On 21st July 1824 Edward Geoffrey Stanley landed in New York, after a sea passage of 37 days from Liverpool. Over the following eight months before his return to Britain he made a remarkable tour of eastern Canada and the young Republic of the United States of America, travelling by horse, carriage and boat, along tracks, lakes, and rivers. He explored New England, upstate New York, Niagara Falls, the St Lawrence River and the great lakes of Ontario and Erie. He crossed the Appalachian Mountains, before travelling down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to New Orleans. Stanley was horrified to see the condition of the enslaved Africans working on the plantations in the Deep South, alongside the destitution of the Native Americans and the abject poverty the Irish emigrants. He continued his journey overland from Alabama to Charleston, South Carolina, before taking a coastal ship up to Washington DC where he witnessed the inauguration of the sixth American President John Quincy Adams. Stanley's encounters with the culture, economics, politics and peoples of North America stood him in good stead for his later career as a political reformer and distinguished statesman.
To be published in April 2025.
