Western Visitors to Petra in 1847. The Ewart Group (and Harriet Martineau)

Travel to Petra

Although western visitors to Petra were slow to follow Burckhardt’s ‘discovery’ of the ancient city in 1812, by the 1840s there was a regular parade almost every year. By then it was rare to approach Petra from the north, via Hebron. Would-be visitors commonly began in Egypt after making a winter voyage up the Nile to the First or Second Cataracts in – broadly, November/ December to February/ March. They then arranged to travel from Cairo via Suez, across Sinai to St Catherine’s Monastery and on to Aqaba at the head of one arm of the Red Sea. From there they visited Petra then continued north to Hebron and – usually, Jerusalem before touring Palestine and perhaps Syria and Lebanon.

Parties of western visitors usually ranged in size from one or two people to several. Overwhelmingly they were men. For the first half of the c. 35-40 day journey by camel, individual parties would each have its own dragoman who would negotiate for them with the beduin tribe that dominated the Sinai part of the route – the Towareh. The latter undertook by written contract to provide guide(s) and escort, logistical support including camels and camp furniture and all foodstuffs. As far as Aqaba, individual parties might travel quite independently of one another, sometimes days apart.

At Aqaba the Towareh handed their parties to the beduin of that region – the Alawin. The latter were much more difficult to deal with, and they generally insisted that parties should wait at Aqaba – for days if necessary, until all those known to be en route across Sinai had arrived. Then they would proceed as a single Group to Petra then on to Hebron. In negotiating with the Alawin the various parties commonly delegated one of their number to work with their dragoman.

Travellers of 1847

On 23 February 1847 a number of western parties set out from Cairo. Several individuals are known to have kept journals but only one subsequently published a book which included this trip and based on and sometimes quoting from the journal. The writer was the renowned author, traveller and social reformer, Harriet Martineau (1802- 1876) (henceforth, HM). Her book is both invaluable and exasperating. She begins by explaining the circumstances of her trip – beginning sailing on the Nile and concluding with travels in Palestine and Syria (Martineau 1848: iii):

In the autumn of 1846, I left home for, as I supposed, a few weeks, to visit some of my family and friends. At Liverpool, I was invited by my friends, Mr. and Mrs. Richard V. Yates, to accompany them in their proposed travels in the East. By the zeal and kindness of those who saw what a privilege this journey would be, all obstacles in the shape of business and engagements were cleared away; and in a month, I was ready to set out with my kind friends. – At Malta, we fell in with Mr. Joseph C. Ewart, who presently joined our party, and remained with us till we reached Malta on our return.

In short, HM joined a party organized by old friends – Mr and Mrs Yates, which was then joined by a fourth member – Mr Ewart. Enough information is provided to identify all of the party and – as we shall see, Ewart seems soon to have emerged as the leading member of this Yates Party and later of the entire group – what I will call the Ewart Group of parties. We can begin with HM’s party, including their ages at the time of their visit to Petra:

Yates Party (4):

Richard Vaughan Yates (4 July 1785-1856) – aged 61

Mrs Anne Yates (2 August 1811-1891) – aged 35

Harriet Martineau (12 June 1802-1876) – aged 44

Joseph Christopher Ewart, M. P. (1 October 1799 – 1868) – aged 47

Unfortunately, HM declined to name members of the other parties in the group (1848: iii-iv):

It is by permission of my companions [i.e. the Yateses and Ewart] that I have thus named them here, and spoken of them in my book as occasion required. I am truly obliged to them for granting me this freedom, by which I am spared much trouble of concealment and circumlocution which, in their opinion and mine, the personal affairs of travel are not important enough to require and justify. Not having asked a similar permission from our comrades in our Arabian journey, I have said as little as possible about them, and suppressed their names. I shall be glad if they find anything in my narrative to remind them pleasantly of that remarkable season of our lives, — our five weeks abode in the Desert. 

HM does indeed, then have to resort to “concealment and circumlocution” as far as all the other parties are concerned. She is nevertheless helpful, providing information on the total number of parties and overall number of people in the group. From time to time, alongside references to her own immediate companions – whom she refers to as Mr Y, Mrs Y and Mr E, she alludes to others in the same fashion (but without us having been given their full names) or even more opaquely.

Fortunately, recent work on the journal and other papers of the leading member of another party in this Ewart group, has permitted the full identification of several more people (Jackson 2013; cf. Joyce 2011. See also McCormick 1960: Ch. V and Warriner 2022: 248-9). This is the party of the “Lady –” to whom HM refers (1848: 369).

Kavanagh Party (5):

Lady Harriet Kavanagh (1799-1885) – aged 47

Thomas Kavanagh (10 August 1827-1852) – aged 19

Harriet (‘Hoddy’) Margaret Kavanagh (early 1830 – 1876) – aged 16/17[1]

Arthur Macmurrough Kavanagh (25 March 1831-1889) – aged 16 (a few days after Petra)

Rev. David Wood (18 August 1815-1852) – aged 31

Lady Harriet Kavanagh was a redoubtable character. Widowed early in her marriage she nevertheless travelled extensively with her children. The youngest child – Arthur, was born without limbs but was still included in her challenging expeditions. Indeed, Arthur undertook serious expeditions himself in later years, to the Balkans, Russia, Persia and India (Kavanagh 1865) and served as a Member of Parliament for several years (1866-1880) (McCormick 1960). He married and had seven children. In her other papers, HM expressed extremely negative views of Arthur Kavanagh in a letter to Fanny Wedgewood almost twenty years later (Arbuckle n.d. Ch. 51, p. 9):

… inconceivably disgusting, – parading his monstrosity every where, – overbearing everybody … a gross and low gossip.

But she conceded he was popular with their Arab escorts and adored by the peasants on his Irish estate which he seems to have improved considerably.

Lady Harriet had another son but he did not accompany them on this expedition, perhaps because of weak health – he died of consumption in 1853, aged 24: Charles Kavanagh (28 January 1829-1853).

We may here note that HM observed of the various parties her Yates Party was about to join that (1848: 282):

… it appeared that a large party of travelers, including English, Scotch and Irish, were in hope, – a doubtful and vague hope, but still a hope, – of penetrating to Petra, on their way from Sinai to Jerusalem.

The Yates Party were English and the Kavanagh Party were the Irish.

So far, we have two parties and nine identifiable travellers. HM gives a further clue in the context of describing the various parties getting underway each day (1848: 296):

While we were at our meal, we saw one after another of the other four parties come forth from their tents, and sit down to table; – the two bachelor companions being always the last. They were generally sitting down just when I was walking off in advance

Thus, we have a total of five parties including the Yates and Kavanagh Parties[2] and we can now identify another parry which we may call the Two Bachelors Party. 

A few weeks later, when they were all at Aqaba and negotiating with Sheikh Hussein of the Alawin, she reveals the overall number when she records the sheikh (1848: 352-3):

… now went the round to declare that he had forgotten to say that he must have a robe (no trifle!) from each tent, and a sheep from each individual of the company:- ten robes, and fifteen sheep.  

In short: the five parties totalled 15 people who between them were housed in ten tents. The Yates and Kavanagh Parties already account for nine people and now we may add the Two Bachelors. HM reports the Yates Party had two tents; she has no explicit evidence for the tents of the Kavanagh Party, but Lady Harriet has hired two dahabiyehs for her family on the Nile and in Steele’s biography of Arthur Kavanagh (1891: 23-4), she includes a letter he wrote from Beirut in which he says they had three tents; presumably the Two Bachelors had a shared tent.

Who were the remaining four travellers? HM provides a reference while at Hebron to a party not till then identified and that they had two tents (1848: 381):

… an urgent message came from two of the clergymen, begging Mr. E(wart). to come and help them to get rid of the Sheikh. … A second message came, however, so urgent as to summon him [= Ewart]; and there he found the Sheikh pulling down the tent from over the heads of these gentlemen and the sister of one of them. He was going to seize both their tents, …

Thus, a fourth party: Two Clergymen and the Sister of One, and travelling with two tents. The fifth party consisted of just a single individual and a single tent. He may be the “the clergyman who had made a great point of being at Jerusalem for Palm Sunday” (1848: 355).

Two further pieces of evidence in HM: she refers early on to the parties setting out each day (1848: 297):

One by one, the company would mount and follow, or Mr. W[ood] with his book, and Mr. E[wart] with his chibouque, would set forth on foot. In a line, or in pairs or groups, the camels, with their riders, would step out slowly; and then the two lively young ladies, Miss K. and Miss C., would rouse theirs to a fast trot, and pass us all by.

‘Miss K’ is presumably Miss Harriet Kavanagh; ‘Miss C’ can only be the sister of one of the two clergymen, implying her – and his, surname begins with C. I.e. Rev. C– and Miss C–.

Which of the three smaller parties was the ‘Scotch’ one is unknown.

Finally, HM twice refers to a ‘Mr F’ (1848: 370), who seems to ride alone or in company with a ‘youth’. Is this the single traveller noted above and here riding with 19-year-old Thomas Kavanagh?

Missing in all this are the servants. Lady Kavanagh seems to have had one or more servants when she set out – one of whom died (Jackson 2013: 57). While crossing the desert, did none of the men have a male servant; did none of the five women have a maid? It seems not. When Arthur Kavanagh describes the establishment of their camps his account of their support staff is entirely local natives (Steele 1891: 24). Indeed, in an Appendix devoted to advice for the traveller, HM explicitly says one should not take a maid (1848: 521-2):

No lady who values her peace on the journey, or desires any freedom of mind or movement, will take a maid. What can a poor English girl do who must dispense with home-comforts, and endure hardships that she never dreamed of, without the intellectual enjoyments which to her mistress compensate (if they do compensate) for the inconveniences of Eastern travel? If her mistress has any foresight, or any compassion, she will leave her at home. If not, she must make up her mind to ill-humour or tears, to the spectacle of wrath or despondency, all the way. If she will have her maid, let her, at all events, have the girl taught to ride – and to ride well; or she may have much to answer for. To begin to ride at her years is bad enough, even at home, where there may be a choice of horses, and the rides are only moderate in length. What is a poor creature to do who is put upon a chance horse, ass, or camel, day by day, for rides of eight hours’ long, for weeks together? The fatigue and distress so caused are terrible to witness, as I can testify; though we were happily warned in time, and went unincumbered by English servants altogether. Of course, the lady herself is sure of her ability to ride to this extent; or she will put herself into training before she leaves home. 

She offers no parallel advice about valets/ menservants. Presumably if women can manage without a maid, men can manage without a servant.

There seems not to be any scope for western servant or maid in HM’s numbers. Perhaps any they had on the Nile were sent home before the desert journey. Certainly Mr Ewart had brought his dog, Pierre, with him to Egypt but then decided to send him home from Alexandria (1848: 24)!

The answer to the many questions above surely lies in the journal of Lady Harriet and indeed the other papers in the Kavanagh Papers in Dublin (Steele 1891: 18):

A detailed record of this journey has been preserved in a series of letters, chiefly from Lady Harriet, and, in much fewer number, from others of the party, which included his [= Arthur’s] eldest brother Tom, his sister Harriet, and their tutor, the Rev. David Wood. 

These seem only to be available for consultation in person and on microfilm. The journal in particular is evidently very hard to decipher.

Two striking features of this group: First, no less than a third (5) are female; and second, three – perhaps four, were clergymen.

Provisionally therefore, we may set out the Ewart Group at Petra as:

Party	Number	Gender	Tents
Yates	4	MMFF	2
Kavanagh	5	FFMMM	3
Two Bachelors	2	MM	2?
Two Clergymen and the Sister of One	3	MMF	2
Single Clergyman?	1	M	1
	15	10M + 5F	10

Arbuckle, E. S. (n.d.) A Nineteenth-Century Woman’s Engaging with her Times: Harriet Martineau (1802-1876), pdf (Martineau Society). https://martineausociety.co.uk/publications/harriet-martineau-a-new-biography/

Bunbury, T. (2022) “The Incredible Arthur Kavanagh (1831-1889)”, The Turtle Bunbury Podcast, 3 April 2022 (https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-incredible-arthur-kavanagh-1831-1889/id1613068992?i=1000556082169)

Jackson, E. (2013) “An Irish Woman in Egypt: the Travels of Lady Harriet Kavanagh”, in D. Fortenbury (ed.), Travellers and Collectors, Oxford (Association for the Study of Egypt and the Near East/ Oxbow Publications).

Jackson, E. (2014) “Lady Harriet Kavanagh”, Irish Egyptology

Joyce, T. (2011) “Lady Harriet: journeys through Europe and the Middle East 1835-1850”, Carloviana. Carlow Historical and Archaeological Society 60 (December): 72-78+

Kavanagh, H. (1848) Letters by Lady Harriet Kavanagh and her family during their tour of the Middle East, including Palestine, 12 oct. 1846–29 Apr. 1848. Borris House, County Carlow. (National Library of Ireland)

Kavanagh, H. (1848) Journal of a Tour in the Middle East, including Palestine, by Lady Harriet Kavanagh of Borris, Co. Carlow. 1 Oct. 1846–5 May 1848. 2 vols. Borris House, County Carlow. (National Library of Ireland)

Martineau, H. (1848) Eastern Life, Present and Past, 3 vols, London (Moxon)

Martineau, H. (1848) Eastern Life, Present and Past, Philadelphia (Lea and Blanchard)

Martineau, H. (1876) Eastern Life, Present and Past, New edition, Boston (Roberts Brothers)

McCormick, D. (1960) The Incredible Mr Kavanagh, London (Putnam)

Murphy, D. (2012) “Kavanagh, Lady Harriet Margaret Le Poer Trench”, Dictionary of Irish Biography, in J. McGuire and J. Quinn (eds), Cambridge (CUP)

Steele, S. L. (1891) The Right Honourable Arthur MacMurrough Kavanagh: A Biography, London (MacMillan)

Warriner, H. (2022) Francis Gerald Vessey’s Journal. Rome, Egypt, Sinai and Palestine. (Published Privately).

David Kennedy

Perth, Western Australia

11 September 2026; revised 12 September 2026.

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[1] Harriet’s year of birth is often given as 1833, making her the youngest child. However, the census of 1871 gives her age as 41, and the burial record of 1876 gives her age as 46, both numbers implying birth in 1830.  

[2] In a letter from Beirut in May 1847, Arthur Kavanagh says there were three other parties but that may have been before the Yates Party joined the group (Steele 1891: 20).

Henry Selby Rickards – Abdallah Pasha, el-Ingilizi: An Englishman in the Service of the Viceroy of Egypt

When Louisa Allan sailed down the Mahmoudiyeh Canal from Alexandria to Atfeh on 22 November 1851, she noted some fellow-passengers:

Fig. 1: p. 45 of Louisa Allan’s Journal

Louisa’s handwriting is often – as here, difficult to read. In this case most can be read finally with confidence except for one word (Allan MS p. 45):

There were several Turkish Officers on board who had been educated in England and were very agreeable, a renegade Englishman, high in the Pasha’s service who turned out to be one of the Selby family, a nephew of Mrs de Heugy’s?? – Rickards was his name, …

Although I have been unable to decipher the name of his aunt, Rickards himself can be easily identified though otherwise not well-documented.

Henry Selby Rickards (Colchester, Essex, 29 December 1814 – Beirut, 14 Jan. 1886) was the son of a draper is Essex. Aged 18 in 1832, he joined the Portuguese Legion commanded by the British officer, Colonel George Lloyd Hodges. Hodges’ expedition to Oporto was a brief episode and Rickard is not named in the colonel’s subsequent two volume account of it (Hodges 1833). As noted below, Rickard is said to have subsequently joined the British Auxiliary Legion, commanded by General de Lacy Evans in the First Carlist War 1835–1838.

In October 1839 Hodges was appointed ‘Agent and Consul-General in Egypt’ and it is probably no coincidence that Rickards also moved there in 1840, aged 26. Hodges moved on the next year, but Rickards evidently remained.

As Louisa Allan notes, he was a ‘renegade’ – in fact he swiftly converted to Islam and undertook the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, adopting the name Abdallah, and known as ‘el-Ingilizi’ – the Englishman. His marriage the following year to a Muslim Egyptian wife may explain the early conversion. In 1849 he took service amongst those westerners employed by the Viceroy, Mohammed Ali Pasha, to modernise his government and military, in which post he rose to the rank of Pasha – General, which is how he appears in uniform in a portrait. He retired in 1870 after 21 years.

Rickards married twice, the first by his Egyptian wife with whom he had ten children. After her death in 1869, he “went through the form of marriage with Catherine Rickards, the daughter of a brother. The form of marriage was celebrated according to Mohammedan rites …”, that same year, by whom he had four further children. After retirement and the second marriage, they lived for five years in England then in 1875 bought property and a house at Beirut where he died and was buried in 1886.

A colourful life became more widely known after his death as he left his quite substantial property – at least £20,000 (house, land, shares and jewellery), to his British children. An attempt was made by his second wife and young children to compromise with a challenge from the older half-Egyptian children. Evidence was brought by both parties to the effect that Rickards was certainly a practising Muslim till 1870 but then recovered his name, practised as a Christian and brought his newer children up as such as well.

The case was reported extensively in British newspapers with the final judgement providing a little money to the older children plus their late mother’s jewellery.

Catherine Rickards, despite apparently maintaining a home in central London, evidently remained in Beirut after her husband’s death. She died there in 1889 and is buried beside him in the French-German Protestant Cemetery.

The family continued their association with Egypt and the Levant and one (British) descendant – Patrick Grigsby, was preparing a book about his ancestor at the time of his own death, apparently on the basis of family documents. An Egyptian descendant is an authority on Yemen.

Although Rickards gained widespread report because of the tangled case over his inheritance in 1888, only one source I have found, provides an obituary and details of his career not found elsewhere and worth reproducing despite obvious errors – Rickards did not bear the name ‘Collingwood’ and de Lacy Evans was ‘George’ not ‘H.’ (The Naval and Military Gazette, 10 February 1886, p. 42). More seriously, the obit claims Rickards “served as a captain in the Bengal Lancers and came to Egypt in the latter part of Mohamed Ali’s reign’. Muhammad Ali died in Egypt in August 1849. This conflicts with Rickard’s marriage in Egypt in 1841. It seems likely that the writer is here confusing Henry Selby Rickards with Captain – and ultimately, Major-General, E. W. Rickards who served in India from at least 1841 till 1871, during which in 1841 he was an ensign with the 6^th Bengal Native Infantry. This man’s papers are held in an archive in Cambridge.

How much more in the obit has to be treated with caution is uncertain.

Anon. (1888) Essex Standard (9 June) 1888 “Singular career of a native of Colchester. He turns Mohamedan. Dispute as to his property”.

Grigsby, P. (2015) A Life Apart. The Fate of an Outsider, Falmer (Pen Press)+

Grigsby, P. (n.d.) “Levantine Heritage. The story of a community”,

https://www.levantineheritage.com/testi78.htm

Hodges, G. L. (1833) Narrative of the Expedition to Portugal in 1832, under the orders of His Imperial Majesty Dom Pedro, Duke of Braganza (London, 1833).

David Kennedy

Perth, Western Australia

18 August 2026

Revised 19 August 2026

‘Mr Purser, the Artist’ – Vital Dates

Despite his considerable output, the vital dates of the life of William Purser are uncertain. In fact it is possible to achieve greater precision about both birth and death and the artist’s family.

Fig. 1: Dates for the birth and death dates of William Purser provided by a sample thrown up by Google Search

An expected item linked to on the Ancestry.com web site is for the Anglo-American lawyer and politician, George Henry Purser. A lengthy obituary published in the Boston Globe for 24 June 1889 (page 8), reads:

George H. Purser … Ho leaves a widow, six daughters and one son. …He was born in London. Eng., in 1810. and was in his eightieth year at the time of his death. He was a brother of Purser, the celebrated English water-color painter, who made his fame by painting oriental scenery and who spent most of his life and died at Constantinople. Many of the most famous paintings of Mr. Purser can be found in Bartlett’s collection of oriental paintings. 

The same site reveals his tombstone with date of birth as 8 June 1810, and family history sites record a facsimile of his baptism on 23 December 1810:

“Posthumous son of William Purser Surveyor and Dorothy.”

Fig. 2: Facsimile of baptismal record of George Henry Purser

A William Purser married Dorothy Reynolds in St Margaret’s Church, Westminster, London on 7 February 1789. The baptisms and birth dates of a succession of children of ‘William Purser, Surveyor and Dorothy’ have survived (in a badly fire-damaged register). At least six children can be identified, the last of whom was George Henry who went to the Americas when he was 18. The first was William, the future artist:

William, Son of William Purser, Surveyor, & Dorothy his Wife.

Despite fire damage, reference to other entries on this and adjacent pages allow the baptism date in the left column and born date in the right to be reconstructed:

Baptised [179]0 5 [Febr]uary

Bo[rn] 178[9] Dec^r [**]

In the ‘Born’ column, the day of birth follows the month so we cannot be more precise than that William Purser was born in December 1789.

Fig. 3: Facsimile of baptismal record of William Purser

The date of death is still unrecovered but now the obituary for his brother reveals the place of death (and burial?) as Constantinople.

David Kennedy

UWA, Perth, Western Australia

17 August 2026

‘Mr Purser, the Artist’ in Syria, Asia Minor and Greece in the summer of 1836

In 1836 the wealthy aristocrat, politician and army officer, Richard William Howard Howard-Vyse (sic) (1784-1853) (henceforth, ‘HV’), travelled widely in Palestine and Syria. He kept a field journal which survives but is in barely legible and minute handwriting. Fortunately, he produced the first draft of an edited version, most of which also survives and is a little easier to read. In the surviving part, he records that at the end of extensive travelling in Syria he arrived (back) at Beirut on 29 May 1836. The following day he arranged to hire a small boat and crew to take him onwards along the coast of Asia Minor and recorded:

I gave a passage to Smyrna to Mr Purser, the Artist. I embarked at 8 & sailed about 3 on the following morning (1 June) …..

In the pages that followed, HV mentions the man he invariable calls ‘Mr Purser’ a further 26 times.

Purser is well-known as an artist whose paintings still change hands for several thousand pounds/ dollars/ euros at art sales and are found in major collections including the British Museum and Victoria and Albert Museum. He seems to have spent much of his life travelling and sketching; he was prolific, with work extending geographically from Britain through Italy, the Levant to India, and, unexpectedly, Tasmania. His sketches and watercolours were marketed and he was explicitly listed on the first two volumes of the trilogy by the publisher Fisher, Syria, the Holy Land, Asia Minor, &c (1836-38). However, his role in this book is problematic. The sub-title states: illustrated (in a series of views drawn from nature, by W. H. Bartlett, William Purser, &c.; with description of the plates by John Carne. In fact, not one of the dozens of illustrations bear Purser’s name and he is never mentioned beyond the title page. In the third volume, his name is replaced by that of another artist, Thomas Allom.

HV’s journal shows Purser joining him at Beirut, proceeding via Cyprus along the south coast of Asia Minor to Rhodes and on to Greece; then back east across the Aegean to Smyrna and finally onwards to Constantinople. They presumably parted company at that point – certainly HV never mentions Purser again and they would have moved in different social circles once more.

Purser in Howard VyseDownload

Fig. 1: Table of the occasions and circumstances in which HV mentions Purser.

The two men were together for three and half months. On occasions they were apart when they explored differently or – as in Athens and when HV encountered parts of a large British fleet, their social standing left them moving in different circles, and later at Smyrna. Nevertheless, they must have learned a great deal about one another so it is disappointing that HV is almost totally silent about Purser’s travels before they met or about the man himself. As the basics of Purser’s biography are obscure, we cannot be sure even of his age in mid-1836. He may have been 51 or a few years younger; HV was 52. He had already travelled extensively, especially in Greece and this may not have been his first visit to Constantinople either. It would be interesting to know where he had been in the Near East before he met HV at Beirut.

Purser often signed ‘W. Purser’ on his sketches and paintings but seldom dated them; including all of the many arising from his time(s) at Constantinople.

How long HV remained in Constantinople is unknown. He evidently mixed in higher levels of society there and when he left, he was able to use his social contacts to be transported by Royal Navy warship to Malta from which – after quarantine, he then sailed to Egypt to begin his controversial excavations (e.g. Creighton 2014; 2016) that led to his major publications (Howard-Vyse 1840a, 1840b, 1842. Howard-Vyse 1840 is a reminded that he was a serving soldier who subsequently reached the rank of Major-General).

How long Purser remined in Constantinople is unknown. In autumn 1840, in a letter to William Collins dated ‘Pera, Constantinople, 15^th Oct. 1840’, the artist Sir David Wilkie wrote (Cunningham 1843: 326):

After we reached this, we were surprised by the arrival of John Lewis, from Italy, Corfu, Athens, and Symrna (sic). He has been making most clever drawings, as usual. There are some artists settled here; one Purser, a landscape draughtsman, and one Worthington, aged, an engraver. 

Note: Most biographical information on Purser consists of brief outlines on web sites for institutions and art sites. They are inconsistent in recording his dates of birth and death. A record for him on Ancestry.com gives his death precisely as 1856 and at Constantinople. This is apparently based on information from an obituary for his half-brother, George Henry Purser (1810-1889) who emigrated to the United States

Creighton, S. (2014) “Crime in the Great Pyramid”, Atlantis Rising 106 (July/ August): 42-43; 68-70

Creighton, S. (2016) The Great Pyramid Hoax, Rochester, Vermont (Bear and Co).

Cunningham, A. (1843) The Life of Sir David Wilkie: With His Journals, Tours, and Critical Remarks on Works of Art; and a Selection from His Correspondence, 3 vols., London: John Murray.

Howard-Vyse Papers: Deeds and Family Papers of the Howard-Vyse Family of Stoke Place, Stoke Poges. Buckinghamshire Council.

Howard Vyse, R. W. H. (1840) “Some account of the composition and force of the Egyptian army”, The United Service Journal (November): 305-314

Howard Vyse, R. W. H. (1840a) Operations Carried on at the Pyramids of Gizeh in 1837. With an Account of a Voyage into Upper Egypt and an Appendix, Vol. 1, London (James Fraser)

Howard Vyse, R. W. H. (1840b) Operations Carried on at the Pyramids of Gizeh in 1837. With an Account of a Voyage into Upper Egypt and an Appendix, Vol. 2, London (James Fraser)

Howard Vyse, R. W. H. (1842) Appendix to Operations Carried on at the Pyramids of Gizeh in 1837. Containing a Survey by J. S. Perring., Vol. 3, London (John Weale and G. W. Nickisson)

David Kennedy

UWA, Perth, Western Australia

12 August 2026

Captain Augustus Henry Frazer at Petra and in Syria in 1848

Although a great many more names have been added since then, the appendix titled “Verzeichnis der Besucher von Petra” in Brünnow and von Domaszewski (1904-09) (= B&D) remains the only extensive survey of all the then-known western travellers to Petra in the 19^th century. It includes (B&D 1904: I, 193):

1855. Augustus Henry Frazer: war in Petra vor 1856. Siehe John Hogg, Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature, Second Series, vol. V, 1856, p. 57. Kopierte die Inschrift von No. 633.

The reference is in Hogg’s ‘Addendum’ to his article on ‘Sinaic inscriptions’ in which he published “a copy of the [two] inscriptions which the late Captain Augustus Henry Frazer, R. A., made amongst the ruins of Petra, and also of one from Mount Serbal.”

Hogg does not include the dates on which Frazer logged the inscriptions in his journal and B&D can only note it was ‘vor 1856’ (the date of Hogg’s article), and then located it under 1855. Unknown to B&D, the correct date was already reported in a prominent publication (Barker 1876: II, 276-7) (and in a second which had been printed for private circulation but would not then have been available to them (Lefroy 1895: 115)). They would certainly have been unaware of the plaque which by then had been set up in the Frazer family church at Charlton near Woolwich (Fig. 1).

Augustus Henry Frazer

Augustus Henry Frazer (15 August 1810 – 11 June 1848), was the son of Sir Augustus Simon Frazer, a notable senior officer of the Napoleonic Wars, and his wife, Lady Emma Frazer (née Lynn). Frazer was commissioned into the Royal Artillery, and it was while stationed at the RA HQ at Woolwich (near his parents) in the mid-1830s that he became close friends with John Henry Lefroy (later Sir John) in whose posthumously (and privately printed) autobiography he receives several mentions. These two men were part of an informal Methodist study group at Woolwich Barracks (Lefroy 1895: 17-18). In mid-1837 the Frazer and Lefroy and – for a time, a third friend, toured together on the Continent for three months (Lefroy 1895: 21-5).

Despite separation during military service, the close friendship endured until Frazer’s death: Lefroy explicitly records (cf. above) (115):

My dear friend Augustus Frazer died in 1848 (July 11th) at Suedia, in Syria (1), of cholera. He left me his residuary legatee, and I ultimately received between £3,000 and £4,000.

And (22) that:

… Mr. William Page Wood, afterwards Lord Hatherley, and I were, later on, joint trustees under the will of Augustus Frazer, whose residuary legatee I was, …

The reference to the other trustee is significant. William Page Wood, 1^st Baron Hatherly, at one time Lord High Chancellor, is the man referred to by Hogg as the source of the inscriptions recorded by Frazer in his journal (1856: 57):

We are greatly indebted to Mr. [John Godfrey] Teed, Q.C., for procuring from Sir W. P. Wood a copy of the inscriptions which the late Captain Augustus Henry Frazer, R. A., made amongst the ruins of Petra, and also of one from Mount Serbal. These have been carefully lithographed and are here given. (Vide Plate.) The accounts relating to them, as extracted from the MS. Journal of that lamented officer, are as follow …

Willian Page Wood was the husband of Charlotte Moore – the ‘Charlotte, niece of Lady Frazer’, referred to by Lefroy (1895: 21). Charlotte’s mother was Elizabeth Moore, née Lynn, Lady Frazer’s sister, and she was Frazer’s cousin. I.e. The joint trustees under Frazer’s will were John Henry Lefroy his old friend and fellow soldier and Willian Page Wood his cousin’s husband, a lawyer.

Sir Augustus and Lady Frazer had just the two sons. The younger died in 1845 unmarried and childless and then, in 1848, the elder son discussed here, Augustus, likewise died childless.

Augustus Frazer in Egypt and the Levant

As Frazer’s will was dated 7 August 1847 in London and he died in Syria 11 months later, we may infer that the ‘Capt. Fraser’ (sic) recorded in Shepheard’s Hotel Guest book as arriving in Cairo from Alexandria on 9^th December 1847 and leaving for Upper Egypt on 16^th December 1847 is our Frazer, presumably on one of the Nile river-boats (dahabiyehs). Such a voyage would normally take at least 6-8 weeks; more if he went to Abu Simbel and the Second Cataract. After his return in perhaps late February 1848, he evidently crossed Sinai via Wadi Mukkatab and Mt Serbal to – presumably, St Catherine’s Monastery, then on to Petra. From the latter, travellers went north to Hebron and Jerusalem. He is said then to have “completed a tour of the Holy Land” (Thiessen 1946: 365) and was visiting Antioch/ Antakya when he fell ill (below)

According to the plaque in the family church at Charlton (Fig. 1):

Augustus Henry Frazer,
Captain of the Royal Artillery
born August 15^th 1810, died in Syria July 11th 1848.
Interred at Suedia.

Fig. 1: Plaque for members of the Frazer family in the church of St Luke, Charlton, near Woolwich.

‘Suedia’ is well known. In 1848 it was in the northwest part of the Ottoman province of Syria, west of Antioch/ Antakya. It remained part of Syria until transferred from the French Mandate of Syria and Lebanon in 1939 since when it has been part of the Turkish province of Hatay.

Its Arab name is rendered variously in western publications where the spelling Suedia is common but also found are: Suediah, as-Suwaidiyah, Seleucia, Suwaydiyya, Suadeiah, Suadea, Suadeah, Souedeeyah, Suweida, Souvadia, es-Suedie, Suweidiyeh and doubtless others. The place partly overlies the ancient Hellenistic-Roman port-city of Seleucia Pieria, from which its later name may be derived. Places have been renamed under Turkish rule (as, widely, elsewhere). Today it is Samandag.

The place lies in what is sometimes called the Suedia Valley, opening onto the mouth of the R. Orontes (now R. Asi). It was especially lush arable land and was attractive to westerners in the early 19^th century who saw the soils and climate as suitable for experimentation with imported species of plans and a new industry. Foremost amongst these was John Barker (1771-1849), the one-time British Consul at Aleppo (1799-1825) and later Alexandria in Egypt (1825-1833). On his retirement, he settled on land at Suedia owned by his wife, the redoubtable Marianne Barker, née Hays, an heiress. (In a publication of 1845, one of the Barkers sons noted that his father had owned land at Suedia for 40 years (Barker C. F. 1845: 32)). John and Marianne Barker had seven daughters and four sons, some of whom lived at Suedia and the Barkers summer retreat in the hills to the north at Betias (now Batiayaz), at both of which John Barker had houses and developed exotic gardens. At their various homes over the course of their married life – Aleppo, Alexandria and at Suedia, the Barkers were famous for their hospitality, especially to visiting fellow-countrymen (Manley 2002: 41) – as they thought of them, though John Barker had been born in Smyrna and Marianne in Aleppo, and most of their children were born in the Levant. (Barker 1853: 2):

His services to Eastern travellers have in numberless instances been called into action, and have been gratefully recorded in many published works of those who partook of his hospitality.

It is no surprise then to find that the Barkers were especially attentive to the sick Frazer (Barker 1876: II, 276-7):

In the summer of the following year, 1848, the cholera, which had broken out simultaneously in all the towns of Egypt, Syria, Constantinople, Malta, and Trieste, visited Souedeeyah. Captain Fraser (sic), a young artillery officer on his travels, passing through Antioch, caught the disease, and coming to Souedeeyah, pitched his tent near Mr. Barker’s house.  He had not a letter of introduction, but his being an Englishman, and sick, was a sufficient one. Mr. Barker had him carried to his house, and Mrs. Barker nursed him herself; for his two servants refused to attend to his wants, and even to go into his room, when they found he had the cholera. Dr. [William Holt] Yates [1802-1874] attended him, but all in vain; he sank rapidly, and was buried in the churchyard of the Greek church, the priests officiating. A monument was subsequently erected over his grave by his relations, who sent it out from England. 

This time the cholera was more virulent than usual, carrying off as many as 500 persons in one day at Aleppo. Mr. Barker had a good opportunity of testing the efficacy of his newly discovered remedy, bleeding, and found it never-failing when resorted to in time. But before he had discovered this method of treatment, he thought the safest plan to avoid the danger, until some panacea could be found, was to get out of the sphere of its influence; and he therefore set sail, with all his family, for Latakia. He found there many of his friends, who had come from Aleppo, flying also from the pestilence. He spent a month at Latakia, and then, hearing the disorder had ceased, for it never continues in the same place more than from thirty-five to forty days, he returned to Souedeeyah.  

Fig. 2: John and Marianne Barker’s house at Suedia as sketched by William Bartlett during his visit in late 1834 and published in 1836 (Carne, Bartlett and Purser 1836: II, following p. 28).

There is one further piece of evidence. General Lefroy subsequently held posts in Canada – where he has descendants still – including in 1848, superintendence of a ‘Magnetical and Meteorological Observatory’ at Toronto. A letter he wrote at that time concerning proposed leave to return to Britain, was published in 1946. The first paragraph refers to Frazer (Thiessen 1946: 266):

Toronto, 30 September, 1848.

My dear Colonel,

You will have been grieved and shocked, I know, by the death of poor Augustus Frazer, so unexpected and so sad under all the circumstances. All the consolation we can have is that it might have been under circumstances much more painful. He died surrounded by strangers, but they were in spirit kind and Christian friends, and everything that medical skill could effect was done for him. There is something, too, almost enviable in a summons so timed when his heart and affections had been stirred up by meditations over the scenes of our Saviour’s history, and, I have no doubt, his natural piety of character quickened and his Christian hopes confirmed by their influence on his susceptible mind. He has given me no common proof of generous affection by bequeathing to me not only all his books, maps, MSS, together with other effects, but also the residue of his personal property, which at Lady Frazer’s death will amount to a large sum, I believe over £4,000. He has made me one of his executors, a responsibility which may make it desirable for me to return to England before 1851, but I do not think that it will. However, should it become necessary, I should be glad to feel at liberty to apply to the Commander of the Forces here for three or four months leave for that purpose. (I presume that it would not be necessary to go to the Master General) and beg beforehand to hold your sanction to my taking that step at my own discretion, being always responsible that the duties of the Observatory are properly carried on during my absence. If it so happened that circumstances were to require my presence in England in February or March, it would be rather advantageous than otherwise as regards the Observatory. I hear that poor Lady Frazer bears her affliction with much patience and I know that she has all the consolation that the utmost kindness and affection can impart, from her niece Mrs Wood.  

Lefroy’s attachment to Frazer led him to name a son, born in Toronto three years after his friend’s death, Augustus Henry Frazer Lefroy (1851-1910). In his own writings (e.g. Lefroy 1895) he refers to the boy as ‘Frazer’. This son in turn named his third child, Frazer Keith Lefroy (1895-1917). He was killed on the Western Front in 1917.

Location of Frazer’s Grave

According to Edward Barker, Frazer was interred “in the churchyard of the Greek church” (above). In the 19^th century Suedia was almost entirely Christian. Today, now part of Turkey, the population is much more mixed, many of the Armenians in particular having migrated after 1939. Both the present Armenian and the Greek ‘Rum Ortodoks St Ilyas Kilisesi’ lie to the northeast of Samandag and appear to be relatively new structures. It may well be that the churchyard of 1848 has been built over. The fate of the grave of John Barker himself near his summer residence in the hills is instructive (Manley 2002: 44-5):

On 5 October, 1849, John Barker died of ‘apoplexy’ at the age of 78 years at his summer house at Betias on a commanding eminence of Mount Rhosus, and is buried close by. He had expressed a wish to be buried by the wall of the Armenian church at Betias and there he was laid. Two years afterwards “a handsome marble monument, procured from Genoa, was placed over the vault, and a suitable inscription put on the slab”. But the monument is no longer so fine. The Barker papers include a report of it made at the request of the British Consul in lskunderun in 1952. The// grave was still visible at the upper part of the village; it stood in a grass-covered plot with a low wall around it. The monument was “no more than a pile of stones with no inscriptions” and would be “very costly to restore”. “Nobody,” commented the ‘inspector’, “seems to have visited the grave for many years”.

A more recent visitor was even less successful (Morray 1996: 78):

“Suedia Hall” has vanished, however, as well as all but the barest traces of the summerhouse at Bityas, or Teknepinar, as it is nowadays better known.

…

A few years ago I searched there for Barker’s grave. It was reported to lie against one of the walls of the nineteenth-century Armenian Church of St Meletios, which overlooks the village. The church is still there, although it has not been used since 1939. For, when the area became part of Turkey, the then Armenian inhabitants of Bityas left, mostly for Syria and Lebanon. There was no sign, though, of Barker’s tomb, or even of a tablet, reported as late as 1965, which recorded in Arabic the generous refurbishment of the church in 1897 by Edward Barker.  

What Became of August Frazer’s ‘Papers’

Frazer’s will of 1847 (above) bequeathed his “maps charts plans manuscripts documents and papers” to Lefroy. The implication of Hogg’s text above is that after Augustus Frazer’s death in 1848, his papers – including his travel journal, became the property of William Page Wood and his wife, Charlotte, another beneficiary in his will, Augustus Frazer’s cousin. The Woods, too, were childless and the fate of Augustus Frazer’s journal is unknown: Wood’s own will may provide a clue. Or were the papers subsequently sent to Lefroy as intended? The survival of Frazer’s journal from his final months would be particularly valuable in many respects.

Visitors to Petra in 1848

Frazer’s account of his visit to Petra would be valuable because of its rarity that year. B&D’s list has just one entry for 1848: ‘R. W. G.’ This is probably ‘R. W. de Grille’, met on the Nile on 8 January 1848 and later found travelling with the Higgins brothers across Sinai to Petra and on the Palestine:

Charles Longuet Higgins (1806-1885)

Rev. Henry Hugh Higgins (1814-1893),

Charles Higgins lost his journal out of his saddle-bag on his travels but his brother-in-law, Dean Burgon, in his biographical essay on Higgins many years later, had a notebook of some kind to consult and sketched out places and dates for the brothers’ travels in Egypt and the Near East (Burgon 1888: 383):

The brothers were joined at Alexandria by Mr. de Grille. They went only a little way up the Nile: then, struck across the desert from Cairo for the Convent of S. Catharine, and entered the Holy Land by way of Hebron, — taking Petra and Mount Hor in their way. This dry desert journey wrought wonders for Charles. He declared that he ‘could have carried the camel.’ But he was ill on the Nile, — the moist air affecting him greatly. The travellers succeeded in their object, which was to reach Jerusalem (April 8^th [1848]) in ample time to witness the solemnities of Holy Week and Easter. The journal in which my brother from day to day jotted down his impressions, was lost out of his saddle-bag, — to the infinite regret of many besides himself. From a briefer memorandum-book which lies before me, it is found that having inspected every object of interest in that// sacred locality, — having visited Bethlehem and Bethany,

Rachel’s tomb and Emmaus, — having accompanied the pilgrims to Jericho and the Jordan, — having bathed in the Dead Sea and taken many a thoughtful walk with his brother round the ancient walls of ‘the Holy City’ — he left Jerusalem on Easter Tuesday (April 25^th [1848]), — not without casting many ‘a longing, lingering look behind.’

The implication of the dates recorded is that this Higgins-de Grille Party was at Petra in the very early days of April 1848. Allowing for Frazer’s travels in Palestine and Syria which ended with his death at Suedia, he, too, will likely have been at Petra in April 1848.

Notes

1. The notice posted in The Economist (26 August 1948, 6, #261: 978) read the placename incorrectly: “On the 11th ult, at Sindia, near Antioch, Syria, Augustus Henry Frazer, Esq., late a Captain in the Royal Artillery, eldest son of the late Colonel Sir Augustus Frazer, K.C.B., of the same Regiment, aged 36.” On the other hand, it correctly located it as near Antioch and not – as sometimes occurred, the Suwayda in southern Syria, south of Damascus

Bibliography

Barker, C. F. (1845) Memoir of Syria: Designed to Illustrate the Condition of that Country before and Subsequent to the Evacuation of the Egyptian Army, and its Position Under the Ottoman Yoke, to Which are added, Remarks on its Prodce and Resources, its Climate and Capabilities, the Cultivation of Silk, the Purchase and Tenure of Land, and the Working f the Old and New Taruiff. Being the Result of Personal Observations made During a Residence of Seventeen Years in the Levant, by Charles Fiott Barker, Formerly Secretary to Mr. Consul-General Barker, London (Madden and Malcolm).

Barker, J. (1876) Syria and Egypt under the Last Five Sultans of Turkey: Experiences, During Fifty Years, of Mr Consul-General Barker. Chiefly from his Letters and Journals, ed. E. B. B. Barker, 2 vols, London (Samuel Tinsley).

Barker, W. B. (1853) Lares and penates, or, Cilicia and its governors. Being a short historical account of that province from the earliest times to the present day. Together with a description of some household gods of the ancient Cilicians, broken up by them on their conversion to Christianity, First Discovered and Brought to this Country by the Author, Edited by W. F. Ainsworth,London (Ingram, Cooke, & Co).

Brünnow, R. E. and von Domaszewski, A. (1904-09) Die Provincia Arabia, 3 vols, Strassburg (Trübner).

Carne, J., Bartlett, W. H., Purser, W., et al. (1836-38) Syria, the Holy Land, Asia Minor, &c. illustrated in a series of views drawn from nature, by W.H. Bartlett, William Purser, &c.; with description of the plates by John Carne), 3 vols, London (Fisher, Son, & Co)

Hogg, J. (1856) “Further notice respecting the Sinaic inscriptions”, Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature, Second Series, V:  33-58.

Lefroy, J. H. (1895) Autobiography of General Sir John Henry Lefroy, CB, KCMG, FRS tec, Colonel Commandant Royal Artillery, edited by Lady Lefroy, London (Printed for Private Circulation Only).

Manley, D. (2002) “Mr. & Mrs. Barker and Family (Franks in the Levant)”, Archaeology & History in Lebanon 16: 34-48.

Morray, D. (1996) “The Consul’s retreat”, Cornucopia 10: 72-78

Thiessen, A. D. (1946) “Her Majesty’s Magnetical and Meteorological Observatory, Toronto. Part XII. Captain Lefroy goes before a Medical Board and is advised to take leave of absence to return to England, 1850”, Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, 40: 365-372.

David Kennedy

Perth, Western Australia

5 August 2026.

Updated 6 August 2026

Two Early Photographers on the Nile in 1851-2: 2. Hon. Thomas Hatton George Fermor, An Early Photographer on the Nile in 1852?

The unpublished journal of Louisa Maude Allan who sailed on the Nile with her husband George William Allan and her brother Christopher Robinson during December 1851 – February 1852, has a reference to an encounter with a young man in another river boat (the one they had originally hired at Cairo but returned in favour of a better one). The date was 3 January 1852 and this was to be the first of several meetings along the river (MSS pp. 62-3):

… M^r. Fermor one of the present owners of our old boat took tea with us. He is very young,

very good natured, very slow, in the second life guards a son of Lord Pontefract’s …

She has several further references to Fermor who sailed in their company at least as far as Philae on 24 January 1852.

Fermor can be identified as Thomas Hatton George Fermor (Easton Neston, Northants., 9 October 1832 – Halse Grange, Northants., 4 March 1864). He was the third son of Thomas William Fermor, 4^th Earl of Pomfret (not Pontefract) (1770-1833). He had been educated at Eton then entered the army as a Cornet in the prestigious 2^nd Life Guards, part of the Household Cavalry. When the Allan Party met him, he was just 19 years old. They evidently got on well and Louisa was grateful to be loaned books by him, they dined together and he sometimes joined George and Christopher hunting ashore. He was travelling and sharing his river boat with a Mr Coate and four men engaged in boisterous parties which included Fermor playing a guitar (MS p. 70).

Fermor was to receive ten further mentions in the journal, including the occasion on land when they met Captain Peel (third son of the British Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel) (MS pp. 63-65) who proved to be as fast a talker as Fermor was a slow one. On none of these does Louisa mention photographs. However …

In 2007, Sotheby’s auctioned an album of photographs taken along the Nile which their online catalogue records as “an important and rare collection of early photographs of egyptian monuments taken by the Hon. Thomas Fermor (1832-1864) in 1853 and 1854”.

https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2007/the-estate-of-christian-lady-heskethsold-by-order-of-her-executors-together-with-property-of-the-trustees-of-the-2nd-baron-heskeths-will-trust-l07500/lot.212.html

The catalogue goes on to say: “These 16 photographs appear in Fermor’s privately published work: Ancient Egypt in 1853 & 1854, being Illustrations in Photography (London: for the author, by J.C. Sanford, [c.1855])”. The dates “1853 and 1854” are two years later than Louisa’s record of meeting Fermor in January 1852.

I cannot trace that book and have found no evidence Fermor was in Egypt in those years. The years 1853 and 1854 would accord rather with the two expeditions to Egypt by John Beasley Greene who took photographs on the Nile:

https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/person/103KHN

and:

https://hyperallergic.com/john-beasley-greene-sfmoma

Nevertheless, it certain that Fermor did take photographs on the Nile and at home (including one of his sister). Those on the Nile may belong to his time there in early 1852 when Louisa Allan met him. The Artnet web site publishes an image of the album cover and records that it has “32 works”. I have not subscribed to Artnet to learn more about the album and – perhaps, its current ownership.

Fig. 1: Screenshot of the Artnet page on the web.

Fermor died young – in a hunting accident, and his possessions passed to his sister Lady Anna Maria Arabella Fermor (1828-1870), wife of Sir Thomas George Hesketh. In 1867, Hesketh changed the family name to “Fermor-Hesketh”, and it was the sale in 1999 of “Books and manuscripts from the Fermor-Hesketh library at Easton Neston”, that brought the album onto the market.

David Kennedy

Perth, WA. 26 July 2026.

Two Early Photographers on the Nile in 1851-2: 1. Rev. George Wilson Bridges

The unpublished travel journal of Louisa Allan recording her visit to Egypt with her husband and brother in 1851-2, includes two references to people she met who were taking photographs of Egypt and the Levant at that early date.

Rev. George Wilson Bridges (1788-1863).

While in Malta on their way to Egypt, the Allans met the Rev. George Wilson Bridges (1788-1863). Bridges was then resident in Malta – his son, a naval officer, was based in the Mediterranean at that time. He had previously lived in the West Indies – where he had lost most of his children in a tragic drowning accident. More recently he had and lived in Canada, not far from Toronto. In the 1840s he developed a keen interest in the emerging photographic techniques, especially that pioneered by William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877), with whom he corresponded.

Louisa reports after a visit to Bridges’ home near Valetta on 2 November 1851 (MS 34):

M^r. Bridges spent eight months last year in Jerusalem and he has most interesting & Talbotype views taken by himself of every thing there of interest.

Two days later (MS 35):

In the morning Mr Bridges came, & went with George to D^r. Templeton’s where his Talbotype is, Mr. Templeton being a pupil, & a most successful one. They took two or three very good views.

Then, on 8 November (MS 37):

We were to have gone to the Naval Hospital on Bighi Point, to see one of the Officers there take some Daguerrotype sketches but it was too cloudy, and we postponed it. M^rs Templeton & M^rs Glier were going with us. M^r Bridges brought one of his books of Talbotype views to shew me – & most beautiful and wonderfully true the sketches are. They were chiefly of Cairo, The Pyramids, Pompeii, Malta, & Sicily, & made a most interesting collection.

On 10^th November (MS 38):

M^r Bridges came again later George was out but I had returned. He stayed for some time after George came back, & left his book of Views with us.

Bridges’ early photographs are well-known and there are examples in several collections. Especially valuable are albums he had made – one is in the National Library of Scotland and another recently sold at auction: priced at Euros 60-70,000, it sold for Euros 500,000.

https://www.gros-delettrez.com/lot/10317/1898073

Bridges has been the subject of a thesis recently (Gourley 2023) and an academic publications (Harris ****). It is clear Bridges travelled quite extensively in Egypt and the Levant (Gourley 2023: 19-20) in 1949, 1850 and 1851.

Gourley, B. (2023) The Paper Negatives of Reverend George Wilson Bridges: A Preliminary Investigation into their History, Materials and Techniques, Unpublished MA Thesis, University of Melbourne

Harris, C. (***) “The Revd George Wilson Bridges’ Palestine As It Is: an early photographic work”, The Bodleian Library Record 31.1-2: **-**

https://doi.org/10.3828/blr.2018.31.1-2.147

Fig. 1: Cover of a recently auctioned album of Bridges photographs.

David Kennedy

Perth, 24 July 2016

Hawker and Robinson. Two New Travellers to Petra in 1852

A previous post on this site arising from the travel journal of Louisa Allan to Egypt in 1851-2, included as they were in Cairo, soon to leave for Alexandria and the steamer to Malta (MS p. 123):

Christopher was very busy in making all his arrangements for his trip across the Long Desert; Hassaneen being with him as Dragoman which I am very glad of as I am sure he will take good, faithful, care of him. He is with a M^r Hawker, an extremely intelligent agreeable man, and a charming sketcher.

Christopher is Louisa’s 23-year-old brother:

Robinson, Christopher (York, Upper Canada, 21 January 1828 – Toronto, 31 October 1905).

The ‘sketcher’, Mr Hawker is known from other sources as active in Egypt in 1851-2, not least from incising his name alongside that of a travelling companion, R. H. Borrowes, on temples at Semna and Kumma (Keersmaecker II, 32):

Hawker, Edward James (Ripley, Surrey 1817 – 1892), son of Rear-Admiral Edward Hawker, a graduate of Trinity College, Cambridge, and traveller widely in the Levant.

In 1852 when Hawker met 23-year-old Christopher Robinson, he was 35. The ‘Long Route’ is, of course, the c. 40 day journey from Suez across Sinai via St Catherine’s Monastery, to Aqaba then via Petra to Hebron and Jerusalem.

Louisa sailed from Alexandria on 21 March 1852 so this parting from Christopher and her observation about his plans belongs in the first half of March 1852. It is not known if Robinson actually joined Hawker and neither man is found amongst the scores of graffiti other western travellers left at Petra and neither is mentioned by any of the other quite numerous visitors to Petra in early 1852.

What we can say is that Hawker certainly did follow the ‘Long Route’. He brought home scores of sketches and water colours from his travels in Egypt and the Levant which are now in the Griffiths Institute of the University of Oxford. These include several from the Sinai crossing, one for Aqaba and 15 for Petra. It is likely Christopher was with Mr Hawker and that both names should be added to the list of known western visitors to Petra before 1914.

Brünnow, R. E. and von Domaszewski, A. (1904) Die Provincia Arabia, auf grund Zweier in den Jahren 1897 und 1898 Unternommenen Reisen und den Berichte Früherer Reisender. I. Die Römerstrasse von Madeba über Petra und Odruh bis El-Akaba, Strassburg (Trübner): 192-4 (“Verzeichnis der Besucher von Petra”).

Keersmaecker, R. O. De (2003) Travellers’ Graffiti from Egypt and the Sudan. II. The Temples of Semna and Kumma, Antwerp (Mortsel)

David Kennedy

Perth, 23 July 2026

The Allan-Robinson Party in Egypt and the Levant in 1851-2

The Allan and Robinson families were amongst the leading members of Toronto society across much of the 19^th century. They were wealthy and members travelled extensively. As Empire Loyalists who left the new 13 colonies after the Revolution, they still had family in the new United States. They also had family in Britain whom they visited: for the three people discussed here, George Allan’s father was from near Huntly in north-eastern Scotland and Louisa and Christopher Robinson’s mother was English. This trio travelled widely and some of that is recorded in one of the family documents to survive in Canadian archives: the journals of George Allan and  Louisa Allan of 1851-2:

https://digitalarchiveontario.ca/objects/386859/the-journal-of-louisa-maude-robinson-allan-18511852

The journal is in fact in two parts – an initial four pages evidently written by George Allan then 121 pages in a different hand, that of George’s wife Louisa.

William’s journal begins on 1 January 1851 and records the visit made by them to Georgia beginning in Savannah then south to the Hopeton-Altamaha planation near Darien, owned by James Hamilton Couper (1794-1866) and worked by c. 1500 slaves. The journal breaks off abruptly and the otherwise blank notebook was then taken over by Louisa on 1 October 1851. On that date they set off from London to begin a journey that was to take them through France and northern Italy, to Malta and then to Egypt. They made a trip down the Nile to the First Cataract and back, returned to Malta where it breaks off mid-sentence on 2 April 1852, soon after they had been released from quarantine into the comfort of Hood’s Hotel in Valetta. They probably moved onwards via Naples and by 12 May were in Rome where Louisa died, aged 26.

Louisa’s journal is often quite banal and she was frequently unwell – apparently tuberculosis; doctors are regularly consulted in her journal and she both medicated and she often stayed indoors in hotels and on the Nile boat when others of the family went out. The journal has merits for depicting a life of a wealthy Canadian colonial family, their extensive travels and the people encountered.

The Travellers

The core of the party until they reached Egypt was Louisa – just turned 26, and George – aged 30:

Allan, George William (York, Upper Canada, 9 January 1821 – Toronto, 24 July 1901).

Allan (née Robinson), Louisa Maud (York, Upper Canada, 9 October 1825 – Rome, 12 May 1852).

They were then joined by Louisa’s younger brother, Christopher (‘Crissie’) – aged 23:

Robinson, Christopher (York, Upper Canada, 21 January 1828 – Toronto, 31 October 1905).

Naturally, Louisa was attended by a personal maid – Ellis, who was with them throughout the recorded trip and frequently mentioned. Also present was Louis Vienot (?), a Swiss national, seemingly acting as William’s servant and general ‘fixer’. He had been recommended to them in England by Sir Robert Inglis. It emerges in her journal that Louis had been in Egypt “two years ago with Lord Alford” [= John Hume Egerton (born Cust), Viscount Alford, 1812-1851]. In the event, relations soured and in early December 1851 they dismissed him though promising to re-engage him when they returned through Naples in 1852.

For the trip down the Nile they engaged a young Egyptian she calls ‘Hassaneen’, whom George knew already.

Previous Travels

Louisa reports their earlier visit to Cuba – as part of their travels which also took them to Georgia. When she met her brother Christopher in Alexandria she says they had last met in Philadelphia “last year’. She says, too, that she had been in Paris 5 years before: presumably on honeymoon following their marriage in Toronto on 16 April 1846. And on her 26^th birthday while in Paris on 9 October 1851 she says she had celebrated her 14^th birthday in Paris (in 1839).

When Christopher met them in Alexandria on 19 November 1851, Louisa says he had just arrived from Constantinople having previously been in England.

Finally, and most notable, Louisa says George had been in the East before in 1842-3 when “George’s & M^r Parke’s old Dragoman in Syria nine years ago, Hassaneen as our Dragoman, interpreter &c, a capital little fellow, of more use to us than half a dozen ordinary men …”.

George was then 19 years old. From other sources (Wilson 1847 and Smith 1878), we know that George Allan had travelled as a party with Rev. Henry Sherlock and a Mr Parke in company with a second party consisting of Dr John Wilson and Mr John Smith, from Cairo across Sinai to St Catherine’s Monastery then northwards to beyond Nakhl where the two parties separated. Wilson and Smith went east to Petra then Palestine while the Allan party went to Dhahariyeh then Hebron and Palestine. Although George had evidently been in Egypt in 1842-3, there is nothing in Louisa’s account of their journey on the Nile to suggest that George had sailed on it on that occasion.

People Encountered in Egypt

Mr and M^rs Saunders

Mr Rickards [= “an Englishman”]

General & M^rs Cooper [Americans]

Mr (Dr) and Mrs Eccles

Mr and Mrs Larkins

An Irish Member

Colonel Taylor with two or three friends

M^r and MrsDavidson

M^rs Alexander

M^r. Fermor

Captain Peel

M^r. Cheale

M^r Coate

M^r Stephenson or Stevenson? …

Mr and Mrs Murray (Consul)

D^r. Abbott (the Vice Consul)

M^r & M^rs Shighan?

M^r & M^rs Lieder

M^r Durheim

M^r & Mrs Forster

Miss Plunkett

The Moreheads

M^r Leadall?

M^r. Storr

Mr Medleycott

The Smiths, Dents?, Gooldens & Yatman’s boats.

The Earl of Dalkeith in Mr. Murray’s large boat, & his brother Lord Henry Scott, in M^rs Larkins small one.

Mr. Hanbury, Close, Nicholson &c.

Mr. (Dr) Evans & Mr. Cooke’s boat

A Russian, & American boat

Captⁿ Hamilton

M^r. Rowat …

M^r. Cheales, Watson, & Birley, …

M^r. Plowden & his friend Captain Hagg

Mr. Sayer

M^r. Hawker

Duke of Saxe Weimar & Prince Altekorf?

Madame Pastral

Many of these people are already attested in Egypt and/ or otherwise known; several are here attested in Egypt for the first time. A few will be singled out for comment in subsequent Blog essays.

Grant, B. (2025) “A young Canadian, Louisa Allan (1825-1852)”, Friends of the Non-Catholic Cemetery in Rome, Newsletter 70 (Spring): 2-3

Wilson, J. (1847) The Lands of the Bible Visited and Described, in an Extensive Journey Undertaken with Special Reference to the Promotion of Biblical Research and the Advancement of the Cause of Philanthropy, 2 vols. Edinburgh (Whyte)

Smith, G. (1878) The Life of John Wilson, DD, FRS, for Fifty Years Philanthropist and Scholar in the East, London (Murray)

David Kennedy

Perth, 23 July 2026

Cyril Graham’s Syrian Wedding Guests Identified

No sooner had I posted the essay on the Syrian guests at Cyril Graham’s wedding in 1874 with my preferred identification than the following book came into sight:

Taylor, W. H. (2005) Antioch and Canterbury. The Syrian Orthodox Church and The Church of England 1874 – 1928, Piscataway, NJ (Gorgias Press)

The identity of the “Patriarch of Antioch and his suffragan, the Bishop of Jerusalem, who had come expressly to town for the occasion” was revealed and the two men even depicted in a photograph with the then Archbishop of Canterbury – NOT the Greek Catholic (Melkite), Gregory II Hanna Youssef-Sayour I had suggested, BUT Patriarch Ignatius Peter III/IV (1872-1894) and Bishop Gregorius Abdullah of Jerusalem, later Ignatius Abdullah (1906-1915), of the Syrian/ Syriac Orthodox Church.

Fig. 1: The Patriarch, Bishop and Archbishop (from Taylor 2005: Frontispiece).

The two men had arrived in London on 24 August 1874 and stayed over seven months till 3 April 1875. At the request of the Archbishop of Canterbury, they were hosted by Elizabeth Finn, widow of the former British Consul in Jerusalem, who was an Arabic speaker and familiar with the Christian churches in the East. She provides a quite lengthy account of the episode (E. Finn 1929: 50-52).

The Patriarch was in London on his way to India and seeking the support of the British church and government for a split within his church in India. He had numerous meetings while there including two audiences with Queen Victoria and even gave a speech in Mansion House to members of the Oriental Congress.

Nowhere in Taylor’s book nor in Mrs Finn’s report is there any mention of Graham, the Herveys or the Graham-Hervey wedding. There is still no known link between Cyril Graham and the Patriarch of Antioch – but at least it is now certain which Patriarch was present at Cyril Graham’s wedding and why he was in London if not why he was amongst a handful of very close family guests.

Finn, E. A. (1929) Reminiscences of Mrs. Finn, London (Marshall, Morgan and Scott)

David Kennedy

UWA, Perth, Western Australia

18 May 2026