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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | The Kru Coast Revolt of 1915-1916 |
Author: | Sullivan, Jo M. |
Year: | 1989 |
Periodical: | Liberian Studies Journal |
Volume: | 14 |
Issue: | 1 |
Pages: | 51-71 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Liberia |
Subjects: | Kru rebellions 1910-1919 History and Exploration Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) |
Abstract: | The political and military upheaval on the Kru Coast during 1915-1916 had both historical and immediate causes, resulting in devastation which has affected events in that area for most of the twentieth century. The long-term causes were a result of the economic, political and social relations among the Kru Coast towns and the Liberian settlers and their government. Kru communities in the nineteenth century were powerful, independent, and relative to other Liberians, both settler and indigenous, prosperous. To preserve their political and economic independence, the Kru opposed the presence of settlers in their midst and resisted Liberian attempts to control their societies. Their dispersed settlements, mobility, and relative wealth enabled them to resist the government of Liberia longer than many of their neighbours. More immediate causes were Kru attempts to participate in Liberian economic and political life and settler rejection, grievances against the Sinoe settlers and the government, especially from the 1890s and into the twentieth century, the depression brought on by World War I, and the taxes and repression that followed. With the military assistance of the United States, the government defeated the Kru communities, but did not integrate them into the Liberian polity. Bitterness, reprisals, and repression - towards the entire coast - continued for many years. Notes, ref. |