FULL TEXT: Paris, France – The story of a white woman who became wife number six of an African cannibal chief is revealed in a recently found manuscript of Alphonse Leroy, explorer who died 20 years ago [circa 1917]. He had refused to publish the facts at time for fear that the woman, who was a murderess, would be hunted down and because she had many relatives living in London. The distant relative of the explorer who found the manuscript in a strong box refused to give the full name of the woman because he believes her relatives may still be living.
The story makes your hair stand on end. Leroy, drawn to a
jungle clearing by the light of a forest fire and the howling of natives, crept
up to witness a revolting scene. Black, sinuous bodies twisted evilly around
the leaping flames. In a circle about the dancers 20 natives squatted, tearing
and snapping at almost raw flesh with almost animal ferocity.
From this fresh vantage point Leroy was sure the native who
held his attention had a skin somewhat lighter than the rest. Dare he risk
another two years?
A blood curdling yell rose to crescendo. Each of the natives
took up the cry in turn. But one of them produced a note more shrill and fierce
than the rest. Leroy could have sworn it was the fair skinned one.
Leroy tightened his grip on his revolver and slid, inch by
inch, nearer his circle. Now – If he raised his head slowly above the
undergrowth.
Just 10 seconds he started into that circle. Then, startled
and suddenly afraid. He dropped back again. The fair skinned native was a
woman. And the meat she was eating looked almost like human flesh!
Ten days later, in broad daylight, Leroy entered the tiny
hamlet 80 miles north of Bangala. He warned his porters to move warily. He
experience that night was still vivid in his mind. But nothing could have been
more peaceful than the native village this stifling afternoon.
~ “I Come From England” ~
The whole of the villagers flocked from their huts to watch
the arrival of the white man. Two among them, by gestures, indicated where
Leroy would find the chief. His hut, slightly larger than the others, was
guarded by two giant natives, who immediately advanced to meet them. After much
palaver he was conducted inside.
The chief was a genial soul, very anxious to talk and
entertain his visitor. At first Leroy suspected guile. He was alone among these
natives who only the other night –
And then followed an astonishing thing. A woman moved out
from behind a mud partition. Immediately Leroy recognized the fair skinned
native he had seen gorging at the feast. She paused uncertainly before him.
He spoke to her in French. She appeared not to understand.
He tried his English. A grin spread over her face, and very slowly, searching
for every word, she said: “Yes, I come from England.”
~ Killed Her Husband ~
The chief was overwhelmed with joy that his visitor should
be able to converse so easily with his wife. For that, Leroy quickly discovered,
was her social standing. The chieftain’s sixth wife!
Leroy remained for a week in the village. During that time
he saw a great deal of the fair skinned woman who said she came from England
and that her name was Jane. And this was the story she unfolded.
As a child, nothing could control her headstrong nature.
Mother, father, governess, and schoolmistress all had tried and failed. By the
time she was 20 her father had thrice threatened to disown her, and when she
calmly announced that she was going to have a second illegitimate child, she
was told that she must go.
She did. During the next few months she lived crazily. A
French aristocrat finally won her affections and she married him. Disaster
followed six months later. Her husband began to beat her. Jane’s fiery nature
rose in rebellion. One night he whipped her severely. At 3 o’clock the next
morning she smiled down on her husband, watching him for nearly five minutes as
he slept. Then she thrust a hatpin through his left eye, killing him.
~ Lost in the Jungle ~
Disguised as a man, she fled from one country to another,
suffering the most appalling hardships. But gradually the net tightened round
her. At last they thought they had her cornered in Cape Town. But she slipped
through and disappeared in the wilds of central Africa. That was the last they
heard of her.
And now Leroy had stumbled on her, 10 years afterward, deep
in the interior. Completely lost in the jungle, she had flung herself down one
night, falling asleep from sheer exhaustion. When she awoke next morning,
strange faces peered at her from the riotous undergrowth.
Weak from starvation, she called for help. But at the sound
of her high, cracked voice the natives disappeared. She must have fainted
shortly afterward. When she came round again, she was lying in a native hut.
~ Children’s Dreadful Fate ~
At first the natives took her for some kind of goddess come
from another world. But, as gradually she adapted herself to the ways of
Canalla, and shook off her European habits, they realized Jane was just an
ordinary human being like themselves.
Her first initiation into the secret rites of their feasts
made her physically sick. She saw them kill, cook, and eat a child of 9. Any
female child whose mother died before her daughter reached the age of 10 was a
possible victim of this barbaric rite.
The infants were tested by a painful process of skin
pricking. If they cried out during the ordeal, they had the devil in them and
were doomed.
It took Jane five years to accustom herself to this
appalling business. Then suddenly something seemed to change in her mental
make-up, She found herself taking a queer, perverted pleasure in the cannibal
rite. Finally the day arrived when she actually ate a morsel of flesh at one of
their midnight orgies.
These orgies only occurred about twice a year, and the whole
populace had to work themselves into a frenzy.
~ Strange Delight ~
When Leroy came upon Jane, she was already comparatively
hardened to the life. She admitted that she was half mad with a local brew of
particular potency before she dared enter the ring of the feast – but, with a
queer glitter in her eyes, she confessed to finding strange, sensuous delight
in certain stages of the proceedings.
[“White Woman Became a Cannibal When She Married African
Chief – French Explorer Found Her in Jungle, Kept Her Secret to Spare Family,”
Milwaukee Journal (Wi.), 1937, p. 1]
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[761-4/26/21]
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