Kikuyu Home Guard

The Kikuyu Home Guard or The Kikuyu Guard, existed from early 1953 until January 1955. It was a volunteer organisation raised in response to the threat posed to Kikuyu people by the Mau Mau.

History of the Kikuyu Guard

The Home Guard had their origins in the many Kikuyu who - for one reason or another - stood opposed to the Mau Mau movement. Clayton calls these early, ad-hoc anti Mau Mau groups the Kikuyu Resistance Groups, which appeared in the last part of 1952.. [A Clayton "Counter Insurgency in Kenya 1952-60" (Nairobi: Transafrica, 1976)p. 28] The Kenya Government recognised that a substantial proportion of Kikuyu were ready and willing to take up arms to defend themselves against the Mau Mau, and so the Home Guard came into being in March 1953. They were unpaid, un-uniformed and armed with crude edged weapons.

The Kenya Government already had at its disposal small numbers of Tribal Police (later called the Administration Police) under the control of local Administrators (District Officers and District Commissioners). The large numbers who enrolled in the Home Guard tremendously boosted the ability of the Administration to resist Mau Mau. By 1955 the majority of the Guard were stood down, since Mau Mau no longer constituted a major threat, and the remainder of the guard were absorbed into the Tribal Police. The Guard reached a maximum establishment of 25,000 in 1954, a much greater number than were active in the Mau Mau forest platoons.

Organisation

As noted above, the Guard was organised by the Kenya Administration, rather than the Army or Police, and Temporary District Officers were appointed to officer the guard. In most cases, individual platoons and sections of the Guard were officered by junior administration officials, such as chiefs and headmen.

The Role of the Home Guard

The Guard undertook a variety of mission roles. For the majority of the time, they guarded the fortified villages that had been set up to protect the Kikuyu from the Mau Mau. In the early period of the Guard, it was common for the Mau Mau to over-run these fortified positions because the Guard lacked sufficient firepower to resist their attackers. In due course, as the Guard demonstrated its political and military reliability, the Kenya Government supplied shotguns and rifles to the Guard.

The Guard also took part in anti-Mau Mau sweeps and local patrolling. Their local knowledge and intimate understanding of the Mau Mau made them very effective in this role. It is estimated that the Tribal Police and the Home Guard were responsible for some 42% of all Mau Mau deaths, making them the most effective branch of the Kenya security forces.

The Tribal Police / Home Guard was behind the capture of the head of the Mau Mau, Dedan Kimathi.

References

A Clayton "Counter Insurgency in Kenya 1952-60" (Nairobi: Transafrica, 1976)

F Majdalany "State of Emergency" (London: Longmans, 1962)

J Pinney "A History of the Kikuyu Guard" (private publication, Fort Hall, Kenya, 1957) (Edited and privately published by David Lovatt Smith, 2003; ISBN 0-9544713-1-8)