Working in Africa in the 1950’s and 60’s as a foreign correspondent and journalist saw me having to cover a wide range of stories from terrorism to wars and rebellions, including normal criminal activities of note.

One such story was the brazen theft of a high-ranking Government officer’s day-old child from the Tanga hospital on Tanganyika’s Indian Ocean coastline, later described by a British Legal journal as the most audacious child kidnapping plan ever conceived.
At the time, terrorism was rampant in neighbouring Kenya,  and Tanganyika’s Governor,  Sir Edward Twining (of the well-known tea family) became highly concerned that his United Nations’ territory had possibly become embroiled in an act of terrorism as children of people in high places were a definite target.

I was in Nairobi when I received word of the theft and immediately flew to the small town of Tanga in the centre of a major sisal farming district.

On arrival, I was met by a total news blackout ordered by the Government for fear that it’s masters in London and New York would blame the local authorities for being lax with their security measures.

After some snooping around, I soon discovered that the child had been snatched out of his crib only hours after his birth in what was a well secured hospital baby nursery. His mother — the wife of the local influential Government Chief Commissioner — was inconsolable, his father was threatening to murder what he thought would be a band of dangerous miscreants and, on Sir Edward’s demands, had ordered the Askari army out together with hordes of police.

The town and all its inhabitants were in a state of high panic, shutting themselves away from open doors and windows, and the police were totally non-plussed as to who the culprits were or how the child had mysteriously disappeared without any trace.

Some days passed and my story of the child heist went international with overseas media contacting me for me for information as I was the only journalist on the spot in a very secluded part of Africa.

I hunted high and low for clues that would even suggest who had carried out the dastardly deed. Large numbers of Askaris were mobilised and drafted by the Tanganyika authorities in a virtual state of emergency as the British Government in Whitehall heard of the incident and demanded immediate explanations as to what had actually happened.

It was at this stage that the annual tropical Monsoon storms broke with record downpours. After two further days of serious flooding rain on the valleys and hills surrounding Tanga Town, one of the African Askari militia men sent to comb and hunt the vast Tanga floodplain found himself in the mud and slush of a totally remote area.

When about to give up on his order to undertake a search of the district, he suddenly heard the single muted cry of a baby…. or was it something else?

One of the Askari sent out on what was a major search for the missing child around Tanga, found himself in a sea of slush and mud when he heard that cry.

He had to dash and splash his way around the sodden undergrowth but, at first, he could not find the slightest evidence of where the cry had come from. 

As he later told me, he thought it might have been a well-known bird making the call, but he persisted and eventually found a young totally naked White baby boy face-down in the mud and almost totally covered by debris from the storms.

The Askari immediately wrapped the child in his shirt and feverishly ran several miles back to his camp with the boy in his arms in what was still the worst storm of its type that year. A kindly man and father of four, he knew that time was of the essence.

The baby was rushed to hospital by a medical team fearing the worst but, to everyone’s amazement, he was still in good health in spite of chapped skin — and his discovery was heralded as a miracle.

Although the stolen child had been found alive, the wicked crime was still completely unsolved. The Tanganyika Government was also quaking in its boots over the possibility of a terrorist intervention in what was at that stage a normally peaceful and quiet country.

This situation led me to do some detective work. When I looked into the background of the other women who had given birth in the hospital at the same time as the stolen baby’s mother, I discovered that one of these women had been continually visited by a pregnant foreign local who had brought her unexpected gifts and had literally forced her friendship on her.

I put two and two together and looked into the background of this person and found that she lived with her husband on their sisal growing property hidden in the Tanga hinterland.

I had heard that she had been unable to have a child but one day had told her husband that she was finally pregnant and needed to move into town from their distant farm as a precautionary medical measure and under the guidance of a local doctor.

When I investigated the precincts of her temporary home in Tanga, I learned that she was seen to be pregnant but on two occasions had appeared as her former slim self. I immediately linked this up with the many presents given to the baby’s mother and became convinced that she had something to do with the new-born child’s disappearance.

I took my suspicions to the local police who interrogated her and found that she was not pregnant, could not have a child and had devised a mock pregnancy by carrying a special cushion under her clothing.

Her plan was put into action when she had heard that a very well-groomed lady, unknown to her, was expecting. With this in mind, she plotted to steal this woman’s newborn child on the basis that this mother-to-be already had a beautiful daughter and would no doubt produce a good-looking baby.

The intention of the kidnapper was to steal this woman’s child after making concerted efforts to become her close friend. But the plan came very unstuck when she picked up the wrong newborn and had caused an almost national emergency, let alone an international incident. 

When she later appeared in court on a serious child stealing charge, evidence was given that she had walked into the hospital as usual appearing to be pregnant and had then nonchalantly managed to slip unnoticed into the nursery where she removed her baby bump cushion and calmly walked out with her one-day old prize.

After the Tanganyika Government had sent in the troops, she had taken fright and had given the child to a wet nurse for a substantial sum.

This person decided in turn to abandon the baby in the wilderness when she became afraid of the consequences and with the hope that the Monsoon storm would destroy all evidence.

The upshot of the whole affair, however, was when we later learned in court that the baby thief had been having an affair with the most distinguished town resident and held him to ransom by forcing him — a knight of the realm —  to pay all her legal expenses and import two prominent English Q.C’s to defend her — all so his wife would not know of his unfaithful duplicity.

In the end, the baby thief was sentenced to gaol, the doctor, who had looked after her when supposedly pregnant, was deregistered and terrorism was finally discounted with the people of Tanga walking freely once again.