William Clevland (king)

Arms of Clevland of Tapeley: Azure, a hare salient or collared gules pendent therefrom a bugle horn stringed sable. Detail from memorial stained glass window to Archibald Clevland (1833-1854), Westleigh Church

William Clevland (1720 – 6 December 1758) was an Anglo-Scot who became the self-appointed King of the Banana Islands off the coast of present-day Sierra Leone.^[1]

Early life and family

William Clevland was the son of Commodore William Clevland, a Scotsman who settled at Tapeley Park, near Bideford, Devon. His brother was John Clevland, who was appointed as Secretary of the Admiralty.^[2]

Career

In the 1730s Clevland was working for the Royal African Society, which had a monopoly on trade at Sierra Leone. He was on board a slave ship that was wrecked off the Banana Islands. He and surviving African slaves made their way to the islands, which they settled. Clevland took power and named himself as king.^[3]

He took as his wife Ndamba, a Kissi woman. Their Eurafrican children included:

• James Cleveland, whom he sent back to England for his education. After his return, James Cleveland eventually succeeded as king of the Banana Islands. In this period, the British had a trading post at the mouth of the Sierra Leone River.
• Elizabeth Clevland Hardcastle (1741-1808) who settled in South Carolina.^[4]

In 1792, the British established a colony of freedmen at Freetown.

References

Sources

• Lang, George (1999). Entwisted tongues: comparative creole literatures. Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi Bv Editions. ISBN 978-90-420-0737-6. 
• Caulker-Burnett, Imodale (2010). The Caulkers of Sierra Leone. Xlibris. ISBN 978-1456802400.