Born in 1813 and raised in Blantyre, Scotland, David Livingstone was among the first Europeans to explore the African continent[1]. The medical doctor, humanitarian, preacher, missionary, and African explorer fearlessly went to Africa at a time when slave trade was at its peak. Livingstone was raised with his four other siblings in a very humble background. Having seen the situation back at home, the humanitarian started working at a tender age of 10 at a cotton factory. Even after working for 14 hours during the day, Livingstone did not lose his focus of becoming a medical doctor when he grew up. Therefore, he sacrificed two more hours to go to school at night. In most occasions, he would also study at work. The theology and medical student at Glasgow was born again at the age of 21 and six years later, he was sent both as an ordained minister and a medical doctor to South Africa by the London Mission Society[2]. The missionary first served at the Kuruman Station in the interiors of Africa, where Robert Moffat served. He later got engaged to Moffat’s daughter with whom they had six children.
After working for ten more years as a traditional missionary, Livingstone found a new calling and this time it followed a different path of mission. According to him, he believed that God called him so that he could use his talents in exploring and mapping the vast heartland of Africa; that is, opening up God’s highway, which would turn more souls to Christ, bring civilization to the people and bring the Arab slavery to an end. The humanitarian sent his family back to England in 1852 and started the work of exploring Africa from the West to the East[3]. He went back to his motherland in 1856 to rejoin with his family where he had an audience with Queen Victoria in a heroic homecoming. Later in 1857, Livingstone left the London Missionary Society due to his different ideology of residence of the missionaries in stations. In 1858, he was sent to find the source of the Nile by the Royal Geographical Society[4]. The explorer gave a detailed research on the different sources that joined to Lake Victoria before joining to River Nile as earlier reported by John Speke.
At the age of 52, the humanitarian set to sail through Africa in search of the source of Nile, which he did for seven years without success. When he reached Nyangwe, past the headwaters of Congo, he witnessed how the Arab traders massacred around 400 Africans. Feeling touched, he traced his way back to Ujiji on Lake Tanganyika, where people never heard of him for close to five years. In 1871, Henry Stanley was sent by the New York Herald to find the story about Livingstone. The two finally met at Ujiji where they became friends but Livingstone refused to move to the coast with Stanley, claiming that he had not yet fulfilled his mission of finding the source of Nile. The medical doctor, having grown older and tired was later found dead in his hut, which he had made of grass. Sources indicated that he was found dead kneeling in prayer. Livingstone’s faithful porters buried his heart at the giant tree foot and sailed his body back to London[5].
Bibliography
Blaikie, William. The Life of David Livingstone. Delmarva Publications, Inc., 2015.
[1] William, Blaikie. The Life of David Livingstone. (Delmarva Publications, Inc., 2015)
[2] Ibid., 19
[3] Ibid., 42
[4] Ibid., 56
[5] Ibid., 72
