Anglo-Asante relations: Historical perspective

It was not for nothing that the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, was invited by King Charles III to attend the state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II. From the bitter period of the Anglo-Asante wars, relations between the Manhyia Palace and the Buckingham Palace have been enhanced with the exchange of visits and other diplomatic engagements.

Otumfuo Osei Tutu could not honour the invitation to attend the funeral, and rightly so, communicated his inability to do so to King Charles III.

Ghana’s history clearly shows that from the 15th Century onward, European nations came to the coast of the Gold Coast to trade.

The presence of the European traders along the Gold Coast aided in the emergence of various states, kingdoms and empires within the coastal and forest belts of the Gold Coast. Among these were the Fante State, the Akwamu, the Denkyera, the Wassa, the Twifo, the Aowin, the Assen, the Akyem Kotoku, Abuakwa and Bosome, the Agona, the Ga Adangme, the Anlo, the Bono Manso, the Gyaman, the Wankyi and the Asante.

Of all these states, Asante emerged as the most powerful, largest and wealthiest, developing to the status of an empire through diplomacy and conquest.

Strategies

Grounded on militaristic strategies where diplomacy failed, materialising such vision involved quelling vassal rebellion, and attacks to safeguarding their Asanteman unity.

While this ensured for a longtime their expansion and supremacy from the late 17th Century through to the 18th and 19th Centuries, it also locked them in several fearsome battles not only with their African neighbours but also with the Europeans, and it marred their relation with the English.

The first decade of the 19th Century (1800-07), was a watershed for the Anglo-Asante relation. The issue of the Assen chiefs named Aputae and Tsibo, whose relatives ransacked the grave of a subject of chief Amo Adae is the conflagration, as well as the genesis of the marred Anglo-Asante relation.

While the act by the relative of the two former chiefs was sacrilegious, the chiefs who were all Asante subjects not only refused to smoke the peace pipe with Amo but also refused to heed the call of the Asantehene as they murdered the Asantehene’s messengers sent to them.

The issue compounded when the coastal chiefs and Governor Torrane refused to hand over Tsibo and Aputae to the Asantehene, who in turn took to arms and decisively defeated the coastal forces in 1807. Though Governor Torrane recognised Asante victory, the coastal states refused.

This was followed with battles in 1811 and 1814 between the Fante and the Asante. The latter again was victorious. While the aftermath built up Asante Fante animosity, it furthered plans of the English to ran down Asante leading to the 1824 and 1826 wars.

Additionally, the 1824 Nsamankow War, among other factors, was precipitated by the death of Kujo Otetefo, who had verbally abused the Asantehene when he had in May 1822 picked a squabble with an Asante trader at the coast. Another was the traducements against Asante and McCarthy’s gullibility to everything the coastal states reported about Asante.

These materialised into a war which ended with English embarrassment and Charles McCarthy’s death, and more importantly of Asante victory.

The 1826 Akatamanso or Dodowa War which the Asante planned as means to punish the Ga for their betrayal, also presented the English an avenue to avenge their loss in the 1824 debacle.

The Asante army lost in the war against coastal forces, including their archrival, the English – with allies including the Fante, Denkyira, Akyem and the Akuapem.

Hanging peace

Then came peace of a sort with the Asante defeat in the 1826 War, and the pyric victory of the English demotivated them to stay at the coast, as well as the coming into the picture of Captain George Maclean who became President of the Trade Merchants since 1827 eliminated the hostility, temporarily.

The 1844 shadowing of Maclean as Judicial Assessor, while Commander Hill assumed formal and superior role as governor oxygenated the previous Anglo-Asante rancorous conflagration when the coastal chiefs signed an agreement for English protection against Asante.

Sir Garnet Wolseley who led the coastal forces – made up of soldiers of Hausa, Sierra Leone, the Gambia and Jamaica – sent the war to Kumase, burning it down and making Asante accept defeat which was sealed with the Fomena Treaty of March 14, 1875.

Prempeh I exile

The 1874 ramification while it was a polarisation of the Asante territorial gains and sovereignty, also sowed the seed of Asante political weakening and their later engulfment by the English. Nonetheless, it ingrained in Asante a deepening hatred for the English.

While the 1896 exile of the Asantehene, Kwaku Dua III (Prempeh I – 1888-1896), with other Asante royals to Seychelles added up to Asante political crisis, the governor, Frederick Hodgson’s remark that Prempeh I would never return, coupled with his sacrilegious demand on March 28, 1900 to have and sit on the Golden Stool — Sika Dwa — was the last straw which broke the camel’s back for the Asante.

War was inevitable, hence the 1899/1901 Yaa Asantewaa War. Though Asante lost in the war, one thing was conspicuous: their unending hostility against the English.

Effects

The Anglo-Asante relation largely brought parasitic effects in terms of destruction of lives and properties on both sides.

Overall, Asante suffered a lasting woe with the hewing down of its territorial and political sovereignty, especially with its loss of vassals and their tributes, as well as the generation of internal political predicament as seen with destoolment of some Asante political figures who failed to war/avenge the English.

Also, this relation while it affected other local groups and sowed discord among them, paved way for English implementation of ‘divide and rule’ and the subsequent colonisation of not only Asante, but also the coastal states, the Eastern and Western, as well as the Northern Territories, until 1957.

The writers are a Professor of History, Provost, College of Humanities and Legal Studies, University of Cape Coast (UCC), and an M. Phil student, Department of History, UCC, respectively.