T H E C O V E N A N T E R
with 11,000 terrorists, although this was within central province. So her high and
expressed as “in the whole emergency Mau low estimates equate to a system of
Mau killed less than 100 Whites and 2,000
oppression causing prisoner-deaths of
loyalists. But there were tens of thousands
between fifty and two hundred people - a
of Mau Mau fighters and civilians killed by
day - over a three year period.
the British and their loyalists supporters”.
Now, according to the Regimental
It neglected to point out that virtually all
History (Lt Col John Baynes’s excellent
of the terrorists victims were innocent,
book) the 1st Bn disembarked in Mombasa
unarmed civilians who were attacked in
on 17th May 1958 and moved to locations
their homes or villages and put to death as
in Nairobi, Gilgil and Naivasha. Apart from
acts of terror.
As the “active warfare” period of the
a foray into Jordan, the Battalion history
emergency drew to a close many of the
tells of training in the NFD, of winning the
surviving hard-line terrorists, now referred
East African Command rugby champion-
to on the programme as “veterans”,
ship and the Kenya Seven-a-Sides tourna-
remained to be screened, sentenced or
ment, of route lining for the Queen
released. This took place after my spell
Mother’s visit and of trips out to game
in the country, so I have no first-hand
parks and to climb Kilimanjaro.
knowledge of that time and could not
yet all this time, if we were to believe
refute any claims in the programme
Professor Elkins and BBC2, ex-Mau Mau
about ‘atrocities’ being committed by the
detainees were, in Central Province being
authorities, nor would I wish to. If any of subjected to a regime of brutality, often by
them, upon investigation, prove to be true “white soldiers” which was causing them to
then, even at this late date, the perpetrators die in their hundreds every week.
should be pursued. The 1st Bn took over duties from 1st Bn
The coverage of Professor Elkin’s
King’s Own Regiment and handed over
research now moved to the aftermath of
at the end of 1959 to 2nd Bn Coldstream
the Emergency and into a new dimension,
Guards. It is unthinkable that any of these
declaring that in the next few years “many
fine regiments, or indeed any British Army
thousands” of people were held in detainee
Regiments, could have been party to the
camps under brutal conditions, subjected
kind of horrific conduct described by
to indiscriminate beatings, kept underfed
Professor Elkins and her interviewees, yet
and put to work in slave labour conditions
the programmes “evidence” was completely
under which many were to die. Her female
interviewees told, on screen, of being
vague citing only “white British soldiers”.
beaten and raped “by white soldiers” and of
For an investigative programme which
mal-treatment of them and their children by
claimed to be able to quote from secret
“loyalist, police and British soldiers. Hit worse
communications between the Attorney
were the wives of forest fighters” (another
General and the Governor General of
euphemism for terrorists).
the day not to have bothered to check
Professor Elkins disputed the historical
which “white British soldiers” were serving
record of around eleven thousand dead
in Kenya in the relevant years seems
saying, “conservatively I would put that figure
reprehensible and weakens the credibility
somewhere around fifty thousand. That’s
of the investigation irredeemably.
conservative”. She then went on to destroy Before and since Independence in 1963
further the credibility of her research Kenya had continued to prosper. The world
by saying “it could have been a hundred has drunk its coffee, bought its fruit and
thousand, could it have been three times as vegetables flown into our supermarkets,
much, four times as much. Certainly”.
and sent its tourists to visit the country’s
People interviewed told of working
many attractions. Kenya distance runners
parties from the camps going out each
are heroes in world athletics. The country
morning, fifty strong, to work on such
has a high profile and a considerable
projects as Nairobi International Airport
reputation yet in all that time no one has
run-way digging, and routinely returning
sought to bring world attention to tales of
with five, six or eight dead, day after day.
the sort told by that programme.
The appaling situation, if Professor
Could it be possible that, since the Sixties
Elkins and her interviewees are to be
believed, continued from the late fifties
we have all been living a lie or perhaps, on
into 1960, centred upon camps situated
that one evening, we were watching one?
G.F.
47
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