The First Anglo-Ashanti War was from 1823 to 1831. In 1823, Brigadier-General Sir Charles MacCarthy*, Governor of Sierra Leone and the Gold Coast, leading one of the four columns of his invasion force advanced on the Ashanti kingdom. Unfortunately he was not joined by the other columns before he was attacked by the 10,000-strong Ashanti army on 22 January 1824 on reaching a tributary of the Pra River. He was defeated and killed and his head was taken as a trophy; his skull was used later as the base for a gold rimmed drinking cup by the Ashanti rulers. The Ashanti then advanced to the coast, but disease forced them back. They advanced on the coast again in 1826 and again withdrew, this time because of superior British firepower. In 1831, the Pra River was negotiated as the border and thirty years of peace followed.

*
MacCarthy was born in Cork, Ireland, on 15 February 1764, and was the son of the French émigré Jean Gabriel Guérault. He changed his name to MacCarthy, his mother’s maiden name, at an early age. His first commission was in the Régiment de Berwick in France’s Irish Brigade. He later volunteered for service with the army of the Dutch Republic. When the Irish Brigade was disbanded he was appointed to command a company of the 11th West India Regiment on 17 October 1799, later transferring to the 52nd (Oxfordshire) Regiment of Foot on 15 March 1800. He was appointed a Major in the New Brunswick Fencible Infantry (104th) but left them in 1811 (before the Battle of Lundy’s Lane) on being appointed a Lieutenant Colonel in the Royal African Corps.