Existing comment:
Map of British East Africa Protectorate, 1909:
On April 21, 1909, Theodore Roosevelt took the Uganda railroad from Mombasa to Kapiti depot, near Nairobi, from which he organized six safaris. In December he traveled north to Uganda, organized two smaller safaris, and on March 1, 1910, from Gondokoro, sailed down the Nile to meet his wife, Edith, in Khartoum (Sudan). Roosevelt was awed and entranced by what he saw in Africa, and he wrote about the continent in great detail. But he had to conclude that ultimately "there are no words that can tell the hidden spirit of the wilderness, that can reveal its mystery, its melancholy, and its charm."
In 1909 Africa was more than exotic scenery. Under Western eyes, it was also the cockpit of great power politics, as Germany sought an imperial presence -- "its place in the sun" -- alongside the traditional powers of England, France, and Belgium. During World War I, Africa would become a distant, but significant. combat theory. |