2-888-729 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Anchorage off the Town of Bonny River, 1850. British ships off the coast of West Africa: showing '...the comfortable and cool way of housing these vessels over; it is a sort of matting supplied from the shore, and having it two-thirds up the masts gives plenty of ventilation and protection from the sun. It costs about £70 in goods. Bonny at one time was the chief market for slaves, who, according to Captain Adams's statement, were sold there to the annual number of 20,000, the greater part of whom were brought down from the Eboe country. The town is...surrounded by a marshy country, overgrown with timber. The canoes are large, capable of containing, perhaps, 130 people. Salt of good quality is manufactured and sent up into the interior. Our traders bring out a quantity of that article, and the natives would rather buy it from them than make it themselves'. From "Illustrated London News", 1850.