Music of the Gambia for an international competition to produce an anthem (and flag) before independence from the United Kingdom in 1965. The Gambia, the smallest country in mainland Africa, is an independent coastal state along the River Gambia. It gained its separate identity as a colony of the United Kingdom while Senegal was a colony of France, but the two countries' traditional music are very much intertwined. Among Gambia's people, who together number some 1.728 million (2010), 42% are Mandinka, 18% Fula, 16% Wolof\Serer, 10% Jola and 9% Soninke, the remainder being 4% other African and 1% non-African (2003). 63% of Gambians live
Gambia Regiment 81st (West Africa) Division during its operations in WWII. Throughout 1900 and 1901, the Gambia had experienced an insurgency against British colonial rule, which was eventually suppressed by a military expedition, known as the Gambia Field Force, under Lieutenant Colonel H. E. Brake. It consisted of soldiers from the West India Regiment and the Central Africa Regiment. With the West African Frontier Force (WAFF) being founded in 1898, the Colonial Office made the decision to raise a company in The Gambia, initially to be part of the Sierra Leone Battalion. Captain F. O. Graham of the Royal Marines oversaw its