Description

Sierra Leone in West Africa is the subject of this 1803 work by English physician Thomas Winterbottom (1766-1859). In the 1790s he spent four years there working for the Sierra Leone Company, established by abolitionists to resettle ex-slaves, and combatting diseases such as malaria and scurvy. He displays none of the pejorative views of Africa or its inhabitants that some of his contemporaries expressed, but has a very positive opinion of the country. Winterbottom describes the women as beautiful and graceful, and he dismisses racial differentiations based on skin colour as being absurd. In Volume 1 he draws a many-faceted picture of the climate, history and traditions of Sierra Leone. Volume 2 focuses on African medicine and common diseases found in Sierra Leone.