The African Association

The Association for Promoting the Discovery of the Interior Parts of Africa, shortened to “The African Society” and “African Association”, whose influential membership was headed by Sir Joseph Banks, president of the Royal Society – a man of learning and influence, had sailed with Captain Cook on his first voyage around the world – was founded in 1788 and sponsored a series of important explorations over the next forty years.

“In the year 1788, some noblemen and gentlemen, desirous of rescuing the age from a charge of ignorance, which in other respects so little belongs to it, and strongly impressed with a conviction of the practicability and utility of thus enlarging the fund of human knowledge, formed the plan of an association, for promoting the discovery of the interior parts of Africa.” (Proceedings of the African Association, 1791).

“Its activities mark the beginning of African exploration in a systematic way, as well as the furthering of British trade and political prestige on that continent. The first concern of the African Association was the River Niger – where was its source and what was the direction of its flow, etc. The first four expeditions were unfortunate for the leaders, Ledyard, Lucas, Horneman, and Houghton, all of whom either died while enroute or were murdered by the fanatical Moors. The fifth, that of Mungo Park, was rich in geographical results, though he too died on his second expedition” (Cox).

Slightly over two hundred years ago a forerunner of The Fortnightly Club met regularly on Saturday evenings at St. Albans Tavern in the Pall Mall district of London. At the meeting of June 9th, 1788 the following resolution was passed:

“That as no species of information is more ardently desired, or more generally useful, than that which improves the science of Geography, and as the vast continent of Africa, notwithstanding the efforts of the Ancients, and the wishes of the Moderns, is still in a great measure unexplored, the Members of this Club do form themselves into an Association for Promoting the Discovery of the Inland Parts of that Quarter of the World”.
Each member agreed to subscribe five guineas a year for three years, and a committee of five was elected to choose explorers to be sent into the interior of Africa. It was also decided that “Such intelligence as they shall, from time to time, receive from the persons who shall be sent out on the business of discovery” would not be disclosed except to members of the newly-named “Africa Association”.

To increase the available money supply the Association was increased in number and three years later, in 1791, there were 95 members, representing the upper class of British society. They included three dukes, twelve earls, seven other lords, two generals and two titled ladies. During the forty-three years of its existence – until it was incorporated into the Royal Geographic Society – there were a total of 212 members. Nearly half of the original “Saturday’s Club” members were Scots, including three large landowners, the richest commoner in Britain, a lawyer and a doctor. The prime movers of the group at the outset were Sir Joseph Banks and Henry Beaufoy. The former, heir to a large Lincolnshire estate, was fascinated by botany and had been a participant in Captain Cook’s first expedition, gathering plants throughout the tropics. Upon returning home he had been elected president of the Royal Society, a post he was to hold as successor to Christopher Wren and Isaac Newton for 42 years. The latter approached the subject of Africa from a different prospect. Beaufoy was a Quaker and an active member of the Society for the Abolition of Slavery – as was another African Association founder, the Bishop of Llandaff. Most of the group had no specific agenda but were possessed of an intense curiosity about the world, its history and its creatures – again quite like the Fortnightly Club. This spirit of investigative discovery led these armchair explorers to launch explorations that the British government, under the thrifty Mr. Pitt, was unwilling to undertake. Thus these wealthy dilettantes laid the groundwork for the expansion of the British Empire into Africa.