The Elephant
They had been on the path about half a day when they heard bellowing in the woods. Actually meeting an elephant had just not occurred to the four men—yet. Wadi Adam and his three companions saw piles of elephant dung on the trail and noticed footprints in the mud. Rainforest elephants, smaller than those found on savannas, make up for their size by fearlessness.
A young rainforest elephant emerged from the thick jungle, charged, faced them, and stopped. This bull appeared to have gone into musk with gallons of testosterone surging through his body. He was either going to find a female elephant to mate with or stomp anything he saw into an unrecognizable pulp. Wadi Adam stood directly in front of him, frozen, his buddies scurrying into the forest like squirrels running from an oncoming garbage truck. Wadi pulled his pistol from the holster and cocked the hammer. The large .476 caliber might not be a match for the creature’s thick skull and large tusks, but Wadi knew the gun was his only chance.
Wadi had never shot an elephant, lion or anything large. A springbuck was his claim to fame, requiring four shots to kill the moving target. This elephant was fairly still, except for pawing the ground and raising his head in a threatening manner. The initial charge—head down and tusks in the kill position—came. Wadi took aim and started firing—first in the skull—second shot dead center—same for the third and fourth. When the fifth shot struck, the elephant stopped and shook his head side to side as though he was trying to dislodge the bullet. He was wounded but not done, dazed, standing in front of Wadi, not thirty yards away. Wadi carefully reached in his pocket and found more rounds. Slowly and methodically he clicked the cylinder out, ejected the spent shells, and put in the new loads without taking his eyes off the elephant. No sooner had he pushed the cylinder back in the firing position, than the elephant started his final charge. Although the injured beast wobbled from side to side, he was well enough to kill Wadi. Taking a standing firing position, Wadi fired round after round. Finally one shot penetrated the skull of the giant. He fell, almost at Wadi’s feet.
Wadi’s companions crept from their hiding places. They would have elephant meat for quite a while. With their knives they carved off pieces, started a fire, and cooked many pounds of meat. Once they were full, they packed as much cooked elephant flesh as they could carry and hurried to make time on the trail. This was the first meat in weeks and their digestive systems made strange sounds, but eating protein was worth the occasional stomach ache and bowel uproar. Since he didn’t have a heavy load, Swadi agreed to carry the tusks. Tusks were another valuable item to trade, in some cases worth a man’s life.
Two days later, they found a small village, but no one had rifles. Although the villagers spoke a different language, everyone knew a little Swahili, so communication was possible. They spent the night sharing elephant meat with the villagers, and telling the amazing story of how Wadi killed the elephant, which would be told for generations to come.
The following day, the four travelers started downstream along a path cut by Stanley’s men only days before their arrival. At times, they would pass the bodies of bearers left to rot in the jungle after they died from exhaustion or disease. The villagers had told the group how many days’ walk to expect before reaching the big settlement where several stolen rifles were located. Ugarrowwa, an Arab slave and ivory trader who worked for Tippu-Tib, controlled the village named for him. Wadi knew Henry Stanley had left over fifty of his sick and injured men in Ugarrowwa to receive care. An agreement had been reached for Ugarrowwa to provide food for the men, but instead, some of the men had to trade their weapons to keep from starving. Stanley had hung one bearer nearby for selling rifles for food, yet it’s unlikely his officers would suffer this same fate. If Wadi and his three friends were caught by the Arab slave traders, they would be turned over to Stanley when he returned. Their best hope was for Ugarrowwa to be out of camp trading with chiefs in outlying areas of the Congo. At the end of the day the four men rested and ate elephant meat along with ripe plantains they had found along the way. Before dark, Wadi decided to further explore Dr. Parke’s luggage. He started at the top and worked his way down, opening each section zipper by zipper. The top enclosure held shirts, socks, and underwear. Also there was a raincoat and a sweater. “Why a sweater?” Wadi asked himself. Next he found a personal care compartment with shaving gear, along with medicines and bandages.
Wadi was able to read only a few English words. His home country of Somalia, being Muslim, used an Arabic script that Wadi didn’t know well. Swahili, on the other hand, had a written language part Arabic and part Bantu which Wadi knew better than Arabic. He recognized a bottle of morphine from helping hold down a porter while the doctor gave an injection from a similar container. Near the middle of the kit, Wadi found identification, money, and trade items. A single sheet paper passport listed the doctor’s name as Thomas H. Parke, Army Medical Doctor. Inside the folded paper passport was money…more money than Wadi had ever seen. Over one hundred U.S. dollars and one hundred and fifty British pounds were neatly pressed, mostly in small bills. This was more money than most native Africans would see in a lifetime. On the other hand, most natives didn’t live very long.
Trade items in the kit included beautiful cowrie shells. Native chiefs loved the seashells so much they accepted them in exchange for natives they sold into slavery, called Maafa or “the great disaster” by the slaves. Wadi also found beads and jewelry for trading in the luggage. Finally he reached the bottom zipper. Inside were Dr. Parke’s personal journal and his collection of native plants, feathers, rocks, small skulls, and three cloth bags tied at the top by a cord. Wadi removed the cord on one to discover green soil and ore containing glass-looking objects. He tied the cloth bag closed and returned it to its place. In the luggage were books, writing materials, boot polish, wash rags, towels, combs and brushes, and more medical supplies. Feeling assured he had explored the suitcase well, Wadi wanted to capitalize on his newfound assets, but first he needed to be well armed.
The next morning, the small band of porters, on the lam, headed downriver with a sense of urgency. Wadi told his companions he had many more items to trade for guns. Obtaining four rifles and a canoe would be desirable. When he told this to his companions, they looked at him as though a new head had grown from his shoulder. He stopped on the trail and asked to see their slave marks. Uchungu and Kajeli had been branded. The two raised their left arms and revealed a “T” burned into their flesh right below the arm pit; the mark of ownership by Tippu-Tib. The two men were a small part of the ten thousand slaves Tippu-Tib owned in Zanzibar. Wadi knew slave owners usually branded their slaves because tattoos took longer and didn’t show up well on dark African skin.
Wadi addressed the men in Swahili, their common language.
“We will try to bypass the Ugarrowwa station at night in a canoe. We cannot count on the Arab settlement being willing to trade with us. Most likely they will rob us of everything we have. While I hope Ugarrowwa is off hunting ivory, we will approach the settlement as though they are fully manned.”
Wadi took on the role of leader. No one opposed him.
“We will look along the trails and in the small villages on the way since other deserters may have been wary of the Arab town,” Wadi said.
During the next two days, they picked up one other deserter who was almost starved to death. Swadi had left the Stanley expedition with only his meager gear. In his possession was a stolen rifle loaded with three rounds of ammo that so far he had not needed to use. Wadi checked on the still intact firing spring. Stanley had removed firing springs from some of the weapons, so the rifles would be useless in a trade and also to prevent shooting at birds and wasting ammunition. Swadi had seen some of the deserters on various trails and was surprised Wadi had not run into them. Three deserters, carrying both rifles and crates of ammunition, let Swadi know they did not want him in their group by firing a round over his head and motioned him to stay back.
The village that lay ahead was near a trail that led directly to the Aruwimi River. The five men noted several canoes on the river banks. The village chief greeted them, offered food, and was quite friendly. Wadi got right to the point and asked what he would want for two canoes. The chief would consider only one canoe, saying he would take ivory in exchange. Wadi offered a tusk and a few cowrie shells, which did the trick. He learned three travelers with rifles had stopped by, but made no trades. Wadi’s gang loaded into a large canoe where they found three paddles to help propel them downriver. They made good time and camped by the river that night.
At camp, Wadi suggested Uchungu and Kajeli conceal their brands with an over-brand. They agreed, and he went into Dr. Parke’s kit and found in the money compartment a U.S. half dollar. Using some of the doctor’s long tweezers, he first heated the coin in the fire. Next, he carefully placed the sizzling coin directly over the “T” on Uchungu. He was a huge man nicknamed Bull Neck by the white men on the expedition. Even so, he yelled in pain. Wadi put salve and a bandage over the burned spot. He knew healing would take a while. Kajeli looked terrified, so Wadi gave him a shot of morphine from the kit to help. When the hot coin was put in place, Kajeli moaned and passed out. Now, if they were caught, Tippu-Tib’s men would not be able to identify them, since many slave traders used the same spot to brand their property. Once Wadi had everything needed for the group’s existence, he could plan for a way back home.
In the morning, they woke up to sounds of gun fire and screaming deep in the jungle. With Kajeli still groggy from the morphine, Uchungu stayed back to look after him while the rest headed in the direction of the noise. After crashing through jungle foliage, they came to a wide circular clearing, an elephant bai, complete with a huge mud hole in the center. Forest elephants create these bais throughout the jungle for the salt they crave, which accumulates below the mud holes.
As the group entered the bai, they saw a herd of rainforest elephants moving slowly into the jungle. Then, they noticed the source of the screams. Three men lay dead at the edge of the clearing, stomped and gored to death by the herd. The corpses had been pulverized and their skulls crushed. The victims’ rifles lay scattered, pressed into the mud, but otherwise okay. Wadi Adam and his two men picked up the weapons, took knives and other useful items from the dead men, then trekked back to the river. Once there, the group of five cleaned, oiled and tested the rifles. Now, they had plenty of fire power, ammunition and a mode of transportation. Another canoe and rifle would be nice, but Wadi hoped to pick up those at one of the many villages they would encounter.
Two more days on the river got them close to the Ugarrowwa station, so they stopped for the night. Early the next morning they floated quietly by the sleeping settlement, hugging the far bank of the river. That night, they paddled steadily, making good time. Later, they carried the canoe past some big rapids. Before they put the canoe back in the water, they stopped along the Aruwimi River, which would soon flow into the much larger Congo River. They had to make some hard decisions.
If they followed the Congo downriver to the Atlantic Coast, the two slaves might be recognized and to make matters worse, a rear column of Stanley’s expedition was plodding along somewhere in front of them. Wadi asked the other men if they had families to return to. Uchungu and Kajeli had been sold away from their parents when they were very young. They had no idea if their parents were still alive. They didn’t want to go back to Zanzibar. Wadi, Swadi, and Salim all wanted to go east, Swadi and Salim to British controlled areas that no longer allowed slavery, and Wadi to Somalia where he had a wife and child. All five men agreed to go east above Lake Victoria to the British coast, and then Wadi would head north to join his family. They would travel the Congo River a short distance, go inland and north to Sudan, and across Africa to the east coast. Wadi had found a compass in Dr. Parke’s luggage that would help, but they knew the villagers would trade for food and directions.
For the time being they were free, a good feeling, but traveling over a thousand miles through treacherous lands, being shot with poisoned arrows and attacked by wild animals left little margin for error. The five native Africans might know how to survive in the jungle, but carnivorous animals were always waiting to eat them for dinner.
Six months later, Wadi left his four friends in the area of what is now Kenya, and journeyed northeast into Somalia. Thirty more days of travel got him to Mogadishu, where he found his wife and son impoverished. They had to move in with her parents to survive. While Wadi had used much of the cash to buy food and provisions for his band of escapees, he still had money left to buy a small farm. He had his pistol and rifle, but no need for the baggage from Dr. Parke. Instead, he needed money for his family. In Mogadishu, a dealer in fine gifts and antiques was excited to purchase the kit from Dr. Thomas H. Parke and offered Wadi ten British pounds. Wadi countered with fifteen and they settled on twelve.
The antiques dealer sent out messages to his other shops in Mombasa, Kenya and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. An elderly doctor in Addis Ababa wished to have his piece of history, so the kit was sent there, but the doctor died before buying the item. The luggage was placed on a high shelf and eventually was hidden from sight behind steamer trunks and valises. Dr. Parke’s kit was listed by handwritten Arabic script in inventory as “doctor’s bag.” Eighty years later, in 1966, Emperor Haile Selassie needed a unique gift for the Haitian doctor, known as Papa Doc Duvalier, who was President for Life of his country. An aide to Selassie was delighted to come upon a fine leather satchel that had belonged to the now-famous Dr. Parke at the antiques store. The luggage was in excellent condition because of the dry desert climate and the many pieces of luggage rested on top of it for years. Nothing had been removed from it since the bag arrived at the store, and the outside had been cleaned and refurbished. Papa Doc loved the important piece of history. Once Emperor Selassie completed his state visit and returned to Ethiopia, Papa Doc began to explore the contents.