Journal of a second expedition into the interior of Africa, from the Bight of Benin to Soccatoo: To which is added, the journal of Richard Lander from Kano to the sea-coast, partly by a more eastern route.

Captain Hugh Clapperton was born in Annan, Dumfries-shire, in the year 1788. His grandfather, Robert Clapperton, M.D., was a man of considerable knowledge, as a classical scholar, and in his profession. He first studied at Edinburgh; but as, in those days, the continental colleges were considered superior in medicine and surgery, he went to Paris, and there studied for some time. On his return to his native country, he married Elizabeth Campbell, second cousin of Colonel Archibald Campbell of Glenlyon; and soon after settled in Dumfries-shire, at a place called Crowden Nows, where he remained until George Clapperton (the father of our traveller), and another son were born. He afterwards removed to Lochmaben, where he had an increase to his family of four sons and one daughter. All the sons became medical men, except the youngest and the only survivor, who entered his Majesty’s service, in the beginning of 1793, as a second lieutenant of marines. His eldest son, George Clapperton, married young to a daughter of John Johnstone, proprietor of the lands of Thorniwhate and Lochmaben Castle, and settled in Annan, where he was a considerable time the only medical man of repute in the place, and performed many operations and cures which spread his fame over the borders of England and Scotland. His father bestowed a good education upon him, which proved so useful a passport to public favour, that he might have made a fortune; but, unfortunately, he was, like his father, careless of money. He married a second wife, and was the father of no fewer than twenty-one children. Of the fruit of the first marriage, he had six sons and one daughter who grew to men and women’s estate. All the sons entered his Majesty’s service, the youngest of whom was Captain Clapperton, the African traveller, and the subject of this memoir. In his person he resembled his father greatly, but was not so tall by two inches, being five feet eleven inches; had great breadth of chest and expansion of shoulders, and otherwise proportionably strong; and was a handsome, athletic, powerful man. He received no classical education, and could do little more than read and write, when he was put under the tuition of Mr. Bryce Downie, a man of general knowledge, but chiefly celebrated for his mathematical abilities. He remained with Mr. Downie until he required a knowledge of practical mathematics, including navigation and trigonometry. He was found an apt scholar and an obliging boy by Mr. Downie, whose attention was never forgot by the traveller; as he expressed a great wish, when he arrived the first journey from Africa, that he could have had time to see his native country, and shake his old master once more by the hand. Captain Clapperton left Mr. Downie about the age of thirteen; when, by his own wish, he was bound an apprentice to the owner of a vessel of considerable burthen, trading between Liverpool and North America. After making several voyages in that vessel, he either left her, or was impressed into his Majesty’s service, and was put on board a Tender then lying at Liverpool, which vessel carried him round to Plymouth, where he with others were draughted on board of his Majesty’s ship Gibraltar, of eighty guns. He did not remain long in that ship, as in 1806 he arrived at Gibraltar in a naval transport; from which he was impressed, with others, on board his Majesty’s frigate Renommée, Captain Sir Thomas Livingston. Opportunely for our traveller, at that time his Majesty’s ship Saturn, Captain Lord Amelias Beauclerc (belonging to Lord Collingwood’s fleet off Cadiz), arrived for the purpose of watering and refitting; and our traveller, learning that his uncle (now Lieut.-Col. Clapperton) was captain of royal marines on board the Saturn, sent him a letter describing his situation in the Renommée. The uncle having been an old messmate of Sir Thomas’s, when both were lieutenants at the Cape of Good Hope many years before, made it his business immediately to see Sir Thomas; and, through his intercession, Sir Thomas very kindly put our traveller, for the first time, upon the quarter-deck as a midshipman. The Renommée very soon after left Gibraltar for the Mediterranean; and, when on the coast of Spain, had occasion to send boats to attack some enemy’s vessels on shore. Clapperton, being in one of the boats, was slightly, as he considered it, wounded in the head, which, however, afterwards gave him much annoyance. He remained in the Renommée, with Sir Thomas, until she returned to England, and was paid off, in the year 1808. He then joined his Majesty’s ship Venerable, Captain King, in the Downs, as a midshipman, where he did not remain long, having heard that Captain Briggs was going to the East Indies in the Clorinde frigate, and wishing to go to that country, he applied for his discharge, that he might enter with Captain Briggs; but he could not accomplish it before the Clorinde had sailed from Portsmouth; he was ordered, however, (by the admiral) to have a passage in a ship going to the East Indies. In the course of the voyage, they fell in with a ship in great distress, it then blowing a gale of wind; but humanity required assistance, if it could be given. A boat was ordered to be got ready, and Clapperton to go in her. He declared to his messmates his decided opinion that the boat could not possibly live in the sea that was then running, but that it was not for him to question the orders of his superior officer. On pushing off, he told his messmates to share equally among them any articles belonging to him, and bade them good bye. The boat had scarcely put off from the ship when she swamped, and as no assistance could be rendered, all hands perished, with the exception of two; one of whom was Clapperton, who, under such trying circumstances, encouraged and assisted his only surviving companion till his own strength failed him. Among others, he had previously struggled hard to save a warrant officer; but finding himself nearly exhausted, he was obliged to desist, and he perished. They then dropped off, one after the other, until the bowman and Clapperton were the only two remaining out of the whole boat’s crew. The latter then made use of a common sea expression to the bowman, “Thank God, I am not the Jonah!” meaning that he was not, by his bad conduct in life, the cause of the Almighty visiting them with his vengeance. The bowman seconded him in the exclamation, and they kept cheering each other until the gale so far abated, that another boat was got out and sent to their relief.

They then proceeded upon their voyage; and in March, 1810, Clapperton joined his majesty’s ship Clorinde, where he received the greatest attention from Captain Briggs during the time he was on board. In 1812, when lying in Bombay harbour, he was joined by another messmate, the Hon. F. Mackenzie, youngest son of the late Lord Seaforth, between whom a most sincere friendship was contracted. Not long after this, Mr. Mackenzie was attacked with a severe illness, on which occasion Clapperton never left him, but nursed him as he would his own brother, until he died; when he added a lock of his hair to his locket, which contained that of his father and some friends. He returned to England in the end of 1813, or beginning of 14; and he was then sent, with some other intelligent midshipmen, to Portsmouth dock-yard, for the purpose of being instructed in Angelo’s sword exercise, in which he afterwards excelled. When these midshipmen were distributed to the different ships in the fleet as drill-masters, Clapperton volunteered his services for the Canadian lakes, and was sent on board Sir Alexander Cochrane’s flag ship, the Asia. This ship continued at Spithead till the end of January, 1814. During the passage to Bermudas, Clapperton’s services as a drill were performed on the quarter-deck. On her arrival, he was sent to Halifax, and from thence to the lakes, just then about to become the scene of warlike operations. During his passage out and his stay at Bermuda, nothing could exceed his diligence in the discharge of his duty with the officers and men. At his own and the other mess-tables, he was the soul and life of the party: he could sing a good song, tell humorous tales, and his conversation was extremely amusing. He bade adieu to all on board the Asia, and pursued his voyage to Halifax; from that to Upper Canada.

Soon after he arrived on the lakes, in 1815, he was placed in a situation that strongly marked that benevolence which was so strong a feature in his character. In the winter he was in command of a blockhouse on Lake Huron, with a party of men, for the purpose of defending it: he had only one small gun for its defence; he was attacked by an American schooner; the blockhouse was soon demolished by the superiority of the enemy’s fire; and he found that himself and the party must either become prisoners of war, or form the resolution of immediately crossing Lake Michigan upon the ice, a journey of nearly sixty miles, to York, the capital of Upper Canada, and the nearest British depot. Notwithstanding the difficulty and danger attending a journey of such length over the ice in the depth of winter, the alternative was soon adopted, and the party set out to cross the lake, but had not gone more than ten or twelve miles, before a boy, one of the party, was unable to proceed from the cold; every one of the sailors declared that they were unable to carry him, as they were so benumbed with the cold, and had scarcely strength sufficient to support themselves. Clapperton’s generous nature could not bear the idea of a fellow-creature being left to perish under such appalling circumstances, for a dreadful snow-storm had commenced; he therefore took the boy upon his back, holding him with his left hand, and supporting himself from slipping with a staff in his right. In this manner he continued to go forward for eight or nine miles, when he perceived that the boy relaxed his hold; and on Clapperton examining the cause, he found that the boy was in a dying state from the cold, and he soon after expired. The sufferings of the whole party were great before they reached York; the stockings and shoes completely worn off their feet; their bodies in a dreadful state from the want of nourishment, they having nothing during the journey except one bag of meal. From the long inaction of Clapperton’s left hand, in carrying the boy upon his back, he lost, from the effects of the frost, the first joint of his thumb.

Not long after this, Sir Edward Owen was appointed to the command upon the lakes. A short time after his arrival, he gave to Clapperton an acting order as a lieutenant, and appointed him to the Confiance. While belonging to this ship, he often made excursions on shore, with his gun, into the woods, for the purpose of getting a little fresh meat. In these excursions he cultivated an acquaintance with the aborigines of the forest, and was much charmed with their mode of life. He had sent to his uncle in England the acting order which Sir Edward Owen had given him, that it might be laid before the Board of Admiralty for their confirmation; but, unfortunately, a very large promotion had taken place a little before his acting order came to England, and the Board declined confirming his commission. No sooner was he made acquainted with its ill success, than he formed the idea of quitting his Majesty’s service altogether, and becoming one of the inhabitants of the North American forests. Fortunately for him, he some time afterwards abandoned that idea.