David Livingstone Totally Explained

Everything about David Livingstone totally explained

David Livingstone (19 March 1813 – 4 May 1873) was a Scottish Congregationalist pioneer medical missionary with the London Missionary Society and explorer in central Africa. He was the first European to see Mosi-oa-Tunya (Victoria Falls), to which he gave the English name in honour of his monarch, Queen Victoria. He is the subject of the meeting with H. M. Stanley, which gave rise to the popular quotation, "Dr Livingstone, I presume?"
Perhaps one of the most popular national heroes of the late-nineteenth century in Victorian Britain, Livingstone's mythic status operated on a number of interconnected levels: that of Protestant missionary martyr, that of working-class "rags to riches" inspirational story, that of scientific investigator and explorer, that of imperial reformer, anti-slavery crusader and advocate of commercial empire.
His fame as an explorer helped drive forward the obsession with discovering the sources of the Nile River that formed the culmination of the classic period of European geographical discovery and colonial penetration of the African continent. At the same time his missionary travels, "disappearance" and death in Africa, and subsequent glorification as posthumous national hero in 1874 led to the founding of several major central African Christian missionary initiatives carried forward in the era of the European "Scramble for Africa."

Early life

   David Livingstone (original surname was Livingston) was born on March 19, 1813 in the mill town of Blantyre, Lanarkshire, Scotland, into a Protestant family believed to be descended from the highland Livingstones, a clan that had been previously known as the Clan MacLea. Born to Neil Livingstone (1788-1856) and his wife Agnes (1782-1865), David, along with many of the Livingstones, was employed in the cotton mill of H. Monteith - David and brother John working 12-hour days as "piecers," tying broken cotton threads on the spinning machines. David Livingstone's father Neil was very religious, a Sunday School teacher and teetotaller who handed out Christian tracts on his travels as a door to door tea salesman, and who read books on theology, travel and missionary enterprises. This rubbed off on the young David, who became an avid reader, but he also loved scouring the countryside for animal, plant and geological specimens in local limestone quarries. Neil Livingstone had a fear of science books as undermining Christianity and attempted to force him to read nothing but theology, but David's deep interest in nature and science led him to investigate the relationship between religion and science. When in 1832 he read Philosophy of a Future State by the science teacher, amateur astronomer and church minister Dr Thomas Dick, he found the rationale he needed to reconcile faith and science, and apart from the Bible this book was perhaps his greatest philosophical influence.
   Other significant influences in his early life were Thomas Burke, a Blantyre evangelist and David Hogg, his Sunday School teacher.
   Livingstone's experience from age ten to twenty-six in H. Montieth's Blantyre cotton mill, first as a piecer, later as a spinner was also important. Necessary to support his impoverished family, this work was monotonous but gave him persistence, endurance, and a natural empathy with all who labour, as expressed by lines he used to hum from the egalitarian Robbie Burns song: "When man to man, the world o'er / Shall brothers be for a' that"..

His studies

Livingstone attended Blantyre village school along with the few other mill children with the endurance to do so, but a family with a strong, ongoing commitment to study also reinforced his education. After reading Gutzlaff's appeal for medical missionaries for China in 1834, he began saving money and in 1836 entered Anderson's College in Glasgow, founded to bring science and technology to ordinary folk, and attended Greek and theology lectures at the University of Glasgow. In addition, he attended divinity lectures by Wardlaw, a leader at this time of vigorous anti-slavery campaigning in the city. Shortly after he applied to join the London Missionary Society (LMS) and was accepted subject to missionary training. He continued his medical studies in London while training there and in Essex to be a minister under the supervision of the LMS. Despite his impressive personality, he was a poor preacher and would have been rejected by the LMS hadn't the Director given him a second chance to pass the course. Setting up the new mission at Mabotswa among the Kgatla people in 1844, he was mauled by a lion which might have killed him if it hadn't been distracted by the African teacher Mebalwe, who was also badly injured. Both recovered but Livingstone's arm was partially disabled and caused him pain for the rest of his life. As Livingstone began to plan for new missionary initiatives, he recognized the difficulties presented by his growing family, and in 1849 he sent his family (now including daughter Agnes and sons Robert and Thomas) back to Kuruman as he planned further inland travels. He returned to Britain to try to garner support for his ideas, and to publish a book on his travels which brought him fame as one of the leading explorers of the age.
Believing he'd a spiritual calling for exploration rather than mission work, and encouraged by the response in Britain to his discoveries and support for future expeditions, in 1857 he resigned from the London Missionary Society.). Finding the Lualaba River, Livingstone decided it was the "real" Nile, but in fact it's the Upper Congo River.

Geographical discoveries

Although Livingstone was wrong about the Nile, he discovered for western science numerous geographical features, such Lake Ngami, Lake Malawi, and Lake Bangweulu in addition to Victoria Falls mentioned above. He filled in details of Lake Tanganyika, Lake Mweru and the course of many rivers, especially the upper Zambezi, and his observations enabled large regions to be mapped which previously had been blank. Even so, the furthest north he reached, the north end of Lake Tanganyika, was still south of the Equator and he didn't penetrate the rainforest of the River Congo any further downstream than Ntangwe near Misisi.
   Livingstone was awarded the gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society of London and was made a fellow of the society, with which he'd a strong association for the rest of his life.
   Livingstone's letters, books and journals did stir up public support for the abolition of slavery. However he became humiliatingly dependent for assistance on the very slave-traders whom he wanted to put out of business. Because he was a poor leader of his peers, he ended up on his last expedition as an individualist explorer with servants and porters but no expert support around him. At the same time he didn't use the brutal methods of maverick explorers such as Stanley to keep his retinue of porters in line and his supplies secure. For these reasons from 1867 onwards he accepted help and hospitality from Mohamad Bogharib and Mohamad bin Saleh (also known as Mpamari), traders who kept and traded in slaves, as he recounts in his journals. They in turn benefited from Livingstone's influence with local people, which facilitated Mpamari's release from bondage to Mwata Kazembe. greeting him with the now famous words "Dr Livingstone, I presume?" These famous words may be a fabrication, as Stanley has torn out the pages of this encounter in his diary. Even Livingstone's account of this encounter doesn't mention these words. However, the phrase appears in a New York Herald editorial dated 10 August, 1872 and the Encyclopaedia Britannica and the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography both quote it without questioning its validity.
   A possibly apocryphal story is included in Presidential Elections by Paul F. Boller, Jr. (1985). The story goes that Stanley told Livingstone what had occurred in Europe and America during his expedition; among other things he said that the 1872 U. S. presidential election campaign had begun and the Democratic Party had nominated Horace Greeley. Livingstone stopped Stanley there; he said, "You have told me curious things and wonderful, but there's a limit--when you tell me the Democrats have nominated Greeley for President I'm hanged if I'll believe it."
   Some in Burundi claim the famous meeting took place 12 km south of Bujumbura at the spot marked by the Livingstone-Stanley Monument, Mugere, but that marks a visit they made 15 days after their first meeting - see linked article for references - on their joint exploration of the north end of Lake Tanganyika, which ended when Stanley left in March the next year.
   Despite Stanley's urgings, Livingstone was determined not to leave Africa until his mission was complete. His illness made him confused and he'd judgment difficulties at the end of his life. He explored the Lualaba and failing to find connections to the Nile, returned to Lake Bangweulu and its swamps to explore possible rivers flowing out northwards. Secondly, Africans educated in mission schools founded by people inspired by Livingstone were at the forefront of national independence movements in central, eastern and southern Africa.

Family Life

While Livingstone had a great impact on British Imperialism, he did so at a tremendous cost to his family. In his absences, his children grew up fatherless, and his wife Mary (daughter of Mary and Robert Moffat) eventually died of malaria trying to follow him in Africa. He had six children: Robert-reportably died in US Civil War. See ; Agnes, Thomas, Elizabeth (who died two months after her birth), William (nicknamed Zouga for the river along which he was born) and Anna Mary. His one regret in later life was that he didn't spend enough time with his children.

Places named in his honor and other memorials

In Africa

The Livingstone Memorial in Ilala, Zambia marks where he died.
The city of Livingstone, Zambia which includes a memorial in front of the Livingstone Museum and a new statue erected in 2005.
The Rhodes-Livingstone Institute in Livingstone and Lusaka, Zambia, 1940s to 1970s, was a pioneering research institution in urban anthropology.
David Livingstone Teachers Training College, Livingstone, Zambia
The David Livingstone Memorial statue at Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, erected in 1954 on the western bank of the falls.
A new statue of David Livingstone was erected in November 2005 on the Zambian side of Victoria Falls.
A plaque was unveiled in November 2005 at Livingstone Island on the lip of Victoria Falls marking where Livingstone stood to get his first view of the falls.
The town of Livingstonia, Malawi.
The city of Blantyre, Malawi is named for his birthplace in Lanarkshire, Scotland, and includes a memorial.
The David Livingstone Scholarships for students at the University of Malawi, funded through Strathclyde University, Scotland.
The Kipengere Range in south-west Tanzania at the north-eastern end of Lake Malawi is also called the Livingstone Mountains
Livingstone Falls on the River Congo, named by Stanley.
The Livingstone Inland Mission, a Baptist mission to the Congo Free State 1877-1884, located in what is now Kinshasa.
A memorial in Ujiji commemorates his meeting with Stanley.
The Livingstone-Stanley Monument, Mugere, Burundi marks a spot that Livingstone and Stanley visited on their exploration of Lake Tanganyika, mistaken by some as the first meeting place of the two explorers.
There is a memorial to Livingstone at the ruins of the Kolobeng Mission, 40 km west of Gaborone, Botswana.
The church tower of the Catholic Holy Ghost Mission in Bagamoyo, Tanzania is called Livingstone Tower because his body was laid down there for one night before it was shipped to London.
Livingstone House in Stone Town, Zanzibar, provided by the Sultan for Livingstone's use, January to March 1866, to prepare his last expedition; the house was purchased by the Zanzibar government in 1947.
Plaque commemorating his departure from Mikindani on his final expedition on the wall of the house that has been built over the house he reputedly stayed in.

In Scotland

A statue stands near the base of the Scott Monument in the Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh, Scotland.

The David Livingstone Centre in Blantyre, Scotland is a museum in his honour.

David Livingstone Memorial Primary School

in his birthplace, Blantyre, Lanarkshire, Scotland.

David Livingstone Memorial Church of the Church of Scotland, in Blantyre, Lanarkshire, Scotland.

A bust of David Livingstone is among those of famous Scotsmen in the William Wallace Memorial near Stirling, Scotland.

Strathclyde University, Glasgow (successor to Anderson's University), commemorates him in the David Livingstone Institute for International Development Studies, the David Livingstone Centre for Sustainability, and Livingstone Tower.

The David Livingstone (Anderson College) Memorial Prize in Physiology commemorates him at the University of Glasgow.

In England

His grave is marked in Westminster Abbey, London.

The Royal Geographic Society has a statue of Livingstone in the hall of their London headquarters.

The London Missionary Society named their headquarters Livingstone House, in Carteret St, London SW1.

David Livingstone Primary School, Thornton Heath, London

Livingstone Primary School, New Barnet, London

Livingstone Primary School, Mossley, Tameside

In Canada

The Livingstone Range of mountains in southern Alberta

David Livingstone Elementary School, Vancouver

David Livingstone Community School, Winnipeg

Bronze bust in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

In USA

Livingstone College, Salisbury, North Carolina

Livingstone Adventist Academy, Salem, Oregon

In popular culture

In the film The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Arthur Dent dresses up as Dr Livingstone at a fancy dress party.

In 1939, a popular film called Stanley and Livingstone was released, with Cedric Hardwicke as Livingstone and Spencer Tracy as Stanley, portraying the works Livingstone did in Africa.

"Dr Livingstone, I Presume" is a song on the 1968 Moody Blues album, In Search of the Lost Chord.

Mountains of the Moon is a 1990 film in which Livingstone is portrayed by Bernard Hill.

"What about Livingstone" is a song by Swedish pop group ABBA on the album "Waterloo".

Livingstone appears on the album cover for The Beatles' Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. The cover was a collage made by artist Peter Blake. Livingstone appears in the third row.

"Doctor Livingstone" is a song by Crowded House which is on their Afterglow album (1999).

The fish seen in the background of Captain Picard's ready room in the popular television series "Star Trek The Next Generation" is named Livingston after the famous explorer.

In the Get Smart reunion movie, "Get Smart Again", Max says "Dr. Hottentot I Presume".Further Information

Get more info on 'David Livingstone'.

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