Victor Tutu Rogers was nearby when the Cotton Tree went down. He told Reuters he saw it fall at about 9:40 p.m. on Wednesday, May 24, as a storm swept through Freetown.
By morning, one of Sierra Leone’s best-known landmarks was a stump. The tree, a Ceiba pentandra about 400 years old, stood 70 meters (230 feet) tall and 15 meters wide. Torrential rain and high winds stripped it of every branch. Only the base of the trunk was left. The government reported no injuries.
Crowds came to see the wreckage. About a hundred residents gathered at the site on Thursday morning in mourning. “I’m shocked and heartbroken to see our beloved Freetown Cotton Tree destroyed this morning on my way to work,” said Gibrilla Sesay, a 34-year-old finance worker.
A symbol for the whole country
The tree stood in the middle of a busy roundabout in central Freetown, close to the national museum, the central post office and the country’s highest court. It appeared on banknotes and stamps. It showed up in lullabies. Queen Elizabeth II visited it in 1961, to mark the country’s independence.
By legend, formerly enslaved people who won their freedom fighting on the British side in the American war of independence prayed beneath it when they reached West Africa. Residents kept praying there long afterward. The tree had survived earlier damage, including a lightning strike that left it partly scorched.
President Julius Maada Bio called the fall “a great loss to the nation.” He said: “All Sierra Leoneans will pause for thought at the loss of such a prestigious national symbol as Cotton Tree. For centuries it has been a proud emblem of our nation, a symbol of a nation that has grown to provide shelter for many.” He also wrote on Twitter that early settlers regarded it as “a symbol of liberty and freedom.”
The city’s Chief Administrator, Festus Kallay, said the site held the municipality’s annual thanksgiving prayers every November, along with many other events. “The Freetown skyline will hardly be the same again,” he said.
Cleanup and what comes next
Police and soldiers were sent to the area on Thursday, and by then the branches and debris had been cleared. The Ministry of Tourism and Cultural Affairs asked people not to cut wood from the remains. It said relics of the tree would be secured and preserved at the national museum.
Bio promised a replacement tribute. “We will have something at the same spot that bears testament to the great Cotton Tree’s place in our history,” he said. “All voices will be brought together for this.”
The storm came in a hard season for the country. At least 15 people died in flooding this month, according to the national disaster management agency. Eight people were killed in a landslide last August, and in 2017 a mudslide in the capital killed more than 1,100. The rainy season usually runs from May to October. Zebek International, a press agency working with the government, compared the loss to the 2019 fire at Notre Dame in Paris.
Sources
- Sierra Leone’s symbolic Cotton Tree falls during storm in Freetown
- Sierra Leone's Historic 'Cotton Tree' Falls
