TheRoyal Niger Company was a mercantile company chartered by theBritish government in the nineteenth century. It was formed in 1879 as theUnited African Company and renamed toNational African Company in 1881 and toRoyal Niger Company in 1886. In 1929, the company became part of theUnited Africa Company,^[1] which came under the control ofUnilever during the 1930s and continued to exist as a subsidiary of Unilever until 1987, when it was absorbed into the parent company.^[2]

The company existed for a comparatively short time (1879–1900) but was instrumental in the formation ofColonial Nigeria, as it enabled the British Empire to establish control over the lowerNiger against the German competition led byBismarck during the 1890s. In 1900, the company-controlled territories became theSouthern Nigeria Protectorate, which was in turn united with theNorthern Nigeria Protectorate to form theColony and Protectorate of Nigeria in 1914 (which eventually gained independence within the same borders asNigeria in 1960). The Royal Niger Company was eventually integrated intoUnilever.

Richard Lander first explored the area ofNigeria as the servant ofHugh Clapperton. In 1830, he returned to the river with his brotherJohn; in 1832, he returned again (without his brother) to establish a trading post for theAfrican Steamship Company"^[3] at the confluence of the Niger andBenue rivers. The expedition failed, with 40 of the 49 members dying offever or wounds from native attacks. One of the survivors,Macgregor Laird, subsequently remained in Britain but directed and funded expeditions to the country until his death in 1861. He opposed the failedNiger expedition of 1841 but the success of thePleiad's first mission in 1854 led to annual trips underBaikie and the 1857 foundation ofLokoja at the Niger–Benue confluence.

There were no voyages for the three years following Laird's death, but the establishment of theWest African Company was soon followed by several other firms. The competition reduced prices to the point that profits were minimal. Arriving in the region in 1877,^[4]George Goldie argued for the amalgamation of the surviving British firms into a single monopolisticchartered company, a method contemporaries supposed had been buried with the ultimate failure of theEast India Company following theSepoy Rebellion. By 1879, he had helped combine James Crowther's WAC, David Macintosh'sCentral African Company, and the Williams Brothers' and James Pinnock's firms into a singleUnited African Company; he then acted as the combined firm's agent in the territory.^[5]

Almost immediately, the firm saw renewed competition as twoFrench firms—theFrench Equatorial African Association and theSenegal Company—and another English one—theLiverpool and Manchester Trading Company—begin establishing posts on the river as well.^[6] A native attack on the UAC's outpost atOnitsha in 1879 was repulsed with help fromHMSPioneer,^[5] but theGladstone administration subsequently denied Goldie's attempt to procure agovernment charter in 1881, on the grounds that the international rivalry might occasion unnecessary conflict and that the united firm was undercapitalized for the expense of genuine colonial administration.^[6]

Goldie first began addressing the administration's concerns by increasing the company's capitalization to £100 000. He then managed to corral£1 000 000 in investments in a new concern—theNational African Company—which bought up the UAC and its interests in 1882.^[7] The death ofLéon Gambetta the same year deprived the French companies of their support within theFrench government and the strong subsidies it had been providing them.^[6] Goldie's cash-flush NAC was then able to maintain 30 trading posts along the river,^[5] and ruin its competition in a two-year price war: by October 1884 all three had permitted him to buy out their interests in the region and the NAC's annual report for 1885 was able to crow that it "remained alone in undisputed commercial possession of the Niger–Binué region".^[6]

Thismonopoly permitted Britain to resist French andGerman calls to internationalize trade on the Niger River during the negotiations at the 1884–1885Berlin Conference onAfrican colonization. Goldie himself attended the meetings and successfully argued for including the region of the NAC's operations within a British sphere of interest. Pledges from him and the British diplomats thatfree trade (or, in any case, non-discriminatory tariff rates) would be respected in their territory were dead letters: the NAC's over 400 treaties with local leaders obliged the natives to trade solely with or through the company's agents. Large tariffs and license fees eliminated competing firms from the area. The terms of these private contracts were made into general treaties by the British consuls, whose own treaties expressly incorporated them.^[8] Similarly, whenKing Jaja ofOpobo organized his own trading network and even began running his own shipments ofpalm oil to Britain, he was lured onto a British warship and shipped into exile onSaint Vincent on charges of "treaty breaking" and "obstructing commerce".^[4]

Despite treaties extending British control over the tribes of theCameroons, however, Britain was willing to recognize theGerman colony that usurped the area in 1885^[8] as a check on French activity in theupper Congo andUbangi watersheds.

The scruples of theBritish government being overcome, a charter was at length granted (July 1886), the National African Company becomingThe Royal Niger Company Chartered and Limited^[1] (normally shortened to the Royal Niger Company), withLord Aberdare as governor and Goldie as vice-governor.^[9]

It was, however, evidently impossible for a chartered company to hold its own against the state-supported protectorates of France andGermany, and in consequence its charter was revoked in 1899^[10] and, on 1 January 1900, the Royal Niger Company transferred its territories to the British Government for the sum of£865,000. The ceded territory together with the smallNiger Coast Protectorate, already under imperial control, was formed into the two protectorates ofNorthern Nigeria andSouthern Nigeria.^[9]

The company changed its name toThe Niger Company Ltd and in 1929 became part of theUnited Africa Company.^[1]The United Africa Company came under the control ofUnilever in the 1930s and continued to exist as a subsidiary of Unilever until 1987, when it was absorbed into the parent company.^[2]

• Alhassan Dantata
• Royal Niger Company's Medal
• Postage stamps and postal history of the Niger Territories
• Sokoto

• "Nigeria" .Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 19 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 677–684.
• "Lugard, Sir Frederick John Dealtry" .Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 17 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 115–116.