Church that stands in memory of Mau Mau victims

Francis Hall was born in Sangor, India on October 1869. His father, Colonel Edward Hall, served in the 52 Bengal Native Infantry.

After completing his education, Hall tried his hand as a clerk with the Bank of England but found the task to be “unrewarding and irksome”.

He tried other jobs at a school, a legal firm, a shipping company, as a cab driver and even as a prospector for minerals but none gave him satisfaction.

Perhaps his father’s tales of life in the army had made him desire something altogether more adventurous. In between the above occupations, he joined campaigns against Africans, then called Kaffirs, in Basutoland (today’s Lesotho) and Bechuanaland, the area occupied by the Tswana of South Africa.

Hall returned home without much fortune but in the eyes of his countrymen, he had gained a lot of experience in “ dealing” with Africans. In 1892, at the age of 32, Hall sailed to Mombasa, as a junior officer of the Imperial British East Africa Company. He was posted to Fort Smith (near today’s Uthiru) soon after the deportation of Chief Waiyaki to Kibwezi and his mysterious death thereafter.

Punitive expeditions

Putting his experience to good use, Hall carried out many punitive expeditions of his own and some at the behest of his friend, Chief Kinyanjui, against Kikuyu sections which had crossed his path.

In his eagerness to expand the frontiers, Hall prevailed upon the government to set up a military base at Mbiri in 1900 following what he claimed was an invitation extended to him by Murang’a chiefs.

Once settled at Mbiri, he proceeded to carry out many punitive raids in the surrounding area, the most famous being the pursuit of John Boyles, the self-styled “ King of the Kikuyus”, who was carrying out unlawful expeditions to enrich himself while carrying the British flag.

About a year after the establishment of Mbiri Station, Hall was out on an expedition against the Muruka clan of the Kikuyu, who had allegedly committed some heinous crimes, when he contracted a severe bout of dysentery. Despite his brave efforts, Hall died at Mbiri on March 18, 1901, where he was buried. Soon after, Mbiri was re-named Fort Hall in his honour.

When Kenya became independent, the town’s name was changed to Murang’a and the word Fort Hall was expunged from the Kenyan map forever. No doubt, if Hall had made a good impression on the Kikuyu, they would have campaigned to retain his memory.

October 20, 1952, the British Colonial Government of Kenya declared a State of Emergency in order to quell the Mau Mau insurrection. Central Province and in particular, Murang’a District, was the nerve centre of the Mau Mau operations.

Following the April 1954 Operation Anvil in the Nairobi area, when all Kikuyu people were rounded up and many were sent to indefinite detention without trial, Archbishop Beecherof the Anglican Church of Kenya and District Commissioner John Pinney mooted the possibility of building a church as a permanent memorial for all those Christians who had lost their lives at the hands of the Mau Mau and, in other ways, since the disturbances started.

At that time, a Kenyan born architect , Julian Hill, was based in Fort Hall District as District Officer of the Kikuyu Guard and he agreed to draw the plans for the church at the site where Hall had been buried. After the plans were approved, Pinney released Hill from his other duties so that he could supervise the construction work.

On May 18, 1955, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Reverend Dr Geoffrey Fischer laid the foundation stone for the memorial church in Fort Hall.

Rural dean

By the time the church building was completed and consecrated in October 1958, Obadiah Kariuki had been recruited to the position of Rural Dean in the Fort Hall area, in part, because his European counterparts found it difficult to perform their priestly duties in the face of popular defiance and , latterly, because of armed resistance of the Mau Mau movement to colonial rule.

As if in a further effort to assuage the African populace, Elimo Njau ( Paa Ya Paa Gallery), then an art student at Makerere University College, Kampala, was invited to paint murals on the internal walls of the church, rendering an African interpretation of the Five Ways of the Cross namely, the Nativity, Baptism of Christ, the Last Supper, Agony in the Garden of Gethsemane and the Crucifixion.

Njau completed the beautiful murals over the Easter of 1959 but, sensing some disquiet amongst the African congregation and reluctance of some Revivalist Christians to endorse unconventional art, did not sign them. The murals were consecrated by the Archbishop of Canterbury later that year.

Given the backdrop of Francis Hall’s escapades in this area and the concentration of Mau Mau activities could the building of this memorial have been ill advised as an effort to placate the African by way of a hearts and mind campaign?