Half Die

[4] Eventually the vacant spaces between the villages become occupied, gradually merging into a single urban area.

[4] Mocam Town received migrants from Kombo and upriver, seeking work opportunities in the colonial capital.

[4] The name Half Die is said to originate from high mortality among its residents, attributed to the 1837 yellow fever outbreak or the 1869 cholera epidemic.

[1][6] One account attributes the name to a conversation between Lieutenant Governor of the Gambia George Rendall and the then colonial surgeon during the 1837 yellow fever outbreak.

[2] George Abbas Kooli D'Arcy, the governor of the Gambia, who had begun his tenure in the midst of a yellow fever outbreak in 1859, sought to improve the sanitary situation in the area by raising the land, but he failed to get the support from the British government at the time.