Ulysses S. Grant (1822-1885) ; John Russell Young (1841-1899)
Around the world with General Grant: a Narrative of the Visit of General U.S. Grant, ex-president of the United States, to various countries in Europe, Asia, and Africa, in 1877, 1878, 1879.
New York: The American News Co., 1879. 2 vols

After serving as general of the Union Army during the Civil War and then two terms as President of the United States, Grant travelled with his wife Julia and son Jesse, stopping in Egypt in 1878. There he met with Egypt's ruler, the Khedive, and after visiting Cairo, sailed up the Nile as far as the temple of Philæ near Aswan. Grant invited John Russell Young, a noted journalist who had worked for Horace Greeley and was then stationed in London as correspondent for the New York Herald, to accompany him on his around-the-world trip. As Young reminisced, "I think that we will all say that the red-letter hours of our Nile journey were when General Grant told us how he met Lee at Appomattox, or how Sherman fought at Shilo." On the ride to Cairo, Young notes that, "The General studied the scenery closely, and noted the resemblance in some portions to prairie land in Illinois. Mrs. Grant was more impressed with the poetry of the scene -- with the biblical associations that cluster about this strange land." No fewer than six accounts of Grant's trip were written by journalists, capturing the fancy of the American public.

From the collection of the National Museum of American History Library

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Henry Martyn Harman (1822-1897)
A Journey to Egypt and the Holy Land in 1869-1870
Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1873. 331 p

Henry Martyn Harman, a professor of ancient languages and literature at Dickinson College (Carlisle, Pennsylvania), travelled to Egypt in 1869 and was struck by the difference between Alexandria and European cities. He commented on the lively, noisy seaport of Alexandria with its mix of Arabs, Greeks, Turks, Italians, Maltese, and others: "What a strange city this Alexandria is! The European or American, who for the first time lands at Alexandria, seems to be in another world. The transition from Naples to Alexandria is sudden. What a mixture of inhabitants you see!" The Libraries' copy of this work was inscribed by the author to "Spencer F. Baird Assist. Sec. Smith. Inst. with the high regards of the author."

From the collection of the Anthropology Library

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Charles Dudley Warner (1829-1900)
My Winter on the Nile Among the Mummies and Moslems
Hartford, Conn.,: American Publishing Company, 1876. 477 p

Charles Dudley Warner, a Hartford journalist, wrote this tongue-in-cheek account of a trip he made to Egypt in 1874-1875. Adopting the humorous style of fellow Hartford resident and friend Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens), who documented his own waggish observations on Egypt in Innocents Abroad (1869), Warner pokes some fun at the expanding industry of travellers' tales about this ancient land. "I suppose that volumes enough have been written about Egypt to cover every foot of its arable soil if they were spread out, or to dam the Nile if they were dumped into it." Warner visited Alexandria and Cairo and sailed the Nile aboard the dhahabîyeh Rip Van Winkle as far south as Wadia Halfa in the Sudan. While at Cairo, Warner stayed at Shepheard's Hotel, the home base for many American tourists in Egypt.

From the collection of the Warren M. Robbins Library, National Museum of African Art

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Charles Edwin Wilbour (1833-1896) ; Jean Capart (editor)
Travels in Egypt (December 1880 to May 1891)
Brooklyn, N.Y.: Brooklyn museum, 1936. 614 p

An amateur Egyptologist whose impressive accumulation of Egyptian antiquities later become part of the collections of the Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour traveled throughout Egypt on numerous expeditions between 1880 and 1891. His letters provide an intimate account of an archaeologist's life and activities in Egypt, where he associated with other notable Egyptologists of the time such as Gaston Maspero and Emile Brugsch. Wilbour's gossipy letters of his adventures include accounts of acquiring antiquities and his social and professional contacts within the community of Western archaeologists and tourists. "Called on David Dudley Field and brought him and his party to tea. He seems bright as of yore and to be enjoying his trip like a boy. I had found the Medeenet Haboo trip hot and fatiguing; he made it the same day cheerily . . . Eighty-four years old and going to Jerusalem." (Letter dated February 27, 1889) (Note: Field, 1805-1894, was a prominent lawyer and legal reformer, also briefly represented New York in the House of Representatives).

From the collection of the Museum Studies Reference Library

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