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 The rivalry between
Ashanti (Asante) and Fante on the Gold Coast grew much more
serious in the nineteenth century. The British were usually allies of the Fante,
and the Dutch of the Ashanti.
At the beginning of 1806 the Asantehene
(king of the Ashanti) charged some people with robbing
graves. The Fante promptly gave refuge to the accused, who were people from
Assin, and Asantehene Osei Bonsu (reigned circa 1801-1824) sent an army against the
Fante. At Abora,
four miles from Cape Coast, a battle was fought, in which the Ashanti were
victorious. A British agent (representing the African Company of Merchants) at Cape Coast sheltered the accused
grave robbers, whilst the Ashanti went on to attack the fort at Kormantine (Fort
Amsterdam) of their old allies the Dutch. The British then tried to make friends
with the Ashanti, and Colonel Torrane, who was in charge at Cape Coast, most treacherously
handed an old and blind Assin king called Kwadwo Otibu to the Asantehene, although he knew the old man would be killed; which he was.
A verbal agreement was now made between the British and the Asante that the
latter should be recognized as the rulers of the Fante, except where a British
fort existed. Shamelessly, Torrane sold or gave away 2,000 of his former Fante
allies, and the Asante victoriously marched first east along the coast and then
north back to their capital. The Ashanti thus extended their dominions to the
coast.
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