The Casement Report 43
In these circumstances, in view of the state of mind which they show to
exist among the natives, in view of their impressionable character and
of their natural desire to escape taxation, it could not be doubted but
that the conclusions at which the Consul would arrive would not be other
than those set forth in his Report.
To bring out this point, and to show how little value is to be attached
to his investigations, it will be sufficient to examine one case, that
on which Mr. Casement principally relies; we allude to the Epondo case.
It is that of the child I I, mentioned on pp. 56, 58, and 78 of the
Report.
It is indispensable to enter somewhat at length into the details of this
case, which are significant.
On the 4th September, 1903, the Consul was at the Bonginda station of
the Congo Bololo Mission, having returned from a journey on the Lopori,
during the course of which he had not come across any of those acts of
mutilation which it is the custom to attribute to officials in the
Congo.
At Bonginda, the natives of a neighbouring village (Bossunguma) came to
him and informed him, amongst other things, that a “sentry” of the La
Lulonga Company, named Kelengo,[90] had, at Bossunguma, cut off the hand
of a native called Epondo, whose wounds were still scarcely healed. The
Consul proceeded to Bossunguma, accompanied by the Rev. W. D. Armstrong
and the Rev. D. J. Danielson, and had the mutilated native brought
before him, who, “in answer to Consul’s question, charges a sentry named
‘Kelengo’ (placed in the town by the local agent of the La Lulonga
Society to see that the people work rubber)” with having done it. Such
are the Consul’s own words: it was necessary to establish a relation of
cause and effect between the collection of india-rubber and this alleged
case of cruelty.
The Consul proceeded to question the Chief and some of the natives of
the village. They replied by accusing Kelengo; most of them asserted
that they were _eye-witnesses_ of the deed. The Consul inquired through
his interpreters if there were other witnesses who saw the crime
committed, and accused Kelengo of it. “Nearly all those present, about
forty persons, shouted out with one voice that it was ‘Kelengo’ who did
it.”
In order to understand the violence with which the natives accused
Kelengo, and the unanimous manner in which the denials of the accused
were rejected by his accusers, it is necessary to read the whole of the
report of this inquiry, as drawn up by the Consul himself in a kind of
_procès-verbaux_, dated the 7th, 8th, and 9th September (Annex II). From
all quarters accusers appeared, and the excited crowd gave vent to all
sorts of accusations: he had cut off Epondo’s hand, chained up women,
stolen ducks and a dog! The Consul did not allow his suspicions to be
aroused by the passionate character of these accusations; without any
further guarantee of their sincerity or further examination into their
truth, he looked upon his inquiry as conclusive, and as he had taken
upon himself the duties of the Public Prosecutor in making preliminary
inquiries into the matter, so he anticipated the decision of the
responsible authorities by declaring to the assembled people that
“Kelengo deserved severe punishment for his illegal and cruel acts.” He
proceeded to dramatize the incident by carrying off the pretended
victim, and exhibiting him on the 10th September to the official in
command of the station at Coquilhatville, to whom he handed a copy of
the record of his inquiry, and on the 12th September he addressed a
letter to the Governor-General which he marked as “personal and
private,” and in which he makes the incident in question among others a
text for an attack on “the system of general exploitation of an entire
population which can only be rendered successful by the employment of
arbitrary and illegal force.” His inquiry terminated, he immediately
started on his return journey to the Lower Congo.
Even if the circumstances had been correctly reported, the disproportion
would still have been striking between them and the conclusions which
the Consul draws when emphasizing his general criticisms of the Congo
State. But the facts themselves are incorrectly represented.
As a matter of fact, no sooner did the Consul’s denunciation reach the
Public Prosecutor’s Department than M. Gennaro Bosco, Acting Public
Prosecutor, proceeded to the spot and held a judicial inquiry under the
usual conditions free from all outside influences. This inquiry showed
that His Britannic Majesty’s Consul had been the object of a plot
contrived by the natives, who, in the hope of no longer being obliged to
work, had agreed among themselves to represent Epondo as the victim of
the inhuman conduct of one of the capitas of a commercial Company. In
reality, Epondo had been the victim of an accident while out hunting,
and had been bitten in the hand by a wild boar; gangrene had set in and
caused the loss of the member, and this fact had been cleverly turned to
account by the natives when before the Consul. We annex (Annex No. 3)
extracts from the inquiry conducted by the Acting Public Prosecutor into
the Epondo case. The evidence is typical, uniform, and without
discrepancies. It leaves no doubt as to the cause of the accident, makes
it clear that the natives lied to the Consul, and reveals the object
which actuated them, namely, the hope that the Consul’s intervention
would relieve them from the necessity of paying taxes. The inquiry shows
how Epondo, at last brought to account, retracted what he had in the
first instance said to the Consul, and confessed that he had been
influenced by the people of his village. He was questioned as follows:--
_Q._ Do you persist in accusing Kelengo of having cut off your left
hand?
_A._ No. I told a lie.
_Q._ State, then, how and when you lost your hand.
_A._ I was a slave of Monkekola’s at Malele, in the Bangala
district. One day I went out boar-hunting with him. He wounded one
with a spear, and thereupon the animal, enraged, turned on me. I
tried to run off with the others, but falling down, the boar was on
me in a moment and tore off my left hand and (wounded me) in the
stomach and left thigh.
The witness exhibits the scars he carries at the places mentioned,
and lying down of his own accord shows the position he was in when
the boar attacked and wounded him.
_Q._ How long ago did this accident happen?
_A._ I don’t remember. It was a long time ago.
_Q._ Why did you accuse Kelengo?
_A._ Because Momaketa, one of the Bossunguma Chiefs, told me to,
and afterwards all the inhabitants of my village did so too.
* * * * *
_Q._ Did the English photograph you?
_A._ Yes, at Bonginda and Lulanga. They told me to put the stump
well forward. There were Nenele, Mongongolo, Torongo, and other
whites whose names I don’t know. They were whites from Lulanga.
Mongongolo took away six photographs.[91]
Epondo of his own accord repeated his declarations and retractations to
a Protestant missionary, Mr. Faris, who lives at Bolengi. This gentleman
has sent the Commissary-General at Coquilhatville the following written
declaration:--
“I, E. E. Faris, missionary, residing at Bolengi, Upper Congo,
declare that I questioned the boy Epondo, of the village of
Bosongoma, who was at my house on the 10th September, 1903, with
Mr. Casement, the British Consul, and whom, in accordance with the
request made to me by Commandant Stevens, of Coquilhatville, I took
to the mission station at Bolengi on the 16th October, 1903; and
that the said boy has this day, the 17th October, 1903, told me
that he lost his hand through the bite of a wild boar.
“He told me at the same time that he informed Mr. Casement that his
hand was cut off either by a soldier or, perhaps, by one of those
working for the white men (“travailleurs de blanc”), who have been
making war in his village with a view to the collection of rubber,
but he asserts that the account which he has given me to-day is the
truth.”
(Signed) “E. E. FARIS.”
“_Bolengi, October 17, 1903._”
The inquiry resulted in the discharge of the prisoner, which, so far as
it concerned the Epondo question, was in the following terms:--
We, Acting Public Prosecutor of the Court of Coquilhatville:
Having regard to the notes made by His Britannic Majesty’s Consul,
on the occasion of his visit to the villages of Ikandja and
Bossunguma in the territory of the Ngombe, from which it would
appear that a certain Kelengo, a forest guard in the service of the
La Lulonga Company--
(_a._) Cut off the left hand of a certain Epondo;
(_b._) ...;
(_c._) ...;
Having regard to the inquiry instituted by Lieutenant Braeckman,
which partly confirms the result of the inquiry instituted by His
Britannic Majesty’s Consul, but also partly contradicts it, and to
the charges already brought against Kelengo adds that of having
killed a native of the name of Baluwa;
Having regard to the conclusions arrived at by the police employé
in question, which tend to raise grave doubts as to the truth of
all these charges;
In view of the fact that all the natives who brought these charges
against Kelengo, whether before His Britannic Majesty’s Consul or
Lieutenant Braeckman, on being summoned by us, the Acting Public
Prosecutor, took to flight, and all efforts to find them have been
fruitless; that this flight obviously throws doubt on the truth of
their allegations;
That all the witnesses whom we have questioned during the course of
our inquiry declare ... that Epondo lost his left hand from the
bite of a wild boar;
That Epondo confirms these statements, and admits that he told a
lie at the instigation of the natives of Bossunguma and Ikondja,
who hoped to escape collecting rubber through the intervention of
His Britannic Majesty’s Consul, whom they considered to be very
powerful;
That the witnesses, almost all inhabitants of the accusing
villages, admit that such was the object of their lie;
That this version, apart from the unanimous declarations of the
witnesses and the injured parties, is also the most plausible,
seeing that every one knows that the natives dislike work in
general and having to collect rubber, and are, moreover, ready to lie and accuse people falsely;
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