The British men who explored Africa during the nineteenth
century have been well memorialized here on MIE. But not all Britain’s intrepid adventurers were
male. One of them is a heroine of mine
and is my subject today.
Mary Eliza Bakewell Gaunt was born on the 20th of
February 1861 in Chiltern, Victoria, Australia.
Her father, a county court judge, was unusual for a man of his era. He supported his daughter’s desire for an
education and travel. Ordinarily, then
and perhaps even now, fathers who had no sons would encourage such a daughter,
but if they had male heirs, they expected their girl children to be proper
ladies. Mary had brothers, but her
father favored her. She, therefore, did
not grow up to be her era’s ideal woman.
But she is my idea of exactly that.
In 1881, Mary was only the second woman ever to enroll in
the University of Melbourne. However,
after only a year there, she jettisoned academic life to pursue her ambition of
becoming a writer. She wanted to make her own money “as a means
of locomotion.” Wanderlust was the
passion of her life.
Based on her memories of her childhood in the goldfields,
she immediately started writing travel articles. Her first novel was published in 1884, the
same year in which she married a widower, Dr. Hubert Lindsay Miller, another
modern-minded man, who supported her going on with her writing and using her
maiden name—a lot to say for a Victorian gentleman. During their brief marriage she published a
book of short stories and two novels.
When Dr. Miller died in 1900, Minnie, as she was known, took
her modest widow’s pension of £ 30 per year and absconded to London in
pursuit of expanded publishing opportunities.
At first, she struggled to establish herself as a writer (has that EVER
been easy?). Then, as soon as her
stories began to sell, she took off for parts unknown: France, Italy, and most
notably as far as I am concerned, West Africa.
Her first trip there in 1908 was along the Gold Coast, now Ghana.
In 1910, her publisher commissioned another
African trip to explore the old forts along that same coast. In her words she packed “a cabin trunk of
pretty dresses, rose trimmed hats, gloves, photographic equipment.” When she landed, she set off with a retinue of
bearers. In 1911, Alone in West Africa was published in London.
If you want, you can download a free copy here:
A woman after my own heart (yours too, I think, Lisa), she next
ventured to China—Peking in 1913 and then north by mule cart to the Hunting
Palace of the Manchus at Jehol (now Chengde).
She wrote her A Woman Alone in
China while staying in a rented temple in the hills above Peking. But then she had to give up her goal of returning
to Western Europe by the old silk road.
She went back the way she came, across Siberia to Finland.
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| Chende |
Two more travel books and several novels and short stories
later, she took a sojourn in Jamaica and then she settled down and had the good
sense to do it in Bordighera on the Italian Riviera. When she was seventy-nine, World War II drove
her from her home. She escaped to
France, leaving most of her possessions behind.
Mary Gaunt died in Cannes in 1942.
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| Bordighera |
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| Bordighera, according to Monet |
Mary Gaunt was never praised as a great stylist. Her prose is clear, concise, and
energetic. Her novels are not deep
character studies, but she told her stories with verve. In other words, her books are like her: full of locomotion.
Annamaria - Monday
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Thank you for this wonderful portrait, Annamaria! Yes, definitely a woman after my own heart.
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