the Akwamu and, later, the Asante, as one party and the British and its ally, the people of Ada, on the right (west) bank of the Volta and, as the other signatory. Freeman's name became a household name which allowed him to become an effective conflict mediator. Herbert Taylor Ussher, the Governor of the Gold Coast from 1867 and 1872 and again, 1879 and 1880, asked Freeman to settle a dispute between the Dutch together with the Elmina people and the Fante chiefs, after the Fante had besieged the Elmina township in 1868. The Fante rejected his efforts and pleas. Lay physician Thomas Birch Freeman was also involved in medical healing using orthodox medicine techniques. He is reputed to have cured the Queen of Juaben, Seiwa, of her ailment. Freeman also treated a chief in Kumasi for bilious fever. Thus, he became not only a preacher but a lay physician as well and enhanced his standing among the local people. As an Anglican missionary-educator, Philip Quaque provided rudimentary medical treatment of ailments suffered by the pupils under his care at the Cape Coast Castle School. For more advanced medical cases, the surgeon of the Royal West African Army, who was resident in the castle, provided treatment. Freeman's services were crucial as the Gold Coast did not have a formalised public healthcare system on the Gold Coast. Literary initiatives Freeman was a writer and penned a novel titled Missionary Enterprise No Fiction, which was published anonymously in England at the Epworth Press. T. B. Freeman kept a Journal of a Visit to Ashanti which was published in England periodically in the Wesleyan Missionary Notices. The publication of the Kumasi journals shot Freeman to stardom in line with the T. F. Buxton's vision of missions. The publications resulted in the recruitment and enlisting of more missionaries dispatched to the Gold Coast in January 1840. In 1859, Freeman and another Wesleyan missionary, Henry Wharton of the West Indies founded a news publication, the Christian Messenger and Examiner as a medium to translate foreign literature and classical works into native African languages. Personal life Shortly after his ordination, Thomas Birch Freeman married Elizabeth Booth, the housekeeper of Sir Robert and Lady Harland, and sailed with her to Cape Coast, Gold Coast on 5 November 1837, arriving on 3 January 1838. On 25 November 1840, Freeman remarried, to Lucinda Cowan of Bristol. Cowan died in