[19 plates illustrating Alexander Murdoch Mackay's expedition to Uganda.]
Thomas O'Neill del.t. Vincent Brooks, Day & Son, Lith. [n.d, c.1880.] 19 Lithographic plates, rare including one double-size. Largest sheet 145 x 445mm, 6 x 17½"; the rest c. 145 x 220mm, 6 x 8½". Tears and slight toning to a few plates. Illustrations to a journey of the Presbyterian missionary Alexander Murdoch Mackay (1849-90) to Zanzibar and Buganda in southern Uganda from 1876. Having heard from Henry Morton Stanley that Muteesa I, the Kabaka of Buganda was willing to receive missionaries, the Church Missionary Society sponsored the expedition. However Muteesa was playing a diplomatic game: by feigning interest and winning the support of the missionaries he managed to avoid colonisation of Uganda, getting protectorate status instead. In the preface of 'Alexander MacKay: Hero of Uganda', the Rev. T.C. Wilson wrote that two members of the expedition 'Lieutenant Smith and Mr. O'Neill had been murdered in December 1877'; whether it was Thomas O'Neill, the artist of these prints, is unclear. Not in Abbey.
[Ref: 27032] £490.00
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