Red Book 1912 - G. Denhardt - Lamu

Frederick Jackson, Early Days in East Africa, 1930 Fellow passengers aboard ship in 1884. The elder of the two brothers could speak English quite well and as he had been up before with Dr Fischer the naturalist and knew Witu and the Tana river well, we soon became very friendly, and he gave me much good advice and very useful information. He also stuffed me with all kinds of cock-and-bull stories about the prospective scientific expedition up the Tana on which they were bent, showed me his maps and various scientific instruments and 'gulled' me generally. Gustav spoke very little English, was very retiring, and it was his first visit to the country, so Clemens did all the talking.

The real intentions were to visit and exchange treaties with the rebel sultan of Witu, Simba (lion) thy name, who had for many years been a thorn in the slide of the Sultan of Zanzibar, Clemens' irritation, not to say anger, when I referred to Simba as a renegade, kidnapper of slaves, and harbourer of all the cutthroats and blaggards of the coast. The Germans were inaugurating their scheme for Colonial possessions by a well thought out and considered system of intrigue and fraud,and the employment of an unscrupulous gang of bogus treaty makers. Their case of scientific instruments was actually guns, presents for Simba. They made an agreement with Simba, which led, together with the presence of two German cruisers in Manda Bay, to the declaration of the German protectorate in 1886.

Chanler Besides these two representatives of the British East Africa Company, two other Europeans resided there [at Lamu], Germans, named Teida and Denardtt, engaged in trade with the natives and in the management of several plantations. Gustave Denhardt, in company with his brother and the late Dr Fischer, had been the first to ascend the Tana River. At this time he had been a resident of that portion of the country about twelve years; during which period he had endeared himself to the natives, and had acquired a considerable influence over them. Both Messrs Denhardt and Teide proved of the greatest assistance to our expedition and we are much indebted to them for their kind offices. Having decided to make use of the Tana River as a means of transporting a portion of our goods a distance of 200 miles into the interior, it became necessary for me to engage canoes and boatmen for the purpose. Shortly after my arrival at Mkunumbi, Mr Denhardt and I set out for Kau, on the banks of the Tana River, to arrange our little column. We engaged eight large dugouts; and through Mr Denhardt's relations with the natives inhabiting this portion of the banks of the Tana, I was enabled to engage 20 boatmen.