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I have previously blogged about the almost 400 illustrations by Edward Mayhew that we have in our archives. We also have a number of other smaller collections of illustrations, one of which is the illustrated notebooks belonging to John Roalfe Cox.
John Roalfe Cox MRCS FRCVS (?-1903) graduated from London Veterinary School in 1849 after which he studied human medicine becoming a member of the Royal College of Surgeons. Eventually he set up a veterinary practice near Grosvenor Square which rapidly expanded until, by 1870, it was one of the largest, and most lucrative in London.
Cox was elected as a Vice-President of the RCVS in 1872 and remained on Council until 1887, serving as President from 1885-6.
His obituary (Veterinary Record 16 (785) pp53-54 records that:
“For many years [he] kept note-books in which he entered very fully the history and treatment of all his most interesting cases … He was a clever pen-and-ink draughtsman, with a neat turn for caricature.”
We are fortunate to have four books which show Cox’s artistic skill in our collection. One case-book and three notebooks containing sketches
The case-book labelled ‘Horses in accident and disease – notes on special cases’ gives detailed accounts of a number of these special cases including a case of ‘coup–de-soleil’ which Cox encountered in the ‘exceedingly hot summer of July 1858’.
He reports his attempts to soothe the horse through the application of cold compresses, at first these appeared to be beneficial but the horse got worse ‘frequently pitching forward’ and ’falling over again as soon as he got on his legs’. Cox ends his account thus:
“I felt no doubt of it being a case of sun-stroke…he had to be destroyed the following day.”
The notes are accompanied by the following illustration.
Two of the notebooks contain sketches of cases with brief descriptions – interestingly one of these books labelled ‘Clinical sketches of horses in accident and disease’ appears to be the manuscript original for his only published work of the same title
Sketches include:
A case of strangulated intestine
Vomiting in a case half an hour before death
Tetanus
Stomach staggers
Appearance of a horse with fractured pastern
Posture of a horse with broken back
The fourth notebook contains some of Cox’s caricatures which show a variety of rural scenes with captions which reveal his sense of humour.
Hold hard!! Tally ho back!
Confusion of purpose
Drawing blank. Impatient foreigner “vi for so long to begin ze hunt”
A dilemma
As you will have gathered from the previous blog by our Archivist Lorna, the Archives Project here at RCVS Knowledge is well under way. Whilst Lorna is currently getting to grips with the collections (and Fred Smith’s handwriting) I have been recruited to work on the digital side of things.
My name is Adele and since the beginning of January I’ve been working on the project as Archive and Digitisation Assistant. My role is to carry out the digitisation of priority documents within the archive and historical book collection, this includes preparing the material with preservation and repackaging measures, creating the high resolution digital images, writing descriptions and relevant metadata for the scans and uploading them onto an online digital archive. Around this I will also be assisting Lorna with promotion of the project through social media, displays and outreach activities such as talks. Once awareness of our collections grows and the enquiries come flying in I look forward delving into the collections to answer some of these too.
Previously I’ve worked as Archive Trainee at Rambert Dance Company and as the Archive and Special Collections Assistant at University of the Arts, London. Though I’ve worked with digital images within archive collections before- as well as taking on ad hoc digitisation- this project is on a whole new scale for me. I’m so excited to get our online digital archive up and running, it’s great to work in a project with such defined goals and to join at this early stage allowing me to be part of the decision making process. There are certainly many decisions to be made!
The first aspect of my role I looked into was the scanning itself. The library had already purchased a professional high resolution scanner so I was able to get straight on with comparing different settings. We want these scans to be of high quality and available in years to come so we chose to scan into TIFF format as this is uncompressed; it means it is excellent quality and 100% of the data captured during scanning is retained. For our printed text based images we want to our users to be able to search the text within them, from a TIFF file we are able to create a PDF document that we can perform optical character recognition on in order for this to be possible. We were also concerned with how easy it would be to read our images on a screen. After some in house-testing, it was decided that scanning images in greyscale provided more contrast. As the real value in our historical books and journals is the information within them, we made a decision to scan this type of material in greyscale. For images and archive material we will likely be scanning in colour to better represent the unique material context of these documents.
The Veterinarian scanned in greyscale. Easy to read and a much more efficient file size to store.
Letter to Frederick Smith. If this were scanned in greyscale would we see that the annotations were made at separate times?
[Edit: These images have been compressed and resized, and do not reflect the quality of the images to be displayed in the digital archive.]
Of course once I had decided how I was going to scan the material, I needed to know what to scan. A priority list has been made by Clare our Head of Library and Information Services in agreement with our funders The Alborada Trust. This was based on demand, what is already accessible online elsewhere and predicted research value. As Lorna is currently in the process of cataloguing the first archive collection, it made the most sense for me to start with our historical book and journal collection and so I am currently working on scanning volumes of The Veterinarian. The Veterinarian, published from 1828 to 1902, was one of the first veterinary journals to be launched and we hold a complete run of the periodical bound by volume. I’m currently digitising the third volume and I can see why it has been chosen as a priority- there are some really interesting case studies and comments on the profession at that time.
Volumes of The Veterinarian 1828-1902
Now we have some digitised pages to work with, Lorna and I are trialling some Digital Asset Management systems for the most important part of the process – making the images accessible to you online. We hope to be able to give you an update on this soon.
If you are interested in our collections then follow the hashtag #vetarchives on our twitter account @RCVSKnowledge for some updates, fun discoveries and more.
If you have any questions for the Archives Project team, please email us archives@rcvsknowledge.org
-Adele-
This month marks the 75th anniversary of ‘Operation Compass’ which took place in the North African desert, in western Egypt during World War 2. It was here, on 11 December 1940, that a member of the veterinary profession was recognised for gallantry of the highest order.
Dr Thomas Somerville was born in March 1887 in Ceylon, the son of a successful tea planter and merchant. After attending Framlingham College Suffolk, he entered the Royal Veterinary College in 1904, graduating MRCVS in 1908. He immediately gained a place at the London Hospital Medical College, believing that a dual qualification would aid his plans to work abroad.
Somerville passed the conjoint medical examination (MRCS, LRCP) in the summer of 1914 and, at the outbreak of war, was commissioned in the Royal Army Medical Corps. He served in France throughout the war: in January 1916 he was awarded the Military Cross (MC) for ‘distinguished action in the field’, and in 1918 received a bar to the MC ‘for conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty.’
Captain T V Somerville c1918
Following the armistice in 1918 he was posted to Northern Russia where he worked as a medical officer on hospital trains, caring for the casualties of the Russian Civil War. He was awarded an OBE in 1920 for this service.
After demobilisation from the army, Somerville pursued a career in medicine, rather than veterinary medicine, working in general practice, initially near to Whitely Bay, Northumberland and then in Bournemouth.
At the outbreak of World War 2, Somerville, aged 52, volunteered for military service. He was commissioned in September 1939 and posted as Medical Officer to the 3rd (Kings Own) Hussars the following month. The 3rd Hussars were despatched to Egypt in the summer of 1940, arriving in Cairo in September, to serve as part of the 7th Armoured Division, the ‘Desert Rats.’
Somerville quickly realised that medical officers would need to be highly mobile in order to provide treatment swiftly. With ‘light-hearted support’ from senior officers, and using a captured Italian ambulance, he designed a vehicle which would allow treatment of casualties on the battlefield. The Medical Assistance Vehicle (MAV) was effectively a mobile surgical unit. Being lightly armed, it could not display a Red Cross, instead Somerville emblazoned the regimental emblem, the Horse of Hanover, on each side.
‘Operation Compass’ commenced on 8 December 1940, with allied forces attacking Italian troops at Sidi Barrani The Italians soon withdrew, and the 3rd Hussars were ordered to pursue the retreating forces. On 11 December the tanks of the 3rd Hussars became trapped in the soft crust of the dried salt lakes at Ras El Saida. – they were ‘sitting ducks’ for the Italian artillery.
Somerville drove out onto the battlefield to rescue the injured. A tank commander recalled how he was trapped in a tank, unable to get out and thought he was going to die, when:
“Suddenly this officer appeared from nowhere. I didn’t know who he was. He tried to pull me out but he couldn’t. High explosive shells were coming in at a terrific rate. I told him to get away before we got hit again but he just dived into the turret head first, just his legs sticking out. He came out and pulled at me again. This time I popped out and he dragged me down the side of the tank onto the ground. I was nearly passing out but he sat me up and told me I was going to lose my leg but I could make it if I could hang on. I didn’t know much about it but I learned after that he was Captain Somerville and he took my leg off in that vehicle and saved my life.”
Somerville’s actions that day were clearly described in the citation for gallantry:
“…Capt. Somerville went out among the tanks attending to the wounded regardless of the heavy fire and with no consideration for his personal safety. He continued to attend to and bring in the wounded until all were under cover from the main enemy position, and thereafter he dressed them in a position where they were still unavoidably under fire from snipers. His cool gallantry was an inspiration to others who assisted him, and the means of saving many lives. I consider that in view of the shattering fire of the enemy Capt. Somerville has earned the highest decoration for valour.”
Somerville’s Headstone Suda Bay, Crete
He was recommended for the award of the Victoria Cross (VC). This was agreed at all levels of command until it reached the Commander-in-Chief in February 1941,- Wavell crossed through the recommendation of VC and approved the award of the Distinguished Service Order.
In May 1941 Somerville was posted to Crete where he provided medical care to those injured in the fierce fighting following the invasion by German paratroopers earlier that month. At the end of May he was ordered to retreat, but remained on the island to treat casualties. He, along with his batman Corporal Fred Marlow, was befriended by local partisans, and lived in the hills and mountains during the summer of 1941. During this period Somerville was taken ill; he died on 23 November 1941 and was buried in a local cemetery lying between a local soldier and a local woman. At the end of the war, he was reburied at the Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery at Suda Bay, Crete.
Thomas Somerville is recognised on a number of memorials in this country, including Framlingham, the London Hospital and The Roll of Honour of the Royal College of Surgeons of England; he is yet to be recognised by any veterinary institution.
Detail from War Memorial of the London Hospital
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Dr Paul Watkins MRCVS for his help in compiling this post.
In June this year, RCVS Knowledge were thrilled to announce that the Alborada Trust had provided funding for a five year project to catalogue, preserve and digitise the Historic Collection and Archive of the Royal College. Now, five months later, it is time to update you with the progress that has been made so far!
One of the first steps of the project was to employ a qualified Archivist, to oversee the execution of the project, including the cataloguing, recruitment of a digitisation assistant, and development of the digital platform which will provide greater access to the collections.
That Archivist is me!
Lorna, Archivist at RCVS Knowledge
I’m Lorna Cahill, and I started working here at RCVS Knowledge six weeks ago. Previously I have worked in the Archives of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, the Natural History Museum, and Royal Holloway, University of London. I have lots of experience working with material from the 19th century, particularly relating to science and education. So this post is a perfect fit! I am incredibly excited to delve deep into these fascinating collections, and to draw out some of the stories and characters and share them with the public. I hope to regularly update this blog, and the @RCVSKnowledge Twitter feed, with interesting bits and bobs I find along the way. So keep an eye out for those.
This is where you will find me for the next five years!
So what have I been up to for the past six weeks – and what’s the next step of the project?
Happily for me, my main task thus far is exploring the collection. I need to get an idea of what the collections contain, the context around the material, who the people are that created the papers, and how best to look after them. It didn’t take me long to realise that I would first need boxes. Lots and lots of Archive boxes.
Tower of empty Archive boxes ready to house collections
First I took a sample of papers by Connie Ford MRCVS (1912-1998), who worked for the Veterinary Investigation Service for nearly 30 years. She was a specialist in cattle fertility, and I very soon got used to reading a lot about bull testicles and cow abortions (archives work is not always so glamorous!). The research carried out by Ford seems incredibly thorough and there is a great deal of data for me to sift through. However, sometimes it can be rather touching, such as this list of cow abortions. Poor Betty, Shirley and Joyce.
Research data from the papers of Connie Ford
The collection I will be focussing on for the near future is that of Major General Sir Frederick Smith MRCVS (1857-1929). Smith served with the Army Veterinary Service during the Second Boer War, and was eventually appointed Director General in 1907. He wrote several veterinary manuals and histories of the veterinary profession, and carried out extensive research. I have just looked through nearly 20 years of correspondence between Smith and Fred Bullock, Secretary of RCVS, which has revealed to me a great deal about Smith’s character. I even found Smith’s prediction, in 1920, that one day I would come along to curate his papers:
“I am leaving all my books, papers, notes &c to the College with one or two exceptions. If I live long enough I will index the papers & notes still in M.S, they may save some man a good deal of spade work.”
It has taken 95 years, but finally someone is giving them all the attention they deserve. However, he couldn’t predict that it would be a woman!
Smith’s handwriting is a little challenging to read, so I certainly do have my work cut out for me. But I look forward to spending the next few months with Fred Smith, and helping everyone else get to know him better too.
Lorna
Illustration of a Common Greenland Seal
In the Historical Collection there are numerous bound volumes that simply say ‘Pamphlets various’ on the spine. They don’t look that interesting but I always have a sense of anticipation when opening one for the first time as they usually contain an eclectic mix of material – prospectuses for vet schools, unpublished correspondence, reprints on matters veterinary (or not), individual issues of journals etc. Flicking through one such volume last week I found what appears to be the complete set of a short lived periodical called The Veterinary Examiner: monthly record of physiology, pathology and natural history
Index to the volume of pamphlets
The subtitle makes a bold statement about the frequency of publication but in reality The Veterinary Examiner seems to have only lasted for three issues December 1832-February 1833. Or at least these are the only issues I can trace in libraries worldwide.
Our issues, bound slightly out of order, are tucked away in the volume between the ‘Rules and regulations of the National Veterinary Benevolent & Mutual Defence Society’ for 1867 and Thomas Challis on ‘Smithfield and Newgate Markets as they should and might be’, 1851
The issues do not give an editors name, or indeed any real clues as to who the editor might have been. I have however found two short reviews in the London Literary Gazette (1832) and The Magazine of Natural History and Journal of Zoology, Botany, mineralogy, geology and meteorology (1833) which give the editors as Professor Dewhurst FWS, FLVS &c and Henry Braddon Esq..
Professor Dewhurst is Henry William Dewhurst who taught anatomy and physiology at his Theatre of Anatomy in Sidmouth Street, Bloomsbury. In a work published in 1822 he is described as Professor of Zoology, Human and Comparative Anatomy, Fellow of the Westminster Medical, Royal Jennerian, and London Veterinary Societies.
The three issues of The Veterinary Examiner have a total of 120 pages and more than one third are taken up with publications written by Dewhurst and Braddon. Dewhurt’s contributions include a lecture on the circulation of the blood and its vessels and his ‘Observations on the natural history of the Phoca Groenlandica or Common Greenland Seal’ (presumably based on research undertaken when he served as a ships surgeon on a journey to Greenland) Whilst Braddon has a three part essay ‘On the structure and oeconomy of the Horse’s foot’ (in three parts).
In contrast to the other veterinary periodicals started around this time (The Veterinarian and the Farrier & Naturalist) the purpose of The Veterinary Examiner does not appear to be to “attack” Edward Coleman and the Veterinary College. In fact the first issue is complimentary about Coleman: “Professor Coleman opened the session at the Royal Veterinary College, by the delivery of an excellent introductory discourse” and goes on to state that the:
“Pages of our journal will be open to all, and influenced by none, …. However [we will] never permit our columns to be defiled, with personal abuse, or in assailing the private character of any individual – Measures not men, must form the theme of the discussion” (pp30-31)
As well as the articles by Dewhurst and Braddon there are reprints of articles first published elsewhere, reviews of newly published works and a long – and quite interesting – article on the ‘History of Veterinary Medicine’ which is spread over the three issues. Part 3 of the history article in issue 3 ends ‘to be continued’ so that and other mentions of items to be included in the next number indicate that another issue was planned.
I wonder if there were more or did something happen to prevent further publication?
Illustration of the frog from Braddon’s article on the hoof
In our collection of watercolours by Edward Mayhew there is only one featuring dogs.
The top image is captioned ‘Dog with retracted eye – near the termination(?) of distemper’ and the bottom ‘The lasting effect left by nitrate of silver when applied to an ulcer on the eye of the dog.’
The fact that there is only one painting of dogs could be considered somewhat surprising as Mayhew wrote regularly on canine matters. For example
In the 1848 article Mayhew reveals that his practice dealt mainly in dogs – ‘[the] public have favoured me by consulting me largely upon the disease of dogs”. His writings on dogs culminated in the 1854 publication:
Dogs: their management: being a new plan of treating the animal based upon a consideration of his natural temperament (London: George Routledge).
The title page states the work is ‘illustrated by numerous woodcuts depicting the character and position of the dog when suffering disease’ but the illustrator is not named. Was it Mayhew? If not were they based on originals by Mayhew like his later books on horses?
A possible clue to the illustrator can be found in Volume 4 of Frederick Smiths Early History of Veterinary Literature and its British development where he describes two works by Mayhew published in 1854 – the one listed above and another Dogs: their management and treatment issued under the pseudonym F. Forester. However Frank Forester is now known to be the pseudonym of Henry William Herbert (1807-1858) a novelist, journalist and illustrator who emigrated to the United States in 1831.
Searching for Forester and dogs quickly lead me to a revised edition (published 1857) of a book titled The Dog by Dinks, Mayhew and Hutchinson compiled, abridged, edited and illustrated by Frank Forester. This book is a compilation of three separate, previously published works, on dogs including Mayhew’s which is described as the second American edition. Does this mean that the illustrations in Mayhew’s 1854 book (which are exactly the same in the Forester compilation as in the individually published version) were by Forester? Certainly that is what most people seem to believe according to my internet search.
Further searching on Forester/Herbert led me to the Life and writings of Frank Forester edited by David W Judd (London, F Warne, 1882). The section on Forester as editor states
“As the editor of other persons’ writings … Herbert was little more than a bookseller’s hack, lending his name and making a few annotations to previously published volumes, to secure for them a more rapid sale”
So presumably the version of Mayhew’s book that Smith refers to as issued under the pseudonym F. Forester was simply a repackage for the American market. All of which might be considered to cast doubt on Forester as illustrator of Mayhew’s book.
Whoever the illustrator was the pictures offer an interesting insight into canine practice in the 1850s. They show how to recognise healthy dogs as in the case of the Scotch Terrier below where ‘the coat is by the artist truthfully depicted as remarkably long, full and hairy’.
Scotch Terrier
Illustrate dogs suffering from various diseases
(Note the man running away in the background from the rabid dog)
and show various veterinary treatments
At our recent Summer Reception, guest speaker Kirsten Rausing announced £387,275 in funding from The ALBORADA Trust for a five year project to catalogue, properly store and digitise priority pieces from our historic collections and make them available for free online.
Amongst the documents we plan to digitise is a manuscript ledger recording the work of the Board of Ordnance Veterinary Hospital at Woolwich Barracks from 1802-1855 – a unique record of significance for the veterinary history of both the Battle of Waterloo and the Crimean War.
The hospital’s origins stem from February 1796 when the artillery horses stationed in Kent were reported to be in a diseased state. Edward Coleman, Professor at the London Veterinary College, was asked to investigate. His report confirmed that many of the horses had glanders and had been destroyed and recommended that a portion of the stables at Woolwich be set aside as an infirmary.
Coleman suggested that the infirmary could be staffed by a pupil from the veterinary college, who could remain in residence, and that he could attend once or twice a week. This plan was agreed very quickly and Coleman started as Medical Superintendent on 25 March 1796 at 10s a day and John Percivall as Assistant at 6s a day.
The ledger is divided into two parts – the first section lists the admissions of sick and injured horses from the
The second section is a store issuing and receipt book for the hospital which allows researchers to see the huge increase in supplies required directly after the Battle of Waterloo and during the build up to the Crimean War.
The National Army Museum’s Waterloo 200 project carries the strapline ‘discover the battle that changed the world’. We are delighted that on the 200th Anniversary of the Battle this document, which highlights the role of veterinary surgeons in this world-changing event, will soon be made available for all to view.
The digitisation project will start later this year – and I will post the history behind our most interesting and rare pieces and updates on progress here, so watch this space!
Image credit: Jacob Bland
Display of Coat of Arms in reception
The addition of the Coat of Arms of the University of Nottingham to the display of stained glass in the reception at Belgravia House, the RCVS HQ, has awakened interest in the history of the glass in this display and elsewhere in the building. As a result I spent several days pouring over 170 years of Council minutes to see what I could find out.
The story begins in 1884 when the College decided to knock down its existing building in Red Lion Square and erect a new home on the same site. This new building was to be ‘fitting for the home of the veterinary profession’ and tenders were invited for three stained glass windows in the Council Chamber facing on to Red Lion Square. Money was tight though and Council decided they couldn’t justify the extra expense.
The idea of having ‘coloured’ windows must have appealed to sections of the profession as the Central Veterinary Medical Society offered to pay for stained glass in the middle window. Practitioners HL Simpson and JF Simpson (prominent members of the Royal Counties Veterinary Medical Association) jointly offered another. So, whilst the building opened on 6 April 1886 with plain windows, stained glass was installed in two of them in time for the AGM a month later.
In an editorial about the new building in May 1886 The Veterinary Journal reminded ‘societies and individuals that there is much yet to be done in the way of furnishing, fitting and embellishment of their building, and that now is a good opportunity for their assistance’. Perhaps this plea was aimed at the remaining plain window in the Council Chamber?
If so it seems to have worked as the following year the Norfolk and Eastern Counties, the Western Counties and the Lincolnshire Veterinary Medical Associations agreed to jointly fund the final stained glass window. They presented the design to Council on 3 April 1888. The window would show:
‘a veterinary surgeon examining a horse, which was made to appear as jaded as possible, to carry out the idea of a sick animal. After the stable-master’s explanation about the animal, the veterinary surgeon appears to be cautioning him for the future, telling him never to leave till to-morrow what might be done to-day. There was a Latin inscription under the subject to that effect. In the background a shepherd was seen driving a flock of sheep for the veterinary surgeon to examine. The subject was surrounded by an oval interlaced with the monograms of the counties by which the window was presented’.
Finally the three windows were complete and they disappear from the records until 1941 when they are mentioned in reports of the damage caused by the bombing of Red Lion Square in the final month of the Blitz. The damage was so serious that they had to be removed and replaced by plain glass.
It was not until 1953, following payment of war damage compensation, that the windows were repaired and returned to their original position. Or were they? Photographic evidence (see below) seems to show that, for some unknown reason, the two outer windows switched sides.
The three windows as they looked when first installed. The window depicting the sick horse is on the right.
Photograph of Council from 1927 again showing the window with the horse on the right
Last Council meeting in Red Lion Square September 1960 – the horse is now on the left
The 1953 Annual Report also records that the idea of adding the ‘armorial bearings of the universities having veterinary schools and of the veterinary colleges which have their own bearings’ in the windows at the opposite end of the building was being considered. It was hoped that these would be paid for by ‘the universities and colleges concerned or by the alumni thereof’.
There is no record of when this happened but the six university coats of arms must have been added before 1960, when the College moved out of Red Lion Square and put the stained glass in storage, as they are mentioned in discussions about which items from Red Lion Square could be incorporated in to the new building in Belgrave Square.
In March 1962 a representative from Goddard and Gibbs (the stained glass studio where the windows were being stored) reports that it was not practicable to include the main windows in the new building but it would be possible to ‘incorporate one panel of the Royal College coat of arms [from the middle one of the three windows] and the six existing panels of the coats of arms … in the window at the garden end of the large room on the first floor’.
This was agreed and these panels, with the addition of new stained glass representations of the coats of arms of ‘the veterinary schools under the old one portal system’ (Royal Veterinary College, Royal (Dick) Veterinary School, Glasgow Veterinary College and the Veterinary College of Ireland) plus Trinity College, Dublin and University College, Dublin were installed in the Historical Library in Belgrave Square.
The coats of arms from the universities and veterinary schools as well as the RCVS Coat of Arms from the original middle window installed in Belgrave Square
It is the stained glass from this window that can now be seen in Belgravia House – the university coats of arms in reception and the RCVS Coat of Arms in the Members’ room.
The question of what happened to the rest of the three larger windows remains a mystery. Minutes of 1962/63 record discussions of possible homes, including a new student hostel at RVC’s Hawkshead Campus. These all fell through. The final mention of them in the official records is in October 1963 when Registrar WGR Oates reports that he has written again to the associations who presented the windows to see if they have views on their future.
You can see glimpses of the windows in Red Lion Square in a film produced by Paul Greenough MRCVS in 1960 (3.07 mins and 4.42 mins)
RCVS Coat of arms – all that remains of the original three windows
In 1898 Robert Stordy, who was working for the Colonial Veterinary Service in British East Africa, embarked on a 400 mile journey from Nairobi to Kampala. This journey was the first made by the Uganda Transport which had been set up to convey the effects, equipment and rations of troops serving in Uganda.
Stordy wrote an account of this journey – ‘The Uganda transport – through the tsetse fly belt of British East Africa’ which appeared in The Veterinarian January 1899 pp 11 – 20.
Stordy’s map of the route dated 2 August 1898
The original plan had been to use both bullocks and mules but an outbreak of rinderpest meant that the first journey was entirely reliant on mules, 102 of which had landed at Kilindini Harbour Mombasa, having travelled by steam ship from Cyprus. From Kilindini the mules were taken by rail, along with carts and other equipment to the start point of the journey in Ndi, some 109 miles away.
As well as the mules the convoy consisted of 25 carts, five ponies, 4 Officers including a Medical Officer, Stordy and a number of ‘Cape boys’. They set out on 1 April and arrived on 19 April covering around 20 miles a day.
Team of the Uganda Tranport
Stordy tells of the animals they encountered including ‘his Lordship’ the man eating lion who had previously claimed seventeen victims and a rhino they mistook for an anthill! He also records their game hunting exploits – giving a detailed description of shooting his first lion (not ‘his Lordship’) on which he performs a post-mortem. The account includes this photograph, taken by Stordy, of a lion skin drying on a hut – it doesn’t say if it is the one he shot.
Skin of lion drying on a native hut
There are numerous descriptions of the scenery they passed through – ‘Reaching the River Simba … a beautiful sight met our gaze in the form of innumerable fireflies lighting up the river banks with brilliant flashes’.
Stordy records some of the veterinary work he undertook e.g. performing a post-mortem on a bullock with rinderpest at Machakos. There is also a description of the precautions taken against tsetse fly: the mules were given balls of arsenic, quinine and gentian; all the animals were regularly smeared with Jeyes fluid with the ponies having additional protection when they were ‘arrayed in their pyjamas’.
Pony in pyjamas as a protection against tsetse fly
Stordy finishes by recording that only one mule had died on the road and the others were in fair condition and that the journey was ‘full of hard work, and anxiety, yet abounding in experience not to be gained in the dear old country’.
RCVS Knowledge Library 