"Yaa-Asantewas"(1840-October 17 1921) (pronounced YAA A-san-TEE-WAA)

Was appointed queen mother of Ejisu in the Ashanti Empire-now part of modern day Ghana-by brother Akwasi Afrane Okpese,the Ejisuhene or "ruler of Ejisu." In 1990 she led the Ashanti known as the War of the Golden Stool against British Colonialism.During her brother's reign,Yaa saw the Ashante Confederacy go through a series of events that threatened its future,including civil war from 1883-1888.When Nana died in 1894,Yaa used her right as Queen Mother to nominate grandson as Ejisuhene.When the British exiled him in the Seychelles,in 1896,along with the King of Ashante Prempeh I and other members of the Ashante government, Yaa became regent of the Ejisu-Juaben District.After the deportation of Prempeh I,the British governor-general of the Gold Coast,Frederick Hodgson,demanded the Golden Stool,the symbol of the Ashante nation.This request led to a secret meeting of the remaining members of the Ashante government of Kumasi,to discuss how to secure the return of their king.There was a disagreement among those present on how to go about this Yaa,who was present at this meeting,stood and addressed the members of the council with these now-famous words:
"Now i see that some of your fear to go forward to fight for our King.If it [was] in the brave days of Osei Tutu,Okomfo Anokye,and Opoku Ware,chiefs would not sit down to see their king to be taken away without firing a shot.No European could have dared speak to chiefs of the Ashante in the way the governor spoke to you this morning.It is true that bravery of Ashante is no more?I cannot believe it.It cannot be! I must say this:If you,the men of Ashante,will not go forward,then we will.We, will.I shall call upon my fellow women.We will fight till the last of us falls in the batterfields."With this she took on leadership of the Ashante Uprising of 1900,gaining the support of some of the other Ashante nobility.Beginning in March 1900,the rebellion laid seige to the fort at Kumasi where the British had sought refuge.The fort stands today as the Kumasi Fort &Military Museum.After several months,the Gold Coast governor eventually set a force of 1,400 to quell the rebellion.During the course of this,Queen Yaa &15 of her closets advisers were captured and they were sent into exile to the Seychelles.The rebellion,represented the final war in the Anglo-Ashante series of wars that lasted throughout the 19 century.On January 1 1902,the British were finally able to accomplish what the Ashante army had denied them for almost a century,and the Ashante empire was made a protectorate of the British crown.Yaa died in exile in the Seychelles.Three years after her death,Prempeh I & other remining members of the exiled Ashante court were allowed to return to Ashante.Prempeh made sure the remains of Yaa &other exiled Ashantes were returned for a proper royal burial.Yaa's dream from an Ashante free of British rule was realized on March 6 1957,when the Ashante protectorate gained independence as part of Ghana,the first African nation in the Subsaharan Africa to achieve this feat.