'We travelled the fifty miles from Umuahia to Cron by car, in torrential rain which almost obliterated our view. Shortly after leaving Umuahia we were stopped at a road-block and questioned. Here the baby helped as she cried loudly in her carry-cot on the back seat of the car. Her efforts helped us to get through numerous road-blocks more quickly than we had anticipated. It was almost dark when we reached Cron so we spent the night there at the house of a friend. There we met another missionary who had come from Britain to see how our work was faring under war conditions, and who hoped to travel with us on the following day. Next morning we made our way to the ferry landing station in the hope that the ferry would travel that day. We had heard that there had been attempts to bomb the ferry as it travelled on the river. As we approached we saw the crowds; boys waiting to help with luggage, women sitting on the ground trying to sell their wares, and a group of passengers waiting to embark. We joined this group of passengers and slowly made our way on board. There were two other Europeans travelling, Irish priests. One was suffering from shell-shock. His home in Enugu had been shelled by the invading Federal troops. We were very glad of their company on this journey. We only had a hard bench on which to sit and had to place the carry-cot on the deck at our feet.'
[I asked Jean about this boat when I was in Killarney. I had always imagined a boat with a cabin. What she described was an small open boat. She thinks that trip to Cron may have been in the hospital car. She described how they had to pull in to shelter from time to time during the boat journey as Federal planes might bomb boats on the river, suspecting that they might be shipping arms etc.. She talked of the particular kindness of the priest who was suffering shell-shock and how he would take the baby to give her time to rest. She also confirmed seeing crocidiles resting on the shore as they travelled - but she hadn't seemed to worried about them!]
We travelled on the Cross River for some distance before entering the creeks. What a maze of waterways! Some of the creeks were so narrow that we could touch branches of the trees growing on either side as we passed. The tide was in and the mangrove trees seemed to be growing out of the water. Overhead we could at times see monkeys at play. As the afternoon wore on it became hotter and the baby grew restless. I fed her, changed her as best I could on my knees since there was nowhere else to take her, or even to wash one's hands. I tried to settle her in her carry-cot again but she was not satisfied. She was dirty, the oil fumes from the engine had been blowing in and I was unable to protect her from these, and she needed more feed. I was breast feeding her yet had some baby cereal and powered milk with me as well, but there was nowhere to prepare these, so I kept her on my knees and amused her as best I could. About 2 o'clock we ate some sandwiches which we had with us, but before we finished these the ferry suddenly stopped. The cause was obvious. There in front of us lay a fallen tree which completely blocked the waterway. There was a brief discussion, then one of the crew, equipped with a [machete], got out, and standing on the trunk started to hack through it. It was a slow tiring job. Other members of the crew relieved him from time to time. As we sat and waited the tide was receding and large expanses of mud became visible on either side, with the gnarled, entangled roots of the mangrove trees growing out of it.
It was late afternoon when with one final blow the tree broke and dropped to the bottom of the water-way. The engine started but the boat did not move - we were stuck in the mud. There was no alternative but to wait the return of the tide. Though we did not have to wait too long for this, it was dusk before we reached the small town of Ikang, which was our last port of call in Biafra. Here the customs and immigration officials came on board to see what that all was in order. There seemed to be a long delay, and we wondered why we were not moving off now that the customs and immigration formalities seemed to be completed. The passengers were growing impatient; then the owner of the ferry appeared and announced that we were not going any further until the morning, as it was not safe to travel at night for fear of being bombed. My heart sank. What about the baby? Though I was breastfeeding her she needed more than that as she was accustomed to having cereal also, and already showed signs of being hungry. For ourselves, we had only brought enough food for one day.
Where we to spend the night? Surely not sitting on these hard benches? The ferry owner's announcement had caused consternation; people argued with him and raised their voices angrily, but suddenly there was dead silence. Were those gun-shots? We all glanced anxiously towards the shore. Now we could plainly hear gun-shots. The ferry owner warned us not to make another sound, lest we draw attention to the presence of the ferry, since there was danger of being bombed. Everyone understood and there was dead silence. The night seemed endless. We were stiff and sore from sitting on the hard bench, and the baby was restless. I had nursed her for the greater part of the night so as to keep her from crying. Slowly dawn came and we were on our way again. It was another tedious day's journey, but that evening we reached our destination - the small port of Lobe in the Cameroons. We got ashore looked around but all we could see was a narrow muddy path ahead. We enquired and were told we would have to walk a quarter of a mile along this path to the Custom's [and] Immigration offices. We picked our way through the mud, and after having our passports and baggage checked tried to get a taxi to take us to Douala, where we could get a plane and where we knew there was accommodation to be had.
After making an agreement with the taxi driver to take the six of us Europeans, we set off. The journey by taxi was certainly a contrast to the slow boat journey. The road wound upwards, was comparatively marrow, and had many hair-pin bends, which the driver took at a speed that would do credit to a racing-driver, despite our requests to go more slowly. As darkness was approaching we came to a police check-point where we were stopped, and asked where we were going. We said Douala. The policeman turned to the driver, and his own language seemed to speak very crossly. He then turned to us and explained that the driver would be endangering our lives if he took us through to Douala at night. This check-point had been set to prevent people from so travelling as there had been frequent attacks recently on travellers who had been robbed of their possessions. He advised us to stay at the town of Kumba for the night. When we got there the priests went off to their Mission while we made our way to the Basel Mission, where a young Dutch couple, who had arrived in the Camaroons a few weeks previously kindly put us up.
We all travelled to Douala the next morning, and two days later my baby and I, with the missionary who set out with us from Umuahia, got a plan to Paris, and from Paris to London, then I made my way to Belfast where I had to go into hospital for treatment.'
Picture: This is the baby who featured in the above story with a baby of her own (Joy and Emily).
In August I hope to continue these blogs telling of mum's experiences with dad being away and dad's continuing experience of Biafra.
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