African traders and tribal chiefs. Trade became more regulated in 1826, when a trading company was granted a monopoly over the ivory trade in the bay, allowing only them to purchase directly from African traders, and negatively effecting commerce in Lourenço Marques. The population of the fort at the time was just a few hundred, and consisted of three main groups: government personnel, including soldiers, civil servants, and their servants and slaves, Portuguese East India Company officials and slaves, and 300–400 Africans living within the fort's borders. Zulu conflict, 1830s In 1833, for reasons that are not entirely clear, Zulu King Dingane kaSenzangakhona attacked Lourenço Marques. On 26 July 1833, Dingane and his army, accompanied by auxiliaries from two other tribes, arrived in front of the fort and burned nearby native villages. Anticipating an attack, the governor of Lourenço Marques, Dionísio António Ribeiro, along with much of the fort's personnel, left to take refuge on Xefina Island, ten miles east of the fort. Some soldiers remained at the fort, along with the head of the trading company, who disagreed with the decision to leave. On 17 September 1833, Dingane's army sacked the fort, but not the trading facilities. Nobre, the trading company head, had convinced the Portuguese soldiers not to resist the Zulus. Nobre made an arrangement with the Zulus and emerged safe from the conflict. On 16 September, Dingane ordered his men to pursue and kill Governor Ribeiro. When Zulu warriors arrived on the mainland across from Xefina Island on 6 October, Ribeiro took a boat, planning to stop at Magaia and then go meet the Ndwandwe leader Soshangane, an ally whom he had invited to attack the Zulus. However, before reaching his destination, the ship had to stop on the coast due to stormy weather. There, Ribeiro was captured by the Zulu, who killed three of his men and took him back to Lourenço Marques, where he was executed on 12 October 1833. Before his execution, a Zulu reportedly gave a public speech, and said:"The governor will die because of his treachery and tyranny—for having usurped the land of the King Dingan [sic] and Machacana, made war on him without motive, sent his people to [the Island of] Moçambique, ... having had flags hoisted in the lands of those kings without their consent under the force of arms, [and] sent powder and ball to King Dingan."While the explicitly