COLONIAL DISCOURSES: Series Two: Imperial Adventurers and Explorers: Part 2
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COLONIAL DISCOURSES: Series Two: Imperial Adventurers and Explorers: Part 2 COLONIAL DISCOURSES Series Two: Imperial Adventurers and Explorers Part 2: Papers of James Augustus Grant (1827-92) and John Hanning Speke (1827-64) from the National Library of Scotland Contents listing PUBLISHER'S NOTE CONTENTS OF REELS DETAILED LISTING EXTRACTS COLONIAL DISCOURSES: Series Two: Imperial Adventurers and Explorers: Part 2 Publisher's Note There is more than one type of Colonial Discourse. This project brings together a wide variety of sources - travel narratives, Indian and African fiction, papers of explorers - which will enable scholars to understand the complexities which exist and to look at the way in which individuals related to the process of Empire and colonisation. How were territories named? How were indigenous peoples treated? Were different cultures respected? This second series covers papers of imperial adventurers and explorers. Part 1 covered the recently discovered papers of Richard Burton at Wiltshire & Swindon Record Office. Part 2 covers the papers of James Augustus Grant (1827-1892) and related material by John Hanning Speke (1827-1864) from the National Library of Scotland. Like Burton, Grant began his colonial career in India, joining the Bengal Army in 1848. He was present at the Siege of Multan, the Battle of Gujarat and at the Relief of Lucknow. Grant used his army career as a springboard for entry into the world of exploration and in 1860 he was seconded to join the Royal Geographical Society's expedition under John Hanning Speke to discover the source of the Nile. This was a follow up to Burton and Speke’s original expedition of 1856 in which Speke had left Burton recuperating from malaria while he set off to discover Lake N’yanza. He renamed this Lake Victoria and claimed it to be the source of the Nile. The 1860 expedition sought to prove this claim. Grant and Speke became the first Europeans to enter Uganda and spent much time with King Mutesa and local tribes. Once again, Speke set off alone when his companion fell ill and found a river flowing north out of Lake Victoria. His claim was hotly disputed and Speke died mysteriously in a shooting accident one day before he was due to meet Burton in public and assert that he had discovered the source of the Nile. His theory was not proven until Henry Morton Stanley’s expedition of 1874. Speke’s own three volume journal of the expedition is included here, and scholars of colonial discourse will be interested to see how this was edited for publication. What was cut out and suppressed? What language was changed? All can be seen from the manuscripts which were rearranged for book publication with large sections crossed out (but still readable), and new linking passages inserted. To balance this we also offer Grant’s journals for this and other expeditions, dated 1846, 1848-1849, 1852-1854, 1858-1891, describing life in Britain, India and Africa. We also offer Grant’s frank and revealing family correspondence and letters from Edwin Arnold, Samuel Baker, Sam Browne, Paul Belloni du Chaillu, Francis Galton, C E Gordon, Sir Henry Hamilton Johnston, John Kirk and David Livingstone amongst others. Finally there are letters of James Grant, junior, his eldest son, who accompanied Joseph Thomson on his last African expedition and who was also involved in Cecil Rhodes' plans for central Africa. <back COLONIAL DISCOURSES: Series Two: Imperial Adventurers and Explorers: Part 2 Contents of Reels REEL 1 Papers of James Augustus Grant (1827-92) MS.17901-17903 - Family correspondence REEL 2 MS.17904 - Family correspondence MS.17905 - Grant: Letters to his wife REEL 3 MS.17906-17907 - Letters of James Grant, Junior MS.17908 - Family correspondence REEL 4 MS.17909-17911 - Letters from fellow explorers REEL 5 MS.17912-17916 - Grant’s Journals, 1846, 1848-49, 1852-54, 1858-63, 1864-76 REEL 6 MS.17917 - Grant’s Journals, 1877-91 MS.17918 - James Grant junior’s Journal, 1890—Thomson Expedition MS.17919-17921 - Grant’s sketches, 1860 expedition MS.17922 - Miscellanea MS.17923 - Map of Tibet by Speke MS.17924 - Map of Zanzibar by Speke MS.17925 - Memoranda MS.17926 - Press cuttings REEL 7 MS.17927-17928 - Printed materials re Grant and exploration REEL 8 MS.17929-17930 - Correspondence REEL 9 MS.17931-17932 - African letters MS.17933 - Miscellanea REEL 10 MS.17934 - proofs of A Walk Across Africa MS.17935 - Reviews of A Walk Across Africa REEL 11 MS.17936 - Notes taken during 1860 Speke Expedition REEL 12 MS.17937 - Notes taken during 1860 Speke Expedition MS.17938-17939 - Maps drawn during 1860 Speke Expedition MS.17940 - Private copy of Memoranda REEL 13 A MS.17941-17943 - Miscellanea and correspondence REEL 13 B COLONIAL DISCOURSES: Series Two: Imperial Adventurers and Explorers: Part 2 MS.17944-17948 - Miscellanea and correspondence REEL 14 Papers of John Hanning Speke (1827-64) MS.4872 - Manuscript and proofs of Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile REEL 15 MS.4873 -Manuscript and proofs of Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile MS.4874 - Manuscript and proofs of Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile <back COLONIAL DISCOURSES: Series Two: Imperial Adventurers and Explorers: Part 2 Detailed Listing Papers of James Augustus Grant (1827-92) MSS.17901-26 Papers of James Augustus Grant (1827-92), the African explorer, and his family. Grant joined the Bengal army in 1848 and was at the siege of Multan, the battle of Gujerat, and the relief of Lucknow. From 1860-1863 he was seconded to the Royal Geographical Society’s expedition under John Hanning Speke, when the source of the Nile was identified and Uganda and southern Sudan visited. After further service in Kashmir and secondment to Napier’s Abyssinian expedition, he retired with the rank of Lt-Colonel in 1868. He was awarded the Royal Medal of the Royal Geographical Society in 1864 and made a Companion of the Bath in 1866. This collection covers all parts of his career, including family and other correspondence, his journals, his African sketches, and other papers. For additional papers see MSS.17927-8 and 17929-48. Bought Sotheby’s 13 March 1979, lots 126-36, 138, 140-150, 156-81, 183-92, with the aid of a grant from the Heritage Grant for Scotland. MSS.17901-4 Family correspondence. Grant was the youngest son of the Rev James Grant (1790-1853), minister of Nairn, and his wife Christiana (d1877). His brothers Alexander (1820-60) and George (1825-55) were respectively an officer in the Madras Army and a merchant in Calcutta and Rangoon. His sister Margaret (1823-1913) married in 1845 the Rev Peter Mackenzie (1818-1913), minister of Urquhart (Dingwall). All corresponded regularly, giving a vivid picture of family doings and of life in India in the 1850s. See also MS.17927. REEL 1 MS.17901 Letters of Alexander to his father, 1849-53 (f 1); to James A, 1848-60, n d (f 46); of James A to him, 1848-60 (f 131); of Alexander to Margaret and her husband, 1850-8 (f 162); and of Margaret and her husband to him, 1851-7 (f 234). 260ff. Quarto and under. MS.17902 Letters of George to his father and mother, 1849-55, n d (f 1); of Alexander to him, 1852-5 (f 117); of George to James A, 1847-54 (f 121); of James A to him, 1852-3 (f 117); and of George to Margaret and her husband, 1850-5 (f 183). 211 ff. Quarto and under. MS.17903 Letters of his father to James A, 1843-53 (f 1); and of James A to his father and mother, 1848-54 (f 19). 129 ff. Quarto and under. REEL 2 MS.17904 Letters of James A to Margaret and her husband, 1848-58 (f 1); of Margaret to him, 1848-61, n d (f 10); and of her husband to him, 1853-60 (f 227). 254ff. Quarto and under. MS.17905 Letters of Grant to his wife Margaret T, 1866-71, n d (f 1); and of his wife to him, 1867 (f 159). These letters come from periods when Grant was apart from his wife, in Kashmir in 1866-7, in Abyssinia in 1868, and in Europe in 1871. 185 ff. Quarto and under. REEL 3 MSS.17906-7 Correspondence and papers of and concerning Grant’s elder son, also James Augustus (1867-1932). After Oxford he went to South Africa where he worked as a surveyor on the Kimberley Bechuanaland Railway, accompanied Joseph Thomson on his last expedition, and became involved in Cecil Rhodes’s plans for Central Africa. Later he was a Member of Parliament and was created a baronet in 1926. See also MS.17928. MS.17906 Letters of Grant to his son, 1885-7, n d (f 1), mostly written while the latter was at Oxford and dealing with Grant’s activities and family affairs; and letters of and concerning his other son Alister (killed in the Boer War in 1900), 1900 (f 129). 141 ff. Octavo. MS.17907 Letters of James A Grant junior to his father and mother, 1883-1900, n d (f 1), mostly written from South and Central Africa; letters of Joseph Thomson to Grant, 1883-91 (f 187), mostly concerning his expedition with his son; and proof of Thomson’s paper on the expedition to the Royal Geographical Society, 28 Nov 1892, with manuscript of Grant’s comments (published in The Geographical Journal, vol 1, 1893, pp 97-121) (f 205). 219 ff. Folio and under.