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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 April 2022
Of all the colonial novels Thomas Vetch's The Amber City, published in Londoi by Biggs & Debenham in 1888 (or perhaps 1889), is one of the rarest. Only fivi copies are recorded on WorldCat – all in the United States – and, despite bein; published in London, it is held by none of the UK legal deposit libraries, no by any UK university library. Yet, in its mixture of (almost believable) sciena fiction and boy's own adventure, it is one of the most intriguing of all such nar ratives, and in spite of being liberally peppered with a good deal of the casua racism common to the period and the genre, it remains eminently readablf today. It is also surrounded by a good deal of mystery, prompting questions; to how much of it is based on reality, and, perhaps even more intriguingly, the true identity of the author.
This article was written during the coronavirus pandemic at a time when libraries and archives were in lockdown, preventing me from carrying out as much research into the authorship of The Amber City as I would ideally have liked.
1 McCarron, K. and Jarvis, A. , Give a dock a good name? (Birkenhead: Merseyside Port Folios, 1992), p.19Google Scholar
2 Glasgow Herald, 30 August 1889
3 It is possible that Vetch had read Thompson Westcott's biography of Fitch which was published in Philadelphia in 1857; this includes on p.178 a copy of the drawing of his initial steam boat which originally appeared in the Columbian Magazine. There is film of a modern reconstruction of this boat, together with a later 1790 design by Fitch on Youtube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZGd3I_5aP4 (accessed 19.11.2020). For the remarkable story of the self-taught John Smith see Harris, J.R. , “The early steam engine on Merseyside”, Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, vol.106 (1954), pp.109-116Google Scholar
4 Electrical Engineer, new series, vol. 4, no. 3 (19 July 1889), p.57Google Scholar
5 The full text of The Amphibion's Voyage is available on Google Books
6 The Scotsman, 17 August 1889; Yorkshire Post, 28 August 1889; Bristol Mercury, 16 September 1889; Glasgow Herald, 30 August 1889
7 Electrical Engineer, new series, vol. 4, no. 9 (30 August 1889), p.174Google Scholar
8 This review appeared in many papers, including the Dundee Evening Telegraph, 24 September 1889, and the Chichester Observer, 25 September 1889. Although the core of the text remained broadly constant and is clearly by the same hand, some versions are longer or shorter, occasionally containing additional detail.
9 The Graphic, 5 October 1889; Oxfordshire Telegraph, 25 September 1889
10 For a representative selection of the press coverage of this affair see Cardiff Times, 12 June 1869; Western Mail, 13 October 1869; Western Daily Press, 27 October 1896, Cheltenham Chronicle, 2 November 1869; Bristol Times, 14 December 1869; Manchester Evening News, 12 January 1870; West Coast Times, 29 March 1870; there are also useful articles in the Western Mail, 17 and 19 September 1935, and in chapter 4 of Margaret Child-Villiers, Fifty one years of Victorian life (London: John Murray, 1922) -she was related by marriage to Jenkins.
11 See for example the Whitstable Bay and Kerne Bay Herald, 28 September, 12 October, 26 October and 23 November 1889; this appears to be the only paper that printed all four extracts.
12 Brisbane Courier, 28 December 1889; there is an- identical review in The Queenslander, 4 January 1890
13 For example in the Dundee Evening Telegraph, 24 September 1889
14 Electrical Engineer, new series, vol. 4, no. 9 (30 August 1889), p.174
15 Leamington Spa Courier, 7 April 1894
16 John Berley's Universal Electrical Directory and Advertiser, 1911, p.22; Electrical and Allied Trades Directory, 1917, p.29; Pall Mall Gazette, 26 November 1907; Pick-Me-Up, vol.7 (10 October 1891), p.31
17 Pick-Me-Up, vol.7 (10 October 1891), p.31
18 Baines, A.E. and Bowman, F.H. , Electro-pathology and therapeutics (London: Ewart, Seymour & Co., 1914), pp.108-109; Northern Whig, 7 March 1914Google Scholar
19 Westminster Gazette, 11 November 1920; The New Age, vol. 30, no. 7 (15 December 1921), pp.75-76
20 The Scotsman, 19 June 1918
21 The John Fender was purchased by the Eastern Telegraph Company in 1877; see https://atlantic-cable.com/Cableships/JohnPender(l)/index.htm(accessed 27.11.2020)
22 Baines, A.E. , Studies in electro-physiology (London: Routledge, 1918), p.xxvGoogle Scholar
23 Western Mail (Perth), 6 January 1927; Baines, A.E. Studies in electro-physiology, pp.271-272Google Scholar
24 Berley's, J.A Universal Electrical Directory and Advertiser, 1884, p.59Google Scholar
25 U.S. Congressional directory, 1888, p.216
26 West Middlesex Gazette, 20 April 1907; Middlesex and Surrey Express, 22 April 1907
27 Manchester Courier, 24 August 1889