Bishop Hannington murdered in vain?

The unbearably dusty potholed road seemed endless as the wretched old motorcycle that carried me threateningly rattled and scoffed unceasingly.

The dusty road that branches off the Iganga- Jinja Highway, and penetrates the depth of Mayuge in Busoga is one of the hard-to-reach to parts where on October 29, 1885, a missionary bishop, Hannington and his team met their death.

You need a motorbike to reach this bushy area where the blood of the first white missionary was shed in Uganda. But then, due to the bad terrain, I was forced to send off the rider, and embark on the rest of the journey on foot.

While trekking the bushy meandering path to the murder site, I kept imagining the enthusiastic doctor walking the same path many years ago. I felt a cold sting moving down my spine.

The rock of death
Finally, I got at the alledged murder site. Apart from the recently constructed church building and a small clinic above the valley from where the bishop was said to have been murdered, there is nothing to show for significance of the site of a man from Britain who came to Africa and died planting the seed of Christianity.

The bushy and uninhabited valley appears gloomy and menacingly dreadful as if hiding the secret of death that claimed the life of the doctoring missionary. The young man I found at the church who offered to be my guide during the remaining part of the journey pointed at a flat rock we were standing on and said it was on that very rock that Bishop Hannington was pierced with spears and swords.

“You are standing at the spot where the innocent blood was shade trying to pave the way for Christianity into Uganda,” my guide, John Waiswa said.

Looking at the rock on which he was slain, I could not help wondering what compelled Hannington to leave his comfortable home in England and come to die in Mayuge District.

But what is of more impact is the misfortune that befell this place that though it is the cradle of Christianity in Uganda, it is one of the most remote places in Uganda.

Conflicting accounts
Recorded history has it that James Hannington, born at Hurstpierpoint, Sussex 1, 1847 was in October 1884 dispatched from England by the Anglican Church to head the Eastern Equatorial African Headquarters in Buganda but met his death in Mayuge before reaching Buganda.

The cave where the Bishop used to spend his nights and the one where he used to stay during the day plus his preaching stone, stand to date intact on the forested hill of Kyando overlooking the valley where he was killed.

Although a greater majority of historians affirm that the murder of Bishop Hannington at King Luuba’s Palace in Busoga was as deliberate as Kabaka Mwanga of Buganda required it, some locals argue that it was an accident due to the misinterpretation of the Kiganda dialect into Lusoga, a mishap in spellings in the course of communication between Mwanga and King Luba.

Those who claim it was an accident narrate that after Hannington had been arrested in Busoga, word was sent to Kabaka Mwanga who responded in Luganda that bamute agende (they should set him free and he goes), but this was unfortunately misinterpreted for bamutte agende which means “kill him”. Chief Luuba thereafter ordered for the killing.

The great grandson of Chief Luuba, Grace Tilutangwa Mbaziira however argues that the killing of Hannington was on the orders of Kabaka Mwanga and was not an accident because it is evidenced by the unwillingness that Chief Luuba expressed after receiving the information that the preacher who was treating Basoga should be put to death.

“In an effort to save Hannington’s life, Luuba subjected him to a test, which his ministers had resolved that if he passed he would be spared,” says Tulitangwa.

The Basoga believe that in an effort to save the Bishop he was put to a test of climbing a slippery steep rock that still stands in the same pond of water to date, but he failed. If he had been successful, they say he would have been sent to Kabaka Mwanga to spare his life.

Talitangwa narrates that Hannington’s crime was to attempt to come to Buganda through Busoga, a shorter route than that employed by earlier visitors who took the route from the south of Lake Victoria. Like history has told us,Buganda’s kings regarded Busoga as a backdoor through which those with ill intentions entered the Kingdom.