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Robert Hart (Chinese name He De) was born in Milltown, Co Armagh, on 20 February 1835. He was educated at Queen's College, Taunton, Wesley College, Dublin, and Queen's College, Belfast, where he received a BA in 1853. The following year he entered the consular service, working in Hong Kong, Ningo and Canton before resigning in 1859 to join the Chinese Maritime Customs. After working as Deputy Commissioner in Canton and Commissioner in Shanghai he was appointed as the first Inspector General in 1863. He held this post for nearly fifty years until his death and his commitment to the service led him to refuse the post of British Minister to China in 1885. As well as his work in the Customs he was used by the Quing government to further their aims in dealing with foreign powers. He became supreme advisor to Zongli Yamen (the Chinese office dealing with foreign affairs). On behalf of the Quing government he arranged the Lisbon Protocol in 1885 after negotiations with the Portugese over Macao. He negotiated with the Indian government over Sikkim and with the British over navigation of the Yangtze River. His efforts led to his receiving honours from a number of countries including Italy, Portugal, Norway, and Holland, and a number of Chinese honours. He gained an honorary doctorate in 1882. He was also asked to help with efforts towards 'modernisation' such as the establishment of the Chinese postal system and the establishment of Tong Wen Guan (Institute of Education).

In 1866 he married Hestor Jane Bredon and they had three children including a son, Bruce, who took over from J D Campbell in the London office in 1907. He also had three children from an earlier liaison with a Chinese woman. These children he supported as his 'wards'. Hestor's brother, Robert, was also a member of the Chinese Maritime Customs and became Acting Inspector General when Hart returned to England from 1908 until 1910. In 1901 he wrote These from the Land of Sinim. He died on 20 September 1911.

Sir Francis Arthur Aglen joined the Chinese Maritime Customs in 1888. He was Acting Inspector-General in 1910 before succeeding Sir Robert Hart. He retired as Inspector-General in 1928.

Robert Hart (Chinese name He De) was born in Milltown, Co Armagh, on 20 February 1835. He was educated at Queen's College, Taunton, Wesley College, Dublin, and Queen's College, Belfast, where he received a BA in 1853. The following year he entered the consular service, working in Hong Kong, Ningo and Canton before resigning in 1859 to join the Chinese Maritime Customs. After working as Deputy Commissioner in Canton and Commissioner in Shanghai he was appointed as the first Inspector General in 1863. He held this post for nearly fifty years until his death and his commitment to the service led him to refuse the post of British Minister to China in 1885. As well as his work in the Customs he was used by the Quing government to further their aims in dealing with foreign powers. He became supreme advisor to Zongli Yamen (the Chinese office dealing with foreign affairs). On behalf of the Quing government he arranged the Lisbon Protocol in 1885 after negotiations with the Portugese over Macao. He negotiated with the Indian government over Sikkim and with the British over navigation of the Yangtze River. His efforts led to his receiving honours from a number of countries including Italy, Portugal, Norway, and Holland, and a number of Chinese honours. He gained an honorary doctorate in 1882. He was also asked to help with efforts towards 'modernisation' such as the establishment of the Chinese postal system and the establishment of Tong Wen Guan (Institute of Education).

In 1866 he married Hestor Jane Bredon and they had three children including a son, Bruce, who took over from J D Campbell in the London office in 1907. He also had three children from an earlier liaison with a Chinese woman. These children he supported as his 'wards'. Hestor's brother, Robert, was also a member of the Chinese Maritime Customs and became Acting Inspector General when Hart returned to England from 1908 until 1910. In 1901 he wrote These from the Land of Sinim. He died on 20 September 1911.

James Duncan Campbell was born in Edinburgh in 1833. Educated at Cheltenham College and the universities of Paris and Heidelberg, he worked for the Post Office and the Treasury before 1862. In that year he joined the Chinese Maritime Customs and became non-resident secretary in London in 1874. He was sent to Paris in 1884 by Robert Hart to negotiate on behalf of the Quing government a cease-fire agreement in the Sino-French War. He married Ellen Mary Lewis in 1870. He died on 3 December 1907.

James Duncan Campbell was born in Edinburgh in 1833. Educated at Cheltenham College and the universities of Paris and Heidelberg, he worked for the Post Office and the Treasury before 1862. In that year he joined the Chinese Maritime Customs and became non-resident secretary in London in 1874. He was sent to Paris in 1884 by Robert Hart to negotiate on behalf of the Quing government a cease-fire agreement in the Sino-French War. He married Ellen Mary Lewis in 1870. He died on 3 December 1907.

Sir Robert Hart (1835-1911) was Inspector General of the Imperial Maritime Customs (later Chinese Maritime Customs) from 1863.

Cecil Arthur Verner Bowra (b 1869) joined the Chinese Maritime Customs and arrived in China in 1886. With the appointment of Sir Francis Aglen as Inspector-General Bowra was made Chief Secretary in Peking (1910-1923). The post meant that he became Acting Inspector-General when Aglen was on leave in 1911 and 1917. Bowra retired in 1923 but was subsequently employed in the London Office of Chinese Maritime Customs. He died in 1947.

Sir Francis Arthur Aglen (1869-1932) joined the Chinese Maritime Customs in 1888. He was Acting Inspector-General in 1910 before succeeding Sir Robert Hart in 1911, serving as Inspector-General until his retirement in 1928.

Francis George Hall was born 11 October 1860 at Saugor, India, the third son of Lieutenant-Colonel E Hall. Following his education at Sherbourne and Tonbridge he worked for the Bank of England. In 1880 he resigned and went to South Africa. There he followed a number of occupations including schoolteacher, soldier, farmer, and gold miner before returning to England in 1891. The following year he joined the Imperial British East Africa Company and became Acting Superintendent of the District of Kikuyu. Hall remained as District Officer after company control was ceded to the British government. He married Beatrice Russell in May 1898 and was to have returned home in April 1901, but died after contracting dysentery on 18 March 1901.

School of Oriental Studies , Library

The School of Oriental Studies (later the School of Oriental and African Studies) was founded as part of the University of London to address inadequacy of teaching in Asian languages in London - hitherto dispersed among various colleges of London University and other institutions - and to cater for the study of Asian history, geography, culture, law and literature, as well as including a library. It opened in 1917, occupying premises in Finsbury Circus formerly occupied by the London Institution (which had amalgamated with the Society of Arts in 1906). Its library received substantial collections of books transferred from other London institutions.

The Imperial Maritime Customs (later called the Chinese Maritime Customs) collected customs duties from foreign ships at treaty ports and administered port facilities on behalf of the Chinese government. It was managed and staffed mainly by foreigners, largely British.

Arthur Jermy Mounteney Jephson: born in Brentwood, Essex, 1858; educated at Tonbridge School, 1869-1874; a cadet with the Merchant Navy, serving on HMS Worcester, 1874-1876; joined the Antrim regiment of the Royal Irish Rifles, 1880; resigned his commission, 1884; accompanied H M Stanley's expedition to relieve Emin Pasha in Central Africa, 1887-1889; Medallist, Royal Geographical Society and Royal Brussels Geographical Society, 1890; following his return from Africa, suffered ill health, and his attempts to return to Africa were frustrated; Queen's Messenger, 1895-1901; King's Messenger from 1901; died, 1908. Publications include: Emin Pasha and the rebellion at the equator: a story of nine month's experiences in the last of the Soudan provinces ... with the revision and co-operation of Henry M Stanley (1890); Stories told in an African forest (1893).

Emin Pasha: born in Germany, 1840; originally named Eduard Schnitzer; a physician and explorer; served under General Charles Gordon in Sudan as a district medical officer, 1876-1878; succeeded Gordon as governor of Equatoria, the southernmost province of the Egyptian Sudan, 1878; isolated from the outside world by the Mahdist uprising, 1885; European explorers including H M Stanley were sent to rescue him, 1887; eventually agreed to accompany Stanley to Mombasa, 1889; murdered while engaged in exploration for Germany in the Lake Tanganyika region, 1892.

Sir Henry Morton Stanley: born in Denbigh, Wales, 1841; originally named John Rowlands; Anglo-American journalist and empire builder; took the name of his adoptive father in New Orleans; became a naturalized US citizen; fought in the American Civil War; became a journalist; commissioned to go to Africa to find the explorer David Livingstone, whom he located on Lake Tanganyika, 1871; returned to England with news of his discovery; led a second expedition to further Livingstone's explorations, 1874-1877; followed the Congo River from its source to the sea; accepted the invitation of Leopold II of Belgium to head another expedition, and helped to organize the future Independent State of the Congo, 1879-1884; at the Berlin Conference (1884-1885), instrumental in obtaining American support for Leopold's Congo venture; his last African journey was to find Emin Pasha, 1887-1889; again became a British subject, 1892; sat in Parliament, 1895-1900; Knight, 1899; died, 1904. Publications include: In Darkest Africa (1890), giving his account of the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition.

Edward William Bovill was born on 25 December 1892. He was educated at Rugby and Trinity College, Cambridge, and served in the First World War with the 10th Royal Hussars and the W.A.F.F. He was Director of Matheson & Co. Ltd. from 1936-1945 and Chairman of R.C. Treat & Co. Ltd. from 1942-1961. He was a medallist at the Royal Society of Arts in 1935 and became Vice-President of the Hakluyt Society in 1964. Between 1962 and 1966 he researched and wrote the four volume Missions to the Niger (published for the Hakluyt Society at the University Press). He died on 19 December 1966.

Other publications included Caravans of the Old Sahara, 1930; East African Agriculture, 1950; The Battle of Alcazar, 1952; The Golden Trade of the Moors, 1958; The England of Nimrod and Surtees, 1959; English Country Life, 1780-1830, 1962; The Bornu Mission (ed.), 1965.

The British North Borneo (Chartered) Company was formed in 1881 and from 1882 administered the territory of North Borneo, the present-day Malaysian state of Sabah. The Company ruled the territory until the end of 1941, when the Japanese occupation ended Company rule. After the war, in 1946, the Company surrendered the territory to the British Crown and North Borneo became a British colony until 1963, when the territory became part of Malaysia. The Company was dissolved in 1953.

The territory was administered by a Governor, a nominated Legislative Council and a Civil Service, but the final seat of authority was the Court of Directors of the Company, which sat in London. The Company, under the Charter, was the Government of the territory and had to maintain a civil administration. But the Company was also mindful of its shareholders, and promoted the territory as a source of timber, forest products and mineral wealth, and publicised the territory's potential for growing plantation crops such as rubber and coconut.

Edward Peregrine Gueritz was Governor of British North Borneo, 1904-1911.

Further reading: K G Tregonning, Under Chartered Company Rule (North Borneo 1881-1946) (University of Malaya Press, 1958).

These papers were possibly collected by Margaret Burke, who worked for the Friends Service Council Madagascar Committee.

The Friends Service Council (FSC) was established in 1927 by the amalgamation of the Friends Foreign Mission Association (FFMA) and the Friends Council for International Service (CIS). The FSC is the standing committee responsible for the overseas work of the Religious Society of Friends in Great Britain and Ireland. Its predecessor the FFMA was formally established in 1868 in succession to a provisional committee set up a few years before. It remained an independent organization until it became a committee of London Yearly Meeting in 1918. Its fields of action included Madagascar, from 1867.

Madagascar was also among the mission fields of the London Missionary Society, whose first missionaries arrived in 1818.

Gladys Aylward was born in 1902 in Edmonton, North London. Following service as a housemaid, and rejection by the China Inland Mission, she went to China as an independent missionary. Travelling on the Trans-Siberian Railway to Tientsin she then continued to the province of Shansi in North-West China, where she worked from 1931. She became a Chinese citizen in 1936. In 1940, against the background of government, communist and Japanese warfare she led a group of orphans on a perilous journey to Sian. She returned to England during the Second World War, but returned to work with children at the Gladys Aylward Children's Home in Taiwan from the late 1940s until near her death in 1970.

Her life was the basis of the 1959 film 'The Inn of the Sixth Happiness' starring Ingrid Bergman. A number of books have also been written about her life including: Gladys Aylward, One of the Undefeated by R O Latham (1950); The Small Women by Alan Burgess (1957); London Sparrow by Phyllis Thompson (1989); and Gladys Aylward: the Courageous English Missionary by Catherine Swift (1989).

Born in Oxford, 1878; educated at Magdalen College School and New College, Oxford; MA; Cadet, Federated Malay States Civil Service, 1902; posted to Perak, and studied Malay language and culture; appointed District Officer, Kuala Pilah, 1913; appointed to the education department, 1916; stationed in Singapore for 15 years; DLitt, Oxford, 1920; first President of Raffles College, Singapore, 1921-1931; his recommendations were instrumental in the founding of a new teacher training college, the Sultan Idris Training College at Tanjong Malim, to which was attached the Malay Translation Bureau, 1922; acting Secretary to the High Commissioner, 1923; Director of Education, Straits Settlements and Federated Malay States (FMS), and member of Legislative Council, Straits Settlements, 1924-1931; CMG, 1926; member of Federal Council, FMS, 1927-1931; General Adviser to the Malay State of Johore, 1931-1935; retired from the Malayan Civil Service and was appointed KBE, 1935; lecturer in Malay, School of Oriental (later Oriental and African) Studies; Member of the Colonial Office Advisory Committee on Education, 1936-1939; Reader in Malay, School of Oriental Studies, 1937-1946; President, Association of British Malaya, 1938; member of Governing Body, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), 1939-1959; Director, Royal Asiatic Society, 1940-1943, 1946-1949, 1952-1955, 1958-1961, President, 1943-1946, 1949-1952, 1955-1958, 1961-1964, Gold Medallist, 1947, and Honorary Vice-President, 1964; during World War Two, broadcast in Malay to Malaya under the Japanese occupation; following the re-occupation his joint authorship of a letter to The Times played a role in the reversal of the British government's Malayan Union policy and the institution of a federal government which led ultimately to Malayan independence; Fellow of the British Academy, 1945; retired from SOAS, 1946; Honorary Fellow of SOAS, 1947; Vice-President of the Royal India Society, from 1947; Vice-Chairman of Executive Committee for Exhibition of Art from India and Pakistan, Royal Academy of Arts, London (and headed a delegation to India to arrange for collection of exhibits), 1947-1948; Hon LLD (Malaya), 1951; Honorary Member of South-East Asia Institute, USA; Honorary Member, Royal Batavian Society and of Kon Instituut voor Taal-Landen Volkenkunde, The Hague; died, 1966. Publications: numerous works on Malay language, culture and history.

Cronje , Suzanne , fl 1972 , author

Nigeria obtained its independence on 1 October 1960, having been formerly under British rule. In the same year a Federal Government based on the parliamentary system was created. Elections had been held in 1959, centred on a number of ruling parties including the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons (NCNC), which had control of the Eastern region and was led by Nnamdi Azikiwe; the Northern People's Congress (NPC), which had control of the Northern region and was led by Ahmadu Bello; and the Action Group (AG), which had control of the Western region and was led by Obafemi Awolowo. No party won a majority during the elections, and the NPC joined with the NCNC to form the government. When independence arrived in 1960, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa was made Prime Minister and Nnamdi Azikiwe was made Governor General.

In 1962, part of the Action group split off to form the Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP), led by S. I. Akintola. In 1963, the Mid-Western Region was formed from part of the Western Region. In 1963, Nigeria became a Federal Republic with Nnamdi Azikiwe as President. A great deal of controversy followed the 1963 population census, which the NCNC felt overestimated the number of people in the Northern Region, giving them a greater representation in the federal parliament. In January 1966, a group of Igbo army officials staged a coup d'etat to overthrow the government, killing Balewa, Bello and Akintola and placing General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi in charge of the new military government. He suspended the regional constitution, dissolved all legislative bodies, banned political parties and formed a Federal Military Government that was more central in nature.

There were strong suspicions that Aguiyi-Ironsi favoured the Igbo (Ibo) over other ethnic groups, fuelled by the fact that the military government did not prosecute the army officers responsible for killing the northern leaders. Many northerners saw the coup as a plot to make the Igbo dominant in Nigeria, and there was hostility from the Muslim population. Fighting broke out between the northerners and the Igbo, and in July 1966 a group of northern army officers revolted against the government, killed General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi, and appointed the army Chief of Staff, General Yakubu Gowon, as head of the new military government. In 1967, Gowon moved to split the existing 4 regions of Nigeria into 12 states. The military governor of the Eastern Region, Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, refused to accept the division of the Eastern Region and declared that this region would become an independent republic, named Biafra. This led to a civil war between Biafra and the remainder of Nigeria. The war began in June 1967 and continued until Biafra surrendered on 15 January 1970. Over 1 million people died during the conflict.

Helen Maxwell Newham was born in 1896, daughter of Rev. W. G. Newham. After being educated at Godolphin School, Salisbury she trained as a teacher at Salisbury Training College and Shoreditch College. Helen Newham worked as a teacher in South West Africa between 1929 and 1933. On her return to England she became headmistress at Bayham, Suffolk and then from 1948 in Campsea Ashe. She died on 6 Feb 1974.

Allison Wessels George Champion ('Mahlath' amnyama') was born in 1893. He was known as a campaigner for racial equality, devoting his life to the betterment of Zulu people. Positions held during his career included Natal Provincial Secretary of the Industrial and Commercial Workers' Union; founder member and Provincial President of the African National Congress; Chairman of the then Durban Combined Bantu Advisory Board; and central committee member of Inkatha Kwazulu. He also wrote a regular column for Ilanga (newspaper) entitled 'Okubanwa ngumahlathi' ('As seen by Mahlathi'). Champion died at his home in Chesterville in 1975. He was about to be returned without opposition to a position he had held as a member of the Ningizimu Urban Bantu Council.

Basil Davidson was born on 9 November 1914. He was a member of the editorial staff of the Economist, 1938-1939. Following a brief spell as diplomatic correspondence for The Star in 1939, Davidson joined the army, serving throughout the European sphere of conflict, including a spell in Italy resulting in his receiving the Freedom of the City of Genoa in 1945. After the war he continued his work as a journalist, as Paris correspondent for The Times until 1949. He subsequently worked for the New Statesman, 1950-1954, for the Daily Herald, 1954-1957, and as leader-writer for the Daily Mirror, 1959-1962.

Since his 1952 Report on South Africa Davidson has written over twenty books on Africa and a number of novels. His publications on Portuguese Africa include In the Eye of the Storm: Angola's People (1972). He was also responsible for an eight-part television documentary on Africa in 1984. Since 1978 he has been an Honorary Research Fellow of the University of Birmingham and has received Honorary Doctorates from the Universities of Ibadan (1975), Dar es Salaam (1985), Open University (1980) and Edinburgh (1981).

Mary Benson was born in South Africa in 1919. After a period spent travelling in Europe and the United States she enlisted in the South African Women's Army as a Personal Assistant and was sent to the Middle East, Italy, Greece and Austria. Following the War she became secretary to the film director, David Lean. On reading Alan Paton's Cry, the Beloved Country in 1948, she became friendly with the author and determined to involve herself more fully in South African politics. From 1950-1956 she assisted the radical Anglican priest, Rev. Michael Scott and helped to found the African Bureau in London. In 1957, Mary Benson became Secretary of the Treason Trials Defence Fund. Her biography of Tshekedi Khama was published in 1960 and then in 1963 The African Patriots: The Story of the African National Congress of South Africa. In May 1963 she became the first South African to testify at the Committee on Apartheid at the United Nations, risking imprisonment on her return by calling for sanctions. In February 1966 she was banned and placed under house arrest until she went into exile later that spring.

Mary Benson's other writings include a novel, At the Still Point (1969), South Africa: The Struggle for a Birthright (an update of African Patriots) (1966), and Nelson Mandela (1986). She also edited Athol Fugard's Notebooks (1983) and has written a number of radio plays.

Laura Elsie Beckingsale was born on 1st September 1886 in Camden Town, North London. She was educated privately at first, and then attended Bestraven High School, Brondesbury, until she was eighteen. After teaching for a year elsewhere, she returned to Bestraven as a member of staff. At the age of twenty-three she entered the Women's Missionary College, Edinburgh, and in March 1911, went to Wuchang, China, with the London Missionary Society. She remained there until 1915, when she returned to England under medical advice, arriving March 1. A year later she resigned her connection with the London Missionary Society and joined the Baptist Missionary Society, for work in China. She was put in charge of a girl's boarding school at Tai Yuanfu Shansi. She finally returned to England in 1939. Laura Beckingsale never married. She died in 1983.

Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje was born on 9 October 1876, in the district of Boshof, Orange Free State, South Africa. His parents were Barolongs, coming originally from Thaba Ncho, and trekking eventually to Mafeking. He was educated at Pneil Mission Station (Berlin Missionary Society), near Barkly West, until he passed the fourth standard. He then worked as a student teacher, continuing his study through private lessons from the Rev. G. E. Westphal. In March 1894 he joined the Cape Government Service as a letter-carrier in the Kimberley Post Office. In his own time he studied languages and passed the Cape Civil Service examination in typewriting, Dutch and native languages. In 1898 he was transferred to Mafeking as interpreter, and during the Siege of Mafeking at the outbreak of the Boer War in 1899, he was appointed Dutch interpreter to the Court of Summary Jurisdiction.

Plaatje decided to become a journalist in order to give a voice to the Bantu people. He edited a number of Bantu language newspapers including Koranta ea Becoana (The Bechuana Gazette) 1902-1905, a weekly paper in English and Sechuana, which was financed by Chief Silas Molema. He then became Editor of Tsala ea Batho (The People's Friend) 1910-c1912.

He was elected First Secretary-General of the South African Native National Congress (forerunner of the African National Congress), 1912-1917. In 1914 and 1919 he was a member of the Congress delegation to London against the Natives' Land Act of 1913.

As a result of financial difficulties he became stranded in London for some time, but used this time to address meetings and to write Sechuana Proverbs. He returned to South Africa in 1917. Plaatje was also a delegate to the first Government Conference held under the Native Affairs Act. He travelled throughout Europe, Canada and the United States to draw attention to the plight of the black South Africans.

He was the author of numerous books including Native Life in South Africa (1915), Sechuana Proverbs and their European Equivalents (1916), and A Sechuana Reader. In 1919 he wrote Mhudi (published in 1930), which was the first published novel written in English by a Black South African.

He died on 19 June 1932.

Further reading: B Willan, Sol Plaatje: South African Nationalist 1876-1932 (Heineman, 1984).

Mangosuthu Gatsha Buthelezi was born on 27 August 1928, in what is now the province of Kwazulu-Natal. He was the son of Chief Mathole Buthelezi and Princess Magogo. He was educated at Fort Hare University. He joined the African National Congress (ANC) Youth League while attending college. In 1952 he married Irene Audrey Thandekile Mzila. In 1953 he became Chief of the Buthelezi tribe. He was involved in the administration of the Zulu people from 1953-1968. In 1976 he became the first Chief Minister of Kwazulu (the 'Bantustan' designated for Zulu people under the system of Apartheid). He also revived Inkatha Yenkululeko Yesizwe, the Zulu National Cultural Liberation Movement, as an anti-apartheid organisation, now the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP). In the 1980's tensions mounted between Inkatha and the ANC, and the early 1990's saw increasingly violent clashes between supporters of the two parties. Buthelezi was particularly opposed to the ANC's support for international sanctions against Apartheid. Inkatha boycotted the 1993 multiparty talks that wrote the new South African constitution, but participated in South Africa's first multiracial elections in 1994. In 1994, Buthelezi was appointed Minister of Home Affairs in the cabinet of President Nelson Mandela. In June 1999, Buthelezi declined a conditional offer by the South African President Elect Thabo Mbeki to be Deputy President. The post was offered in exchange for his party's surrender of leadership of Kwazulu-Natal province. It was decided to retain Buthelezi as Minister for Home Affairs when these negotiations collapsed.

Unknown

The Republic of Biafra was a short-lived secessionist state, established in 1967 by the Ibo (Igbo) people of south-eastern Nigeria. Biafra proclaimed its independence on 30 May 1967 after the Islamic Hausa and Fulani peoples, who dominated the Nigerian federal government, massacred between 10,000 and 30,000 of the Christian Ibo. Lt. Col. Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu (military governor of the Eastern region of Nigeria, 1966-1967) led the new secessionist state of Biafra, 1967-1970. The country took its name from the Bight of Biafra (an arm of the Atlantic Ocean). It comprised roughly the East-Central, South-Eastern and river states of the federation of Nigeria, where the Ibo predominated. Biafra's original capital was Enugu, but Aba, Umuahia and Owerri served successively as provincial capitals after the Nigerian forces captured Enugu. Civil war followed the proclamation of independence, beginning in June 1967. Nigeria imposed economic sanctions on Biafra from the start of the secession, and by 1968 Biafra had lost its seaports and become landlocked. Starvation and disease followed. The Biafrans surrendered on 15 January 1970. Estimates of mortality range from 500,000 to several million.

Silas Modiri Molema was born c1891, in Mafeking, South Africa. He attended the Lovedale Institution and the University of Georgia, qualifying in medicine in 1919. In 1921 he returned to Mafeking to work as a doctor. From the 1940s he was involved in the African National Congress, and was elected National Treasurer in December 1949. He resigned in 1953. He died in 1965.

His publications included The Bantu Past and Present: An Ethnographical and Historical Study of the Native Races of South Africa (1920); Montshiwa 1815-1896: BaRolong Chief and Patriot (1966); and Chief Moroka: His Life, His Country and His People (1987).

William Charles Anderson was born 24 August 1897. In the early 1920s he worked as a cotton estate manager for Magunda estates in British Nyasaland on cotton plantations at Mbewe and Gonda.

From at least 1821 the Church Missionary Society advocated the establishment of a permanent post in Jerusalem. The London Jewish Society, which aimed to convert Jews to Christianity, also took an interest in the city. The first permanent station was established in Jerusalem in 1833 and the first Bishop, Michael Solomon Alexander (a converted Jewish Rabbi), arrived in 1841 with the aim of converting Jews and Palestinians to Christianity. The Bishopric started as an Anglo-Prussian union, for Anglicans and Lutherans. In 1845, the first Anglican Church (Christ Church, Jaffa Gate) was dedicated. The second Bishop (1845-1879) was Samuel Gobat von Cremines. After the death of the third Bishop (1879-1881), Joseph Barclay, the Bishopric became a solely Anglican Bishopric, centred on the Cathedral Church of St George, which was built and dedicated in 1898 under the fourth Bishop, George Blyth (d 1914).

Khalil Sakakini (1878-1953) was a Palestinian educationalist and Arab nationalist.

Isa Daoud Al-Isa (1878-1950) was a Palestinian journalist and poet, the co-founder (in 1911) and editor of the Arabic newspaper based in Jaffa, Filastin.

Ebenezer John Mann was born in 1881, and Mabel Mann in 1883. They were second cousins, and first met in England in 1900. Each sailed independently for China with the China Inland Mission - Ebenezer in 1903, and Mabel in 1905. Both were sent to Kansu province (North West China) - Ebenezer to Tsinchow and Fukiang, Mabel to Liangchow. In October 1907 they were married at Sichuan and left to fill a gap at the Si'ning Mission (close to the Tibetan border) for six months. In May 1908 they returned to Fukiang, where they were based until their retirement in 1944. In 1921 Ebenezer Mann was appointed Chairman of the Famine Relief Committee set up after the earthquake in Kansu Province. He was awarded the Certificate of the Medal of the Sprouting Grain in 1921, the highest award given to foreigners. Ebenezer Mann died in 1957 and Mabel Mann in 1977.

John Boden Thomson was born on 14 April 1841 at Kirkpatrick, Kirkcudbrightshire. He studied at Western College and Highgate Missionary College. He married Elizabeth Edwards in 1869. In the same year he was appointed to Matabeleland with the London Missionary Society. He was ordained on June 17 at Trinity Presbyterian Church, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Thomson and his wife sailed on 9 August 1869, and arrived at Inyati, Matabeleland on 29 April 1870. Thomson was initially posted to the Matabele Mission, where Robert Moffat, William Sykes and Thomas Morgan Thomas were already based. He was to replace Thomas, who was due to return to England. During his service in Matabeleland, Thomson was able to negotiate the grant of a valley 50 miles from Inyati with the Matabele Chief, Lobengula. The site was to form the basis of the new Hope Fountain Mission - a difficult station, which was to be destroyed twice through local conflict before the end of the nineteenth century.

In 1876, Thomson was recalled to England to discuss the possibility of establishing a new Mission at Ujiji on Lake Tanganyika. Together with Roger Price, he was appointed leader of the Central Africa Mission to Ujiji. Leaving his family in England, he sailed for Zanzibar on 6 May 1877. The party, including Thomson, Roger Price, Elbert Sellis Clarke, Edward Coode Hore, Arthur William Dodgshun and Walter Hutley, left Zanzibar for the Ujiji on 21 July 1877. The expedition was beset by difficulties. To travel across Central Africa with ox-drawn wagons proved impracticable, and after deliberation the Mission members decided that their original objective of reaching Ujiji without establishing intermediate stations was over ambitious. Price was dispatched to England to consult with the Directors of the London Missionary Society. The remaining members decided to press on to Ujiji. Clarke withdrew from the Mission in January 1878. When Price failed to return from England, Thomson was appointed overall leader of the expedition (February 1878). The party set out from Kirasa on 29 May 1878. Thomson's group arrived in Ujiji on 23 August 1878. Dodgshun's group failed to reach Ujiji until 27 March 1879, Dodgshun dying seven days after his arrival. Thomson himself died suddenly of a fever on 22 September 1878.

Shaw , Mabel , 1889-1973 , missionary

Mabel Shaw was born in December 1889, at Bilston. She trained at the Women's Missionary College, Edinburgh. In 1915, she was appointed to Mbereshi, central Africa, with the London Missionary Society, and sailed on 6 March 1915. She was the first single woman missionary to be sent by the London Missionary Society to Central Africa. Her work was chiefly educational, but also evangelistic. She founded the Girl's Boarding School, which later became known as the Livingstone Memorial School in Mbereshi, and which marked a significant new chapter in the education of African girls in Northern Rhodesia. In 1931 she was awarded an OBE in recognition of her missionary work in central Africa. She retired from the London Missionary Society in 1941. In 1942 she was appointed to temporary service with the Church Missionary Society, and sailed once more for Africa on 9 April. She retired from the Church Missionary Society in 1952. She died on 25 April 1973 in Guildford.

Books written by Mabel Shaw included Children of the Chief (LMS Gift Book for 1921); Dawn in Africa (Edinburgh House Press, 1927); God's Candlelights: An Educational Venture in Northern Rhodesia (Edinburgh House Press, 1932); A Treasure of Darkness: An Idyll of African Child Life (Longmans, 1936).

Margaret Katherine Sabin was born on 17 Apr 1887. She was educated at Camden School, with a scholarship of three years to the North London Collegiate School. From 1913-1914, she undertook a training course at Westhill, Selly Oak. She was a member of the Church at Lyndhurst Road, Hampstead, North London, and its associated Mission at Kentish Town. In 1919, she accompanied her sister on a two-year visit to China, where she observed the work of the London Missionary Society. In 1922, she returned by way of South Africa, and spent a few months at Hope Fountain. In 1926, she was appointed as an educational missionary with the London Missionary Society, and posted to Mbereshi, Northern Rhodesia. She remained in Mbereshi until 1948, assisting Mabel Shaw (founder of the Livingstone Memorial School) in building up the girl's boarding school and home. She died in 1978.

Constance (Ethel) Cousins was born on 22 September 1882, in Antananarivo (Tananarive), Madagascar. She was the daughter of the Rev. William Edward Cousins, missionary to Madagascar with the London Missionary Society, 1862-1899. By 1885, Constance and her siblings had returned to England, where they attended the Walthamstow Hall School for the daughters of missionaries. Constance then attended Oxford University, gaining first class honours in Physiology in 1904.

In 1911, Constance Cousins' application to serve with the London Missionary Society was turned down on the grounds that she displayed the symptoms of latent epilepsy (a diagnosis never subsequently confirmed). In November 1911, she went to the Almora Sanatorium for Tuberculosis in North India as an unpaid medical assistant. The Church of Scotland ran the Sanatorium and in November 1913 she transferred to the Church of Scotland's medical mission at Kalimpong (North India). Her appointment to the mission staff was confirmed in January 1914. During her period of service at Kalimpong (1913-1923) she was requested to help combat a cholera epidemic in neighbouring Bhutan. Thus, in August 1918, she and her assistant, Nurse Brodie, became the first European women to be admitted to that country. In 1923 Cousins returned as a permanent member of staff to the Almora Sanatorium. She also obtained a diploma from the School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in London. She continued to work at Almora until her death in May 1944.

John Baker Carpenter was born in Cheltenham in 1874. He was educated at Cheltenham and County School and later attended Corpus Christi College, Cambridge where he graduated with a second class Theology Tripos in 1896. He was appointed to the Church Missionary Society on 30 June 1896. From 1897 to1899 he served as Curate of St. Thomas's, Birmingham. He was posted to Fukien Mission, Foochow on 6 October 1899. He served in Foochow from 1899 to 1901, and 1908 to 1911. Between 1901 and 1907, he was stationed at Futsing, and between 1911 and 1914 at Kutien. From 1915 to 1920 he taught at the Union Theological College at Foochow (later the Fukien Christian University), and from 1917 to 1920 he was Examining Chaplain to the Bishop of Fukien. He returned from China in 1921. He married Edith Casson on 22 April 1901. Their son John was a missionary with the China Inland Mission.

William Arthur Crabtree was born c1868, at Darlington. He was educated at St. Peter's School, York and King's School, Canterbury. He also attended St. Catharine's College and Ridley Hall, Cambridge. He obtained a BA in 1889. In 1890 he trained at the Church Missionary College. On 23 November 1891 he was posted to the East Equatorial Africa Mission, Frere Town, with the Church Missionary Society. From 1892 to 1906, he worked as a missionary explorer in Uganda. His publications included Elements of Luganda Grammar, Together with Exercises and Vocabulary (1902, revised 1921), A Manual of Lu-Ganda (1921), and Primitive Speech (2 parts, 1922).

Rev. Alexander L. Banks was a missionary with the Regions Beyond Missionary Union, based at Siwan, Northern India. The Regions beyond Missionary Union is an inter denominational union, formed in 1899 to carry on the work begun by the East London Institute for Home and Foreign Missions in 1872 - especially in areas beyond those already evangelised. Their field included work in India, Africa and South America.

The Zimbabwe-Rhodesia Constitutional Conference, held at Lancaster House, London, began on 10 September 1979. The delegates included Lord Carrington, the British Foreign Secretary; Bishop Abel Muzorewa, Prime Minister of Rhodesia since the general election in April, and other members of his Government of National Unity including the former premier, Ian Smith, Joshua Nkomo, head of the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU), and Robert Mugabe, head of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), both representing the Patriotic Front. Although none of the participants began the conference with any real expectations that a solution would be reached, after four months of negotiation a settlement was concluded. On 21 December 1979 the delegates signed an agreement to accept a constitution for a new independent Zimbabwe and to implement a cease-fire in the civil war.

Werner , Alice , 1859-1935 , linguist

Alice Werner was born in Trieste on 26 June 1859. In her youth she lived in New Zealand, Mexico, USA and Europe. She was educated partly in Germany, and later in England, where she attended Newnham College, Cambridge University. Her interest in Africa began with visits to Nyasaland in 1893 and Natal in 1894. In 1899 she taught Afrikaans and Zulu in London. Between 1911-1913 she toured East Africa, where she came into contact with Swahili and other languages of the region. In 1917 she joined the School of Oriental Studies as one of the original members of staff, initially as Lecturer but later as Reader and eventually Professor of Swahili and Bantu languages. She continued in this position until her retirement at the end of the 1929/1930 session. During this time, she also taught at Oxford and Cambridge, in co-operation with her sister Mary Werner. In 1928, Alice Werner received the degree of D.Litt from the University of London. After her retirement in 1930, she received the title of Emeritus Professor from the same University. In 1931 she was awarded the Silver medal of the African Society, of which she was Vice-President. She died on 9 June 1935.

Alice Werner made contributions on African subjects to the Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, in addition to other journals. She also produced works on African philology and mythology. Her own publications included: The Natives of British Central Africa (1906); The Language Families of Africa (1915); A Swahili History of Pate (1915); Introductory Sketch of the Bantu Languages (1919); The Swahili Saga of Liongo Fumo (1926); Swahili Tales (1929); Structure and Relationship of African Languages (1930); The Story of Miqdad and Mayasa (1932); and Myths and Legends of the Bantu (1933). She also translated a number of works.

Reginald George Pearce was born in South Africa in 1915. He was educated in South Africa and Scotland. He became junior clerk in a motor firm, and then a bank clerk in Johannesburg, where he worked for seven years. He was ordained into the Anglican Church in 1940, serving first as a curate at the Church of St. Marks, Bury, Lancashire. He spent a year in Brazil from 1957-1958.

From 1958-1961 he served in the Parish of St. John Wynberg, Cape Province, South Africa, before taking up the post of Rector and Manager of Anglican Church Schools in Namaqualand. In September 1964, Pearce became Rector of St. Anne's Church, Maitland, Cape Town.

During his time in South Africa, Rev. Pearce was witness to the effects of the Race Re-classification Laws on members of his own congregation. In 1964 he became involved in the case of William Boikanyio, a 14 year-old student who was removed from the Steinkopf Coloured High School following a ruling by the Coloured Regional School Board, Springbok, that re-classified him as 'black' (Bantu). In January 1967 he resigned his living and used his passport to sponsor the passage of the Fabing family to England, when certain members of the family were re-classified from 'white' to 'coloured'. The wide publicity surrounding the case and the difficulty in obtaining a suitable post in England led to a deterioration in Pearce's health, and he was hospitalised from May - June 1967.

In July 1967, he returned to South Africa to take up a post as hospital chaplain and assistant priest at St. Mary's Collegiate Church, Port Elizabeth. However, his continued stand against apartheid led to his resignation in August 1968. He returned to England, where he became Vicar of St. Clether Church, Laneast, Cornwall. He continued to support the Fabings and it was while seeking sponsorship for Aubrey Fabing's education in 1969 that he came into contact with the Anti-Apartheid Movement, which he later joined. Although Pearce's main concern was with the apartheid system in South Africa, he was also involved in other aspects of church work, for example combating alcoholism and developing the role of the church in industry.

Reginald John Beagarie ('Mike') Moore was born on 20 August 1909. He was educated at Bungay Grammar School and Clarke's College, London. In 1928 he entered Cheshunt College, Cambridge, where he studied for a degree in theology and anthropology. He was appointed with his wife (née Joan Gundry) in 1933 to Central Africa by the London Missionary Society as the first representative of what was to be the United Missions in the Copper Belt. After a few months of study of the Bemba language, he settled in the Copper Belt at Mindolo, a section of the Nkana Mine. For two years, he and his wife laid the foundations of the United Church and Mission. The United Missions came into being in 1936, when a number of colleagues joined Mr and Mrs Moore. Amongst their work, they built up a small printing press. In 1941 Moore was transferred to the Mpolokoso District and settled at Kashinda, where he undertook evangelistic work over a wide area.

Following a long illness, R. J. B. Moore died at Johannesburg on 27 February 1943 at the age of 33.

Publications by R. J. B. Moore include: Man's Act and God's in Africa (London, 1940), These African Copper Mines (London, 1948), and Africa at the Mines (London c1948). He also published articles in numerous journals including Journal of the Royal African Society, Bantu, African Studies and International Review of Missions.

Further reading: H Theobald, Moore of the Copper Belt (London, 1946). A copy of this work is included in the collection.

McLean , David , 1833-1908 , banker

David McLean was born on 4 February 1833 at Scotswall Farm, near Dunfermline in Fife. At sixteen he joined the National Bank of Scotland. In 1858 he took a post in the Far East with the Oriental Bank at Hong Kong and Shanghai. In 1865 he was appointed Manager of the Shanghai Office of the newly formed Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank. He remained there until 1873 when he was made Manager of the Bank's London Office, where he stayed until his retirement in 1899. McLean remained with the Bank as a Member of its London Committee for some years after his retirement. He died in June 1908.

Chaloner Alabaster was born in 1838 at Barcombe in Bournemouth, and educated at King's College, London. In 1855 he was appointed student interpreter in China and served through the Opium wars and the Taiping Rebellion. He was Vice-Consul at Shanghai (1869-1873), and went on to become Consul General at Hankow (Wuhan) (1880-1886) and Canton (1886-1891). In 1892, the year of his retirement, he was knighted. He died in 1898. Sir Chaloner Alabaster was married in 1875, to Laura, daughter of Dr. D. J. MacGowan of New York.

His elder brother was a member of the China Consular Service from 1856 and his son became Attorney General in Hong Kong.

The Nazareth Baptist Church was founded by Isaiah Shembe, the Zulu religious leader and healer, in Natal in 1910. The amaNazarites are the oldest African independent church in South Africa. For further information see A Vilakazi, Shembe: the revitalization of African Society (1986).

James Legge was born on 20 December 1814 at Huntly, Aberdeenshire. He studied at Kings College and the University of Aberdeen, and at Highbury College. He was ordained on 25 April 1839 at Trevor Chapel, Brompton. On 30 April 1839, he married Mary Isabella Morison (1816-1852).

He was appointed to the London Missionary Society (LMS) in 1839, and was posted to China. He arrived at Malacca on 10 January 1840, where he served as Head of the Anglo Chinese Mission in Malacca from 1840 to 1843. In 1842, he received the diploma of D.D. from the University of New York. After the opening of the ports of China, he left Malacca on 6 May 1843 for Singapore. There he began his work translating and annotating the Chinese classics, which he was to continue until shortly before his death. He proceeded to Macao, and arrived at Hong Kong on 10 July 1843. At the Conference of LMS Missionaries that year, he was appointed to the charge of the Anglo-Chinese Theological Seminary at Hong Kong. Between November 1845 and 1848, Mr and Mrs Legge visited England and China, before returning to Hong Kong. Mrs Legge died at Hong Kong on 17 October 1852. During a visit home to England (1858-1859), James Legge married his second wife, Hannah Willetts, widow of the Reverend G. Willetts and daughter of John Johnson. In June 1859, they sailed with his two daughters to Hong Kong.

In 1861, James Legge published his first volume of The Chinese Classics. In 1866, Mrs Legge returned to England, followed by her husband in 1867. In 1870, the degree of LL.D. was conferred on him by the University of Aberdeen. In February 1870, he sailed alone for Hong Kong to take up a three-year Pastorate with the Union Chapel, Hong Kong. At the end of this term he visited the stations at Shanghai, Chefoo and Peking and returned to England via Japan and the United States, arriving in England in August 1873. In November 1873, he withdrew from the position of missionary with the LMS. In 1876 he was appointed to the Chair of Chinese at the University of Oxford. Mrs Hannah Legge died on 21 June 1881. James Legge died on 29 November 1897.

James Legge's publications included: The Chinese Classics, 8 volumes (Trübner & Co.); The Religions of China (Hodder & Stoddington, 1880); also numerous pamphlets on Chinese subjects and translations from Chinese.

Serdang Central Plantations Ltd

Serdang Central Plantations Ltd. was registered as a company on 12 January 1909, to acquire and manage estates and plantations for the production of rubber, coffee, cocoa and other crops. The company's registered offices were at Mincing Lane House, Eastcheap, London. The Directors in 1909 were William Frederick de Bois Maclaren, Herbert Wright, Frank Copeman and James Charles Tate. The first Annual General Meeting of the company was held on 16 March 1909. The first estates to be purchased were Soekaloewi and Boloewa, Malaysia. This was extended in 1929 with the acquisition of the Wassenaar Estate in the Tamiang District of Sumatra.

By 1918 the company was feeling the effects of wider problems in the rubber plantation industry caused by a lack of shipping, the restriction of imports imposed by the Government of the United States of America and the consequently low prices of rubber. By 1921, the company had joined the restriction scheme of the Rubber Growers' Association in an attempt to stabilise prices. By 1932 the company faced liquidation, and turned to its shareholders to support a voluntary liquidation of the company and reconstruction of a new company under the same name. The new company was incorporated on 8th September 1932.

Born, 1921; educated at Tonbridge School; attended Magdalene College, Cambridge (Scholar, MA, PhD); Bye-Fellow, Magdalene College, Cambridge, 1947-1949; Lecturer and Senior Lecturer, University College of the Gold Coast, 1949-1955; Professor of History, 1955-1959; Deputy Principal, 1957-1959; Lecturer in African History, School of Oriental and African Studies, 1959-1963; Professor of African History, University of Birmingham, 1963-1984; Director, Centre of West African Studies, 1963-1982; Deputy Dean, Faculty of Arts, 1973-1975; Dean, 1975-1978; Pro-Vice-Chancellor, 1979-1984; Vice-Principal 1981-1984; Emeritus Professor of History; Fellow of the Royal Historical Society; Honorary Fellow, School of Oriental and African Studies. Publications include: 'The achievement of self-government in southern Rhodesia, 1898-1923' (PhD thesis, 1949); An atlas of African history (1958); with Roland Oliver, A short history of Africa (1962); edited Africa discovers her past (1970); edited, with Roland Oliver, Papers on African Prehistory (1970); A history of Africa (1978); edited The Cambridge history of Africa, vol 2 (1978); Black Africa in time-perspective: four talks on wide historical themes, ed P E H Hair (1990); and other publications relating to West Africa and African history. With Roland Oliver, edited the Journal of African History, 1960-1973, and joint general editor of The Cambridge History of Africa (8 vols, 1975-1986).

Wilson Herbert Geller was born on 26 December 1868 at Thaxted in Essex. He trained at Harley College. In 1897 he was appointed to Siaokan in Central China as Lay Evangelist for the London Missionary Society. On 5 January 1901 he married Mabel Love Neal, also of the London Missionary Society, at Union Church, Hong Kong. His work was mainly pastoral and evangelistic with the oversight of a large country district comprising about 25 churches. He took a large part in the production of a Chinese hymnbook, and composed many of the tunes. He also planned and built Siaokan Church. He retired in 1936, and died on 20 November 1949.

Mabel Love Neal was born on 18 December 1872 at Stoke Newington. She was appointed to Canton and sailed on 9 November 1897. Her chief work in China was building up a Bible school for women, as well as taking part in general work for women and girls at Siaokan Mission. She died on 17 December 1953.

Melville Douglas Mackenzie was born on 29 June 1889, son of Frederick Lumsden Mackenzie. He was educated at Epsom College and then at the University of London where he obtained a degree in Medicine in 1911. He obtained his Doctorate in 1920 and Diplomas in Tropical Medicine and Hygiene and Tropical Hygiene in the same year, and in 1921 an additional Diploma in Public Health. He married Caroline Faith Mackay in 1934.

During the First World War, he served as a Captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps (1917-1919). He was the Senior Medical Officer to the Russian Famine Relief Administration (1921-1923). In 1926 he joined the Ministry of Health and in 1928 he was invited to join the Health Organisation of the League of Nations. From 1931-1932 he went as the Special Commissioner to the Council of the League of Nations, to pacify and disarm native tribes - the Kru (Kroo) peoples - and fix new boundaries in Liberia. He was also a member of the Advisory Mission to the Liberian General Health Survey. In 1936 he became the Acting Director of the League of Nations Epidemiological Bureau, Singapore and later became Chairman of the European Health Committee of United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Organization (UNRRA). Later in 1946 he was United Kingdom Delegate, with Plenipotentiary Powers, to the World Health Conference in New York. He died on 1 December 1972.

Unknown

Factors behind the Indian Mutiny (1857-1858) included the political expansion of the East India Company at the expense of native rulers, harsh land policies of successive Governor-Generals, and the rapid introduction of European civilization. The trigger was discontent among indigenous soldiers (both Hindu and Muslim), who revolted, capturing Delhi and proclaiming an emperor of India. The mutiny became a more general uprising against British rule, spreading through northern central India. Cawnpore (Kanpur) and Lucknow fell to Indian troops. With support from the Sikh Punjab, troops under generals Colin Campbell and Henry Havelock reconquered affected areas. The British government subsequently undertook reform, abolishing the East India Company and assuming direct rule by the Crown. Expropriation of land was discontinued, religious toleration decreed, and Indians were admitted to subordinate civil service positions. The proportion of British to native troops was increased as a precaution against further uprisings.

Publications: Federalism and higher education in East Africa (1974); edited Labour and unions in Asia and Africa: contemporary issues (1988); edited Trade unions and the new industrialization of the Third World (1988); Imperialism or solidarity? International labour and South African trade unions (1995); edited, with Tsoeu Petlane, Democratisation and demilitarisation in Lesotho: the general election of 1993 and its aftermath (1995); edited, with John Daniel and Morris Szeftel, Voting for democracy: watershed elections in contemporary anglophone Africa (1999); edited Opposition and democracy in South Africa (2001).

Peter Hackett was a British field researcher involved in the collection of material for the planned third volume of the Linguistic Survey of the Northern Bantu Borderland (Oxford University Press for the International African Institute, 1956).

The survey was undertaken under the auspices of the International African Institute. Support for the project was obtained from the British, French and Belgian governments, and the work was overseen by Malcolm Guthrie and Archibald Norman Tucker. The field research was carried out by four investigators, two to work on the western languages (between the Atlantic Coast and the River Oubangui) and two to work on the eastern (or central) languages (from the River Oubangui to the Great Lakes). In addition to Peter Hackett, the British members of the team included I Richardson, joined by G Van Bulck from Belgium and André Jacquot, a Frenchman. Richardson and Jacquot worked on the western languages, while Hackett and Van Bulck on those in the then Belgian Congo.

At a later date, work on the languages from the Great Lakes to the Indian Ocean (eastern or far eastern languages) was prepared by Archibald Tucker and Margaret Bryan, from documentary sources as well as their own field research. The collection of material for the first two sections of the work was undertaken from June 1949 to December 1950.

The third volume of Linguistic Survey of the Northern Bantu Borderland, which would have appeared under the heading Linguistic analyses of the central (Belgian Congo) area, never reached publication.