Raphael Armattoe

Ghanaian physician, author and politician

Raphael Ernest Grail Armattoe (12 August 1913 22 December 1953) was a Ghanaian scientist and political activist. He was nominated for the 1948 Nobel Peace Prize and was a campaigner for unification of British and French Togoland. He was called by the New York Post "the 'Irishman' from West Africa", and the BBC producer Henry Swanzy referred to him as the "African Paracelsus".

Armattoe was born at Keta in the Gold Coast (in what is now the Volta Region of Ghana). He received his early education in Lomé, Togoland before completing his primary education in Denu, Gold Coast. Between 1925 and 1928 he attended secondary school at Mfantsipim School, Cape Coast. As Togoland changed from German to British and French hands, Armattoe ended up being fluent in German, French and English; whilst also being fluent in Spanish and Portuguese.

Armattoe moved to Edinburgh, where he qualified to practice medicine. He then got a locum job in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and following that worked at the Civil Defence first aid post in Brooke Park, Derry, between 1939 and 1945. After the Second World War, he opened a medical practice at his home on Northland Road in Derry. The Abochi drug which can cure guinea worms, toothaches, bronchitis, boils and allied diseases patent was later bought by a prominent Nigerian drug company at the time. Through association with international scientific societies he is regarded as one of the very few scientists at the time to understand atomic energy. a conference attended by many future Ghanaians politicians as well as Hastings Banda, Jomo Kenyatta and W. E. B. Du Bois. Though they both favoured independence for the colonies, Nkrumah was centrist while Armattoe was federalist. He joined the Ghana Congress Party rather than Nkrumah's Convention People's Party. He belonged to the Ewe ethnic group who he sought the unification of its people who were divided by colonial powers between British Togoland, the Gold Coast and French Togoland; he wanted its people united as one Ewe nation state being active within the Togoland Congress, advocating for Ewe Unification.

His father Glikpo Armattoe was a merchant of Palime, Togoland, who traded mainly with the Germans and also studied local indigenous languages.

Armattoe fell ill and died in a hospital in Hamburg. His wife reported that he said he had been poisoned by some unknown persons. He had apparently been attacked previously by supporters of Kwame Nkrumah,

Inscribed on his gravestone in Hamburg are the words "Africa's Greatest Nationalist".

Japan's Place in the Sun. 1932
Uber Die Heutige Einstellung Der Wissenschaft. 1933
Moeurs et Coiturnes Togolaises. 1939

Anthropology in Portugal. 1946

Selected Correspondence with Men of Science. 1951
Anaphylaxis (A medical treatise). 1952
Testament to Youth. 1953
The Ewes in Eweland. 1954 (An anthropological study)
Dawn over Africa. 1954 (Novel)