Word: kimathi
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...shade of the great jacaranda tree outside the courthouse at Nyeri, an old woman squatted, moodily scratching the vermin beneath her filthy rags. Inside, on trial for his life before a British judge and a jury of three Kikuyu elders from his native village, was her son, Dedan Kimathi, 36, self-styled Field Marshal, Knight Commander of the African Empire, President of the Parliament of Kenya and Commander in Chief of the Land Liberation Army, the man once feared through all Kenya as the leader of some 10,000 Mau Mau terrorists...
Riddled with venereal disease, still crippled from a bullet wound sustained at his capture in the jungle last month, a leader without an army, betrayed even by his mistress, Kimathi had only the memory of past power to sustain him. Despite the fact that it carried the death penalty, even the charge against him-carrying a loaded revolver-was a humiliation to a chieftain who had once ordained life and death for hundreds. His defense was a meeching plea that he was coming out of the forest to surrender when he was captured. "But he could have surrendered...
...days, not so long ago, when the bloodthirsty Mau Mau were terrorizing all of Kenya, there was no fiercer character in all the jungle than Dedan Kimathi, a scarred, stocky ex-clerk who had fought and jockeyed his way to the leadership of all the guerrillas. Not content with his popular title, "General Russia," Dedan capped his arrogance by calling himself Field Marshal Sir Dedan Kimathi and appointing a parliament of his own to preside over. The Nairobi government put a price of ?500 on his head...
With the success of British arms, and quarreling within their own ranks, the Mau Mau are now on the run. Kimathi and a rival leader split up and went their separate ways. For the past six months the activities of both factions have been confined to a few raids on local cowherds. A refugee captured by Kenya police as he left Kimathi's camp recently has provided a vivid picture of the once great chieftain in his twilight hour. Broken in health and mind, 35-year-old Dedan Kimathi now spends his days making wild speeches to the jungle...
...terrorism had spread through the jungles from Kenya right into Uganda's teeming chief city Kampala, where many a white resident found a dead dog or cat crucified on his doorway in grim warning of what might come. A threat from Mau Mau Leader Dedan Kimathi to kill Britain's Queen if she came to visit gave the final jolt to the British governor's jangled nerves...