A young, average looking bachelor officer in the Indian Army had fallen in love, much against his will, with a celebrated beauty called Frances Gambier in Lucknow, India.
Not only was she breathtakingly beautiful, but she was also acutely intelligent to boot, authoring well-acclaimed journals and articles in major newspapers, not to mention that she was well placed in society and an avowed equestrian with a penchant for breaking wild horses.
With the conviction that she was his one true love and exiting the scene on a convenient mission to Burma while the dust settled, he gave her comforting words, his plans for their future together and his heart; lock, stock, and barrel. And he departed.
The bad news that she had been in an accident and was now recuperating in London, caught up with him overseas. Permission granted by his superiors and half-mad with fear and anxiety, he went seeking Frances and found her, to his uttermost shock and disbelief, much recovered in the arms of yet another gentleman she had recently married.
It was too much for him to bear. He resigned his position in the military and in a suicidal bid, looked for and accepted the riskiest expedition, anywhere.
That expedition was with the African Lakes Company to Uganda in 1888 and that gentleman was Frederick Lugard. It would take him almost 12 years to find that kind of love again in another journalist, Flora Shaw (lover of Sir G.T Goldie). #HistoryVille
Credits: Infi Nity
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