# The return to Africa  
The first Bombay Africans to return to Africa appear to be William Jones, who died in 1904, and Ishmael Semler, along with their Oromo wives. They were sent by the Church Missionary Society (CMS) Nasik orphanage in India to the Rabai mission established in 1846 by Johann Krapf and Johannes Rebmann on the trade route about 25 kilometres inland of Mombasa (Harris,  
1977, p. 20). These two couples were joined by another Nasik African, David George, who worked as a catechist for the CMS and was the leader of the settlement after Rebmann returned to Germany. Jacob Wainright worked as a teacher in Rabai in 1875 (Simpson, 1975, p. 137). Jones worked in Kisulitini and at the Universities' Mission at Zanzibar and, in 1871, returned to Nasik to recruit more settlers (Harris, 1977, p. 21).  
In 1872, Sir Bartle Frere, 1st Baronet, governor of Bombay Presidency, visited Rabai and was very impressed by the work of the Bombay Africans. Upon his return to India he decided that the evangelization of Africa should be carried out by Africans. He urged the CMS to set up a mission near Mombasa as a refuge for freed people, much like Freetown in West Africa. In 1874, the Reverend W. Price arrived from Nasik to set up the Freretown settlement on the mainland north of the island of Mombasa. The Bombay Africans of Rabai became invaluable in this scheme and they were joined by Mathew Wellington from Nasik. In 1875, when the orphanage in Nasik was broken up, over 150 former inmates sailed to Mombasa on the HMS Thetis and settled at Freretown. William Jones was to make several more recruitment trips to India between 1878 and 1881, in addition to a final one in 1893 (Harris, 1977, p. 21). In 1887, James Jones, the son of Reverend William Jones, set up a printing press at Freretown; this was the first independent African press in eastern Africa (RGS link).