*The beginning of the Komenda Wars is affirmed on this date in 1694. These wars lasted until 1700, largely between the Dutch West India Company and the British Royal African Company in the Eguafo Kingdom in the present-day state of Ghana, over trade rights.
The Dutch were trying to keep the British out of the region to maintain a slave trade monopoly while the British attempted to re-establish a fort in the city of Komenda. The fighting included forces of the Dutch, the British, and the prince of the Eguafo Kingdom attempting to rise to the throne, the forces of an influential merchant named John Cabess, other Akan tribes, and kingdoms like Twifo and Denkyira.
There were four separate periods of warfare, including a civil war in the Eguafo Kingdom, and the wars ended with the British placing Takyi Kuma into power in Eguafo. Because of the rapidly shifting alliances between European and African powers, historian John Thornton has found that "there is no finer example of [the] complicated combination of European rivalry merging with African rivalry than the Komenda Wars."
