Miriam & Samuel

Great characters from Freetown, Sierra Leone. I always thought Miriam was of Irish or Scottish descent when I heard her name. Her surname is Murray, so when I met her I was proved wrong....

The modern history of Sierra Leone goes back to 1787, when the Black Poor, mostly former soldiers from the British army, settled on the northern end of the Sierra Leone peninsula. After the area of Freetown and its environs became a Crown Colony of Britain in 1808, Sierra Leone was used as a principal navy base for a British anti-slavery squadron operating in western African waters. Then later in 1896, as the remainder of the territory of modern Sierra Leone was declared a Protectorate of Britain, British colonial rule, which was based on a separate and disparate development of the two areas, started to take its shape.