Frederick Stanley Arnot

Frederick Stanley Arnot (12 September 1858 – 14 May 1914) was a British missionary who did much to establish Christian missions in what are now Angola, Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

Arnot was born in Glasgow on 12 September 1858. His family lived in the town of Hamilton, southeast of Glasgow, for several years. There he became close to his neighbours, the family of the medical missionary David Livingstone. He looked up to Livingstone as a hero and determined to emulate him. He felt practical skills would be needed in his future missionary career. At fourteen he left school to become an apprentice joiner in the Glasgow shipyards. Arnot was brought up in the Church of Scotland, but became a member of the Plymouth Brethren.

In July 1881, aged 22, Arnot embarked for Cape Town. He was not associated with a missionary board, although in his work he was always glad to cooperate with those who were. He aimed to find a region in the hinterland that would be healthy for Europeans. They could train the local Africans in the Christian faith, and these Africans could in turn act as missionaries in the less healthy regions.

Arnot travelled by coastal steamer to Durban. In August 1881, he left for the interior, traveling slowly through the Transvaal to Shoshong in Botswana where he was welcomed by King Kama, who had been converted to Christianity. Arnot arrived in Shoshong on 11 March 1882. There he met the missionary J.D. Hepburn and observed him at work. He called Hepburn "a faithful man, who sought the conversion not only of the natives of the tribe but also of every man who passed through Shoshong white or black".

After a three-month stay Arnot continued northward across the Kalahari Desert to the Barotse kingdom, in what is now western Zambia. In December 1882 he reached Lealui, the capital. Arnot was present when the Lozi King Lewanika received a proposal from the Ndebele for an alliance to resist the white men. Arnot may have helped Lewanika to see the advantages of a British protectorate in terms of the greater wealth and security it would provide. Lewanika kept him here for the next eighteen months. While in the Barotse kingdom, Arnot met the British colonial official Ralph Champneys Williams, who said of the missionary that 'He was the simplest and most earnest of men. He lived a life of great hardship under the care of Wanawenna, then king of the Barotse, and taught his children... he was imbued with one desire, and that was to do God service. Whether it could best be done in that way I will not here question, but he looked neither to the right nor left, caring nothing for himself if he could but get one to believe; at least so he struck me, and I have honoured the recollection of him ever since as being as near his Master as anyone I ever saw.'

Arnot left Bulozi in 1884 to seek medical attention and to escape a brewing rebellion against Lewanika. He was assisted in reaching the Bié Plateau in Angola by the Portuguese trader and army officer António da Silva Porto. Despite his illness, he refused to be carried in a hammock by African porters, insisting on riding an ox. He had to travel westward rather than to the east as he had planned. His route took him over the high country along the watershed of the Zambezi and the Congo rivers. At 5,000 feet (1,500 m) the location was cool and relatively free of malaria-carrying mosquitoes. The journey was arduous, through rough country and with constant exposure to accidents and unfamiliar diseases. Arnot eventually reached Benguela on the Atlantic coast in Portuguese territory around the end of 1884. It had taken him four years to cross the continent from east to west.

Arnot recovered his health while staying at Bailundu, inland from the coast in Ovimbundu territory, as the guest of some missionaries from the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. Messengers arrived there from the chief Msidi (Msiri), who ruled a large area in what is now Katanga Province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, with its capital at Bunkeya. Msiri invited the white men to visit his Garenganze kingdom. On 3 June 1885 Arnot set out with a caravan of forty bearers and supplies for two years, reaching Bunkeya on 14 February 1886. When Arnot arrived he had no food left, no trade goods and no white companions. He received a warm welcome, however, although Msiri discouraged his missionary work for fear it would make his subjects disloyal.

Msiri's father had been in the business of buying copper ore in Katanga and transporting it to the east coast of Africa for resale. As a young man Msiri remained behind in the region as his father's agent. He became leader of a group of Bayeke people, and established a state that extended from the Luapula River south to the Congo-Zambezi watershed, and from Lake Mweru in the east to the Lualaba River in the west. Based on Bunkeya, the state controlled a huge central-African trading network, mostly dealing in slaves but also in ivory, salt, copper and iron ore. Traders came to Bunkeya from the Zambezi and Congo basins, from Angola, Uganda and Zanzibar. The Arabs from the east coast bought guns and ammunition, which Msiri used to maintain his position.