From 1892 the Niger Coast Protectorate pressed the Oba of Benin Ovonramwen Nogbaisi to sign the standard protectorate treaty opening Benin to British trade. The Oba — whose kingdom retained an absolute monopoly on rubber, palm-oil and ivory from the Benin hinterland — temporised. In December 1896 Acting Consul-General James Robert Phillips, on his own initiative and against the explicit instructions of Foreign Secretary Lord Salisbury, organised a mission of nine British officers and 240 carriers to depose the Oba.
The Oba's messengers warned Phillips three times to delay until the Igue festival (during which Benin custom forbade strangers from entering the city) ended in February. Phillips refused. On 4 January 1897 the column was ambushed at Ugbine village by Benin chiefs acting without the Oba's authorisation; Phillips and seven other British officers were killed, with all but two of the carriers.
The Benin Punitive Expedition — 1,200 Royal Marines and Niger Coast Protectorate Force under Rear-Admiral Sir Harry Rawson — took Benin City on 18 February 1897 after ten days' fighting in which an estimated 1,000 Benin defenders died. The city was burnt, the royal palace looted of an estimated 3,000–4,000 bronze plaques, ivories and brass heads (the Benin Bronzes), and the Oba was tried in September 1897 before a Native Council, deposed and deported to Calabar where he died in 1914. Benin Kingdom was abolished as an independent polity; the throne was restored in symbolic form by Eweka II in 1914 under the British Resident.