At the dawn of 1868, British troops charged into the mountain empire of Ethiopia, stormed the citadel of its monarch Tewodros II, freed his European prisoners and grabbed piles of his treasures and sacred manuscripts.
They also took his son – six-year-old Prince Alamayu – and brought the boy back with them to the cold shores of England.
For the first time, Andrew Heavens tells the whole story of Alamayu, from his early days in his father’s fortress to his new home across the seas, where he charmed Queen Victoria, chatted with Lord Tennyson and travelled with his towering red-headed guardian Captain Speedy. The orphan prince was celebrated but stereotyped and never allowed to go home.
The book also follows the loot – Ethiopia’s ‘Elgin Marbles’ – and tracks it down to its current hiding places in bank vaults, museum store cupboards and a boarded-up cavity in Westminster Abbey.
A story of adventure, trauma and tragedy, The Prince and the Plunder is a tale for our times, as we re-examine Britain’s past.
The Prince and the Plunder, written by Andrew Heavens on how Britain stole one small boy and hundreds of treasures from Ethiopia, will be published in May 2022 by The History Press.
Andrew Heavens has worked for newspapers and press agencies for almost thirty years, including six years as a reporter and photographer in Ethiopia and Sudan. He grew up in Nigeria, Kenya and Egypt, and lives in London.
Andrew got caught up in the campaign for Ethiopian plunder when he was taking a break from journalism and working as a communications officer for the Scottish Episcopal Church around 2000. A priest, the Rev John McLuckie, found a sacred carving at the back of a cupboard in his church on Princes Street, Edinburgh. This carving had been stolen during Britain's invasion of Ethiopia in 1868 and John decided to return it. Andrew helped organise the return ceremony and was so blown away by the event, a seven-hour Ethiopian celebration and orthodox mass held in the Edinburgh church, that he decided to head back into journalism and as a foreign correspondent in Ethiopia itself.
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