Before the imposition of French rule over the coast of Guinea-Conakry and Fuuta Jaloo in the second half of the nineteenth century, British traders and Britain itself had considered this region to be within their spheres of influence and perhaps expected it to become British territory, if it were to be absorbed by a European power. This paper traces the activities of British investment interests from the mid-eighteenth century and methods used to maintain dominance over competing ventures.
It also details official British governmental efforts to establish colonial posts along this coast and direct linkages with leaders of Fuuta Jaloo to the mid-nineteenth century. Commercial firms with headquarters in Liverpool and London had maintained numerous trading relationships here since the mid-eighteenth century, especially in the Nunez and Pongo rivers, upon Iles de Los, and upon islands located at the mouth of the Sierra Leone River. Trades in coastally produced commodities and in slaves were paramount to the commerce of this coast.
To be sure, every trader upon this coast perhaps dreamed about a commerce that would link his trade to that believed to exist on the Niger River itself and bring gold and highly sought and equally profitable goods to increase his fortune.
It was this dream, encouraged by a lucrative trade in coastal goods, that drove British and other foreign fascination with the hinterland of Guinea-Conakry and with the Fula peoples who ruled in the Fuuta Jaloo highlands. Lesser but significant centers were located in the Nunez, Pongo, and Scarcies rivers where several independent, or at least marginally attached, British traders operated factories. Newly developed indigenous states in these latter rivers, however, organized trade more directly with coasting vessels, and, in consequence, these stranger merchants increasingly found local elites to be less friendly by to foreign competition which might interfere with local control of commerce.
At Iles de Los, the principal Europeans resident there were British, although an occasional French trader is mentioned in the record.
