Cylchgronau Cymru

STANLEY: THE MYSTERY OF THREE FATHERS I My father I never knew Stanley's Autobiography THERE cannot be many people who are unaware of the broad facts of Henry M. Stanley's life-story, of how he started life as John Rowlands a poor boy born under severely adverse circumstances in Denbigh, North Wales, 150 years ago, and how in 1872, under a newly acquired name, he became a world-famous figure in the field of Central African exploration following his discovery of Livingstone in Ujiji. A new study of Stanley and his various activities during his pre-African years was published under the title Sir Henry M. Stanley: The Enigma, (Gee, Denbigh), in 1989, and the present essay summarises the results of a further study of what might be properly named as his 'Paternity Problem'. In the normal course of a study of this nature one is justified in relying with confidence on the testimony of the person who has written a comprehensive autobiography. Such was the case in relation to Stanley's Autobiography upon which he embarked in 1893, and it was not published until 1909 — five years after the death of the author. At the outset Stanley expressed the desire: 'I would care to leave a truthful record of my life', and asserted that 'I am the best evidence for myself. In the Introduction he declared that there was 'nothing to prevent my stating every fact about myself. He went even further in his declaration of honesty of purpose, and stated: Therefore, without fear of consequences, or danger to my pride and reserve, I can lay bare all circumstances which have attended me from the dawn of consciousness Nothing could be more frank than that, and he offered further reassurance of his determination to tell the whole truth, when he added as if to strengthen his resolve: 'I wish to appear without disguise'. In view of such ardent promises, and recalling the inordinately long gestation period of the first 215 pages the only section of the Autobiography written by Stanley himself it is sad to relate that he sacrificed time and integrity on the altar of self-esteem. Close analysis of his much vaunted effort, as revealed in The Enigma, has demonstrated that he managed to produce a meretricious and laboriously fabricated tale. Much of it can only be described as a conglomeration of massive deceit and blatant untruth. Stanley undertook the writing of his autobiography with the declared object of inspiring 'the penetrable intelligences