Hut Tax War of 1898

[1] The tax constituted a major burden on residents of the Protectorate; 24 indigenous chiefs had signed a petition against it, explaining its adverse effects on their societies, to no avail.

The immediate catalyst for hostilities was an attempt by British colonial officials to arrest the Temne chief Bai Bureh, a general and war strategist, on the basis of rumours.

Bureh was provoked to revolt by an arrest warrant issued by the colonial government, which was intended to serve as a show of force to preemptively discourage any potential rebellion.

Despite the ongoing rebellion, Bureh dispatched two peace overtures to the British in April and June of that year, aided by the mediation of Limba chief Almamy Suluku.

However, after several months, the rebels still had not been defeated, which led him to order a scorched earth policy in response, which stipulated that villages and farmlands in rebel-controlled territory would be burnt.

[2] Occurring concurrently with the rebellion in the north, another uprising broke out, led by disaffected Mende chiefs and warriors from the Sierra Leonean hinterland (joined by a small number of Sherbro) who also opposed the hut tax.

[5] Cardew responded to the rebellion by dispatching a military force under Lieutenant-Colonel J. W. A. Marshall's command to attack the rebels, which managed to defeat most of them after numerous small-scale skirmishes.

[8] These forces combined suffered 67 killed and 184 wounded during the rebellion, in addition to the deaths of 90 African porters and an unknown number of casualties among the levies (which were not recorded).