Djibouti, 1959

By JA

In Djibouti I saw the only slave baby farm of my tour. The Somali showed me around, and seemed as proud of it as if all the babies were his own. There were thirty-eight of them, ranging in age from three to thirteen. Ten of them were boys.

"This was the Greek's idea," the Somali told me. "It came to him after the war. The women in the brothels were having half-caste babies of all races. So the Greek reasoned it out and decided that if he kept the best-looking kids, in ten years or so he would have a valuable commodity to sell at high prices overseas. So he set two houses aside in the brothel area, each managed by an ex-whore. Half-caste kids were taken to them after they were born, their mothers being paid two pounds for each kid.

"The kid was kept in one house until it was about three, and for the first six months the mother was allowed to visit it and nurse it. If after three years these brats showed signs of growing up pretty, they were moved to the bigger house for schooling."

"Schooling?" I asked. "What do you mean?"

The Somali laughed. "They were taught the tricks of their trade. To make themselves look pretty and to be obliging. When they were about thirteen, the Greek usually sold them to the Egyptian who passed them on to the slave traders from the Yemen or Saudi Arabia. It was their responsibility to collect the kids and ship them to their own countries.

"A good-looking half-caste girl of twelve fetches as much as three hundred pounds. We get a couple of hundred for the boys and we sell most of them to Saudis who seem to like them better than girls. There's no accounting for taste," the Somali added philosophically.

Prior to the Suez affair, he told me, the Egyptian had always traveled personally to Djibouti to select children.

"What happens to the ugly children?" I asked him.

"Oh, most of them are sold over the Ethiopian border. But we get such a small price for them that it's hardly worth the trouble," he added offhandedly.

One evening I met the Somali, who was very drunk, in the bar of the Hotel Europa. The moment he saw me he rushed up. "Here's a good Englishman," he shouted, "better than the whole show of you fuckers." I thought he, or I, or both of us would be slaughtered by the whites present. However much the French may preach equality in the colonies, they certainly do not practise it, and they stand no nonsense from "les noirs." However, the Somali was an exceptional man. He was an alcoholic and occasionally became blind drunk but although he shouted a lot in this state he was harmless and was tolerated. When drunk, though, he never entered the bar owned by his boss, the Greek. The French tolerated him for another very good reason-he knew all their secrets, who visited the brothels, who liked to have girls sent to their houses, who liked little boys and so forth. The Somali arranged everything for them, and about these matters was as close-lipped as a confessor.

The Somali's binge on this occasion was apparently caused by the visit of a man he described as a "black fucking Jew" from Saudi Arabia. He a Senegalese, come to buy boy and girl slaves from the baby farm. It was the Somali's job to show him round, and apparently on the last occasion he bought slaves in Djibouti "the black bastard" left without giving the Somali "as much as would quench his thirst." Most of the other dealers gave him a large tip for his trouble, in addition to the money they paid the Greek.

The Somali had to show the Senegalese round the baby farm that evening, and as time went on and we drank together I wondered if he would be on his feet when the time for the visit came. He had conceived a liking for me, declaring that I was the best "fucking Englishman he had ever met." When he left to pick up the Senegalese he was tottering.

To my amazement, half an hour later, he appeared outside the hotel in a taxi. He sent the driver in for me, and when I went out he was leaning back mouthing every obscenity he had ever heard in the British Army. The Senegalese, obviously terrified, was sitting huddled in a corner and when the Somali saw me he shouted, "Come in here, Mr. Englishman, and we'll take this fat black pig and dump him into the harbour." I attempted to reason with him; although he was a slaver and a rogue, he was a likeable one, and I didn't want him to get into trouble with the Greek. He finally insisted that I should accompany him to the baby farm with the "blue-arsed baboon" who was sitting beside him. Fortunately for the Senegalese, he didn't understand English, but I think he got the import of the Somali's words all right.

We got into the car and drove to the brothel quarter which is down near the docks. The Somali had acquired a bottle of whisky from somewhere, and insisted that I and the driver share it. The "blue-arsed baboon" didn't drink, at least I presume he didn't, the Somali never offered him the bottle, except to spill some on him as the car lurched about. We finally pulled up at a large two-storey house. By this time I was swaying slightly and the Somali was well away. He hammered at the door, which was opened by a Somali woman of about fifty, who I gathered was the mistress of the establishment. She said something in Arabic to the Somali who replied by planting a large kiss on her cheek. She led us inside into a kind of sitting-room, and the Senegalese explained the purpose of our visit. His Arabic was slightly different from the Arabic I knew, certain words were pronounced differently but I was able to gather that he wanted seven girls between the ages of ten and thirteen and five boys of similar ages for an important gentleman in Saudi Arabia. The girls had to be as near white as possible. The Somali woman said she would have all the children of these ages ready as soon as possible. She explained that they were all in bed and asleep at that time. While she was away the Somali and I finished the remainder of the whisky between us and the Senegalese, who was dressed in European clothes, kept glancing at his watch.

After about half an hour the Somali woman returned, and led us up some stairs into a large room with rope beds all along the walls, for all the world like an English school dormitory. In the centre of the room there was a large round leather-coloured pouf, about three feet from the ground. Kneeling on it were ten little boys, with their heads bent towards the centre, so that they formed a circle. This was the inspection dais. Each boy was completely naked, and I saw with horror that the two whose buttocks faced me had been castrated. I noticed that on several of the buttocks, were the red marks of the cane. A cane was hung over every bed, and apparently was each boy's personal, and often used, possession from about the age of six until he was sold from the baby farm.

The Senegalese slowly walked around the circle examining each of the boys' buttocks carefully, especially examining his anus. "Why does he inspect their buttocks first?" I asked the Somali in a whisper. He shrugged. "All these agents for the Saudis do," he said, "I believe every one of them is a fucking homosexual."

When the Senegalese had completed the inspection of the boys' buttocks he came up to the Somali and pointed to five of them. The remaining five were taken by Madame to another room, and the five were ordered to lie face upwards on the dais. I saw that all five of them had been castrated, the scrotum had been entirely removed. The Somali said later that only about ten per cent of the boys are castrated; they are mainly purchased by Saudi Arabian homosexuals, or Yemenites who own harems, as guards.

The Senegalese now went around the circle again, this time inspecting the boys' penises and checking their castration scars. Then, to my surprise he pulled a stethoscope out of his breast pocket, and proceeded to examine each boy's back and chest carefully. If not a doctor he certainly had a knowledge of medicine, as the job was professionally done. He made some notes in a notebook he took from his pocket. The Senegalese rejected one of the boys immediately as he examined them. The boy probably suffered from tuberculosis, which is very prevalent in these parts. When the examination was fully over the boys, whose ages ranged between ten and twelve, were led away, all crying bitterly.

We were then led by the Somali woman to another room, where almost the same procedure was gone through. Twelve little girls were ranged in a circle on a dais, their buttocks towards us. Each wore a short cotton vest, pulled well above her waist, so that her protruding buttocks were bare. The girls were near white or chocolate coloured; two who were about thirteen and ten could easily have been mistaken for Southern French or Italian girls.

When the Senegalese had completed the thorough inspection of the girls' buttocks he pointed to nine of them. I noticed that the near white girls were among the nine. The remaining three were taken away and the nine were ordered to remove their vests before lying face upwards for the next inspection. This time the Senegalese went around the circle pulling each girl's legs apart, and examining her vagina carefully, carefully noting that the hymen was unbroken. He went around again with the stethoscope examining each girl thoroughly. Finally when he had finished, he pointed to seven of the girls. The Somali, hardly able to see the paper, wrote seven names on the back of an envelope, and the examination of the girls was over. What surprised me most during all this was that the girls never cried or uttered a whimper during all that had passed. They actually seemed happy to have been chosen.

The Somali explained next morning when I met him that the next stage of the proceeding would be the completion of the deal between the Senegalese and the Greek. He would be called in to advise the Greek on the probably market value of the slaves selected; it was then up to the Greek to accept or reject the Senegalese's offer. If the offer was accepted transport would be arranged, usually by fast sailing dhow.

I put the question that had kept puzzling me. Why had the girls accepted their fate without a murmur, while the boys howled and cried? "Simple," said the Somali, "we tell the girls from a very early age, seven or eight, that they are made for love, where you would call the facts of life. At the age of nine we let them practise with each other, and a year later with boys, taking care, of course that the hymen will not be broken. We show them how to give men exquisite pleasure. Sometimes I even bring my French friends whom I can trust here, and allow the little girls to practise on them. They believe that they are destined for a life of ease, that the days are a long procession of love making. Poor bitches, we don't tell them what the Saudi harems are really like, jealousy, spite, beatings, Lesbianism, with an occasional night in the master's room which only serves to whet their appetites. Let them keep their dreams as long as they can I say.

"With the boys things are different. They have an easy time here, they have no work to do, and probably have homosexual affairs with each other. We let the girls practice with the castrated boys as well. They know instinctively that life can never be so good again. So they cry, and howl. Such is life. And now I must go to the baboon. You really should have let me throw him into the harbour last night.

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The above passage was lightly edited from the notes and publications of Sean O'Callaghan. O'Callaghan was a British expatriate, resident in East Africa, who conducted extensive first hand research on the continued existence of slavery in Africa in the 1950s. He is best noted for his book "The White Slave Trade" on cross border trafficking in women for prostitution in Europe.

The continued existence of slavery in Africa (and elsewhere in the world) has been well noted in a number of places. Anti-Slavery International, the American Anti-Slavery Group, and the Committee Against Slavery in Mauritania and Sudan are especially prominent. All three have web sites and action networks (www.antislavery.org; www.anti-slavery.org; members.aol.com/casmasalc).

The resurgence of chattal slavery in Sudan has become well known enough to have even served as the plot for an episode of "Touched By an Angel" in which the freeing of a twelve year old boy from slavery was featured. Christian Solidarity International, based in Switzerland, has collected money to purchase and free Sudanese slaves. Thus far they have freed several thousand and estimate that there are still about 100,000 southern (Black) Sudanese slaves in the hands of northern (Arab) owners. Their web site is www.csi-int.ch. All of these organizations are in need of support in their efforts to abolish slavery. Several other groups focus on the exploitation of women and children, including slavery as one form of exploitation.

Several authors have noted the frequent castration of captured boys during the civil war in Sudan in the 1980s. The most recent well-attested case that has come to my attention was in 1998. Anti-Slavery International presented clear evidence of two southern Sudanese boys, ages ten and twelve, who had been castrated by their owners. There are more recent reports, but none as thoroughly documented.

The horrors of slavery and of the castration of little boys continue into the twenty first century. Readers of the Archive understand the difference between fantasy and reality and the difference between consensual and forced. These groups deserve your support. [JA]