(Image: From the book "Crossing Ethiopia: Retracing The Last March of Emperor Tewodros to Magdala")
Tadias Magazine
By Tadias Staff
Published: Thursday, July 17th, 2014
Washington, D.C. (TADIAS) – John Snyder, author of the new photography book Crossing Ethiopia, which chronicles his own journey retracing the last march of Emperor Tewodros of Ethiopia to Magdala to face a British army numbering over 60,000, initially thought of making a movie on the scale of Lawrence of Arabia to depict Tewodros’ epic confrontation with Victorian England over European hostages held by Tewodros including the English ambassador to Ethiopia. Snyder writes: “A chain of events that eventually brought in the massive British Expedition of 1867-1868 began when a new English consul, Charles Cameron, arrived to replace the murdered [former consul and close friend of Tewodros ], Walter Plowden.”
In October of 1862 Tewodros gave Cameron 1000 dollars and a letter “directing him to hand deliver” to Queen Victoria. “Cameron went only as far as northern Ethiopia from which he forwarded the letter on to England,” writes Snyder. “Returning in June of 1863 without a reply from Victoria, he incurred the wrath of Tewodros, who forbade his leaving the country until an answer was received.”
In the meantime mail had arrived from France containing a response to Tewodros’ letter to Napoleon III. Suffice it to say that the reply was not exactly what the Ethiopian Emperor was looking for, not to mention that it was not signed by the French King himself. Snyder notes that “after ripping the letter to shreds and trampling it underfoot,” Emperor Tewodros is quoted as saying: “I know the tactics of European Governments when they wish to acquire a possession of Oriental States. They first send missionaries, then consuls to support the missionaries, then armies to support the consuls. I am not a Rajah of Hindustan to be humbugged in that fashion. I prefer at once having to do with the armies.”
In 1868 Ethiopian and British “armies converged for a showdown at Magdala, a mountaintop fortress where a handful of European prisoners were residing in fetters at the mercy of the Emperor.” Snyder states in his introduction: “Costing $9 million in 1867 sterling, (translating to over $5 billion today) it was, and remains, history’s most expensive hostage rescue operation.”
“Born in a remote province west of Lake Tana in 1818, Tewodros received a convent education that left him literate and deeply versed in the bible. After his teens, however, he did nothing but soldiering, getting his start as a shifta (bandit). A few followers gradually swelled into an army as he led them from one brilliant victory to another. By the age of 35, he had conquered all of highland Ethiopia and declared himself emperor. At his coronation in 1855, he cleverly designated himself Tewodros II, fulfilling a legend that 15th century King Tewodros I would eventually have a successor by the same name.”
History also records that Tewodros’ tenor as the crown holder was marked by his infamous killing sprees directed at his own domestic ‘enemies.’ Even his ill-fated letter to the Queen of England was full of macho imagery bordering on religious and ethnic fanaticism. In assuring Victoria that he is taking action to avenge the life of her former ambassador and his close friend Walter Plowden, Tewodros adds: “All men are subject to death, and my enemies, thinking to injure me, killing these my friends. But by the power of God I have exterminated these enemies, not leaving one alive, although they were my own family, that I may get, by the power of God, your friendship – I wish to have an answer to this letter by Consul Cameron and that he may go with my embassy to England…”
The author of Crossing Ethiopia: Retracing The Last March of Emperor Tewodros to Magdala, John Snyder, will be giving a book talk on July 27 in Washington, DC at Politics & Prose bookstore. “I am pleased to report that Foreword Reviews has just awarded Crossing Ethiopia Honorable Mention in the photography category of their 2013 IndieFab competition,” he shared.
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If You Go:
DATE: SUNDAY, JULY 27
TIME: 1 PM
POLITICS & PROSE BOOKSTORE
5015 CONNECTICUT AVE., NW
WASHINGTON, DC 20016
202-364-1919
www.politics-prose.com
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