King Leopold’s Ghost. A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa

By Adam Hochschild

Wow! Talk about the hiding of history, this story of Belgium’s King Leopold destroying the Congo for his own benefit was buried in history. Belgium destroyed as much of the paperwork showing Leopold’s guilt and this author had to find the evidence of slavery and genocide through other channels.

Leopold basically stole the Congo (Stanley and Livingstone weren’t angels either) from the people who lived there, then killed off millions of people over the years by either working them to death (for virtually no pay), flogging them to death, starving them, and more.

The atrocities noted throughout the book are disturbing at times, not unlike the Nazi’s and what they did, these employees of the King lost all disregard for humans. They often were paid for killing African’s by cutting off their hands to show proof. Disgusting and appalling, but it is history.

If you want to learn about a time in history that was buried, and about some of the first human rights groups to stand up for the Congo people, this is a book to read.