History Focus
November 10

(1813 - 1873)

Livingstone was a Scottish doctor and missionary, considered one of the most important explorers of Africa.

In 1840, Livingstone was ordained and sent as a medical missionary to south Africa. In 1841 he reached Kuruman, a settlement founded in Bechuanaland ( now Botswana) by the Scottish missionary Robert Moffat. He began converting black Africans, trying to move northward, despite hostility by the Boers. In 1845 he married Mary Moffat, daughter of Robert, working together they traveled into areas unknown to Europeans in African territory. In 1849 he crossed the Kalahari Desert and discovered Lake Ngami. In 1851 he discovered the Zambezi River.

Stanley Finds Livingstone

"Doctor Livingstone, I presume?" were the first words spoken by Sir Henry Morton Stanley to David Livingstone when Stanley tracked down the missing missionary and explorer to Ujiji on the shores of Lake Tanganyika. "Yes," said the doctor, lifting his cap slightly. Livingstone, a 58 year old Scotsman, is famous as the explorer of the Zambezi and discoverer of Victoria Falls. He is also the first European to cross the continent of Africa from coast to coast. The search for the sources of the Nile and Congo rivers has occupied him obsessively for a number of years.

Henry Morton Stanley is also an explorer of note. He was commissioned in 1869 to find Livingstone by James Gordon Bennett, proprietor of   the New York Herald.  Stanley found time before searching for Livingstone to attend the opening of the Suez Canal, sail up the Nile, visit Jerusalem, Constantinople, the Crimean and Caspian, and travel through Persia to India. Finally, he sat out on his quest for Dr. Livingstone.

It is a moot point whether or not Livingstone was really "missing." Perhaps it was all a publicity stunt. Nonetheless, Stanley's arrival was quite timely. Doctor Livingstone had arrived at Ujiji as a "living skeleton," only to find that the supplies set aside for his arrival had been sold off by the headman of the village.

Some quotations from the Missionary Doctor Livingstone:

I determined never to stop until I had come to the end and achieved my purpose.


All that I am I owe to Jesus Christ, revealed to me in His divine Book.

Sources:
On This Day