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Williams wanted to help Rhodes and he wanted to help himself. His chief problem was to get the copper from the Katanga to Europe in the shortest possible time. Most of it is refined in England and Belgium. At present it goes out by way of Bulawayo and is shipped from the port of Beira in Portuguese East Africa. This involves a journey of 9,514 miles from Kambove to London.
Upon one occasion it was announced that the Vice-Governor of the Katanga would visit Kambove. The station agent made elaborate preparations for his reception. Shortly before the time set for his arrival a man appeared on the platform looking like one of the many prospectors who frequented the country. The station agent approached him and said, "You will have to move on.
With Horner I travelled by motor through the whole Katanga copper belt. I visited, first of all, the famous Star of the Congo Mine, eight miles from Elizabethville, and which was the cornerstone of the entire metal development. Next came the immense excavation at Kambove where I watched American steam shovels in charge of Americans, gouging the copper ore out of the sides of the hills.
From it he ran a line straight from Kambove across the wilderness and found that it covered a distance of approximately 1,300 miles. He said to himself, "This is the natural outlet of the Katanga and the short-cut to England and Belgium." He got a concession from the Portuguese Government and work began.
Associated with him were various Americans including Frank Kehew, Superintendent of the smelter, Thomas Carnahan, General Superintendent of Mines, Daniel Butner, Superintendent of the Kambove Mine, the largest of the Katanga group, Thomas Yale, who is in charge of the construction of the immense concentration plant at Likasi, and A. Brooks, Manager of the Western Mine.
The line will pass through Ruwe, which is an important center of gold production in the Katanga, and connect up with the Katanga Railway just north of Kambove. It is really a link in the Cape-to-Cairo system and when completed will shorten the freight haul from the copper fields to London by three thousand miles, as compared with the present Biera itinerary.
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