The Shipment That Never Spoke — Edwin Ogie Library

The Shipment That Never Spoke

A crate’s diary: a true-sounding story that follows a single crate leaving Benin City in 1897, the places it sees, and what people learn when they finally listen. Written for all readers. Includes guided questions and classroom activities.

By Edwin Ogie — researched and written with care.

Helpful search words (open in a new tab):

Benin Expedition 1897 Benin Bronzes history Queen Idia pendant Benin Bronzes repatriation 2025

Opening — A crate begins to keep a secret

I am a crate made of slow wood. I remember the smell of boards cut when the sun was still small. I remember the hands that nailed me together with care. I had a lid tied with rope and a strip of cloth that a child used to practice knots. I was not carved with a name like a person, but I carried names inside me: names carved onto ivory, names stamped into metal, names that people would say when they wanted to remember.

In Benin City I slept in a workshop room under the edge of a roof where songs were sometimes louder than the rain. The things put inside me had been used in palace halls, in rituals, and at family altars. They were made by hands that taught their children how to make, how to hold a chisel, how to coax a pattern from hot metal. When I closed, the objects inside settled close together as if they already remembered the same songs.

This is my diary. I do not speak with words, but I hold the story of movement. I will tell it as simply as I can: the day I left the palace, the people who lifted me, the ports where I waited, the ship that carried me, the auction room where hands pointed and counted, the museum case where I learned what it is to be silent in a foreign light, and, many years later, the conversation that finally taught people to listen to what I had carried all along.

The making — who made what I carried

Before I was a crate I was an idea. Before the idea, there was a commission: a palace messenger who asked for a pendant carved from ivory, a brass plaque to tell a king’s story, a small bell that would ring during a ceremony. The artists who made those pieces worked in family guilds. They learned the same songs and marks that had been taught for generations. Each line cut into ivory, each face cast in brass, held a meaning — a name, a relationship, a memory of a ruler or an ancestor.

The pendant inside me was small enough to hold, carved with the face of a woman whose name the palace remembered. That pendant had seen hands smooth over its surface as if blessing it. The plaque beside it had been hammered and filed by a metalworker who hummed while he worked. When the artists finished, the palace kept the pieces in a place where elders could call them by name. These were not objects of simple trade; they were pages in a living book.

People who lived near the palace knew these pieces. A master carver might call a young apprentice by the same name the plaque held. A child might learn a song next to a box that held beads; the sound of the master’s hammer became part of learning how to remember. Inside me, these small voices breathed together, even when I was closed.

A palace morning — the day I was taken

Palace mornings have a rhythm: drums, the clatter of dishes, and the careful footsteps of those who carry messages. That morning there was a sense of rushing that felt different — whispers passed like folded paper. People moved items into trunks and bundles. Some things were wrapped because the house felt like it could change at any moment.

Later that season, a small group of foreigners arrived in the region with papers and flags and a sense that the world could be arranged easily on a map. There were meetings, delays, and then — on a day locals still speak of carefully — an attack on a party traveling toward the palace. The attack was used by military officials far away as the reason to send a large force to Benin City. That force came with orders, ships, and weapons. It entered the city and it changed the city’s life.

It was during the capture of the palace that hands came to collect many objects. Some people said, later, that they were taking things as war booty; others called them trophies. Soldiers and others packed crates like me with careful speed. I remember the hands: some rough, some trembling, some mechanical in their efficiency. I remember the sound of doors closing on rooms that once had been full of music.

Historical note: On 4 January 1897, a British party led by Acting Consul James Robert Phillips was attacked, and in February 1897 a larger British expedition under Sir Harry Rawson captured Benin City and removed many objects from the palace. These events are documented in historical records. 0

Packing — how things are silenced

They laid cloth between objects so metal would not bite ivory, and they wrapped fragile faces as if to keep them from remembering the air. I was filled gently — though my gentle filling felt like hurried hands to those who loved what went into me. A small pendant that had hung at a queen’s hip was wrapped in oilcloth; a brass plaque with a story scene was wrapped in soft cloth. The people who packed me did not know the passwords of the songs; they knew how to stack and label and close, and they tied a tag to my handle with a number for the men who kept records overseas.

One of the officers wrote a note in a ledger and said the objects were to be taken as “specimens” or to raise money by selling them. Another officer called them trophies. A clerk marked me with a number and a short description that would later make sense to catalogues but not to the mothers and children who once told the stories the objects carried. The act of cataloguing gave the objects new names — numbers that sounded like silence.

Historical note: Many palace objects were removed and dispersed to museums, auction houses and private collections in Europe and beyond. Some were sold at auction to cover expedition costs and others entered museum holdings. The dispersal scattered Benin's material memory across many countries. 1

The harbour — waiting, salt, and a ship

They carried me down to the river where larger ships waited. The river smelled of fish and rope, and men shouted the names of other crates. The ship had a belly as wide as a house. Below deck was a dark place where crates like me were stacked with other things. In that cool, muffled dark we rocked and listened to the great world we had never seen.

The ship’s voyage was a map of small motions: the groan of boards, the change of light through a porthole, the distant call of seamen. Letters from the captain bragged of safe passage; but letters are often proud in ways that do not know the pain of places left behind. The crate above me held coins from far traders; the trunk near mine had a rug rolled like a sleeping thing. We passed islands, saw gulls, and the sea taught me the taste of salt on wood. I learned that travel is not only distance; it is forgetting and being forgotten in equal measure.

Arrival — light, halls, and hands that count

At last the ship moored in a port city with cobbled streets and large buildings that had names. Men carried us from the hold into rooms that smelled of dust and tea. They placed us into a large hall where tables were set and voices spoke of price. The auction room had a soft echo that made every coin sound important; the men who bought objects counted with both hands and one eye on profit.

At the auction someone pointed and said, “lot 101,” and the auctioneer’s hammer made sound like a small bell. People clapped and wrote names in their ledgers. The pendant was bought by a collector who liked small curved things and imagined it on a table in a room with red curtains. The plaque was bought by a museum representative who said “this will make a fine addition.”

The auction made new decisions about value. In that hall, the stories attached to objects did not speak; only the ledger pages and catalog numbers changed what had been inside me into things to be studied, labeled, and displayed. Our movement had changed the meaning of the objects. They were now in places where their songs were not known, and their caretakers were people who loved or collected with different languages.

The museum case — safe light, missing songs

The pendant was placed behind glass in a quiet room. A placard read a short line, a date, and sometimes a place of origin. People walked past with guided maps and listened to recorded voices explaining art styles. Inside the case the pendant learned how to be still and how to shine under lights that never flickered. People who had never been near Benin City looked closely at its carved face and learned the skill of admiration.

But admiration is not the same as remembering. In the palace the pendant had a song and a family name and a person who could say, "This is our pendant; this is the story that goes with it." Behind glass these pieces were preserved and displayed, but the songs were quiet. The ledger of the museum recorded a number, a country of acquisition, and sometimes the word "ex. Benin" — short notes that do not sing out the names of makers or custodians.

Historical note: Museums preserved many of the Benin objects and later catalogues and research helped show their artistic and cultural value. Yet cataloguing alone does not restore the oral histories and community connections that give objects their full meaning. 2

Silence — what it teaches when things are quiet

Silence is not emptiness. The pendant learned that in the dark of museum storage and behind glass. Silence made scholars curious. Some came with gentle interest and asked, "Who made this?" Others asked about style and age. Researchers traced the lines, compared marks, and started to write the stories the pendant could not speak. They used old ledgers, family names when they were available, records of where objects had been taken. In some cases, the threads were thin but real — a mention in an old note, a photograph in an archive, a family memory whispered in another town.

In the 20th and 21st centuries, more people began to ask a larger question: how did these objects come to be far from their homes? And if they had been taken under violent or unfair circumstances, what should be done? These questions opened conversations that would, in time, teach museums and governments to listen. The crate’s diary remembers when people first began to ask about return (a word for bringing things back) and context (a word for the songs that belong with the objects). 3

Research — following a paper trail

Scholars and archivists became detectives of a careful kind. They opened dusty files, read old auction catalogues, and traced numbers. A small slip of paper could lead to a name; a shipping manifest gave dates; a photograph in a family album in Benin City might match a face on a plaque. These pieces of evidence are what people call provenance — the story of where an object has been and who owned it. Provenance research can be slow. It requires humility and patience and often the willingness to find names that were not recorded properly in the first place.

Sometimes researchers in museums found letters that admitted the object had been taken during violent times. Sometimes they could not find clear documents. As research progressed, the public voice changed: people began asking museums to be more transparent about where their objects came from and whether the objects had been acquired fairly. These requests set the stage for discussions about repatriation — the return of objects to their places of origin when circumstances demanded it. 4

Conversation — listening across distance

Not all museums and countries agreed at once that returning objects was right or even possible. There were legal questions, concerns about conservation, and debates about how to store and show objects safely. But people started talking — museums, governments, community leaders, elders, and scholars. They made plans for shared exhibitions, loans, and in some cases full returns. These conversations were sometimes slow and uneasy, but they marked a change: a move from keeping objects as trophies to recognizing them as part of people’s living history.

In recent years, several museums and countries have agreed to return Benin-related objects to Nigeria. One large, symbolic return occurred when the Netherlands handed over 119 items to Nigeria in 2025, a move described as part of a broader restitution process. Such returns are often accompanied by ceremonies and plans for conservation and display in local museums, showing a desire to restore relationship as much as material things. 5

The return — the day the crate’s contents went home again

Years later — long after the nails that closed me had begun to slacken and the rope that bound my lid had frayed — some of the items I carried were ready to be returned. The road home was not the same as the road out. There were ceremonies, cameras, and many people who had worked quietly for years to trace names and find safe ways to bring objects back. Family elders came with songs. Conservators came to advise how to move delicate ivory. Museum staff came too, sometimes to hand items back with care, sometimes to work on shared exhibitions that would teach both sides of the story.

The pendant was carried into a hall where elders chanted and children watched closely. People took photographs, yes; but more importantly, elders sang the old songs and called the maker’s name. The pendant learned how to breathe again in a space where its story could be told fully. For the first time in a long while, the object had both shape and the music that belonged to its history.

Healing — what return can do and what it cannot do alone

Return can be a beginning of healing but it is rarely an instant cure. When an object returns, it must be cared for — conservation workshops, museum displays, and training for local conservators help preserve the physical piece. But even more important is restoring the stories, the maker’s names, and the contexts. The elders taught the children how the pendant was used; teachers wrote lesson plans; local museums began to include oral histories alongside objects.

Reparation can also include creating resources for schools, funding for conservation labs, and support for artisans who keep traditional techniques alive. The returned pendant now serves as a teaching tool: in classrooms a child can look and then ask, “Who made it?” and hear the answer from someone who can say a name and a song. That is what makes a return meaningful.

Questions — to ask children and to ask ourselves

These simple questions can guide classroom or family conversations:

What object in your home has a story? Who told it to you?
Why do you think people keep objects that remind them of family members or important events?
What changes when an object is in a museum far away from the people who used it?
How can museums and communities work together so objects are shown with their stories and not made silent?

Use these prompts gently. The goal is listening, not scoring. Invite elders and family members to speak, and let children record the stories in drawings or audio with permission.

Activities — classroom and family exercises

Memory Map — Ask each child to bring a photo or drawing of an object at home. Interview a family member about the object’s origin. On paper, write the object at the center and draw lines to people, places, and events mentioned. Share maps and discuss.

Label Workshop — Have students write a museum-style label for their object: object name, maker (if known), place of origin, how it was used, and an oral-history note. Remind them to include the voice of whoever told the story.

Crate Diary — Students write a short diary entry from the point of view of a small crate (like me). What does it smell? What does it remember? This helps children explore perspective and empathy.

Resources & key facts

Key historical facts (short and cited):

In January 1897 a British party headed for Benin City was attacked, and this event was used as the immediate pretext for a larger British punitive expedition in February 1897. 6
The British punitive expedition captured Benin City and many palace objects were removed; these objects were later dispersed to museums, auctions and private collections. 7
Examples of ivory pendants and plaques from Benin are held in major museum collections (for example, the Metropolitan Museum and the British Museum). 8
Provenance research and public debate in the 20th and 21st centuries have led to repatriation efforts; for example, the Netherlands returned 119 Benin-related artifacts to Nigeria in 2025. 9
Repatriation is often accompanied by conservation plans, oral-history projects, and public ceremonies intended to restore context and community care. 10

Further reading and teacher resources (open each in a new tab):

Benin Expedition of 1897 — overview and references. 11
British Museum — Benin Bronzes: history and contested objects. 12
Metropolitan Museum — Ivory pendant (Queen Idia). 13
AP News — Netherlands returns 119 Benin Bronzes to Nigeria (2025). 14
Smithsonian — The raid on Benin (interpretive resources). 15

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