British colony founded as a settlement for freed slaves, plus its inland protectorate.
The Sierra Leone Colony and Protectorate became independent on 27 April 1961 as a Dominion within the Commonwealth, with Queen Elizabeth II as head of state; it became the Republic of Sierra Leone on 19 April 1971 under President Siaka Stevens. Britain had founded the original Freetown colony in 1808 and declared the protectorate over the hinterland in 1896.
The atlas holds 5 border frames for Sierra Leone Colony and Protectorate — the shape you scrub through changes in 1808 · 1848 · 1897 · 1922 · 1934.
Fyfe's own concise history of Sierra Leone, condensing his classic account of the colony and its freed-slave settlement.
The wider British expansion in West Africa (broad context).