Report on the measures adopted for the suppression of sleeping sickness in Uganda / by Sir H. Hesketh Bell ; presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of His Majesty.

  • Great Britain. Colonial Office.
Date:
1909
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Report on the measures adopted for the suppression of sleeping sickness in Uganda / by Sir H. Hesketh Bell ; presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of His Majesty. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    opposition to the orders of the Government was anywhere encountered. Compensation for Evicfiov. 31. In accordance with the recommendations made in the despatcli above quoted, a small sum—something; between 4.>!. and G.S., according^ to the number of huts and extent of farm—was paid to the head of each evicted family. These doles seem to have been thankfully received, and there is no doubt that the outlay under this head was money well spent, and that it greatly facilitated the peaceful acceptance of the whole scheme. The total expenditure, in the guise of “compensation,” has been about £1,500, and the excess over the original estimate of £1,000 was met out of economies under other heads. Infinence of the Chiefs loyally exercised. 32. At the expiration of the period of grace, all who had not previously evacuated their holdings were ordered away. Their huts were burnt and their banana plantations were cut to the ground. Only the seriousness of the situation could have war- ranted such drastic measures. When one considers that most of the farms and homesteads from which all these unfortunate natives were thus arbitrarily evicted had been the homes of their forbears for generations, one realises the remarkable state of discipline under which these people have existed, and the extraordinary influence which their headmen still exercise over them. The chiefs, whose opposition to the wishes of the Govern- ment might, perhaps, have proved almost insuperable, loyally helped the Administration, even in cases where the necessary measures entailed on them considerable pecuniary loss. 33. By the end of 1907 it was reported to me that the whole of the prohibited zone in the Kingdom of Buganda, stretching from the German boundary on the west to the Kipon Falls on the north-east coast of Lake Victoria, was completely evacuated. The depopulation of the Busoga shore had not been so effectively dealt with, and several thousands in that locality still remained to be moved. Good progress was, however, being made. Conditions in Buvnma and the Sesse Islands.—Reyrstration or Destruction of Canoes.—Fishing prohthited. 34. Buvuma and the Sesse Islands, in Lake Victoria, presented a problem which seemed hopeless. Professor Koch had expressed the opinion that nine-tenths of the natives who were living in the archipelago seemed to be already infected, and that, failing the discovery of a therapeutic cure, all would die. The people of Buvuma and of the Sesse group, though subjects of the King of Buganda, appear to have’always kept themselves much apart from the inhabitants of the mainland, and it was believed that a serious rising' would follow any attempt to force them to leave their island homes. We determined, therefore, to concentrate our attentioii pn the people of the mainland, apd to liinit our