Hitherto, it has not been easy to form a just appraisal of the events that led up to the Kano-Sokoto Expedition Of 1903. Not only has almost all the readily available evidence come from the British side but most of it can be traced back to Sir Frederick Lugard, the High Commissioner. Eminent as he was, he cannot be considered a disinterested witness because, before the event, he was trying to convince a sceptical British Government that it was necessary while afterwards he was at pains to prove that it had been justified. Until recently little account has been taken of the views of British officers who differed from Lugard on this issue and no attempt has been made to check his assertions against such evidence as there is from the other side. As a result, certain anomalies in the accepted version of events have long remained unchallenged. Now, however, when fresh facts have been brought to light on the British side 1 and more is known of the reactions of the Fulani to the British threat, the time has come to attempt a fresh appraisal.
The first subject for scrutiny is the abortive correspondence which was exchanged between Lugard and Sultan Abdu. Describing the circumstances afterwards Lugard made the most of a case which looks less convincing now than it did at the time. He laid great stress on the two letters which he actually did write, covered up the other occasions when he should have written but failed to do so, harped on the difficulty of coming to terms with a potentate who did not reply, and finally built up the Sultan's letter of May 1902 into a virtual declaration of war. To see whether this is a true picture we must run over the course of events afresh.
In 1900 Lugard had the Proclamation establishing the Protectorate translated into Hausa and sent a copy of it to Sokoto. It was not well received by the Sultan, who declined to acknowledge it 2. On his return, Lugard's messenger reported that, when the Sultan had read the proclamation, he had turned to his Court and, speaking in Fulfulde, a language which he wrongly believed the messenger did not understand, had said,
— No letters ever brought fear like this one. I'll read no more letters from these white men 3.
It was supposed at the time that clumsy translation must have given offence where none was intended. This may well have been a contributory factor, but the Sultan's use of the word ‘fear’ suggests that his reaction was one of dismay rather than umbrage. Now the Fulani, even in Bello's day, had known all about the British conquest of India 4 and, more recently, must have heard of British activities on the Gold Coast, in Ashanti, and in Southern Nigeria. They certainly knew of the French drive to the Upper Niger, which had led to the destruction of the Fulani Kingdom created by Haj Umar 5. This being so, it seems likely that what disconcerted the Sultan was not so much the wording of the proclamation as the realization that in future he would be dealing not with a mere trading company but with a world power which he knew to have acquisitive instincts.
Whatever the cause of the Sultan's displeasure, he made it plain to the messenger, first by telling him that if the Europeans came, he was ready to fight them, and then by having him hastily conducted out of the town. From private sources the messenger subsequently gathered that the underlying cause of this hostility was fear that the British determination to suppress the slave trade would ruin Sokoto's agriculture 6, which of course was unusually dependent on slave labour.
When the messenger returned empty-handed to Lokeja and told his story, it was Lugard's turn to be angry. The Sultan's action, he said later, ‘was a deliberate insult.’ 7 From this unhappy start the relations between the two men never recovered.
At the beginning of the following year, 1901, Lugard was apparently still piqued because, when he dispatched a column against Kontagora and Nupe, he took no steps to acquaint the Sultan beforehand with his reasons for doing so. Only in March, when the operation was complete, did he write to explain his motives and invite the Sultan to nominate a new Emir of Kontagora in place of Sarkin Sudan Ibrahim, whom he had defeated and driven out. And even then he went on to inform the Sultan that in Nupe he had deposed Abubakr and reinstated Goldie's nominee, Muhammadu 8. Yet, in making this gesture, Lugard seems to have believed that he had fulfilled all his obligations towards the Sultan.
— This was a very significant act, he wrote afterwards, and equivalent to a recognition of all his ancient prerogatives 9.
Consequently, when this letter too remained unanswered, he again felt aggrieved. It is evident that, through want of imagination, he never realized that his action in Nupe might have spoken louder than his gesture in Kontagora and that even in Kontagora the only choice he was offering was between capitulation (because acceptance of his invitation to nominate a new Emir meant an acknowledgement by the Sultan of the British right to depose his predecessor) and defiance.
Lugard's next move was made in the late summer of 1901 when the Yola Expedition was launched. He himself was on leave at the time, but the action was of course taken on his instructions. It led to more fighting and the flight of another Emir. For the Sultan the fall of Adamawa was a more severe blow than the loss of Kontagora, a much more recent acquisition, or of Nupe, which was tributary to Gwandu and not to Sokoto. But neither beforehand nor afterwards was any word of explanation vouchsafed to him. Nor, apparently, did Lugard realize the bitter resentment he had engendered.
Early in 1902, soon after his return from leave, Lugard embarked on a new series of moves. First he launched the Bauchi-Bornu Expedition. Next, in response to an appeal for help from the Emir of Zaria, he dispatched a small force against Sarkin Sudan Ibrahim, the fugitive but still troublesome Emir of Kontagora, which resulted in his capture and removal into captivity. Finally, on the pretext that by appealing to him for help the Emir of Zaria had acknowledged British suzerainty, he posted a Resident to Zaria with a garrison to support his authority. To the Sultan he gave no prior information about any of these moves, although in March 1902, when the first had been initiated and the second completed, he did at length write to explain his actions 10. But even then he said nothing of his third move. News of it must have reached the Sultan at about the same time as the letter and ruined any chance that there might have been of Lugard's message being received in a conciliatory spirit.
The messenger who took this second letter of Lugard's to Sokoto was treated coldly and kept waiting for some time for a reply, but he met with no abuse, threats, ill-treatment, or even discourtesy 11. Eventually he was given the following answer from the Sultan to take back to Zungeru:

To Governor Lugard.
Be it known to you that I did not call on you to enter on the pacification of Bauchi or any other place whatever, nor that you should enter on the pacification of towns or territories.
I seek help from no one except from God. You have your faith, we have ours.
God is our defence and our sure refuge: there is no strength or power except in God on high, the Almighty.
This with salutations 12.

In the circumstances the tone of this letter was surprisingly moderate and even Lugard, when he saw it, admitted that it was inoffensive.
The Sultan's reply did not reach Zungeru until June 1902. In the previous month, however, apparently out of the blue, Lugard had received from him a much more hostile and provocative letter (quoted at the end of Chapter Twenty-two) saying that henceforth there could be no exchanges between them save those between Moslems and Unbelievers war. This letter is of considerable historical importance, because it seems finally to have convinced Lugard that conciliation would never succeed and that Kano and Sokoto would have to be subdued by force of arms before the Protectorate became a reality. At any rate, he said later that it was tantamount to a denunciation of the Treaties and even referred to it as a declaration of war 13. In addition, when he had to convince the British Government that there was no alternative to his policy, he made its implacable tone one of the main foundations of his case.
About this letter there has always been a slight aura of mystery. It apparently bore no relation to earlier correspondence but seemed, rather improbably, to have been written spontaneously by a man who, for the previous two years, had remained obstinately silent. Moreover, despite the crucial significance afterwards attached to it, the Secretary of State was not even informed of its existence until eight months after it had been received. Suspicions aroused by these curious circumstances have been sharpened by the disappearance of the original, the lack of any evidence of how it came into British hands, and the fact that Captain Abadie, the principal advocate of a military rather than a peaceful solution, was the translator. They have even prompted one historian of the period to suggest that the letter may either have been a mistranslation, probably deliberate, of an earlier letter from the Sultan to the Royal Niger Company or else a fabrication planted on Lugard by Abadie 14. The evidence hardly supports so sweeping a conclusion, but the mysteries remain and deserve to be re-examined.
The key to the mystery of what evoked the letter seems to lie in the very first sentence in which the Sultan wrote:

« Know that I do not consent to any of your people dwelling among us.»

Who had made such a request? Certainly not Lugard himself. But in the summer of 1901, while Lugard was on leave, his Deputy, Wallace, had written to the Sultan saying that the British wished to place a Resident in his capital and urging him to accept the appointment 15. Against Wallace's better judgement this letter was sent up the Niger to the officer in charge of the detachment at Illo, who was to arrange for its transmission. From another of Wallace's letters, however, we know that at the end of October, either because the messenger from Illo was turned back or because the Sultan refused to receive his message, the letter had still not been delivered. In mentioning this delay, Wallace observed testily that, if he had employed his own channels, he could have sent a dozen messages and got answers 16. Soon afterwards, apparently assuming that the letter would never reach its destination, he told Morland that if Lugard would allow him, it was his intention to go to Sokoto himself.
— I think it is only fair, he wrote, that the Sultan should have the chance to refuse to a white man this Government's friendly advances 17.
Nothing came of this proposal and so we must assume that, when Lugard returned from leave soon afterwards, he vetoed it. Nevertheless, it is perfectly possible that the Illo letter was eventually delivered to the Sultan or alternatively that, being barred by Lugard from going to Sokoto himself, Wallace wrote again in the same vein and had the letter conveyed to the Sultan by a messenger of his own. If such a message reached Sokoto in the spring of 1902, which from the date of the reply seems the most probable time, the coincidence of its arrival with the move against Bauchi and the capture of Sarkin Sudan Ibrahim would account for the acerbity of the answer. Significant, too, is the fact that, whereas the Sultan's next letter was addressed to Lugard by name, this one was not. It is also noteworthy that in May 1902, when the Sultan's letter reached the British, Wallace had just gone on leave: in his absence it would naturally have found its way to Lugard.
The explanation to the second mystery — why Lugard said nothing about the letter for eight months — emerges quite clearly in the light of his conduct during the rest of the year 1902. Briefly, the reason for the delay was that, while preparing a military expedition, Lugard was at pains to conceal the fact from the British Government. He therefore chose to hold back this particular card until he judged that the right moment had come to play it.
Unless fresh evidence comes to light it is unlikely that the doubts surrounding this famous letter will ever be resolved. All we can say now is that it was probably neither addressed to Lugard nor written spontaneously, as has hitherto been supposed, but that, as the text suggests, it was a reply to an earlier letter from Wallace urging him to bow to the inevitable and accept a British Resident. If this was indeed the case, it is possible that the true facts were not disclosed even to Lugard. They were certainly withheld from the British Government.
Whatever the precise truth about the Sultan's letter, it is clear from other papers which have survived that, in the spring and summer of 1902, Lugard was hardening his heart against Sokoto and paying less and less attention to conciliators like Burdon (who as Resident Bida was in touch, through the Emir of Nupe, with the Emir of Gwandu) and listening more and more to men like Abadie who were pressing for action. We know, for example, that in April 1902 Burdon wrote a long letter to inform Lugard that Fulani opinion had been shocked because the captive Emir of Kontagora had been sent to Lokoja in irons and that he ended it by asserting his conviction that the intransigence of the Sultan was based less on hostility than on misunderstandings which diplomacy could resolve. This advice Lugard brusquely rejected.
— Diplomacy ceases, he wrote, when either party refuses to receive the agent of the other, to read his letters, or to reply 18.
Similarly, Temple, the Resident of Bauchi Province, whose attitude to the Fulani was much less conciliatory than Burdon's, informed Lugard at about the same time that, according to information which had reached him, the Sultan did not wish to fight 19. This advice was also ignored.
On the other hand Lugard seems to have fallen increasingly under the influence of Abadie, whom he described at about this time as being extremely able and, through such sources as spies and traders, closely in touch with the African world 20. In judging Abadie, we must first of all admit that his task in Zaria was particularly difficult in that the Emir had not been defeated in battle and clearly resented being saddled with a British Resident. Nevertheless, from what we know of Abadie's character, we can infer that he simply did not possess the fund of sympathy and patience which might have enabled him to get on friendly terms with the Emir. The result was that in Zaria no effective links were established with the Fulani ruling classes and Abadie had to rely for all his information on his agents and paid informers. Not surprisingly, this information was consistently hostile to the Fulani and harped constantly on the menace of Kano. Much of it, as we shall see, was either inaccurate or greatly exaggerated. Nevertheless, it was all passed on to Zungeru, where Lugard seems to have taken it at its face value.
Whether Lugard and Abadie, in accepting these tendentious reports as valid, were acting disingenuously, or merely being naive, it is now impossible to tell. All that we know for certain is that during the summer of 1902 Abadie sent in a series of reports alleging that the Emir of Zaria, Kwasau, was the worst kind of Fulani ruler, that he was still raiding for slaves, that he was perpetrating outrages and extortions in the name of the Resident, that he was intriguing with Kano, and that he was contemplating an attack on the British force. In September Lugard at length responded by giving instructions for the garrison in Zaria to be doubled 21. Soon afterwards Abadie, on his own initiative, arrested the Emir and took him to Zungeru on charges of oppression and tyranny. Apart from the earlier accusations, these included allegations that under his rule people were mutilated for petty offences and buried alive for more serious crimes, that influential men were being done to death and buried in the palace, and that he had even tried to have the Resident poisoned 22. Lugard accepted the charges without further inquiry, detained the Emir in Zungeru, and authorized Abadie to entrust the government of Zaria to a compliant councillor, the Galadima.
The deposition of the Emir of Zaria, as related in Chapter Twenty-three, inflamed the hot temper of his representative in the tributary Emirate of Keffi, the Magaji Dan Yamusa, and precipitated a fresh crisis which culminated in the Magaji's assassinating the British Resident, Captain Moloney, and seeking refuge in Kano. These events reinforced Lugard in the belief that there would have to be a military confrontation with Kano and Sokoto and at the same time presented him with the perfect casus belli. But, just when the way ahead seemed plain and clear, an important new development occurred which introduced fresh uncertainties and threatened further delays.
Within a week of Moloney's assassination, Sultan Abdu died in Wurno. For more than a decade he had held the Empire in his tyrannical grasp and determined its policy according to his unpredictable whims. His disappearance from the scene at this juncture was therefore an event of major political importance, because it presented Lugard with the opportunity of reopening negotiations with a new Sultan who had suffered none of Abdu's humiliating reverses and was in no way committed to resisting the British rather than coming to terms with them. If Lugard's mind had not already been made up, his first action should have been to send a conciliatory message to the new Sultan, Attahiru, and his second to inform the Secretary of State of this important new development. In fact, he did neither of these things. As a result, Attahiru was driven, against his own better judgement, to hopeless resistance while Whitehall remained ignorant that the chance of a negotiated settlement was slipping away 23.
On the British side there was as sharp a division of opinion about the intentions of the Emir of Kano as there had been about Sultan Abdu's. In April 1902 Burdon reported to Lugard that an emissary of the Emir who was in Bida insisted that he wanted peace and that the Emir of Nupe supported this view 24. Abadie, on the other hand, kept reporting that there was real and imminent danger of the Kano forces making an unprovoked attack on the British garrison in Zaria. Any chance that there might have been of Lugard's believing Burdon rather than Abadie disappeared for good, of course, when the Magajin Keffi and his followers, having eluded their pursuers and reached Kano, were warmly received by the Emir 25.
Soon after this Abadie reported to Lugard that, on 28 October, the Emir of Kano had actually advanced on Zaria with the intention of attacking the British garrison and had only turned back because he had been overtaken by news of Sultan Abdu's death 26. No historical evidence whatever has come to light to support this story or Abadie's earlier reports that the Emir of Kano was planning an attack. On the contrary, we know from his letter to the Waziri of Sokoto that he had come to the conclusion that resistance to the British was hopeless and that the best course for the Fulani was to emigrate en masse 27. Nevertheless, Abadie's reports caused Lugard to dispatch more troops to Zaria, to have a supply route cleared, and to send up reserves of food and ammunition 28.
These activities on the British side were in turn reported to the Emir of Kano as evidence that an expedition was being mounted against him.
— They declare, wrote one of the Emir's correspondents in Zaria, that when they have finished what they are doing among us, they will ... come to you.
In the autumn of 1902, therefore, similar reports were reaching Lugard and the Emir of Kano, both affirming that the other was preparing to attack. It is a strange paradox that on the Fulani side, while the reports were basically true, they failed to stir the Emir into effective action; whereas on the British side, while the reports were basically false, they caused Lugard to redouble his efforts.
Since the summer it had been an open secret among the senior British officers that the High Commissioner was soon going to march against Kano and Sokoto 29. By the autumn it was clear that the move was to be made during the forthcoming dry season (October-April) and that an expeditionary force was being mustered in Zaria. But Lugard had still given the Secretary of State virtually no information about his plans or preparations, nor indeed did he do so until much later and then only because an explanation was demanded of him. He did, however, drop some hints, perhaps with the object of providing himself with a defence if he was afterwards accused of failing to keep the British Government informed of his intentions. For example, in a dispatch of 7 October 1902 about the International Boundary Commission, he wrote:
— I may have to visit Sokoto with a strong force at the same time and put an end to the present unsatisfactory state with regard to that town 30.
He also made provision in his financial estimates for the following year for the new Provinces of Sokoto, Kano, and Katsina; in the accompanying dispatch, dated 21 November, he added a brief note explaining that these new items had been included because it would be impossible to postpone much longer the impending crisis with the Sultan 31. Lugard knew perfectly well that these dispatches would take well over a month to reach London and, from the way he presented the information, it is fair to assume that he hoped that even then it would pass unnoticed. Of the telegraph, by means of which he could convey clear or code messages to London in the space of a day or two, he made no use. It is impossible to believe that, in a man of such competence and experience, these lapses were the result of inadvertence or lack of savoir-faire. It must be concluded, therefore, that they were deliberate and that, doubting his ability to convince the British Government of the necessity for the Kano-Sokoto Expedition, he had decided to force their hand by going past the point-of-no-return.
Lugard's tactics were for a time successful. His dispatch of 7 October reached the Colonial Office and excited no notice. But on 5 December his plans were upset when the London press published a report from Reuter describing the military preparations that were being made in Zaria for an attack on Kano. Chamberlain, the Secretary of State, was away in Natal at the time and his responsibilities were being discharged by his Under Secretary, the Earl of Onslow. He and the officials of the Colonial Office thought that there must have been a misunderstanding, but they were uneasy and so on 10 December they telegraphed to Zungeru saying that they presumed that Reuter's report referred to an expedition which was intended to support the Anglo-French Boundary Commission, not to attack Kano, but that in any case the High Commissioner was to state in outline what his plans were 32.
Even then Lugard played for more time. He telegraphed back on 12 December saying that he had received information that Kano had completed preparations for provoking war and that the safety of the Zaria garrison, the delimitation of the international boundary, and the prestige of the British Government depended on energetic action. But, instead of summarizing his plans as instructed, he referred the Secretary of State to the three dispatches, including those of 7 October and 21 November mentioned above, in which he had dropped his hints, implying that all the information required was given in them 33. It did not take the Colonial Office long to establish that two of the three dispatches contained very little that was relevant. As the third had not arrived, however, it was assumed that it must embody a full account. Judgement was therefore suspended and Lugard gained his respite.

But at least one of the civil servants in the Colonial Office was suspicious. Commenting on Lugard's telegram of 12 December, he wrote:

I am inclined to think that Sir F. Lugard has tried to follow his favourite policy of keeping silence until the coup has been made 34.

After digesting this and other minutes Onslow decided on 19 December to send a telegram to Lugard, which began as follows…

As you are aware, His Majesty's Government are anxious to avoid military operations in West Africa. We have full confidence that you will not engage in them unless they are absolutely necessary for defensive purposes but if in your judgement they are necessary we leave you full discretionary powers... 35

As Lugard's third dispatch had still not arrived, the telegram went on to demand a definite statement of his plans. Five days later Onslow followed this up with another telegram, which stated bluntly that the British Government must have the information before any expedition started for Kano 36.
In response to the first of these telegrams, Lugard telegraphed back on 23 December and at last admitted that he was planning to march on Kano. To emphasize the imminence of the supposed threat from that quarter he quoted Abadie's report that towards the end of October the Emir had actually started marching on Zaria 37. He went on to say:
— Reports have been spread through all the Protectorate concerning the movement of troops. Consequently protected States quite certain imminence of fighting and therefore hesitation would be ascribed to fear, endangering other allegiance 38.
In other words, Lugard was now saying that he had passed the point-of-no-retum and must be allowed to go on.
In the meantime, however, Sir Charles Dilke had made a speech in the House of Commons condemning the proposed expedition and the Manchester Guardian was fulminating about it. On receiving Lugard's telegram of 23 December, Onslow therefore prepared a paper for the information of the Cabinet and sent a cable to Chamberlain in Natal asking whether he authorized Lugard's plan. On 28 December Chamberlain replied giving qualified assent:
— I approve of the expedition assuming that you are satisfied that the force is equal to any emergency and that the High Commissioner has good grounds for anticipating attack. Unless clearly called for by the attitude of the Sultan, I should deprecate aggressive action 39.
Evidently, Abadie's story of the Emir of Kano marching against Zaria had convinced Onslow that there were good grounds for anticipating an attack because, though Lugard was asked for an assurance on the first of Chamberlain's points, no mention was made of the second. And so on 8 January 1903, after Lugard had replied confirming that his forces were equal to any emergency, another telegram was sent to him which began as follows:

His Majesty's Government have carefully considered your telegram No. 4, 4th January, and the previous correspondence on subject of Kano. They desire to impress on you that there is strong feeling in this country amongst those most deeply interested in Northern Nigeria that military operations should he avoided if possible. The information in possession of His Majesty's Government is not so complete as they could have wished
but they understand that it is, in your opinion, absolutely necessary as a defensive measure and in the interests of protected native States, as well as for safety of Boundary Commissions, that Kano should be occupied by you in anticipation of attack on Zaria which Emir is preparing to make, that you have exhausted all means of arriving at a peaceful settlement, and that you consider force at your disposal ample for your purpose and are satisfied that reserves of men now proposed are sufficient for any probable
contingency. In these circumstances His Majesty's Government will not withhold their consent to despatch of expeditionary force... 40

Onslow went on to say that the British Government considered that the command should be given to Brigadier-General Kemball, the Inspector-General of the West African Frontier Force, and that other troops in West Africa should stand by in case of need.
The point in this telegram which should have given Lugard pause was the British Government's insistence that they considered a military move justified only if all possibility of negotiation had been exhausted and then only as a defensive measure in anticipation of an attack by Kano on Zaria. In fact, he ignored these stipulations completely but took up the cudgels on the question of whether Kemball or Morland should be in command and whether it was necessary to mobilize reserves in other parts of West Africa. These wrangles served to distract attention from the fundamental question of whether or not the Expedition was necessary. They also led to further delays and so it was not until 19 January that Onslow at length sent a telegram authorizing an advance and not until 29 January that the expeditionary force actually marched 41.

We know now that on 2 January, nearly four weeks earlier, the Emir of Kano, accompanied by half his fighting men, had set out from his capital, not with the object of attacking the British in Zaria but in order to go to Sokoto and pay his respects to the new Sultan 42. It May be that the underlying object of this strangely timed journey was to urge on the new Sultan the policy that the Fulani, rather than submit to a Christian power or fight a war they could not hope to win, should emigrate en masse. Be that as it may, when the British expeditionary force set out to nip in the bud the threat that the Emir of Kano was supposed to represent, he was, in fact, two hundred and fifty miles away. As he was accompanied by a force of not merely hundreds but thousands, it is astonishing that the British did not get accurate information about his movements. In Lugard's dispatches and telegrams, however, there is no mention of them until 23 January when he at length quoted a report that the Emir had moved out to a war camp twenty-four miles west of the City 43. So much for Abadie's intelligence system: there could be no more striking proof than this of how misplaced was Lugard's faith in the accuracy and objectivity of the reports that he received from this quarter.
What verdict should be passed on Lugard's conduct in this episode? The first accusation against him must be that, by choosing to believe in Abadie, whom he liked, and to ignore Burdon, who irritated him 44, he formed a badly distorted conception of the problem which confronted him. In the light of the facts related here, particularly the complete untrustworthiness of Abadie's reports, it is impossible to acquit him of this charge. The verdict against him, incidentally, serves to confirm the judgement of his biographer that two of his greatest failings were tendencies to cultivate favourites and to allow private feelings to influence official decisions 45.
The second charge, which arises out of the first, is that, by withholding information about Sultan Abdu's death and pursuing his own preparations in secret, Lugard forced the British Government into authorizing an enterprise which, if they had been properly consulted, they would probably never have sanctioned. Or, in other words, that he deliberately precipitated a campaign which could certainly have been postponed and might possibly have been avoided altogether. On this charge, too, the verdict must be that he was guilty. In his defence, however, let it be said that he acted as he did because he thought the end justified the means and that for him the great objective was not winning minor battles in an obscure campaign but clearing the site for the new country that he was impatient to build 46.
— The advocates of conciliation at any price, he wrote at about this time, appear to forget that their nation has assumed before God and the civilized world the responsibility of maintaining peace and good order in the area declared as a British Protectorate 47.
Whether the end he sought can be held to justify the dubious means he employed is a question which must be left to individual judgement.

Notes
1. Muffett, op. cit.
2. Annual Reports, Northern Nigeria, 1900-11, p. 81.
3. Muffett, op. cit. p. 30.
4. Clapperton, Travels, vol. II, 352.
5. Appendix I, Note A.
6 Muffett, op. cit. p. 28, n. 4.
7. Confidential Dispatch of 23 January 1903 in CO 446/30.
8. Annual Reports, 1900-11, pp. 157-8.
9. Annual Reports, 1900-11, p. 82.
10. Ibid. p. 158.
11. Muffett, op. cit. p. 45.
12. Muffett, op. cit. The translation is Burdon's and differs slightly from the version given by Lugard in his Annual Report for 1902.
13. Annual Reports, 1900-11, pp. 82-83.
14. Muffett, op. cit. pp. 43-51.
15. Muffett, op. cit. p. 53.
16. Ibid. p. 55.
17. Ibid.
18 Muffett, op. cit., pp. 40-42.
19. Ibid. p. 42.
20. Confidential Dispatch of 12 December 1902 in CO 446/26.
21. Annual Reports, 1900-11, p. 71.
22. Ibid.
23. Lugard said nothing to the Colonial Office about Sultan Abdu's death until, in his confidential dispatch of 19 December 1902, he mentioned it parenthetically. Even then he gave no hint that it was an event of any importance and of course his dispatch did not reach London until 19 January 1903. See CO 446/26.
24. Muffett, op. cit. p. 71.
25. Ibid. p. 68.
26. Lugard's confidential dispatch of 12 December 1902 in CO 446/26.
27. Backwell, up. cit. Letter, no. 125.
28. Perham, Lugard; The Years of Authority, op. cit. p. 94.
29. Ibid.
30. CO 446/26.
31. Ibid.
32 CO 446/26.
33. Ibid.
34. Ibid.
35. CO 446/26.
36. Ibid.
37. Ibid.
38. Ibid.
39. Ibid.
40. CO 446/30.
41. Ibid.
42. Annual Reports, 1900-11, p. 88.
43. CO 446/30.
44. Perham, op. cit. p. 181. See also Monthly and Quarterly Reports from Sokoto Province, 1903-6.
45. Ibid. pp. 179-82.
46. Ibid. p. 148
47. Dispatch of 15 January 1903 in CO 446/30.