What were the problems faced by David Livingstone in his
journey to the interiors of Africa ?
Answers
David Livingstone,
(born March 19, 1813, Blantyre, Lanarkshire, Scotland—died May 1, 1873, Chitambo [now in Zambia]), Scottish missionary and explorer who exercised a formative influence on Western attitudes toward Africa.
Early Life
Livingstone grew up in a distinctively Scottish family environment of personal piety, poverty, hard work, zeal for education, and a sense of mission. His father’s family was from the island of Ulva, off the west coast of Scotland. His mother, a Lowlander, was descended from a family of Covenanters, a group of militant Presbyterians. Both were poor, and Livingstone was reared as one of seven children in a single room at the top of a tenement building for the workers of a cotton factory on the banks of the Clyde. At age 10 he had to help his family and was put to work in a cotton mill, and with part of his first week’s wages he bought a Latin grammar. Although he was brought up in the Calvinist faith of the established Scottish church, Livingstone, like his father, joined an independent Christian congregation of stricter discipline when he came to manhood. By this time he had acquired those characteristics of mind and body that were to fit him for his African career.
In 1834 an appeal by British and American churches for qualified medical missionaries in China made Livingstone determined to pursue that profession. To prepare himself, while continuing to work part-time in the mill, he studied Greek, theology, and medicine for two years in Glasgow. In 1838 he was accepted by the London Missionary Society. The first of the Opium Wars (1839–42) put an end to his dreams of going to China, but a meeting with Robert Moffat, the notable Scottish missionary in southern Africa, convinced him that Africa should be his sphere of service. On November 20, 1840, he was ordained as a missionary; he set sail for South Africa at the end of the year and arrived at Cape Town on March 14, 1841.
Initial Explorations
For the next 15 years, Livingstone was constantly on the move into the African interior: strengthening his missionary determination; responding wholeheartedly to the delights of geographic discovery; clashing with the Boers and the Portuguese, whose treatment of the Africans he came to detest; and building for himself a remarkable reputation as a dedicated Christian, a courageous explorer, and a fervent antislavery advocate. Yet so impassioned was his commitment to Africa that his duties as husband and father were relegated to second place.
From Moffat’s mission at Kuruman on the Cape frontier, which Livingstone reached on July 31, 1841, he soon pushed his search for converts northward into untried country where the population was reputed to be more numerous. This suited his purpose of spreading the Gospel through “native agents.” By the summer of 1842, he had already gone farther north than any other European into the difficult Kalahari country and had familiarized himself with the local languages and cultures. His mettle was dramatically tested in 1844 when, during a journey to Mabotsa to establish a mission station, he was mauled by a lion. The resulting injury to his left arm was complicated by another accident, and he could never again support the barrel of a gun steadily with his left hand and thus was obliged to fire from his left shoulder and to take aim with his left eye.
On January 2, 1845, Livingstone married Moffat’s daughter, Mary, and she accompanied him on many of his journeys until her health and the family’s needs for security and education forced him to send her and their four children back to Britain in 1852. Before this first parting with his family, Livingstone had already achieved a small measure of fame as surveyor and scientist of a small expedition responsible for the first European sighting of Lake Ngami (August 1, 1849), for which he was awarded a gold medal and monetary prize by the British Royal Geographical Society. This was the beginning of his lifelong association with the society, which continued to encourage his ambitions as an explorer and to champion his interests in Britain.
Answer:
David Livingstone, (born March 19, 1813, Blantyre, Lanarkshire, Scotland—died May 1, 1873, Chitambo [now in Zambia]), Scottish missionary and explorer who exercised a formative influence on Western attitudes toward Africa.