Dan Crawford

Who was Dan Crawford?

Daniel "Dan" Crawford, also known as 'Konga Vantu', was a Scottish missionary of the Plymouth Brethren in central-southern Africa.

He was born in Greenock, son of a Clyde boat captain. He was influenced to go to Africa by meeting Frederick Arnot in 1888, a missionary who had just returned from two years at Bunkeya, capital of the Garenganze King, Msiri, where he had founded the Plymouth Brethren's Garenganze Evangelical Mission.

Crawford arrived at Bunkeya in 1890 to join two Plymouth Brethren already at the mission. He was therefore a junior observer rather than a player in the dramatic events of late 1891 when British and Belgian expeditions competed to take Msiri's kingdom into their respective colonies, and Msiri was killed by Lieutenant Bodson of the Belgian expedition,

In the aftermath of the killing and a massacre of Msiri's men, the 10,000-strong population of Bunkeya fled into the bush, and Crawford moved to the western shore of Lake Mweru and established a mission there.