HIST 314 - Leopold's Ghost Quiz

Nzinga Mbemba Affonso (Affonso I)

15th century king who ruled near the Congo River. Affonso I was popular among the early Portuguese colonialists who visited the Congo River because he wanted to modernize his kingdom with European technology and religion and he supported a slave trade. However, Affonso I became more opposed to European colonization and slave trading toward the end of his life, by which time Portugal had already strengthened its position in the Congo.

William Sheppard

African American explorer and priest who traveled to the Congo in the 1890s and became a key opponent of the Belgian administration there. Sheppard joined forces with Edmund Dene Morel and Roger Casement to criticize King Leopold II for his human rights abuses. Later, he was tried in the Congo for supporting Congolese resistance movements. His acquittal further the strengthened the Congo reform movement.

George Washington Williams

African American journalist who traveled to the Congo in 1890 and became the first Westerner to write about the human rights abuses he saw there. While Williams died of tuberculosis shortly after publishing his first articles criticizing the Belgian administration, his work helped spark an international Congo reform movement.

President Chester A. Arthur

American President whose administration was the first to formally recognize King Leopold II's landholdings in the Congo, setting in motion a series of atrocities in the region.

Henry Kowalsky

American lobbyist hired by Leopold II to control the controversy surrounding the Congo reform movement, but who ultimately switched sides and told the public that Leopold was trying to bribe American politicians. This greatly damaged Leopold's reputation.

Chapter 12: David and Goliath

At the time when Morel realized what was going on in the Congo, few Europeans had spoken out about the truth of King Leopold's territories. Most people simply praised Leopold for his generosity and greatness. Morel began by telling his superiors what he'd learned. Elder Dempster had a lucrative deal with the Belgian government, and if Morel exposed what he'd learned, then the company could go bankrupt. Thus, Morel's superiors offered him a handsome raise and a promotion as a bribe for his silence; Morel refused. In 1900, he began writing attacks on Leopold, which he sent to British newspapers. Then, in 1903, he founded his own newspaper, West African Mail. Gradually, he assembled evidence that the Force Publique was taking hostages in order to force slaves to harvest rubber, and he published interviews with some of the British and Swedish missionaries who'd witnessed human rights atrocities in the territory.

Chapter 4: "The Treaties Must Grant Us Everything"

By the late 1870s, Leopold had a definite plan for the Congo: having satisfied Europe's power elite that he was a benevolent figure, he needed to colonize the Congo before another European power claimed it. Leopold was a shrewd judge of character: he recognized that Stanley, in spite of his vast fame, was hungry for praise and recognition from the aristocracy. Thus, Leopold was careful to flatter Stanley in addition to offering him large sums of money in return for doing his bidding.

Captain Léon Rom

Captain in the Force Publique, the official military force of the Belgian Congo, who was famed for his cruelty and may have served as a partial model for Mr. Kurtz in Joseph Conrad's novella Heart of Darkness.

Edmund Dene Morel

Edmund Dene Morel was one of the first Europeans to recognize the existence of slavery in the Belgian-controlled Congo and publicize his findings. While he was a young man working for a shipping company, Morel discovered a trading imbalance between the Congo and Europe: rubber and ivory flowed out of Africa, but nothing but guns and ammunition entered it. Concluding that the Belgians practiced slavery, Morel published a series of articles that galvanized the European public into action. For more than ten years, Morel recruited hundreds of journalists, statesmen, and businessmen to his cause, and this effort arguably convinced the Belgian Parliament to reform some of their practices in the Congo.

Father Achte

European priest who was captured by rebel Congolese soldiers. Much to Achte's surprise, he was treated respectfully and hospitably in captivity and was subsequently released.

Chapter 7: The First Heretic

George Washington Williams was a gifted preacher and public speaker; he was also a committed advocate of African American rights. Williams believed that African Americans should have the right to govern themselves and be free of stigmatization and prejudice—life in the Congo, he believed, offered such an opportunity. After visiting, however, Williams concludes that the Congo is currently a slave state, in which white soldiers use guns, torture, and intimidation to force African people to work for nothing. Williams sends a letter to the American secretary of state, arguing that the Congo state was guilty of "crimes against humanity."

John Rowlands / Henry Morton Stanley

Henry Morton Stanley was the first European explorer to sail all the way across the Congo River. An ambitious yet intensely insecure man, he was born into a poor Welsh family and he worked hard to establish himself, first as a reporter, then as an explorer. After tracking down David Livingstone, Stanley entered the employ of Leopold II, who paid him large sums to secure landholdings in the Congo and build infrastructure there. At times, Stanley criticized Leopold's cruelty toward the Congolese, but it's also clear that Stanley himself was a cruel master to the Congolese: he didn't shy away from using torture and intimidation when he thought it was necessary.

Chapter 14: To Flood His Deeds with Day

Hochschild doesn't hide the truth about Edmund Morel; in spite of his sincere commitment to Congolese rights, he had some pretty offensive beliefs about African people, and about Western imperialism in general. In spite of the limitations of his political and racial views, Morel campaigned vigorously against King Leopold's policies in the Congo. He enlisted businessmen, he spoke with many Christian luminaries of the era, and mobilized key journalists at major British newspapers, causing news of the atrocities in the Congo to spread at an exponential rate. Around the same time that Morel was attacking Leopold in the press, a scandal came to light: Leopold had been having an affair with a 16-year-old girl. The combination of the news of the scandal and the news of Belgium's human rights abuses destroyed Leopold's reputation as a great man.

Chapter 15: A Reckoning

Hochschild estimates how many Congolese people died unnecessarily under Belgian rule. While the Belgian occupation of the Congo wasn't a genocide, the effect was similar: soldiers murdered a huge chunk of the native population, and entire Congolese tribes vanished. While many of the Congolese were murdered by soldiers, disease, starvation, and record-low birth rates also assisted in the decline of their people. Some Belgian government officials in 1919 estimated that the total population in the Congo was "reduced by half" in the years following Henry Morton Stanley's colonization.

Chapter 16: "Journalists Won't Give You Receipts"

In the early 20th century, Henry Morton Stanley was in poor health and he continued to support King Leopold. He died in 1904, before the attacks against Leopold became really vitriolic. Members of the Swedish Parliament signed a statement supporting Morel's CRA, and human rights groups protesting Leopold appeared in many European countries. In response, Leopold launched a counterattack, criticizing the human rights abuses of the British Empire. In spite of Leopold's efforts, the criticism of his regime in the Congo spread quickly, eventually reaching the writer Mark Twain. Twain lobbied against Leopold in Washington, D.C., causing other politicians and writers to join the cause. In America, Leopold tried to get powerful politicians and businessmen on his side. He met with congressmen and offered their districts concession rights (i.e., the right to conduct business out of the Congo without paying tariffs) in the Congo if the congressmen supported him publicly. The plan worked, and Leopold was able to prevent the White House from appointing a consul general to the Congo. Leopold also managed to convince several cardinals of the Vatican that he was the victim of a Protestant smear campaign.

Chapter 5: From Florida to Berlin

In this section, Hochschild shows that Leopold II, in addition to being a racist himself (given that he was willing to enslave Congolese people), was skillful at manipulating other people and catering to their political and ideological leanings. Thus, he used Sanford to convince Chester A. Arthur that the Congo would become "the next Liberia"—a place where former slaves could live in peace. The "back to Africa" movement, which originated in America in the late 19th century, proposed sending millions of former slaves back to Africa. The idea had very broad-ranging support, including from white supremacists, supporters of African American equality, and President Chester A. Arthur. The strange bedfellows of the back to Africa movement and Belgian imperialism show just how convoluted Western ideas about Africa were.

Roger Casement

Irish government worker who spent many years in the Congo observing human rights abuses before joining with Edmund Dene Morel to speak out against King Leopold II and the Belgian government in the Congo. Like Morel, Casement had a talent for publicity, and he was instrumental in recruiting many famous writers and statesmen to the Congo reform cause.

Chapter 9: Meeting Mr. Kurtz

Joseph Conrad was one of the greatest writers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His novels and novellas continue to attract a lot of interest and attention in the 21st century. In this short chapter, Hochschild will study Heart of Darkness, Conrad's most famous book, from a historical perspective, since many of the novella's most famous literary ideas were based on real events from Conrad's time as an officer. It's a matter of historical record that Conrad was stationed in the Congo for many months, although he spent most of the time sick (and therefore not participating in or witnessing the worst atrocities of the Force Publique). Previously, Hochschild characterized King Leopold II, (a real person), as resembling a literary villain.

Chapter 11: A Secret Society of Murderers

King Leopold II devoted enormous attention to his Congolese colony; however, he also wanted to expand his African territory. It's important to remember that the European powers blocked him from expanding his territory, not because they objected to his cruelty, but because they didn't want Belgium to become a dangerous political and economic rival. However, Hochschild begins to suggest here that King Leopold might have succeeded in expanding further into China had there not been an international outcry against his cruelty in Africa. In this section, Hochschild makes an important distinction between telling the truth and being good at public relations. It's wasn't enough for Sheppard to write articles about the cruelty of the Congo—in order to threaten Leopold's regime in the Congo, he would have had to do more to popularize his articles and influence powerful people in Europe and America.

King Leopold II

King Leopold II was the longest-reigning monarch in Belgian history. During his reign, he amassed enormous landholdings in the African territory surrounding the Congo River. Determined to make Belgium a major international "player" (and amass a lavish fortune for himself), Leopold supported a series of policies that involved enslaving huge numbers of Congolese men, women, and children, and forcing them to gather ivory and rubber, which was then sold in Europe at an enormous profit. He spent twenty years carefully establishing a reputation as a great philanthropist, in order to disguise his human rights abuses in the Congo. Even after he'd secured land in the Congo, he proved himself to be a master of public relations by manipulating politicians, journalists, and philanthropists to disguise any hint of wrongdoing on his part. His brutality and greed have left a horrific and enduring legacy in the Congo.

Chapter 17: No Man Is a Stranger

King Leopold himself had sent the three judges to the Congo, so he couldn't plead that their findings were biased or unfair. And the witnesses who spoke to the three judges couldn't have been lying, since many of them described the same horrific events. The three judges had heard the testimony of African slaves who'd been tortured and beaten by the Force Publique with the full support of the Congo administration. Leopold decided to sell his territory in the Congo, though he had already planned to bequeath it to the people of Belgium. While Parliament was furious that it had to buy a territory it had been promised for free, it recognized that buying the land now was the only way to ensure that it wouldn't end up in the hands of the British or the French. William Sheppard argued that the sale of the Congo changed nothing—the local administrators would continue to exploit their slaves. Sheppard worked with another minister, William Morrison, to continue denouncing the state of the Congo.

Chapter 2: The Fox Crosses the Stream

Leopold came of age in a time of rampant imperialism, but, because Belgium was a relatively new country, it "missed out" on the empire-building of the 15th-18th centuries. Thus, by the time Leopold ascended to the throne, he found that there was little land outside of Europe that hadn't been claimed by a European power already, which required his imperial ambitions to be creative and shrewd. This also nods to the toxic competition for power and reputation among European states that was played out at the expense of the African continent.

Chapter 6: Under the Yacht Club Flag

Leopold concentrated on running the Congo, rather than taking care of his wife, sister, or children. Leopold took advantage of European technology to secure his newly-official landholdings. He was quickly running out of money, though, so he borrowed funds from banks throughout Europe, and even asked the Pope to encourage all loyal Catholics to buy Congo bonds to ensure "the spread of Christ's word." He also amended free trade agreements in order to allow him to levy duties on trade out of the Congo—supposedly so that he could support a campaign against slavery. In the early 1890s, Leopold made an important deal with the Belgian parliament. While continuing to claim to be a philanthropist in public, Leopold privately claimed that, if Parliament loaned him money now, he would leave control of the soon-to-be-lucrative IAC to Parliament in his will.

Chapter 8: Where There Aren't No Ten Commandments

Life in the Congo was rigorously segregated; for example, European-built houses and hospitals were usually "whites only." Congo administrators behaved hypocritically—they claimed to have come to Africa to preach Christianity, and yet some of them entered into multiple marriages, plainly disobeying the rules of Christianity. Leopold made most of his fortune by leasing out his properties to other companies, and then collecting his share of the profits. Thus, he opened up the Congo to rubber and ivory companies, and made a large fortune in doing so. Leopold's behavior utterly contradicted his claims of being interested in philanthropy. His practices also contradicted the claims of free trade that he had made to Sanford in the 1880s.

Chapter 1: "I Shall Not Give Up the Chase"

Right away, Hochschild conveys a sense of Stanley's insecurity about his identity and social status. In a time when class and social status were all-important in Britain—to the point where it was almost impossible to marry or take a job outside one's own social rank—Stanley was born to a working-class family. He spent much of his adult life trying to gain enough success and fame to become an upper-class English gentleman. Because he was eager to forget his working-class past, Stanley frequently distorted the truth about himself. While Hochschild doesn't try to "psychoanalyze" Stanley to excess, he does (somewhat dubiously) link Stanley's ambition and his confusion with his insecurities surrounding women.

Chapter 13: Breaking into the Thieves' Kitchen

Roger Casement was, along with Edmund Dene Morel, one of the key voices in the Congo reform movement. Like many of the key opponents of the Belgian occupation of the Congo, Roger had experienced discrimination throughout his life—like many Irishman working in England at the time, he was seen as a second-class citizen, and not a "real" Englishman. Casement, unlike many of the reformers of the era, reports disliking Leopold from the very beginning. Together, Casement and Morel formed the Congo Reform Association (CRA). By early 1904, the CRA had held meetings with more than a thousand attendees. It's important to keep in mind, however, that they were "white men trying to stop other white men from brutalizing Africans." There were hundreds of thousands of unremembered Africans who fought the Force Publique and died.

Chapter 3: The Magnificent Cake

Stanley continued to crave social respectability—perhaps explaining why he signed a marriage arrangement with an heiress. Also, notice that Stanley didn't try to hide his cruelty to African people; there were plenty of people in Europe (maybe even most of them) who celebrated Stanley for his racism and sadism. Leopold II succeeded in colonizing the Congo partly because he convinced powerful Europeans that he would treat the Congolese benevolently; however, the disturbing truth is that many powerful Europeans didn't care how Leopold treated the Congolese.

Chapter 18: Victory?

The aftermath of Leopold's death exposes some of the limitations of the Congo reform movement. Leopold's death marked the end of one era of tyranny, but that era was succeeded by another era of tyranny in which the Belgian Parliament inherited a lot of Leopold's money, but didn't bother to return it to the Congolese. And, tragically, the Belgian Parliament continued many of Leopold's policies. The Congo was controlled by one small and relatively new European country, while most of the large European powers, such as Britain and France, had no economic or political interest in the Congo. Powerful British, American, and French figures criticized the state of affairs while turning a blind eye to the atrocities of their own countries' colonies.

Chapter 10: The Wood That Weeps

The chapter begins with a quick update on Stanley's life. Stanley, in spite of his world-fame, was eager to ingratiate himself with European high society, and Hochschild strongly implies that Stanley married a wealthy heiress in part because he thought it would help raise his social standing. The "back to Africa" proposal, popular in the U.S. in the late 1800s, had backing from both African American activists and white supremacists. William Sheppard's activism in the Congo was, in part, inspired by his own experience as a black man in the U.S. at a time of widespread prejudice—he was sympathetic to the Congolese in part because he knew what it was like to be treated as sub-human.

Joseph Conrad

The late 19th and early 20th century author Joseph Conrad (born Konrad Korzeniowski) worked aboard a ship in the Congo while he was a young man; his horrific experiences there influenced the plot of his most famous book, Heart of Darkness.

Chapter 19: The Great Forgetting

The legacy of the Belgian occupation of the Congo survives into the 21st century. As has often been the case, the Belgian government was slow and reluctant to officially acknowledge the country's history of human rights atrocities, or take any concrete steps to apologize. In short, "the Congo offers a striking example of the politics of forgetting." Leopold, and many of his successors in Belgian politics, worked hard to erase the records of human rights abuses in Africa. In 1908, the Belgian government spent eight full days burning records of the Belgian occupation of the Congo. In the 1970s, a man named Jules Marchal devoted himself to researching Belgium's behavior in the Congo full-time. In the end, he composed a four-volume history of the Belgian occupation of the Congo.

Senator John Tyler Morgan

White supremacist senator from Alabama who was instrumental in drumming up support for Belgian occupation of the Congo, and who believed that the Congo could serve as a future resettlement site for African Americans.