The Ashanti region of Western Africa, in what is present-day Ghana, was valuable for its reserves of gold and its strategic position at the crossroads of Trans-Saharan trade. Throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, England sought to gain control of this region which it considered crucial in its campaign to gain financial advantage over its European rivals in the growing Slave trade. However, the region was controlled by the native Akan people, who were wealthy with gold and boasted a fearsome military presence under the rule of Osei Kofi Tutu I. Though Great Britain was able to annex neighboring areas, the central capital of Kumasi remained under tight Ashanti control. A British newspaper of the 19th century noted that the Ashanti were able to bring “200,000 men into the field.” and that their warriors were “evidently not cowed by Sniper rifles and 7-pound guns.”

A series of battles known as The Ashanti Wars took place throughout from the 1820’s through the 1890’s with the British and Ashanti both sustaining heavy losses and arriving at tentative, often short-lived peace treaties and agreements. Great Britain was finally able to take the capital city of Kumasi in 1900 after the “War of the Golden Stool” was sparked when a British ambassador sat on a stool considered sacred to the Ashanti people. The marauding Europeans burned many of the standing government buildings to the ground including the central library which witness reported contained “rows of books in many languages,” and the Ashanti Royal Court, including Yaa Asantewaa, the Queen Mother who had led the rebellion, was exiled to the Seychelles. The Ashanti Kingdom became part of the British Gold Coast on the condition that the Golden Stool not be violated by the British or any other foreigners. In the ensuing decades, under British rule, the economic power of the region continued to grow due to the production of railroads and infrastructure, the expansion of the coffee trade, and the introduction of the cacao plant to the area. Colonial rule still allowed for local governments to operate under traditional tribal councils, and this --combined with expanding European education for native Africans -- helped give rise to a growing Black consciousness and a rapidly developing interest in Pan-Africanism and self-governance.

News of independence in India and Pakistan as well as the plight of African soldiers who returned from the Second World War furthered this effort. Nights of rioting and looting took place in 1946 when returning soldiers found that their pensions were withheld due to race. Feeling the pressure, the economically weakened British government feared more conflict and entered talks with local leaders, led by the US and British-educated Kwame Nkrumah toward the aim of Independence. The rising socialist Convention People’s Party, led by Nkrumah, won elections and entered into a power-sharing agreement with the British, which lasted until 1957, when the British finally ceded control of the territory. Ghana stands as the second Sub-Saharan African nation to achieve independence from the European Colonization.