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Updated: June 5, 2025
Accustomed as many of them were to high lying lands free of trees, the miasma from the swamps was well nigh as fatal to them as it would be to Europeans. Thousands died, and many of the rest were worn by fever to mere shadows. "Do you think," Ammon Quatia said to Frank one day, "that it is possible to blow up a whole town with powder?"
Taking fifty picked warriors Ammon Quatia started at once. They marched all night towards the west, and at daybreak joined the Elminas. These took post in the brushwood lining the river. The general with a dozen men, taking Frank, went down near the mouth of the river to reconnoiter. The ships lay more than a mile off the shore.
It was known now that Ammon Quatia was lying with the Ashanti army at Amoaful, but five miles away, and ambassadors arrived from the king finally declining to accept the terms of peace. Russell's and Wood's regiments marched forward to Quarman, within half a mile of the enemy's outposts. The white troops came on to Insafoo, three miles behind. Quarman was stockaded to resist an attack.
"I am going," Ammon Quatia said to Frank, "to eat up Dunquah and Abra Crampa. We shall do better this time. We know what the English guns can do and shall not be surprised." With ten thousand men Ammon Quatia halted at the little village of Asianchi, where there was a large clearing, which was speedily covered with the little leafy bowers which the Ashantis run up at each halting place.
The few Ashantis in the village next to Elmina retired at once when the column was seen marching from the castle. Ammon Quatia had taken up his quarters at the village of Essarman, and now advanced with his troops and took post in the bush behind a small village about three miles from the town. The Houssas were skirmishing in front of the column.
They had held their ground, and the British had not ventured to attack them in the bush. "You see," Ammon Quatia said exultingly to Frank, "what I told you was true. The white men cannot fight us in the bush. At Essarman the wood was thin and gave but a poor cover. Here, you see, they dared not follow us."
The gold necklace which I showed you, which Ammon Quatia gave me, weighs over twenty pounds, and as it is of the purest gold it is worth about a thousand pounds, a sum amply sufficient to keep me and pay my expenses till I have passed. Besides, Mr. Goodenough has, I believe, left me something in his will. I sent home one copy to his lawyer and have brought the other with me.
On wall and roof of the village the slugs pattered thickly; but the defenders were all in shelter, and in reply, from breastwork and loophole, from the windows and roof of the church, the answering Snider bullets flew out straight and deadly. Several times Ammon Quatia tried to get his men to make a rush.
The firing round the town continued, but Ammon Quatia, when he saw the reinforcements enter, at once began to fall back with the main body of his troops, and although the firing was kept up all night, when the besieged in the morning advanced to attack the Ashanti camp they found it altogether deserted. "It is of no use," the Ashanti general said to Frank.
Four carriers had been told off for Frank's service, and these came in, took up his baggage, and joined the line. Frank waited till the general, Ammon Quatia, whom he had several times met at the palace, came along, carried in a hammock, with a paraphernalia of attendants bearing chairs, umbrellas, and flags. Frank fell in behind these accompanied by Ostik.
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