African Initiatives and Agency Within British Protestant Missions in Africa, c.1792–c.1914

This chapter surveys the substantial contribution made by African and African American agents to the British Protestant missionary enterprise in Africa from the arrival of the Nova Scotian black settlers in Sierra Leone in the 1790s to the First World War. It notes the difficulty of making accurate estimates of the size of this agency, as the missionary societies were inconsistent in including indigenous agents in their statistics, especially if they were not ordained or remunerated by their society. Particular attention is given to the following examples: the role of Samuel Adjai Crowther in the Church Missionary Society (CMS) missions to the Yoruba and Niger; the work of the Bagandan catechist Apolo Kivebulaya in the CMS missions to Toro and the Ituri district of the Congo; the key contributions of Jamaican and Congolese agents to the Baptist Missionary Society (BMS) missions to Cameroons and the Congo; the agency of Xhosa Christians in the early Scottish missions to Malawi; and the ministry of the Xhosa Tiyo Soga in the Eastern Cape. Although these African Christians often adopted aspects of European culture, they shared a conviction that Africa and Africans occupied a cherished place, both in Christian scripture and in the future salvific purposes of God for the world.