Benjamin Joseph Knight Anderson (1834–1910) was a
Liberia
Liberia (), officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country on the West African coast. It is bordered by Sierra Leone to Liberia–Sierra Leone border, its northwest, Guinea to its north, Ivory Coast to its east, and the Atlantic Ocean ...
n traveler, politician, and educator. He is known for having ventured into the then little known city of Musardu and published an account of it.
Early life
Benjamin Joseph Knight Anderson was born 1834 in
Baltimore
Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore was d ...
,
Maryland, United States.
His father was named Israel, his mother Henrietta. In December 1851, when he was still a teenager, his family, except for his father, relocated to Liberia on board the ''Liberia-Packet''.
Liberia was where he received his education.
Career
Anderson was a member of Liberia's original military unit. His highest rank was
Colonel. From 1864 to 1866, he served as the Liberian Treasury's
Comptroller
A comptroller (pronounced either the same as ''controller'' or as ) is a management-level position responsible for supervising the quality of accounting and financial reporting of an organization. A financial comptroller is a senior-level executi ...
and
Secretary of the Treasury.
However, in 1879 he was found guilty of embezzling money from the treasury.
On February 14, 1868,
he embarked on a journey to
Musardu, a city in what is now found in
Guinea
Guinea ( ),, fuf, 𞤘𞤭𞤲𞤫, italic=no, Gine, wo, Gine, nqo, ߖߌ߬ߣߍ߫, bm, Gine officially the Republic of Guinea (french: République de Guinée), is a coastal country in West Africa. It borders the Atlantic Ocean to the we ...
in the western part of the
Mandingo region;
this made him one of the first people to explore that area.
He is written to have convinced the Liberian government to focus on and develop the area more, because many natural resources could be found there and it was strategic for trading.
After ending the exploration a year later, he went there again some time later.
His accounts of Musardu were published in ''Narrative of a journey to Musardu: the capital of the Western Mandingoes'' (1870), which was reprinted a decade and one year later.
In his later life, he stopped exploring and settled down as a mathematics teacher at an educational institution in Liberia.
He retired in "the late 1890s".
Personal life and death
Anderson was married with one child, a son named Benjamin John Knight. According to one source, he died during the middle of December 1910,
while another states that he died on June 27, 1910.
Notes
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Anderson, Benjamin
1834 births
1910 deaths
People from Baltimore
American emigrants to Liberia
Americo-Liberian people
Finance Ministers of Liberia
Explorers of Africa