What became of Uganda’s war museum?

A national museum is one of the treasures of a country. In a museum, history and culture of a people is told either in pictures, artefacts and other physical features.
Uganda has a national civilian museum at Kitante hill in Kampala. But what is there is not even a quarter of what should be there.
If Uganda Tourism Board (UTB) was not an inapt organisation but charged with the marketing of Uganda especially abroad as a leading tourist destination in the region, some treasure souvenirs laying idle somewhere that this reporter has seen would be earning Uganda an extra dollar in the tourism sector.

It is unbelievable that the Uganda National Museum has absolutely nothing that tells the real story of the “Pearl of Africa” brand. No historical stories, no inscriptions, no pictures no nothing.
In fact, there are Ugandan individual researchers who have far better information as well as historical artefacts about Uganda that if assembled for exhibition, the Uganda Museum would look better than a ruined museum.

No war museum
Ugandans have participated in several wars in recorded history. In spite of that, there is no war museum to remind those who participate or tell the story to those who were absent when they happened.
The earliest documented wars were the inter-tribal wars between the Bavuma and Baganda, the famous Lake Nalubaale (now Victoria) battle of 1875 which the British ex-serviceman Henry Morton Stanley participated in by commanding the Buganda forces alongside Kabaka Muteesa I and Buganda defeated Buvuma.
As a matter of fact, Buvuma was not part of Buganda until after the 1933 Buganda/Buvuma agreement. There was also the 1860’s-1899 Bunyoro or the Kabalega/British war. That aside, Ugandans also fought in the First and Second World Wars.

After that were the polital wars such as the 1979 war that ousted President Idi Amin, the 1981-1986 Luweero war that catapulted President Yoweri Museveni to power in January 1986. Unfortunately, “Treasure souvenirs” collected from those wars were destroyed.
Today, many years after the guns fell silent, who would not want to see the gun Kabalega, King of Bunyoro used to fight the British colonialists or the special boat Gabuga, in which army commander of Buganda kingdom Henry Morton Stanley and Kabaka Muteesa I sailed in from Munyonyo in 1875 to fight the Bavuma in Lake Nalubaale. By 1900, that boat was docked somewhere in Buganda and today, its picture lays idle in a private home of a researcher.

The first bullet to be extracted from a Ugandan ex-soldier’s body by a western medical personnel, Dr Albert Cook in 1897 at Mengo hospital is also kept in a private home somewhere in Uganda.
Who would not want to see the picture of the mighty Uganda National Liberation Army (UNLA) anti-personnel carrier (APC) that for days halted the NRA quick onslaught to Kampala in 1985? The APC was, however, disabled, thanks to Commander Pecos Kutesa’s shrewdness. This picture should perhaps be in every UPDF office. Unfortunately it’s not.

Tourist asks for war museum
Last Saturday, I travelled from Rukungiri District to Kampala with my brother (names withheld) who is in the tourism industry. He had dropped a couple of Norwegian tourists at Kihihi Air Field, Kanungu District to fly to Entebbe airport for a return journey to Europe having been with them for 14 days.

During the six-hour journey from Rukungiri to Kampala, I engaged him in a conversation about tourism in Uganda.
After passing by Mbarara military barracks, previously known as Simba barracks since 1965 after the Ugandan forces had returned from the “First Congo Mission” also referred to as the “First Congo Invasion” by some commentators, he told me an interesting story.

Sometime back, he guided a retired British General, Ian Graham, on his second visit to Uganda. His first visit to Uganda was in 1975 when he and Gen Chandos Blair, a personal envoy of Queen Elizabeth of England sent them to President Amin to plead for the release of Denis Hill, a Makerere University lecturer who authored a book titled The White Pumpkin in which he referred to Amin as a village tyrant.
Hill was tried in a court martial and sentenced to death by firing squad. The two Generals and British Foreign Secretary, James Callaghan convinced Amin to pardon Hill.

This time, Gen Graham desired to visit the war museum he had visited in 1975; my brother was startled. He had never heard of a war museum in Uganda. Indeed, not many Ugandans know that Uganda once had a war museum.
I asked the Uganda Peoples Defence Forces (UPDF) spokesperson, Brig Richard Karemire, whether Uganda has ever had a war museum, his response was: “To my knowledge, we don’t have a war museum in Uganda. At least, not yet”.
I told him that there once existed a war museum at Bombo barracks, the Brigadier said that he was not aware of that.

War museum established in 1919
Had it not been vandalised, this January, the Uganda War Museum would have marked 100 years of existence.
When Ugandan troops of the King’s African Rifles (KAR) returned from World War I, in December 1918, the governor of Uganda, Richard Corydon directed that the military equipment captured from the enemy as well as those used by the KAR but were rendered useless be put in war museum at Bombo military barracks. In January 1919, Uganda War Museum was established at Bombo barracks.

The exercise also involved collecting some of the earliest military equipment used in Uganda during the Baganda/Bavuma war of 1860/70’s, some from Ankole military barracks, and equipment from Luba’s military barracks in Busoga, present day Magamaga barracks. Other collections were from Masindi barracks in Bunyoro and Toro barracks in Fort-Portal.
All these barracks were established in 1891 by Capt Fredrick Lugard who had been in Afghanistan and fought in the 1880’s Anglo-Afghanistan war before coming to Uganda in December 1890.

Treasure pieces vandalised
Probably, the most treasured military equipment that was vandalised from Bombo war museum was the 600 caliber chain-Maxim gun Lugard used on January 24, 1892 to attack Rubaga Hill during the inter-religious wars between Catholics and Protestants.
Catholic fighters had retreated to the hill from the lower grounds and for hours, had enjoyed the height to shoot at the advancing Protestant fighters until Capt Lugard brought the Maxim gun.
There is a Ugandan researcher who has the rare picture of this gun with Capt Lugard and his soldiers looking at it before the infamous Lubaga battle.

Also vandalised was Gabunga, Buganda army commander’s special boat, in which Kabaka Muteesa I and Stanley sailed in during the 1875 Baganda/Bavuma war in Lake Nalubaale (Victoria).
Other souvenirs stolen from Bombo war museum include the bicycles British military commanders rode during the war, Kabaka Sir, Capt Daudi Chwa’s binoculars and bicycle he rode from Kampala to northern Tanzania to boost the morale of his Buganda Rifles (BRs) who were fighting alongside the King’s African Rifle (KAR).

Until 1920’s, the hill where Nakasero State lodge is, was popularly known as the Gun Hill to the Europeans. Why?
There was a World War I gun facing Lake Victoria on the hill. After the war, the gun was also taken to Bombo museum.
It should be noted that Bombo war museum was not open to the public then and was not a museum in the sense of it, but a depot of old and unused military equipment assembled together in a store and in the compound and was also exclusive to Europeans officials.
The museum was restocked after the Second World War. In 1977, President Amin collected some the equipment from Bombo and put them at Mbuya military museum.

One of the treasured souvenirs in the new museum was the eagle symbol used by the German forces captured by the Ugandan KAR during the Second World War.
In Rwanda, tourists pay about $150 to visit the banker in Mulindi in northern Rwanda that housed now Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame, then the commander of the Rwandese Patriotic Front (RPF) during the 1990-1994 war.
War museums are special tourist attractions that should be preserved. In Africa, countries with famous war museum include South Africa, Tunisia, Morocco and Egypt.