1902 War Office Five Sheet Set of Maps of Eastern Nigeria

A concurrent set of five folding sheets, together forming a map covering central and eastern Nigeria, produced by the Intelligence Division of the British War Office in 1902 (with one map being dated 1905). The maps cover this region as it was roiled by opposition to British encroachments and was being negotiated over between the British and Germans, who controlled the neighboring colony of Kamerun.

A Closer Look

These sheets cover a large portion of eastern and central Nigeria, stretching from Lake Chad to the Bight of Benin and westwards beyond the Niger River to the limit of territory surveyed by the Anglo-French Boundary Commission in 1900, following an agreement between the two colonial powers to fix the border of Northern Nigeria. At right, the Anglo-German Boundary is marked, below which was the German colony of Kamerun. These sheets were an enlargement and elaboration of the 1901 map of Nigeria produced by the War Office's Intelligence Division (previously sold by us), a foundational map in the cartography of Nigeria.

Like their predecessor, these maps note settlements in remarkable detail, along with rivers (especially the Benue and Niger Rivers, which meet at Lokoja), lakes, areas of elevation, 'well defined main tracks,' other routes, wells, springs, and additional features. Notes throughout provide supplemental detail, such as 'uninhabited wilderness' or 'dense vegetation.'

Abuja, the modern capital of Nigeria, appears at left, towards bottom of the 'Central Nigeria' sheet (though the modern city is closer to Waru, slightly to the southeast of the settlement labelled Abuja here, now known as Suleja). Larger settlements towards top, especially Zaria and Kano, were well-established cities linked with trans-Saharan trading networks that in the 19th century fell to the powerful Fulani Sokoto Caliphate.

British Nigeria

British colonial activity in Nigeria can be traced to 1861 when Britain annexed Lagos as part of its ongoing war against the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. In 1884, the Crown established the Oil River Protectorate - referring to the Niger Delta's rich production of Palm Oil. From Lagos, the British gradually expanded their influence, forcing, cajoling, and buying the loyalty of surrounding kingdoms. In the 1885 Berlin Conference, the other European colonial powers acknowledged British suzerainty over the region. The Crown founded the Royal Niger Company in 1886, granting the joint stock company a charter calling for the exploitation and development of Nigerian resources, but in the end, Nigeria proved an untenable money pit. They did, however, expand British influence southwards into the Lower Niger, driving out rival German colonials and renaming the area the Southern Nigeria Protectorate (SNP). Nonetheless, by 1900, the Royal Niger Company was in default and ceded its claims to the British Crown for £865,000.

Under Crown control, the Northern and Southern Nigerian Protectorates were amalgamated as the Colony and Protectorate of Nigeria. By 1901, the Protectorate began to aggressively expand its borders, fighting in a series of wars with neighboring African kingdoms, tribal confederations, and the Sokoto Caliphate. The largest of these were the Anglo-Aro War (1901 - 1902), in the borderlands between British Nigeria and German Kamerun, and the subjugation of the Sokoto Caliphate (1900 - 1903), which faced attacks from both the British and Germans. British General Frederick Lugard (1858 - 1945), who would play a leading administrative role in Nigeria in the following decades, cleverly played rival emirs of the caliphate against each other during a relentless march into their territory. It was during this time of rapid expansion that this map was compiled - a synthesis of the most up-to-date cartographic information collected by intelligence officers, war parties, and tribal allies - as an essential tool for both conquest and administration.

Publication History and Census

These maps were prepared by the British War Office, with four of them being printed in 1902 by the office's Intelligence Division and one ('Cross River') in 1905 by the Topographical Section of the General Staff. The four Intelligence Division maps were compiled by Charles John Donovan, and all were 'reproduced and printed' by the cartographic firm W. and A.K. Johnston. Four of the maps also carry a stamp of Edward Stanford (the stamp is obscured or 'whited out' on the fifth, 'Nikki'), most likely indicating where they were sold. As mentioned above, these sheets are an enlargement and elaboration of a 1901 War Office map, the first to cover much of this territory in detail. Either as a set or individually, the maps are quite rare. We note three of the individual sheets cataloged at various institutions in the OCLC ('Central Nigeria' at Northwestern University, Nikki and Yola at the Bibliothèque nationale de France as part of a larger collection of British War Office maps of Africa from the early 20th century). The National Archives at Kew holds a collection of Nigeria maps from the early 20th century that appears to include all of these sheets.