Winston S. Churchill
CHURCHILL, Winston S. My African Journey.
London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1908.
First edition, first impression, sole printing. Octavo. Original red cloth, spine lettered and ruled in gilt, with the striking front board pictorially blocked in black, blue and grey. Photographic frontispiece and 46 further plates containing 61 illustrations in total, together with three maps and publisher’s advertisements at rear.
Written while Churchill was Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies, My African Journey records his remarkable 1907 expedition through British East Africa, principally modern Kenya and Uganda. What began partly as a hunting journey developed into an examination of the region’s government, railways, commerce, public health and future development.
The book occupies a unique place among Churchill’s works. Its 61 photographic illustrations include images taken by Churchill himself and Lieutenant-Colonel Gordon Wilson, making this the only Churchill book to contain his own photography. The celebrated front board depicts Churchill standing over a rhinoceros, derived from an episode during the expedition.
Much of the narrative first appeared in The Strand Magazine, before Churchill substantially expanded it for publication in book form. The result combines travel, politics, hunting and colonial observation, capturing the thirty-three-year-old Churchill years before his premiership.
This is an unusually attractive example in the original decorated cloth. The boards remain particularly bright, with only slight fading to the spine, toning to the endpapers and a little foxing internally. Clean endpapers without inscriptions. Sourced from a private collection in South Africa.
