James Richardson (explorer of the Sahara)

James Richardson ( born November 3, 1809 in Boston, Lincolnshire, † March 4, 1851 in Ngurutua at Kuka, Bornu ) was a British missionary, abolitionist and African explorer.

Life

Richardson was an opponent of the slave trade, which was still operated around the middle of the 19th century in a big way between Lake Chad and Tunis, and Tripoli. He hoped that the introduction of the so-called "legitimate trade ", ie the trade in non -human goods to be able to bring the slave trade to a standstill. On the basis of the reports of earlier traveler, he had chosen the Tuareg controlled the trans-Saharan trade, as allies. The African traders should more European - import finished products to Inner Africa and exclusively to domestic products, but not for slaves, trade - primarily British.

Work

In 1843, Richardson took the attempt to penetrate into the forbidden for Christians Morocco and to proselytize among the living there and oppressed by the Muslim majority Jews. After he was expelled from the country, he undertook in 1845 on their own a research trip over Tunis and Tripoli in Libya through the midst of the Sahara to Ghadames and Ghat. Here he gathered information about the Tuareg, of which he hoped to support, tied valuable contacts with the leaders of this people and met after nine months, sometimes very arduous, hike over Fezzan back in Tripoli.

After he had published in 1849 in his Travels in the great desert of Sahara, a description of this expedition, he succeeded the British government to move to equip an expedition to the Sudan and Chad. His main argument against the government was to increase the export of machine-made fabrics. Simultaneously, the production of cotton in Africa should be increased, and the UK should have exclusive access to these areas of cultivation. As the Ghanaian historian Adu Boahen has shown in a comprehensive study on the political and economic backgrounds of the British research on Africa, it was Richardson personally but primarily to combat the slave trade, and the economic arguments were focused on the skeptics in the British Foreign Office for his controversial to lure project.

As in England no suitable scientists were to recruit, the geographer and historian Heinrich Barth and the geologist Adolf Overweg from Berlin were recruited through the mediation of the Prussian ambassador. In March 1850 Richardson broke on Tripoli and went for the second time to Ghat. He was the first European who crossed the rocky plateau of the Hammada. From there he went on his way after Aïr ( Asben ) and Bornu continued. In the course of the expedition, there was a violent quarrel between Richardson and Barth, as the German saw his role not in the promotion of British foreign trade, but in exploring the cultures and history of Africa.

James Richardson died on this journey on March 4, 1851 in Ngurutua, situated at six days' journey from Kuka. After his death, Heinrich Barth took over the leadership of the expedition. The contracts the Richardson and Barth had concluded with African leaders, were never ratified by the British government, as had been during the absence of the expedition explored the route over the Niger Delta, and thus found a more convenient way to Inner Africa.

Works

• Travels in the great desert of Sahara. 2 vols London 1849
• Narrative of a mission to Central Africa. 2 vols London 1853 - His travel notes and diaries were published posthumously by Bayle Saint John:
• Report on a mission to Central Africa in the years 1850 and 1851, by order and at the expense of the Government of Her Majesty of Great Britain. Leipzig 1853.
• Travels in Morocco. 2 vols London 1859.