AGIA-TREE MONUMENT

It was the meeting in Badagry of Reverend Townsend and Thomas Birch Freeman, son of a Nigerian and a British woman and first missionary to land in Badagry on 24 September 1842, that decided on the first Christmas celebration in Nigeria. This took place on December 25, 1842 under a majestic tree that fell in 1959, the Agia-tree. A monument - a white stele - today symbolizes the deceased plant, around which the Mass was celebrated for many years after that first Christmas and after the first preaching in September 1842.