The Portuguese:First Europeans on the Coast.
Two views of Elmina Castle: Built in 1482 by the Portuguese and originally known as Fort San Jorge
The Portuguese were the first Europeans to reach the coast of the country now known as Ghana. Sailors trained by Prince Henry the Navigator had been searching for the people from whom Morrocans had been buying gold. Don Diego de Azambuja was their leader and he was the first European to set foot on the coast of Ghana.They arrived on the coast in 1471 and built a settlement called Fort San Jorge in 1482 on an area of land which they named Elmina, meaning the mines. This settlement was to be the main trading area.
Initially, they traded items like gold, gunpowder, gin and beads for gold, native cloth, pepper and spices from the chiefs of the native people. The natives were of the Akan tribe, the most powerful then and in modern day Ghana. At that time there was no slave trade although some of the natives were taken to Portugal and Spain to be servants in aristocrat homes. Kente: Native Akan Cloth
The Slave Trade.
The slave trade started after the Americas and West Indies were discovered because cheap labor was needed to work the lands. A great number of the Indian tribes in the Americas had been defeated and Spain, who was then controlling the Americas bought slaves from the Poruguese. This was the start of the slave trade. The Elmina Castle was very important to the Europeans for many centuries for it was there the captured slaves from many African settlements were kept under very cruel conditions till they were shipped to the Americas and the West Indies. The Portuguese monopolized the trade with the natives till 1637, when the Dutch defeated them and took control of Elmina Castle. Other European countries competed to take control of the slave trade and each country added more forts along the coast.
While the Europeans fluorished in the slave trade, the natives were building their own states through wars with each other and diplomacy. The Asante Empire and the Fantes were the two states that the natives had developed by 1750. In the 19th century, the British were controling the trade on the coast and the Asante were expanding over Southern territories. The British did not like the power the Asante Empire was gaining especially because they were very sophisticated in their administration of the trade.
The Gold Coast Colony
Before the Gold Coast became an official Crown colony the British had already been ruling some parts of it. In 1874, the Gold Coast, made up of the Southern States became a Crown colony of the British. The Asantes continued to fight and they defeated the British in a series of wars. In 1896, the British captured Nana Prempeh I, the King of the Asante Empire in an attempt to break the spirit of the people and prevent them from continuing to fight. This did not work so the British seized the Golden Stool of the Asante (picture on left) on March 28, 1900 in a second attempt to break their spirits. The people went home without an immediate fight to prepare for war. The chiefs had a meeting where they were discouraged till Yaa Asantewaa, one of the Queenmothers stood up and gave a moving speech which inspired them to fight.
She led them to war against the British and the British did not defeat them till after many months. Yaa Asantewa was captured and sent in exile to Seychelles island. The British finally had power over the Asante and made them as well as the Northern States part of the colony in 1902.
