Travelling overland from uk to Kenya 1920's

[carolmc]

Hi
My grandfather, followed 6 months later by grandmother plus 2 children travelled overland to Kenya sometime after 1922. Does anyone know anything about this way of emmigration, passports/documents needed etc. Gr Ada Watts discovered Gr Fred Watts 'living with another woman' and returned to the UK. Fred died there in 1960, he only returned to the UK in 1953 for s hort visit (record on ancestry).
Regards Carolmc

[Lydart]

The 'old' deep blue British passport was used from 1920, when there was a passport service started in UK.   Previous to 1920 it had been a folded one page document.

I'm a little suspicious about the 'travelling overland' .... look at a map and try and find a possible land route !    I think its more likely they may have taken a train to, for e.g. the south of Italy, and then a boat to Egypt, the same or another boat through the Suez Canal, the Red Sea, around the Somali coast and on to Mombasa.   Train from there up country to wherever they were stationed.

The Imperial Airways flying boats didnt start until around 1930 - 31. 

Do you know what your grandfather did ?  Plots of farm land were given or sold very cheaply  to ex soldiers after WW1 in the Kenya highlands .... the idea being that they would develop the colony.

Volume 2 of Elspeth Huxleys history of Kenya 'White Man's Country' has lots of info.   Out of print now but you might be able to get it through a library.

[Lydart]

I just checked the index in my copy of that book .... no mention of a Frederick Watts .... but then it is mostly about the politics of the colony; the early settlers; the building of the railway from Mombasa to Kisumu (on L. Victoria), etc. and he was probably just an ex soldier or settler answering British government requests for settlers.   

Not surprised about him living with another woman !!!!!!    Kenya in the 20's and 30's was notorious for wife swapping, etc !   They were known as 'the happy valley set' !     I met a few of them when they had grown old and grey, in the  1960's and 70's.   

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Valley_set

[GrahamSimons]

From my knowledge of Kenya, this overland story is pretty unlikely. True, Ewart Grogan had walked Cape to Cairo (worth a bit of internet searching!) but the main route was by ship. Until quite late on there were no roads, still less rail lines, that would provide an overland route.
There was one settlement trek, but from South Africa and pre-First World War, when Boers travelled to seek new land. They travelled by sea to Mombasa and then by train to Nakuru; after that they inspanned their oxen and set off to what is now Eldoret. Fantastic story, but more or less irrelevant to your question.
Once at Mombasa, the railway was the route to highland Kenya and on to Uganda. See the book The Lunatic Express for this (and for an excuse that Network Rail has yet to use: line undermined by guineafowl).
You might just find mentions in the Kenya Gazette which has been digitised by Google Books.
Passenger lists unfortunately won't help if the family travelled overland to the Mediterranean before boarding a ship.
The newspaper which most settlers used was the East African Standard. Copies are to be found in the British Library's newspaper library at Colindale, but they are not indexed so any searching would be amazingly laborious.
Might be worth trying the Kenya Society - someone might know something, but they don't maintain an archive or anything like that.

[Lydart]

(and for an excuse that Network Rail has yet to use: line undermined by guineafowl).

.... and that line was also a little hazardous for the men who constructed it; they kept being eaten by lions !!

[ShaunJ]

The route that Lydart describes (ferry to France, train to the Med, ship to Suez and through the canal) was known as the "overland "route. It was quicker than the sea route and avoided the Bay of Biscay.

[GrahamSimons]

(and for an excuse that Network Rail has yet to use: line undermined by guineafowl).

.... and that line was also a little hazardous for the men who constructed it; they kept being eaten by lions !!

Yes - see The Ghost and the Darkness film 1996, or visit the Nairobi Railway Museum where you can see the railway coach from which the lions dragged the Superintendent who was waiting to shoot them, and ate him.

[Lydart]

Yep !   Been there, seen it !     But lets not get away from the original question ..... where is Carol ?   Does she need to ask any other questions ?

[carolmc]

Hi
big thanks for all the replies. My own thoughts were they may have travelled to Gibralter or Istanbul, never thought of Italy/Egypt. Had a look at the Happy Valley Set, the 'woman' is buried at Nyeri.

My parents meet and married 1949 in Nairobi, I was born 1950, we came to the UK 1952 re Mau Mau. Dad was foundry manager at Gailey and Roberts, photo of 30/40 staff.

Fred Watts aka 'african fred' was an engineer, we don't know where he worked, he was extremely keen model steam train maker. 1944 he was on the front cover of Model Engineer, an article describes his workshop, handmade lathes and tools and there are photos of his model steam trains.
We still have a tank engine which he gave my father when we left kenya.

Very few photos exist of him and nothing is known of his life in kenya. He died 1960 in the care of the Salvation Army, a poor man.

We think that Ada and my Dad returned to uk leaving my uncle 'radio Fred' behind. Radio fred returned to uk 1937, he had worked for Cable and Wireless and was a radio ham.

Radio fred is driving the train with the children. African fred is the man kneeling in front of the train.

regards Carol in Somerset UK