Leopold's
Reign
1870's-1960
Belgian King Leopold II, after hearing explorer
Henry Stanley's reports of a resource-rich and untapped area in central
Africa, launched a private financial venture there in the 1870s. After
other European leaders recognized his claim to the Congo River basin
at the Conference of Berlin in 1884, Leopold established the Congo
Free State and named himself ruler. Having wrested control of the
Eastern Congo from East-African Arab and Swahili-speaking traders,
Belgian authorities began a fierce and violent reign over the territory,
during which Leopold accumulated a vast personal fortune from ivory
and rubber through Congolese slave labor. Ten million people are estimated
to have died from forced labor, starvation, and outright murder during
Leopold's rule.
