To the Heart of the Nile - Lady Florence Baker and the Exploration of Central Africa (Pat Shipman, 2004)

I am always fascinated reading about African exploration (most recently, this one). This book was also very interesting. But not that great. It felt like it was written for a junior high class where the teacher was interested in touting the "woman's perspective." I wouldn't chase down any more of her books.

The story line is another one of these unbelievable situations. 38-year-old widower (stalwart Englander) traveling in eastern Europe (Ottoman territory, I think) spontaneously bids on a 14-year-old Transylvanian girl being presented at a Turkish slave auction as a high-priced virgin (harem product) who could speak a European language. He had never seen the girl before. Outbid by the local headman. So he did the only logical thing: abduct her (before ever having spoken to her) and head for the border.

So of course they fall madly in love. Samuel Baker is an adventurer and shortly thereafter takes up the idea of searching for the source of the Nile (inspired by similar efforts of Burton, Speke, etc.) His new wife (Florence, as Anglicized) tags along on all of his trips, facing the usual litany of awfulness that those trips involved. High risk for anyone, super high risk for a woman.

It is pretty amazing.

They didn't find the source - Speke gets credit - but they did quite a bit of useful geographic work and came back to England as heroes. They were so popular that Florence's past - a non-starter in Victorian society no matter how much it wasn't her fault - was generally overlooked.

A few thoughts:

1. Florence had ended up a slave as part of the unrest in the 1848 revolution where Louis Kossuth sought to gain a measure of independence from Austria for Hungary. Kossuth was viewed in America as some sort of patriot and freedom lover, thus there are places named for him. Like the Iowa county in which I was born (and which was laid out shortly after 1848).

2. Samuel & Florence were mightily frustrated trying to get the natives to function in anything near the manner that folks back in Europe would have functioned. Much commentary that definitely wasn't PC.

3. Allowing for that - unfortunately it all sounds too familiar in many key aspects going back to these very early European incursions into Africa. Western powers in it for a mixture of trade and territorial ambition and to reform the benighted natives (including I think some sincere motives). Main method of dealing with the locals seems to be to endlessly provide gifts (then: trade beads and weapons to the leaders, now: cash (outright aid, or loans that won't be repaid) and weapons) to the leaders. The leaders typically kept, and keep, the lion's share of the gifts with pretty much zero benefit to the society as a whole. Ugh.

4. This book was helpful in sorting out the Ottoman empire relationship with Egypt. Nominally it was part of the Ottoman empire, but Egypt took counsel with England before doing much of anything. Which is how folks like "Chinese" Gordon ended up as a pasha in Khartoum when the Mahdi overran the place (Baker also was a pasha on the Egyptian payroll for a few years.)