Greater Britain: Volume 1

A young Cambridge graduate tours the English-speaking world and describes Victorian colonial culture and the British legacy in America.

Charles Wentworth Dilke (Author)

9781108003001, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 20 July 2009

444 pages
21.6 x 14 x 2.5 cm, 0.56 kg

As a young man, Charles Wentworth Dilke (1843–1911), the Cambridge-educated Radical politician who went on to campaign for votes for women and labourers, legalisation of trade unions, and universal schooling, spent two years touring the English-speaking world. This two-volume illustrated account of his journey was published in 1868, the year in which he first entered Parliament. Volume 1 describes his travels across the United States, where he arrived aboard The Saratoga, landing at Chesapeake Bay in Virginia on 20 June 1866. Dilke explored the reconstructing American South, the bustling eastern seaboard, the vast plains of the Midwest, the magnificent Rocky Mountain range, and the diverse landscape and peoples of California before venturing south into Mexico and departing for Polynesia and the Pacific islands. He thoughtfully discusses the legacy of British colonial culture in America, and its continuing diffusion via America to other parts of the world.

Preface
Part I: 1. Virginia
2. The Negro
3. The south
4. The empire state
5. Cambridge commencement
6. Canada
7. University of Michigan
8. The pacific railroad
9. Omphalism
10. Letter from Denver
11. Red India
12. Colorado
13. Rocky Mountains
14. Brigham Young
15. Mormondom
16. Western editors
17. Utah
18. Nameless Alps
19. Virginia city
20. El Dorado
21. Lynch law
22. Golden city
23. Little China
24. California
25. Mexico
26. Republican or Democrat
27. Brothers
28. America
Part II: 29. Pitcairn Island
30. Hokitika
31. Polynesians
32. Parewanui Pah
33. The Maories
34. The two flies
35. The Pacific
Appendix.

Subject Areas: History of the Americas [HBJK]