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Name: BAKER, Frederick Sandbach

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Nee: son of Thomas Baker and Eliza Sandbach. Bro-in-law of R.M. Ewart. Father of Guy

Birth Date: 1849, bapt. 2 Jan 1850 Bunbury, Cheshire

Death Date: 1926 Oswestry

Nationality: British

First Date: 1901

Last Date: 1912

Profession: The Homestead, Nairobi. Provider of dairy products

Area: Nairobi. They left the Colony in 1914 and retired to England

Married: 1. Alice Oliver b. 1858, d. 1887; 2. In 1888 Marie Vera 'Queenie' Salmon b. 1871 (she later m. in 1935 Cape Town, John Wagstaffe Wynter b. 1881)

Children: Guy (1882, bapt. 14 Feb 1883 Church Hulme, Cheshire-27 July 1956 Nairobi))

Book Reference: EAHB 1905, North, Drumkey, EAHB 1906, EA Diary 1902, EAHB 1904, EAHB 1907

General Information:

SE - F. Sandbach Baker - The Homestead, Nbi - Jul 1907
Drumkey 1909 - F. Sandbach Baker, The Homestead, Nairobi
North - F. Sandbach-Baker - British settler; Present at first meeting of 'Committee of Europeans' Nairobi 4-1-1901; Land Grant application, Lari Swamp 22-6-1903; Issued with Bird Licence 16-9-1901
EA Diary 1902 - Listed as Committee member of the East Africa Agricultural and Horticultural Society - Established 1901 - F.S. Baker
EAHB 1904 - Nairobi Residents - Baker, F.S. - The Homestead, Near Nairobi
EAHB 1907 - F.S. Baker - Nairobi (The Homestead)
Web - Royal Birkdale Golf Club - Captain 1894 - F. Sandbach-Baker
North - Issued with Bird Licence 1901; present at first meeting of "Committee of Europeans", Nairobi 4/1/1901; Land Grant application 1903 - Lari Swamp
Old Africa - 13-8-16 - Christine Nicholls - The Sandbach Bakers and Kenya’s first Dairy
One of the first white settlers to be given land in Nairobi was Frederick Baker. He was granted 1,600 acres in Muthaiga by John Ainsworth, the Sub-Commissioner, on condition that he supplied Nairobi with dairy products. Who was Baker and why had he come to East Africa? He was not a young man, having been born in in Bunbury, Cheshire, in December 1849 to Thomas Baker, a draper and grocer, and Eliza Sandbach, and he arrived in Nairobi in 1901 with his second  wife Marie Vera, usually known as Queenie.  Frederick’s first wife Alice Oliver had died in September 1887 and he had married Mary Maria Salmon in 1888. He had been a cotton cloth agent in Stretford, Lancashire (some said he went bankrupt). He took to East Africa with him his wife and his son Guy, a former shipping clerk (born in Holmes Chapel, Cheshire, to his first wife Alice Oliver in October 1882).
Marie was the driving force in the dairy enterprise, which she ran with modern equipment, and she won many prizes in local shows. Her butter, known as ‘siagi ya queenie,’ was much preferred to that imported from India in tins. She became the main supplier of dairy products throughout the Protectorate. According to court records, she also appears to have been a regular litigant – presumably she was suing those who had not paid their bills. Sir Frederick Jackson, in his Early Days in East Africa, described Queenie as ‘a lady who merited the highest respect and admiration for her undoubted pluck and determination to succeed in her venture.’ On the other hand McGregor Ross described her as ‘the dreadfullest shrew you ever dreamed of’ (Rhodes House, McGregor Ross Papers). In 1903 Queenie found she could not manage 1600 acres and leased 500 of them to other settlers, including James Archibald Morrison, a retired captain of the Grenadier Guards. Her husband joined the Nairobi Section (Mounted) of the Volunteer Reserve in 1904.
Queenie sold all her property, known as ‘Homestead Farm’, to Archie Morrison in 1912 for £20 an acre, possibly because her older husband (he was then 71 years of age) was not well, and the pair retired to England, leaving behind her husband’s son Guy. J.C. Coverdale carried out the title survey for Morrison and discovered that the land covered 754 acres. Morrison transformed the dairy establishment to a residential estate with small plots, devised by the firm of architects Henderson and Ward. He also built Muthaiga Club on the site. Muthaiga became a township, but in 1928 it was absorbed into Nairobi Municipality. The name ‘Muthaiga’ refers to the tree whose bark is used by the Kikuyu people for medicine. Gertrude’s Garden Children’s Hospital was later built on the site of the Sandbach Bakers’ house.
The Sandbach Bakers left Mombasa on the Windhoek in August 1912 and arrived in England on the 28th of that month. In England they were interviewed by a reporter from The African World (31 October 1913). Frederick told him that before he went to East Africa he had been a member of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, of the Royal Exchange, the National Liberal Club and the Manchester Reform Club. He said they planned to grow cotton when they went to East Africa, but were dissuaded from this. The reporter described the appearance of Queenie as ‘more fitted for the polite occupations of the drawing room than wrenching into commercial order and success the untamed forces of the jungle and the plains.’ But a few minutes’ conversation led to him say, ’One might as well doubt the traditions of Boadicea or of Joan of Arc as pretend to mistake the qualifications of Mrs Sandbach Baker as a colonial pioneer.’ As for Frederick, he was described as ‘happy in the assurances of the correctness of his conclusions.’ Apparently he had sent the first samples of Ugandan cotton to England in 1902 and claimed that with Lord Emmott he was the means of launching the cotton-growing industry in Uganda.
The reporter interviewed the couple in the Westminster Palace Hotel and said they were planning to leave England to embark on an important project. There is no record that they returned to Kenya. It is possible that they went to India because it was in India that their son Guy married Nora Meade King, on 13 December 1921. Guy remained in Kenya, having been appointed assistant conservator of forests in 1902, in charge of forests in Kikuyu and near Nairobi. He was later involved in the sawmills business and later still farmed at Marmanet Falls, Thomson’s Falls (Nyahururu). He was responsible for starting the Nyeri golf course, with Reggie McClure, in 1910. Both his wife, who died on 4 June 1930, and he are buried in Forest Road cemetery, Nairobi. Guy’s date of death was 27 July 1956. It is not known when or where the dairy pioneers, Frederick and Maria, died, but they do not feature in Kenya records after 1912.
He had a great deal to do with the launching of the cotton-growing industry in EA and both he and his wife took an active part in the social and philanthropic affairs of Nairobi. Stephen Ellis's ledger shows F. Sandbach Baker at The Homestead, Nairobi in July 1907.
Cuckoo - Their estate is now the Muthaiga Club.
Ainsworth - In 1901 Mr Sandbach-Baker was persuaded by Ainsworth to purchase 5,000 acres of land, which later became the suburb of Muthaiga.
KFA - Prize for butter and honey at Nairobi Show in 1906. The Sandbach Bakers are said to have held the first official settlers' lease to be granted in the Highlands. They had arrived in 1901 from Cheshire intending to grow cotton, rubber and flax, but Sir Charles Eliot, the Commissioner, advised them to start a dairy instead. So they bought, for 5 rupees and acre, 5000 acres just outside Nairobi, which then consisted of a few wood and iron structures ........ The course of dairy farming, like that of true love, did not run smooth. The Sandbach Bakers bought a large number of native cattle and, in 1903, lost 54 head in a few months. Mrs Sandbach Baker, "wild with grief", believed them to have been poisoned, though East Coast fever was probably to blame. The Sandbach Bakers persevered and in 1904 won nine first prizes for cheese and butter at a Show in Mombasa, in face of stiff German competition. By 1908 Homestead Farm, as it was called, supported between three and four hundred milking cows and crossbred Herefords, with an output of a hundred pounds of butter and 300 gallons of milk a week, besides Devonshire cream and Stilton and other kinds of cheeses. Its owners claimed not to have lost a single head of stock from disease for 6 years; they had imported Berkshire pigs and had 200 acres under cultivation. Samples of their cotton were welcomed with enthusiasm in Manchester. Shortly before the First World War they sold their farm and it became the Muthaiga building estate. Gertrude's Garden, the childrens' hospital now stands on the site of their original house and buildings.                                          Permanent Way - In 1901 John Ainsworth had persuaded Mr Sandbach-Baker to acquire 5000 acres of land, the present suburb of Muthaiga, which he later sold to Major J.A. Morrison. There Mrs Sandbach-Baker produced the first dairy butter in EA. Of excellent quality, it was known as 'Siagi ya Queenie' - Mrs Sandbach-Baker was known to all her friends as 'Queenie'. 
Kenya Diary - 1903 - Nairobi - At Ainsworth's this afternoon I met a settler called Sandbach-Baker who was given 5000 acres of Kikuyu land by Eliot in 1901, provided he supplied Nairobi with meat. This he does .... He tells me that if I care to ride out any morning he will sell me fresh butter; I shall certainly do so whenever I can, for I dislike tinned butter. (Sandbach-Baker was the original owner of the Muthaiga Estate, which was subsequently sold to Morrison, who developed the garden city; it was originally all Kikuyu land)  
White Man - 1902 - Mrs Sandbach Baker, at dinner with the Commissioner, promised to make Eliot some butter - start of dairying in EA.
North - Former cotton merchant in Manchester, with wife, farmer Nairobi area c. 1901; At 'The Homestead' Nairobi Aug 1902 Playne - Homestead Farm - Mr and Mrs Sanbach Baker, of the Homestead Farm, Nairobi, are the pioneer settlers of BEA, and hold the first settlers' lease ever granted. When they arrived from Cheshire in 1901 they intended to grow cotton, rubber, and falx, but on the advice of Sir Charles Eliot they remained near Nairobi as makers of butter, cheese, and other dairy produce. Their success may be gauged from their splendid record of 40 first prizes. ....... Much of this success is due to the fact that Mr Baker was formerly in the dairy business in England, where he prepared milk for the fever and consumption hospitals of Manchester under the supervision of Dr. Niven, the Medical Officer of Health of Manchester, and Dr. Laithwood, Veterinary Officer, Cheshire County Council. The Homestead Farm is one of the show places of BEA, and visitors find much to interest them there. In extent the farm is 1000 acres, held freehold, and is situated about two and a half miles from Nairobi but only half a mile outside the municipal area. There are 2 good streams of water on the property and plenty of timber, while part of the land is let to tenants who have stalls in the Nairobi market. ........... Most of the dairy work is done by Mr and Mrs Baker, who, since 1901, have employed about 45 natives on the farm. ........ Mr and Mrs Baker were privileged to be presented to the Duke and Duchess of Connaught. Mr and Mrs Baker played a prominent part in the formation of the EA Agricultural and Horticultural Society ............ It is, it may be added, Mr Baker's intention to take up a large area of land, as soon as it is available from the Government, for the purpose of cotton, rubber, and flax cultivation.
Drumkey - Cattle Brand - A1B
Advertiser - 11/12/08 - Advert - Homestead Dairy, Parklands - M.V. Sandbach-Baker
Agricultural Journal 1908 - Brands allotted and registered - Mrs Sandbach Baker, The Homestead, Nairobi - Nairobi A1B North - Henry Wright was fined by Nairobi Magistrate for assaulting Mrs Sandbach-Baker 19-8-1904; on list of 'Principal inhabitants of Nairobi' … with wife Sept 1903; Member of the Nairobi Mounted Section of the EAP Volunteer Reserve June 1905;  
North - 'Mrs Baker is the awfullest shrew you ever dreamed of' (McGregor-Ross, RH)
Red Book 1912 - F. Sandbach-Baker - Nairobi
Web - In 1901, Sub-Commissioner John Ainsworth recommended to Sir Charles Eliot, the then Commissioner of the East Africa Protectorate, that 1,600 acres of unallocated land situated to the north of Nairobi should be ‘given’ to Mr. Guy Sandbach-Baker on condition that he produced dairy products for the Protectorate. Sandbach-Baker, who had been educated at Owens’ College, Manchester and Cheshire County Agricultural College, had been a bankrupt cotton broker in Manchester, England prior to his arrival in the British East Africa Protectorate in 1901. He called his newly acquired property ‘Homestead Farm’, which was constructed on the site where Gertrude’s Garden Children’s Hospital now stands. The farm soon became the major supplier of dairy products to the Protectorate. Within a few years, the Sandbach-Bakers had converted their property from a wilderness, home to wild game into a well-organized dairy farm, boasting the most modern equipment.
 

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