The rules of conquest over Africa were established during the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885. Thirteen European nations and the United States agreed on the regions in Africa where five principal nations – Britain, France, Portugal, Italy, Germany and Spain – had the right to pursue legal ownership of land. The agreements made during this conference gave Britain the go-ahead to enact the Crown Land Ordinance in 1902, a year after the completion of the railway line from Mombasa to Kisumu. This colonial land policy alienated areas in the East Africa Protectorate to European settlers by removing Africans’ claim to unoccupied land. Once Africans vacated an area, those lands reverted to the Crown. European settlement in the protectorate’s highlands began in earnest after the enactment of this ordinance.
Opposing Perspectives Between Settlers and The Colonial Office
Within a decade of the railway line’s completion, the growing white settler community in the Uasin Gishu plateau began expressing their desire for the extension of the rail network. These farmers ascribed poor transport facilities as the cause of their minimal agricultural produce and exports. One of the biggest proponents of this extension was Ewart Grogan, a settler who owned 200,000 acres of timberland in Timboroa. A railway line that ran close to his sawmills would allow him to make the most of his property.
The settlers’ request met uncertainty from the colonial office whose plan was to extend the railway line from the Kisumu terminus through Mumias and into Uganda. This would offer a direct overland railway route to Uganda since the main line ended at the eastern shores of Lake Victoria. The line would also be shorter and cheaper to construct, in addition to enabling access to North Kavirondo which the colonial office considered the most productive part of the East Africa Protectorate and the best source of African labour. The colonial office also believed that European settlers were doing very little to develop the Uasin Gishu region, thus bringing little return on investment.
Dancing to the Settlers’ Tune
Not ones to be put off by this lack of enthusiasm, the settlers proposed a scheme in which this extension would be funded privately. The protectorate government would then have the option to lease or purchase it upon completion. This piqued the colonial office’s interest in the project since it would leave them with little financial risk. This culminated in a detailed survey of the proposed Nakuru-Eldoret-Mumias-Uganda route as well as an alternative Kisumu-Mumias-Uganda route in 1913. The results of the survey shocked colonial officials as it estimated construction of the Uasin Gishu route at approximately £1,000,000, while the amount budgeted for railway extensions amounted to £400,000. Before this scheme was given further consideration, World War I began in 1914, bringing all deliberations to a halt.
Post-War Developments
In the final months of the war, the settlers returned their attention to this project. Ninety settlers went ahead to pledge £300 annually for three years to construct a trolley line that would link to the Nakuru terminus. The idea gained momentum, even leading to the establishment of the Uasin Gishu Railway Committee. This pressure from landowners finally managed to turn the tide as the colonial office buckled to their demands, opting to extend the railway through Uasin Gishu.
Construction began in 1920, reaching Eldoret in 1924 and winding up at Kampala in 1930. This extension put Eldoret town itself 64 miles away from the railhead, an occurrence that birthed the town’s famous moniker of Farm 64 which morphed into Sisibo through vernacular influence. Construction of the Eldoret line paved the way for the extension of other branch lines into areas of high European settlement such as Kitale, Nyahururu, and Nanyuki. Railway presence in these towns created a reliable means of transporting farm produce, thus leading to their growth and development as the colony’s bread baskets.
