James Pinson Labulo Davies (1828 – 1906)

James Pinson Labulo Davies (1828 – 1906). Davies was a businessman, farmer, merchant-sailor, naval officer, industrialist, statesman, philanthropist, and the husband of Sara Forbes Bonetta (Princess Aina). Davies was a lieutenant on HMS Bloodhound , the vessel which capture Lagos in 1841 ousting the Oba Kosoko, with the objective of ending the slave trade. Davies is credited with the introduction of cocoa farming and spreading the knowledge of cocoa farming to West Africa, using seeds from he obtained from a Brazilian ship and the island of Fernando Po. He was also a sponsor of the CMS Grammar School. According to Chief Justice W.B. Griffiths, the son Governor of the Gold Coast from 1885 to 1895 Sir Brandford Griffiths, whose father introduced cocoa planting to the Gold Coast:

As far as I’m aware, the first person to plant cocoa on the main-land was the late Capt. J.P.L. Davies, a well known native of Lagos, who in 1882 used to tell me about the farm he had lately just made beyond the Protectorate of Lagos.[i]