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| 1841 |
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| Failure of the Thomas Fowell Buston's Niger Missions. Designed for philanthropic and exploratory purposes, the mission was a failure because a large majority of its members died of malaria. Only in the 1870s did widespread use of quinine assist in suppressing malaria and permitting Europeans to live longer in the African tropics. | 1 |
| Palm oil exports began from Dahomey. | 2 |
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| 1842 |
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| Saros arrived in Abeokuta. | 3 |
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| 1845 |
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| CMS grammar school was opened in Freetown. By 1849, CMS had opened a girls' secondary school in Freetown. | 4 |
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| 1846 |
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| The British Presbyterian Mission began its work in Calabar along the Nigeria coast. | 5 |
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| 1847, July 26 |
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| The commonwealth became the independent Republic of Liberia. The founders of the republic drafted a declaration of independence and garnered international recognition for their newly established nation. Great Britain was the first to recognize the new nation. | 6 |
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| 1848 |
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| First deputy from Senegal sent to the French National Assembly. | 7 |
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| Mid-19th Century |
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| Following the abolition of the slave trade, the states of the Niger delta were forced to look elsewhere for commercial opportunities. The development of trade in commodities, known as legitimate trade, replaced the slave trade as the economic mainstay of the region. The main trade goods of legitimate commerce included palm oil, ivory, shea butter, indigo, and gum. Demand for these tropical commodities and the decline of the transatlantic slave trade LED TO THE WIDESPREAD EXPANSION OF SLAVERY IN AFRICA. Increased use of slaves in Africa augmented production of goods for regional and international trade and contributed to patriarchy because slave wives had fewer rights than freeborn wives. Old elites continued to thrive in the era of legitimate commerce, but new ones were created as a result of the missionary presence and the spread of Western literacy. Coastal societies witnessed the rise of a Western-educated African elite in this era. Lagos became a major Christian center in West Africa. Although local African rulers continued to exert political power in the Niger delta in the mid-19th century, their authority was eroded when Europeans established the first courts of equity to adjudicate commercial disputes between African and European merchants. | 8 |
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| 1851 |
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| Edward Blyden migrated to Liberia. | 9 |
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| Nov.–Dec |
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| The British bombarded Lagos. | 10 |
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