How 19th century Goans who arrived in Zanzibar became one of East Africa’s wealthiest communities

At half past 11 on the night of October 11, 1886, revolver shots pierced the dark of night, alerting Doctor Edward John Baxter of the Church Mission Society. Baxter, as a missionary doctor, travelled frequently to the interior and was no stranger to violence. In fact, he was about to embark on another trip. As Baxter tells it, the nearby donkey-keeper informed him that “there was a man in the unoccupied house on the side of de Souza,” this being CR Souza’s house. As Baxter approached the scene, he saw a scrum of policemen dotting the dark with lanterns. They made their way upstairs and returned with the “almost lifeless” body of an unnamed African man who died a minute later. Baxter being a medical man examined the body and found a bullet wound. He took it upon himself to go upstairs to examine the scene, only to discover the man had been on the scaffolding preparing to enter De Souza’s house.

Just minutes before, inside CR Souza’s shed in Shangani, two clerks employed by him, 23-year-old Caetano Felicio Souza from Anjuna and Toletino de Sa, were asleep when awakened by a noise. Toletino went to look out the window but saw...

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