Third Anglo-Virginian War: Difference between revisions
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Virginia became an independent nation following the Second Anglo-Virginian War (1852-1854) against the United Kingdom. Relations between the two countries had been strained since despite healthy trade. Virginia was left with a large free black population along with a minor Dutch speaking population. Race relations were tense and the spread of Zoerkerism did not help. Zoerkerism is a religion that mixes Protestantism and various traditional West African religious beliefs. Their beliefs center around a supreme creator, the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, as well as the pursuit for truth, freedom, and homeland. Zoerkerism was meet with hostility by black and white Virginia, but continued to develop. By the late 1860s, Zoerkerist made up the majority of Black Virginians and Prime Minister Richard Churchill expanded religious freedoms to the group in political alliance with Piet de Kotter, the self exiled Zoerkerist spiritual leader in 1867. In exchange, his congregation would continue their support Churchill's party, the Rationalists, in elections.
Churchill had other plans as well. He wanted to expand Virginian influence abroad and supported the Zoerkerist pursuit of a new homeland. So long as Virginia had some control over it. Between the British colonies of Gambia and Sierra Leone, Salvatia was founded in 1868 by 400 Black Virginians led by 'Red' Benjamin Walker. Walker was a close associate of de Kotter with strict orders to convert the natives and if failing to force them off their land. Many scholars doubt Walker's claims as de Kotter showed himself to be openminded while Protector of South Tussenland. Either way, Walker followed those orders. As the natives were primarily Sunni Muslims, with a small Catholic minority, they did not accept the Zoerkerist conversion efforts. Both sides would soon respond in violence and were evenly matched. However, anther wave of colonists would arrive a long with soldiers led by Colonel Anthony Clarke
Clarke did not support Zoerkerism nor wished to help Black Virginians for their sack. He did however invest heavily into the Virginian African Company (VAC) and needed Salvatia to turn a profit. He began a brutal campaign down the coast throughout 1868 to pacify native resistance in the region. He was successful for the most part, but Clarke would bedridden by a fever and die on 12 January 1869. The town of Clarke would be named in his honor.
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The spread of Zoerkerism into Sierra Leone caused social upheaval in the British colony. Miners who had gone to Salvatia for wealth and work were converted and brought their new faith back home. This caused opposition to British rule resulting in the Port Loko riot in which 8 Sierra Leonean were killed. Though the sect represented a insignificante amount of people it was enough to alarm the British and prepare for war.
== Invasion of Salvatia ==
The war would begin on 18 April 1874 with the British invasion as they crossed the Salutia River. The British forces were under the command of Major General James Outran. It was compromised of 1,000 white soldiers and 1,650 African auxiliaries. The AEF had only 800 soldiers, but the colony could muster another 2,000 militiamen Walker promised. When Washington received reports of the British invasions he at first dismissed it. Washington was celebrating the birthday of his second-in-command, Lt. Colonel Arthur Douglas, that evening and was by several accounts inebriated. However the next morning, when the mayor of Jamestown arrived, exhausted and gave gruesome details of the the city's destructions, he wrote back to Virginia and prepared for war.
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