Satiru 1906, the village that was never allowed to rise again

01A chief, a son and a promise of deliverance

In 1903 the British took the Sokoto Caliphate. The old Sultan was removed, and from then on the Sultan and the emirs held their seats because the British had put them there. They still had real power at home, but everyone knew who had the last word.

That did not make the North quiet. People who had ruled themselves for a long time now paid heavier taxes to a foreign power. The slave trade, which had made some men rich, was being shut down. And many Muslims did not like being governed by Christians at all. Here and there, preachers rose up and announced that they were the Mahdi, the one who would come to free Islam from unbelievers. They gathered followers, but they were scattered, and none of them joined hands with the others.

One of these moments came in February 1904, in a village called Satiru, about fourteen miles south-west of Sokoto. The village chief declared that he was the Mahdi. He named his son, Isa, as the prophet Jesus returned. The new Sultan of Sokoto, handling the matter in his own way, had the chief arrested and locked up. The old man died in prison.

That might have been the end of it. But Isa took his father's place as chief, and his followers still saw him as a prophet. For almost two years nothing much happened, apart from some trouble getting taxes out of the village, which was normal enough at the time.

Then, in January 1906, a stranger walked in. He was a preacher called Dan Makafo, and he came with a large band of followers. They had run from French territory in Niger after an uprising there had failed. Dan Makafo had heard that Satiru had a prophet, and he came looking for him. His arrival lit the fire again.

In February, a nearby village, Tsomo, refused to accept Isa as a prophet. Isa and his men attacked Tsomo and killed at least fourteen of its people. Then they declared a holy war against the British.

02Twenty minutes on Valentine's morning

This is where the British began to get things wrong. In 1904 they had left the Sultan to deal with Satiru. This time they decided to do it themselves, and the men making that choice were all new to their jobs.

The Resident of Sokoto, Major Alder Burdon, had just left and was still travelling to his next post. In his place was H.R.P. Hillary, only acting as Resident. His assistant, A.G.M. Scott, was also acting. The soldiers in Sokoto were a company of Mounted Infantry under Lieutenant Francis Blackwood, the son of a naval baronet, with a European sergeant named Gosling. Both soldiers had been there less than a month. It was most likely Blackwood's first command of his own.

At three in the morning on 14 February 1906, Valentine's Day, Hillary rode out. He took Scott, a doctor named Ellis, seventy mounted soldiers under Blackwood and Gosling, and one Maxim machine gun. But the gun was not ready when they left, so its crew were told to follow on and catch up.

At a quarter past seven, close to Satiru, the small force found itself facing about two thousand men. They carried spears and farm tools. Hillary and Scott walked forward to talk, saying they had come in peace. Behind them, Blackwood ordered his men to get off their horses and form a square. Seventy armed soldiers lining up behind you does not make a peace offer very believable, and Isa's men did not believe it. They moved toward the two officers.

Blackwood saw the danger and ordered his men forward. But some were still getting off their horses, others were busy forming the square, and those at the back could not hear the orders from the front. In that confusion the villagers came in with spears and sharpened farm tools.

It was over in about twenty minutes. Blackwood, Hillary and Scott were dead, and so were twenty-nine of their soldiers. The rest ran, Dr Ellis among them, wounded. Sergeant Gosling and a company sergeant major, Aduma Yola, tried to keep some order as they fell back. On the way they passed the Maxim gun that had been trying to catch up. It was left behind, and the villagers took it. It was the worst defeat the British had suffered in the Protectorate up to then.

03Mown down, burnt and forbidden

Satiru had won, but it could not follow up. The obvious next step was Sokoto itself, and the villagers were not strong enough for that. Isa had been badly wounded and died, which left Dan Makafo, an outsider, in charge. In Sokoto, the Sultan stayed with the British. Other emirs sent help. Major Burdon came back to the post he had only just left, and the British began to plan their revenge.

Reinforcements reached Sokoto by 1 March. On the morning of 9 March, a force of more than five hundred men under Major R.H. Goodwin marched out. This time they brought two Maxim guns and a field gun.

The end could only go one way. The people of Satiru came forward in groups of a few hundred at a time, and the machine guns cut them down. The soldiers took the village with bayonets and shot those trying to get away. Dan Makafo was caught. Patrols went after those who had fled and killed many of them. By one estimate, Satiru lost more than two thousand men that day, and more than three thousand women and children were taken captive. By half past two in the afternoon it was finished, and the village was burnt to the ground.

The Sultan then finished the job. He had the ruins destroyed completely and ordered that Satiru must never be built again. It never has been. Dan Makafo and five of his leading men were tried, not in a British court, but in the Sultan's own court, and they were put to death.

The three British officers were buried in the cemetery in Sokoto, where their graves could still be found in the 1970s. In England, a plaque was put up for Blackwood by the officers who had served with him. For Satiru, there is no plaque at all, only the empty ground where a village once stood, fourteen miles from Sokoto.