
really was talking, you know,pretty highly of the Africans as

(11:36):
he says as he's continu asStanley's continuing to Leopold,
Bolobo is a great center forthe ivory and camwood powder
trade, principally because itspeople are so enterprising.
He continued, these people werereally acquainted with many
lands and tribes on the upperCongo, from Stanley Pool to

(11:57):
Apoto, a distance of 6,000miles, they knew every landing
place on the river banks, allthe ups and downs of savage
life, all the profits and lossesderived from barter, all the
diplomatic arts used by tactfulsavages, were all well known and
as well as the Roman alphabetto us.

(12:19):
No wonder all this commercialknowledge had left its traces on
their faces.
Indeed, it's the same as in ourown cities in Europe.
Know you not the military manamong you, the lawyer and the
merchant, the banker, theartist, or the poet?
It is the same in Africa, moreespecially on the Congo, where
the people are so devoted totrade.

(12:41):
During the few days of ourmutual intercourse, they gave us
high ideas of their quality,industry after their own style,
not being the least conspicuous.
End quote.

Thad (12:53):
So Stanley sounds like he had a pretty high opinion of the
Congolese people.
Yes.
So it sounds like Stanley wasdoing uh pretty good, pretty
good work here.
What what happened at the theuh the Berlin Conference?

Robyn (13:08):
Well, uh Sir Arthur Clunen Doyle, who wrote the
Sherlock he was most famous forthe Sherlock Holmes books, wrote
and published in 1909, TheCrime and the Congo.
And this is what he said.
Quote, with his chief oftreaties in his portfolio, the
King of the Belgians nowapproached the powers with high

(13:29):
sentiments of humanitarianism,and with a definite request the
state which he was formingshould receive some recognized
status among the nations.
Was he at this time consciouslyhypocritical?
Did he already foresee howwidely his future actions would
differ from his presentprofessions?
Is it a problem it is a problemwhich will interest historians

(13:51):
in the future, who may have morematerials than upon which we
are to form judgment?
On the one hand, there was afurtive secrecy about the
evolution of his plans and thedispatch of his expeditions,
which should have no place inphilanthropic enterprise.
On the other hand, there arelimits to human powers of

(14:11):
deception, and it is almostinconceivable that a man who was
acting a part could socompletely deceive the whole
civilized world.
It is more probable, as itseems to me, that his ambitious
mind discerned that it waspossible for him to acquire a
field of action, which his smallkingdom could not give in
mixing himself with the affairsof Africa.

(14:33):
He chose the obvious path, thatof civilizing and elevating
mission, taking the line ofleast resistance without any
definite idea where it mightlead him.
Once faced with the facts, hisastute brain perceived the great
material possibilities of thiscountry.
His early dreams faded away tobe replaced by unscrupulous

(14:53):
cupidity, and step by step hewas led downward until he, a man
of holy aspirations in 1885,stands now in 1909 with such a
cloud of terrible directpersonal responsibility resting
upon him, as no man in modernEuropean history had to bear.
Indeed, in it is indeedludicrous with our knowledge of

(15:15):
the outcome to read thedeclarations of the king and of
his representatives at thattime.
They were actually forming thestrictest of commercial
monopolies, an organizationwhich was destined to crush out
all general private trade in acountry as large as the whole of
Europe, with Russia omitted.
That was the admitted outcomeof their enterprise.

(15:38):
End quote.

Thad (15:53):
He wanted to be a missionary.

Robyn (15:54):
Yeah, rehabilitate them, give them a better life.
You know, he may have actuallymeant that at the time.
What Doyle's saying, who was acontemporary, you know, we don't
really know what he thought atthis time.
We just know that he wanted theCongo.

Thad (16:11):
To to make it better.

Robyn (16:12):
Yes, to make it a better place.

Thad (16:14):
So you mentioned that uh trees were signed.
How how did they get thosetrees?
What what was like like whatdid it look like from the
perspective of Congolese peoplethere?
Um, these these Europeanscoming in, uh signing treaties.
What what was that like?
What was life like for them?

Robyn (16:33):
Well, so you know, it was hundreds of small villages
everywhere, and small groups ofwhite men, mercenaries,
Europeans, Belgian generals, andCongolese people they'd already
found would come into avillage, make a treaty.
If the villagers said, nah,that doesn't sound good to us,

(16:53):
well, then sometimes they wouldjust kill them all.
Um, but a lot of times it was fit was friendly and there were
treaties made, you know, you goget rubber for us, go get things
for us, and we will give yousomething in return.
Clothes, food, you know, randomthings that really meant
nothing to the Belgians.
Yeah.

Thad (17:12):
But so it sounds like the Belgians went in along with did
they send any missionaries aswell?

Robyn (17:18):
Well, so Leopold allowed missionaries from well, they
were Dutch missionaries and somefrom England, some from
America.
So, yes, missionaries werethere.

Thad (17:28):
So it sounds like, at least when they were first
establishing uh presence in theCongo, it sounds like they were
just engaging in what you wouldthink of as regular trade.

Robyn (17:39):
Um yes, well, that was you know the premise of it.
Um we'll talk about in a fewminutes uh how a man, E.
D.
Morrell, saw that this was notexactly the case.
He worked on the docks andwould notice the discrepancies.
Uh, but we'll talk about him ina minute.
But the Belgiums were mainlylooking for rubber, and like I

(18:02):
said, a lot of the you knowtreaties were based on also like
how much rubber they were ableto get.
And because at the time peoplewere beginning to actually be
able to mass produce back to thesecond industrial revolution,
tires and for bicycles andautomobiles, and rubber was a

(18:23):
big thing to have.
And the fact that the um thatthe Congo had huge jungles of
rubber trees provided Leopoldwith the chance to get that.

Thad (18:35):
Gotcha.
So rubber was a valuableresource at that point in time.

Robyn (18:38):
Yes.
And what Leopold did, and I andI say Leopold because this had
nothing to do with the Belgiangovernment at all.
He himself never visited theCongo, but it was all under his
name.
You can trace, you know, therewere front organizations all the
way down, but everything wentback to him.
But he set up what was calledForce Publique, which was a

(19:04):
combination of some Belgium'slike military people, armed
forces, and uh and a lot fromthe villages.
And in 1885 he said, oh,they're just humanitarians,
they're there to help andeverything.
But that became not the case asdifferent, like missionaries

(19:26):
and and people that visited theCongo came back with stories of
what it was like.
This force had better weaponsthan anyone else around them,
and they had, now I think thisis interesting, they used hippo
tails as whips.
I know that sounds horrible,but evidently they were it was

(19:47):
really bad.
Like one of the worst.
They would people they wouldflog people to death with them.
And anyway, so in 1891, therewere about 3,500 of these
people, and by 1900 there were19,000.

Thad (20:03):
Well, that's a force.

Robyn (20:04):
Yeah, it well, yes.

Thad (20:06):
Also a lot of hippo tails.

Robyn (20:08):
Well, I don't honestly know how many hippo tails they
used, but it was an issue for uhfor how many the amount of
guns.

Thad (20:17):
Look, man, if I'm gonna be in the Congo as a humanitarian
force publique, I'd better get ahippo tail.
Just saying.

Robyn (20:26):
Well, okay.
You might have to go try to getthat yourself.
But hippo teeth have ivory inthem, so maybe you could use the
ivory too.

Thad (20:35):
So you get ivory and a tail.
All you have to do is face downa hippo.
Right.
That sounds like a sounds likea story for another time.
Probably a different podcast.

Robyn (20:44):
Totally.
One entirely on hippos becausethey're my favorite animal.
Um, anyway, and so thesestories started coming out.
One villager who lived throughthis, he was talking about what
life was like to p to be he wasbeing interviewed after Leopold
was no longer in the Congo andit was under the Belgian

(21:04):
government.

Thad (21:05):
Yeah.

Robyn (21:06):
He said that the uh that the blacks that were the force
publique, quote, wanted to seethe number of hands cut off by
each soldier who had to bringthem in baskets.
A village which refused toprovide rubber would be
completely swept clean.
As a young man, um, thenguarding the village of Boeka, I

(21:28):
saw him take a net, put tenarrested natives in it, attach
big stones to the net, and makeit tumble into the river.
Rubber causes these torments.
That's why we no longer want tohear its name spoken.
Soldiers made young men kill orrape their own mothers and
sisters.
End quote.
And it's you know, it just itgets worse um from there.

Thad (21:51):
I yes it gets worse.

Robyn (21:53):
Oh yeah.

Thad (21:54):
So what what were these hands about?

Robyn (21:57):
Okay, well, we were talking about bullets.
They were with the guns.
You know, you you asked aboutum hippo tails and stuff.
And yeah, okay.
So they actually counted howmany bullets were used, right?
Okay, well, I have this quotefrom a report done um that we'll
talk about in a minute by um aMr.

(22:17):
Casement uh for Britain.
But one of the passages in itum that he saw from a diary
said, quote, each time thecorporal goes out to get rubber,
cartridges are given to him.
He must bring back all notused, and for everyone used, he
must bring back a right hand.
They told me that sometimesthey shot a cartridge at an

(22:38):
animal in hunting, then cut offthe hand of a living man.
As to the extent to which thisis carried on, he informed me
that in six months in the stateon the Mombogo River, he had
used six thousand cartridges,which means that six thousand
people were killed or mutilated.
This means more than sixthousand, for the people have

(22:58):
told me repeatedly that soldierskill the children with the butt
of their guns.
End quote.

Thad (23:05):
Okay, so that's horrible.

Robyn (23:07):
Yes, Mark Twain wrote um had this in his soliloquy that
we'll talk about later.
But um a junior officer came toa village and said that the
officer in command, quote,ordered us to cut off the heads
of men and hang them on thevillage palisades, and to hang
the women and the children onthe palisade in the form of a

(23:28):
cross.
End quote.
Another Danish missionarywrote, after seeing after seeing
this happen for the first time,the Danish missionary was, you
know, uh obviously upset as onewould be, and uh and a soldier
told him, quote, don't take thisto heart so much.
They kill us if we don't bringthe rubber.

(23:49):
The commissioner has promisedus if we have plenty of hands,
he will shorten our service.
And and he continued, thebaskets of severed hands set
down at the feet of the Europeanpost commanders became the
symbol of the Congo Free State.
The collection of hands becamean end in itself.

(24:10):
Forced public soldiers broughtthem to the stations in place of
rubber.
They even went out to harvestthem instead of rubber.
They became a sort of currency.
They came to be used to make upfor shortfalls and rubber
quotas to replace the people whowere demanded for the forced
labor gangs.
The forced public soldiers werepaid their bonuses on the basis

(24:33):
of how many hands werecollected.
End quote.
I told you it got worse, andyou know, there's so many
horrible things that happened.
Um in my bibliography, I I listseveral places.
You're welcome to go find outmore about the atrocities.

Thad (24:50):
Yeah, no, that sounds pretty horrible.
So, so that this was going on.
Um what what did the what didthe rest of the world think?
I mean, obviously this is notgoing well for the villagers.
How how did word get out?
What did did everyone just kindof go along with it?

Robyn (25:06):
Well, the first person to actually write anything about
the Congo, there weremissionaries in there, but the
journals and things, they theyhadn't come out yet because they
were still being missionariesin there for the most part.

Thad (25:18):
Right.

Robyn (25:19):
But it was into this setting of craziness in the
Congo that a man, GeorgeWashington Williams, went into.
So this guy was superinteresting and would probably
require an hour or two just onhimself.
But basically, he was um anAfrican American born in

(25:40):
Pennsylvania before the CivilWar.
It was a free state at thetime.
He was the oldest of four kids,and he fought in the Civil War
for the North.
And then afterwards, he becamea Buffalo soldier, which uh were
soldiers that went out andfought in the plains because
going out into the frontier wasa huge thing at this time.

(26:02):
So they would fight in theplains against the Native
Americans who called themBuffalo soldiers because they
showed great strength.
Buffalo soldiers were onlyregiments of African Americans,
and they were formed in 1866.
Because, of course, even thoughwe had the Emancipation
Proclamation, even though wejust fought this war,

(26:23):
segregation was still a thing, Imean, uh until the mid-1900s.
But he was the firstAfrican-American graduate from
Newton Theological Institute.
He was a Baptist minister,first African-American member of
the House, Ohio House ofRepresentatives, but he he was
only there for a couple ofyears.
And most importantly tohistorians, uh, he was the first

(26:47):
person that we really knowabout that uh African-American
who dug into oral histories andnewspaper articles and primary
sources and historiography to umto write.
And he wrote a large tome thatwas basically the Negro race in
America from 1619 to um 1880.

(27:12):
And you know, he wrote manyother things, but he was
supported by Frederick Douglassand William Jennings Bryan,
other famous people of the time,reformers.
He had this idea in the late1880s to relocate slaves to
South America.
Um, that didn't work out, andhe became a journalist um
traveling to Africa to checkAfrica out.

(27:35):
He met Leopold just at aninformal meeting because Leopold
was like, hey, this is prettycool.
I'm gonna send him in and lookat stuff for me to check things
out, see if this would be a goodplace to reform, you know, just
basically to go and check itout and write back to him about
it.
Um and Williams went toHarrison, um, who was president

(27:58):
of the United States at thetime, to get his approval and
say, okay, you can go um intothe Congo because the United
States is, you know, supportingthis too.
He, Washington Williams, wentand was absolutely appalled at
what was going on.
And he was the first person toreally bring this into public

(28:21):
view.
He wrote a letter, an openquote, an open letter to his
Serene Majesty Leopold II, Kingof the Belgians and Sovereign of
the Independent State of Congo,by Colonel the Honorable George
Washington Williams of theUnited States of America.
End quote.
And that like introduction isinteresting because he wrote it

(28:46):
that way because he knew thatLeopold would read it if it said
such great things about him.

Thad (28:52):
That makes sense.

Robyn (28:53):
It it really does.
And he addresses it to a goodand great friend.
But I'm going to read you someof what he said and his
conclusions from it.
He said, quote, Your Majestywill testify to my affection for
your person and friendship foryour African state, of which you
have had ample practical proofsover nearly six years.

(29:16):
My friendship and service forthe state of the Congo were
inspired by and based upon yourpublicly declared motives and
aims, and your personalstatement to your humble
subscriber, humane sentiments,and the work of Christian
civilization in Africa.
Thus, I was led to regard yourenterprise as the rising of the

(29:38):
star of hope for the darkcontinent, so long the
habitation of cruelties, and Ijourneyed in its light and
labored in its hope.
All the principles I havespoken and written of the Congo
country, state and sovereign,was inspired by the firm belief
that your government was builtupon the enduring foundation of

(30:00):
Truth, liberty, humanity, andjustice.
So it afforded me greatpleasure to avail myself of the
opportunity to visit the Stateof Africa, and how thoroughly I
have been disenchanted,disappointed, and disheartened.
It is now my painful duty tomake known to your majesty in

(30:22):
plain and respectful languageevery charge that I am going to
bring about to you.
End quote.
So Williams went through thatand then talked about, like he
brought several charges up,including being engaged in the
slave trade and rapes.
And basically what we've talkedabout before he saw those

(30:43):
things.

Thad (30:44):
And I mean he bought up the hands.

Robyn (30:46):
You know what?
Yeah, you are you are welcometo read this letter.
It's rough, which is why Ididn't include a lot of it in
here.
But his conclusions that hesent to Leopold were, quote,
against the deceit, fraud,robberies, arson, murder, slave

(31:06):
raiding, and general policy ofcruelty of your majesty's
government to the natives standsthe record of unexampled
patience, long-suffering andforgiving spirit, which put the
boasted civilization andprofessed religion of your
Majesty's government to theblush.
During thirteen years only onewhite man has lost his life at

(31:29):
the hands of natives, and onlytwo white men have been killed
in the Congo.
Major Bottelup was shot by aZanzibar soldier, and the
captain of a Belgian tradingboat was the victim of his own
rash and unjust treatment of anative chief.
All the crimes perpetrated inthe Congo have been done in your

(31:49):
name, and you must answer atthe bar of public sentiment for
the misgovernment of a people,whose lives and fortunes were
entrusted to you by the AugustConference of Berlin in 1884 to
85.
I now appeal to the powerswhich committed this infant
state to your Majesty's charge,and to the great states which
gave it international being, andwhose majestic law you have

(32:13):
scorned and trampled upon, tocall and create an international
commission to investigate thecharges herein preferred in the
name of humanity, commerce,constitutional government, and
Christian civilization.
End quote.
He based this appeal on Article36, Chapter 7, from an act at

(32:33):
the Congress of Berlin.
At the end of it, at the end ofthe letter, Williams appealed
to the Belgian people,anti-slavery societies, and
ended with a plea to theHeavenly Father.
And he did not hold back.

Thad (32:50):
It doesn't sound like it.
It sounds like he wantedliterally everyone under heaven
and above to know what was goingon in the Congo.

Robyn (32:56):
Yes, he he absolutely did.
And it goes further.
So he decided he not only wroteto the King of Belgium, to
Leopold, but he decided to writeum a report upon the Congo
state and country to thePresident of the Republic of the
United States of America.
And uh quote Although Americahas no commercial interests in

(33:20):
the Congo, it was the governmentof the Republic of the United
States which introduced thisAfrican government into the
Sisterhood of States.
It was the American Republicwhich stood sponsor to this
young state, which hasdisappointed the most glowing
hopes of its most ardent friendsand most zealous promoters.
Whatever the government of theRepublic of the United States

(33:43):
did for the independent state ofCongo was inspired and guided
by noble and unselfish motives,and whatever it refrains from
doing will be on account of itselevated sentiments of humanity
and its sense of the sacrednessof agreements and compacts in
their letter and spirit.
The people of the United Statesof America have a just and

(34:06):
right to know the truth, thewhole truth, and nothing but the
truth, respecting theindependent state of Congo, an
absolute monarchy, an oppressiveand cruel government.
An exclusive Belgian colony nowtottering to its fall.
End quote.
So both of these letters weresent in 1890.
Um George Washington Williamsdied in 1891 after getting sick

(34:30):
in Africa.
He is buried in Liverpool,England.

Thad (34:34):
So this was one of the last things he was able to do.

Robyn (34:36):
Yeah, and he was only 41.

Thad (34:39):
Wow.

Robyn (34:39):
I know.
Think about what he could havedone if he'd lived longer.

Thad (34:43):
It sounds like he had a very full life as it was.

Robyn (34:46):
Mm-hmm.

Thad (34:47):
And and that this was important enough to him to spend
his his his time working on.

Robyn (34:53):
Yes.
Um and the whole world let itsit for about ten years.

Thad (35:00):
Really?

Robyn (35:01):
Yeah.

Thad (35:03):
So he sent this letter to Leopold.
He sent this letter to someonein the United States.
No, the president.
He sent it to the president.

Robyn (35:10):
President Harrison of the United States.

Thad (35:11):
Send it to the president.
So Leopold knew what was goingon.

Robyn (35:16):
Oh yeah.

Thad (35:17):
The President of the United States knew what was
going on.

Robyn (35:20):
Oh yeah.

Thad (35:21):
And nobody really did anything.

Robyn (35:24):
Well, think about it.
Would the United States want toadmit that they were wrong
about Belgium at the conferencein Berlin?

Thad (35:33):
I apparently not.

Robyn (35:34):
Yeah.
I mean, because then they'dhave to admit that they, you
know, were off.

Thad (35:39):
So, you know, uh a little bit ago you were talking about
uh Sir Arthur Conan Doyle uhremarking about future
historians looking back and andtrying to parse what Leopold's
objectives were.
But it sounds like, you know,you you might be able to make
the argument that, oh, he justhe he never went to the Congo,

(36:00):
so he really couldn't have knownexactly what was happening.
Uh maybe, you know, he had aseries of lieutenants that did
things and they got carriedaway, and all of a sudden, you
know, you have atrocitieshappening, but yeah, he's a long
ways away.
He doesn't know.
But at this point, heabsolutely knows.

Robyn (36:17):
Yes.
Well, he knows that a letterwas sent to him saying that.

Thad (36:21):
Right.

Robyn (36:22):
That doesn't mean that he necessarily wants to believe
it, but he probably just doesn'tcare because he's getting a lot
of money right now.

Thad (36:30):
Okay.
So what happens next?
You said that that nothinghappens for ten years,
everybody's just kind of sittingon this, and the atrocities are
continuing.
Now what?

Robyn (36:42):
Well, next came a very unassuming man, you know, random
guy, E.
D.
Morel, born in France, thenwent and worked on the dock,
worked for Elder Dempster as aclerk on the docks.

Thad (36:56):
The docks where?

Robyn (36:57):
Well, in London.
But they sent him to Belgiumbecause he could speak French.

Thad (37:01):
Okay.

Robyn (37:02):
And so he spent time.
Well, he spent time in bothplaces, but he was a clerk.
So he was writing down, youknow, how much they were sending
out in money and how much theywere getting back.

Thad (37:12):
So he was a dock worker in Belgium.

Robyn (37:14):
Yes, but from an English company.
Okay.
Okay.
And he noticed the goods didnot seem right.
I mean, he was like, so theywere sending out manacles and
guns, um, ammunition to theCongo, and then coming back with
supply with rubber.

(37:35):
And he said, and the estimateis that like Belgium was making,
I think, five times more fromthe things they sent out to what
came back.
And so he asked himself, doesthis seem right to you?
And started to look into it.
Um, his employer wasn't happy.

(37:55):
They kind of tried, in themodern sense, to pay him off,
but he was just like, nah, andquit to become a journalist.
And so he started to writeabout the trade imbalance.
He had a background in it.
He had the he he knew hisstuff, you know.
It wasn't just, yeah.

Thad (38:16):
Right.
He was he was a dock worker.
He was literally there lookingat it, and he said, Yes, hey,
this math doesn't math, becauseif we're sending out guns and
manacles and we're receivingback a whole lot more in rubber,
what could be going on?

Robyn (38:31):
Well, latex.
Latex, yeah.

Thad (38:33):
Sure, but and ivory.
Uh latex and ivory.
So he thought to himself,someone should look into this,
and that someone is me.

Robyn (38:41):
Yes, because his company was like, Yeah, we're just we're
just gonna like not think aboutthat.

Thad (38:47):
You're a dock worker, don't rock the boat.

Robyn (38:49):
Yeah, d literally.
You're so funny.
Um that so he became he talkedabout the trade and balance
prolifically.
He wrote a lot and started theWest African Mail and the
African Mail, which were bothlike journals um that submitted
volunteer letters, volunteerwriting.

(39:12):
Uh, a lot of people that wrotefor him that wrote with it, and
he did, were worried that thesame thing that was happening in
the Congo would happen in therest of Africa.
So part of it was, you know, tomake people really aware of the
Congo, to prevent othergovernments from doing the same
thing.
And eventually it caught theattention of British Parliament,

(39:34):
and they sent their consul, whowas in the Congo, Robert
Casement, to go and do a reportof what was going on in the
Congo.
And I just I just want to readyou a couple things that he had
in this really long report.
I read the whole thing, it'sreally long.

(39:55):
And he said that um when whenhe was asked, uh when a woman
was asked to collect rubber, hesaid, Isn't that man's work?
And why do women do that?
And uh and the man that he wastalking to said, Don't you see
the answer?
If I caught and kept the men,who would work the rubber?

(40:16):
But if I catch their wives, thehusbands are anxious to have
them home again, and so therubber is brought in quickly and
quite up to the mark.
End quote.
So what was happening is theforce public, people in charge
would literally take wives andchildren hostage while the men
went to go collect rubber, whichsometimes took two and three

(40:38):
days to get to the trees, andcome back and kept their wives
and children hostages in casethey decided not to bring enough
rubber or not to come back.
And then, of course, there wasalways the are they gonna cut
off my hand randomly or arm?
Are they gonna kill my child?
Um, I read about it, it was inhis report talking about what

(40:59):
happened to the wives and to thepeople um in the Congo when
they didn't meet quotas andthings.
His his report is very detailedin that.

Thad (41:10):
I'm guessing it wasn't it wasn't pleasant.

Robyn (41:12):
Mm-mm.
No.
And so he came back and gaveall this information to the
British Parliament and wanted todo more, but he was a
government employee, and so hecouldn't do more.
So he encouraged Morrell toform the Congo Reform
Association, which was supportedby people like Mark Twain,

(41:36):
mission activists around theworld, Joseph Conrad, another
author, Robert Conan Doyle, andum Vichelle Lindsay, who wrote a
poem, yes, and I know it's apoem, guys, I know, but it's
it's really moving.
Um it's called The Congo AStudy of the Negro Race.

(41:58):
Quote, then I saw the Congocreeping through the black,
cutting through the forest witha golden track.
Then along that river bank athousand miles, tattooed
cannibals danced in files.
Then I heard the boom of thebloodlust song, and a thigh bone
beating on a tin pin gong.

(42:19):
And blood screamed the whistlesand the fifes of the warriors.
Blood screamed the skull facedlean witch doctors.
Whirl ye the deadly voodoorattle, harry the uplands, steal
all the cattle, rattle rattle,rattle rattle.
A roaring epic rabtime tombfrom the mouth of the Congo to

(42:41):
the mountains of the moon.
Death is an elephant, torcheyed and horrible, foam flanked
and terrible.
Boom steal the pygmies, boomkill the Arabs, boom kill the
white men.
Listen to the yell of Leopold'sghost, burning in hell for his
hand maimed host.
Hear how the demons chuckle andyell, cutting his hands off

(43:04):
down in hell.
Listen to the creepyproclamation blown through the
lairs of a forest nation, blownpast the white ant's hill of
clay, blown past the marsh wherethe butterflies play.
Be careful what you do, ourMambo Jumbo, god of the Congo,
and all the other gods, well whodo you?

(43:25):
End quote.
I just think that that verywell sums up what was happening.
There were actual co umcannibals, so that wasn't a
thing she made up.
She talks about the or he talksabout the elephants, you know,
dying from ivory, whichincidentally at the time in the

(43:46):
late 1800s, it was not illegalto get ivory.
So that, you know, it was justthe idea of killing um
elephants.
And and so she was one of thewriters for this, or he, I'm not
really sure, um was one of thewriters for this for the West
African Mail.
Um, there also began to bepublications that published

(44:12):
things in like satiricaljournals in England and in
Belgium that would publishpolitical cartoons of, you know,
Leopold carving up the cake andLeopold being wrapped around
with rubber coils and politicalcartoons of the time.
That one was from Punchmagazine in 1906.

(44:33):
But the amount of satiricalcartoons coming out at that time
was actually a worldwidephenomenon.
It was it's called yellowjournalism and started with FDR,
uh, mainly in theSpanish-American War.
Um not FDR, Teddy Roosevelt.
It's a Roosevelt.
It's a Roosevelt, it's Teddy,so sorry.

(44:55):
Uh with the Rough Riders.
He would have been soembarrassed if I called him FDR.
But anyway.

Thad (45:01):
Anyway.

Robyn (45:02):
It would have been the worst.
But anyway, so there werepolitical cartoons.
Leopold had his own campaignout, propaganda campaign being
like, yeah, I I don't know whatthese people are talking about.

Thad (45:16):
But there was some traction.
There were there were somepeople that had that had some
things to say, and they were andtheir voices were were gaining
momentum.

Robyn (45:25):
Yes, and the main the main thing to have an impact
work that was done was by MarkTwain, who's American, his real
name was Samuel Clemens, and hewrote the King Leopold's
soliloquy, a defense of hisCongo rule.
And in it, he takes on thepersona of King Leopold, which,

(45:51):
as is normal in a Mark Twainwriting, it's just very
expressive and fun to read, buthe includes so many primary
sources.
He includes the casement reportand morale and missionaries,
and he just he's gathered up allthis evidence that I've been

(46:12):
talking about so far.

Thad (46:13):
So so Mark Twain stopped whatever it was that Mark Twain
usually does and went off andsaid, This is something that
someone needs to write about.
Yes.
And he gathered together, hebasically gathered together all
the documents and the reportsand stuff, and then sat down and
pinned this pamphlet.

Robyn (46:34):
Yes, and and it was pretty long too.
I think it was 70 somethingpages.

Thad (46:38):
That's a a small book.

Robyn (46:40):
Yes, yeah, it is.
So I'm just I'm gonna read youone of the things or a couple of
things that were in thesoliloquy.
That this first one was this isjust a direct quote from a
Reverend A.
E.
Shrivener, who was a Britishmissionary, and he wrote this in
The Journey Made in July,August, and September 1903.

(47:02):
And so I'm getting this fromthe soliloquy.
Okay.
Shrivener said, quote, Soon webegan talking, and without any
encouragement on my part, thenatives began the tales I'd
become accustomed to.
They were living in peace andquietness when the white men
came in from the lake with allsorts of requests to do this and

(47:25):
that.
They thought it meant slavery,so they attempted to keep the
white men out of their country,but without avail.
The rifles were too much forthem, so they submitted and made
up their minds to do the bestthey could under the altered
circumstances.
First came the command to buildhouses for the soldiers, and
this was done without a murmur.

(47:47):
Then they had to feed thesoldiers, and all the men and
women, hangers on, whoaccompanied them.
Then they were told to bring inrubber.
This was quite a new thing forthem to do.
There was rubber in the forestseveral days away from their
home, but that it was worthanything was news to them.
A small reward was offered anda rush made for the rubber.

(48:10):
What strange white men to giveus cloth and beads for the sap
of a wild vine?
They rejoiced in what theythought was their good fortune.
But soon the reward was reduceduntil at last they were told to
bring in the rubber fornothing.
And to this they tried todemure, but to their great
surprise several were shot bythe soldiers, and the rest were

(48:31):
told, with many curses andblows, to go at once, or more
would be killed.
Terrified, they began toprepare their food for the
fortnight's absence from thevillage, which the collection of
rubber entailed.
The soldiers discovered themsitting about.
What?
Not gone yet.
Bang bang bang, and down fellone and another, dead in the

(48:51):
midst of wives and companions.
There's a terrible wail and anattempt to prepare the dead for
burial, but this was notallowed.
All must go at once to theforest.
Without food?
Yes, without food, and off thepoor wretches had to go, without
even their tinder boxes to makefires.
Many died in the forests ofhunger and exposure, and still

(49:14):
more from the rifles of theferocious soldiers in charge of
the post.
In spite of all their efforts,the amount fell off and more and
more were killed.
I was shown around the placeand the sites of a former big
chief settlement were pointedout.
A careful estimate was made ofthe population, say, seven years
ago, to be two thousand peoplein and about the post, within a

(49:38):
radius of, say, a quarter mile,all told they would not muster
200 now.
There is so much sadness andgloom about them that they are
fast decreasing.
End quote.
So that was just one example ofa missionary's journals and
diaries coming out.
There there's several moremissionaries, but that that was

(50:00):
just one of them.
And then as Twain takes on thepersona of Leopold, quote, in
1904 and 1905, I do not see howa person can act so so as Morel.
This Morel is a king's subject,and reverence for the monarchy

(50:20):
should have restrained him fromreflecting upon me with
exposure.
This Morel is a reformer, aCongo reformer.
That sizes him up.
He publishes a sheet inLiverpool called the West
African Mail, which is supportedby the voluntary contributions
of the sab headed and softhearted, and every week it
steams and reeks and festerswith up-to-date Congo atrocities

(50:44):
of the sort detailed in thispile of pamphlets here.
I will suppress it.
I suppressed a Congo atrocitybook there, and after it was
actually in print, it should notbe difficult for me to suppress
a newspaper.
And so it's you know, Twain ssays that he's studying some
photographs of mutilated Negroesand looks down.

(51:06):
And this is Leopold again.
The Kodak camera has been asore calamity to us, the most
powerful enemy indeed.
In the early years, we had notrouble in getting the press to
expose the tales of mutilationsas slanders, lies, inventions of
a busybody Americanmissionaries and exasperated

(51:28):
foreigners who found the opendoor of the Berlin Congo Charter
closed against them.
And when they innocently wentout there to trade, and by the
press's help, we got theChristian nations everywhere to
turn an irritated andunbelieving ear to those tales,
and say hard things about thetellers of them.
Yes, all things wentharmoniously and pleasantly in

(51:51):
those days, and I was looked upto as a benefactor of a
downtrodden and friendlesspeople.
Then all of a sudden came thecrash.
That is to say, theincorruptible Kodak, and all the
harmony went to hell.
The only witness I could haveencountered in my long
experience that I couldn'tbribe.
Every Yankee missionary andevery interrupted trader sent

(52:14):
home and got one.
And now, oh well, the pitchersget sneaked around everywhere in
spite of all we do to ferretthem out and suppress them.
Ten thousand pulpits and tenthousand presses are saying the
good word for me all the timeand placidly and convincingly
denying the mutilations.
Then that trivial little kodakthat a child can carry in its

(52:38):
pocket gets up, uttering never aword, and knocks them dumb.
And then he continues, and thisis a quote.
But enough of trying to tallyoff his crimes.
His list is interminable.
We should never get to the endof it.
His awful shadow lies acrossthe Congo Free State, and under
it an unoffending nation offifteen million is withering

(53:00):
away and swiftly succumbing totheir miseries.
It is a land of graves.
It is the land of graves.
It is the Congo Free graveyard.
It's a majestic thought thatthis, this ghastly episode in
all human history, is the workof one man alone, one solitary
man, just a single individual.

(53:21):
Leopold, king of the Belgians.
He is personally and solelyresponsible for all the myriad
of crimes that have blackenedthe history of the Congo state.
He is the sole master there.
He is absolute.
He could have prevented thecrimes by his mere command.
He could have stopped themtoday with a word.

(53:43):
He withholds the word for hispocket's sake.
It seems strange to see a kingdestroying a nation and laying
waste a country for mere sordidmoney's sake.
And solely and only for that,lust of conquest is royal.
Kings have always exercisedthat stately vice, and we are

(54:05):
used to it.
By old habit, we condone it,perceiving a certain dignity in
it.
But lust of money, lust ofshillings, lust of nickels, lust
of dirty coin, not for thenation's enrichment, but for the
kings alone.
This is new.
This distinctly revolts us.

(54:25):
We cannot seem to reconcileourselves to it.
We resent it, we despise it, wesay it is shabby, unkingly, out
of character.
Being Democrats, we ought tojeer and jest, we ought to
rejoice to see the purpledragged in the dirt.
But well, account for it as wemay, we don't.
We see this awful king, thispitiless and blood-drenched

(54:50):
king, this money-crazy kingtowering towards the sky in a
world solitude of sordid crime,unfellowed and apart from the
human race, soul butcher forpersonal gain, findable in all
his caste, ancient or modern,pagan or Christian, lowest and
highest, and the excreations ofall who hold in cold esteem the

(55:13):
oppressor and the coward.
And well it is a mystery, butwe do not wish to look, for he
is king, and it hurts us, ittroubles us by ancient and
inherited instinct.
It shames us to see a kingdegraded to this aspect, and we
shrink from hearing and theparticulars of how it happened.

(55:35):
We shudder and turn away whenwe come upon them in print.
And it ends with Leopoldsaying, Why certainly that is my
protection, and you willcontinue to do it.
I know the human race.
He said, quote, but neverbefore has there been such a

(56:31):
mixture of wholesaleexpropriation and wholesale
massacre, all done under anodious guise of philanthropy,
with the lowest commercialmotives as a reason.
It is this sordid caused anduncuous hypocrisy which makes
this crime unparalleled in itshorror.
End quote.

Thad (56:50):
So those guys let him have it with both barrels.
What was the result?

Robyn (56:58):
Well, after the soliloquy came out, like in 1906, there
was su people were upset likeall around the world, because
everyone, you know, read well,not everyone, but Mark Twain was
well known.
And um, and it was so welldocumented, so well written,
that there was such uh thepublic was so upset that um that

(57:21):
Leopold was extracted from theBelgium, his sole grip.
And I I don't remember where Iread it, but basically, like
none of the other countrieswanted the bell wanted the Congo
because it like wasn't worth itfinancially.
And so the Belgian governmentgot it.
And then of course, you know,things improved.

(57:43):
It was Parliament and theCabinet in charge.
Leopold died a year later in1909, and the Congo Reform
Association kept active until1913 just to make sure that the
transfer actually happened andthe abuses stopped and
everything.
And the Belgian government thenheld control until 1960.

Thad (58:08):
Wow.
So one guy was able to startthe bowl roll rolling on that
level of whores, and a bunch ofregular normal people and
writers got together and andblew the whistle on it.

Robyn (58:25):
There was no civil war, you know, there was no like huge
fight with you know peopledying and things.
It was just few people creatingpublic outcry and uh to get
things changed.