Scottish missionary David Livingstone and a small group of Africans had traveled far into Central Africa to promote Christianity. These was much confusion when no word was heard from him or his group. Henry Stanley, an American newspaper reporter, was commissioned to find him. Fortunately, Stanley was able to him in the shores of Lake Tanganyika. Leopold's interest was soon to come and form into something even bigger than any Congolese could have imagined.
Stanley became interested himself in African land and set out to trace the course of the Congo River himself. His expedition caught the interest of King Leopold II of Belgium, who eventually hired Stanley to assist him of acquiring Congo land. Stanley was able to sign treaties with many African chiefs in the course of three years. These very treaties gave King Leopold II control of these land. Leopold's justified his actions was to diminish the slave trade and to promote Christianity. However, he began to license companies that forced Africans to collect saps from rubber plants which eventually resulted in more than 10 million Congolese dead. He was ably to make a huge profit from the Congo. Workers who failed to bring enough rubber were killed or their hands cut off. Their hands would then be displayed and brought around the village, serving as a reminder to the people what their punishment would be if they were to fail their task. Under the hot sun, completing such tasks was excruciating for any worker or human to accomplish. He once said "I do not want to risk...losing a fine chance to secure for ourselves a slice of this magnificent African cake". That chance of exploiting all the workers was surely not worth the incredible amount of wealth that was to follow for him. His cruelty eventually resulted in angry humanitarians and a demand for change. In 1908, the Congo was taken from Leopold by the Belgium government. The Congo became one of the world's most scandalous scandals.