Old Rhodesian Days (1928)

Publisher's brown cloth hardcover with gilt titles on spine. 

140pp with fold-out map at rear. Illustrated with all plates present.

Contents clean with neat pencil inscription on the front endpaper, "Carnarvon Castle, 21/5/30". The Carnarvon Castle was an ocean liner launched in 1926 and was the first motor ship to be used on the sailings between Britain and The Cape of Good Hope. At the outbreak of the Second World War she was converted to an armed merchant cruiser at the naval base in Simonstown. On the 5th of December 1940 she had an engagement with a German cruiser in the South Atlantic sustaining 27 hits. The inscription is perhaps not of any relevance to the general contents of the book, but it is certainly of interest in terms of provenance.

From the introduction:

"In these pages I have endeavoured to recapture a little of the atmosphere which surrounded the early settlers of Rhodesia. To the present generation with their railways, their motorcars and their wireless telegraphy the more leisurely existence of the bullock-waggon days may appear dull, but it had its charm and was not without occasional excitement. It provided opportunities for the development of character - national as well as individual, and it was constantly relieved by the exhilarating sense of participation in a great adventure."

In 1976 this title was reprinted in facsimile as vol. 8 in the Rhodesiana Reprint Library Silver Series.