Travels with my mother

Their house in Geita, with the new dog, Ajax.

In September 1954, my father was finally given the promotion he had been seeking to District Commissioner but this meant moving to Geita, a small town a little further west from Mwanza, also bordering Lake Victoria. They were very sad to leave Mwanza with all their friends, sailing and my mum’s good job, but it was close enough to visit for parties and weekends.

Geita, with the new dog, Ajax.

We caught the 8.30 ferry, me with the car, Tom in a lighter with all the boxes…our house is an adorable red-brick thatched gingerbread cottage with a beautifully laid out garden with really lovely flowering shrubs. Tom is very pleased with the prospect of being here and eventually becoming DC In 1954.

Work involved supervising local elections and even officiating at a marriage! Honouring Queen and country was always important. There was ‘a big do on Empire Day…Tom inspected a Guard of Honour of Police in full uniform and then took the salute and the march past. He delivered a speech in Swahili.’ Dad was a real linguist and spoke perfect classical Swahili – something they were both proud of.

For the Queens official birthday, ‘Tom had arranged that a platoon of police should come from Mwanza for a parade…A large number of people gathered at the Boma to watch all this, Tom and Tom Moon [the DO] were in their uniforms and it was all very smart and well done, complete with bugles, three cheers for the Queen. Afterwards we had over 100 people to our house in the garden, to drink the Queens health – and we had some tribal dances and drums. Quite a noisy do…we had breakfast the next day in relays.’ It all sounds fun, but with limited staff and supplies, these occasions were extremely stressful for my mum:

Yes I do all the cooking…we entertain a lot…dinner at 8 for 8 is quite a business when you do it all yourself and 4 courses at that…I have engaged a cook…I can manage the meals but its the cakes and pastries I fail over…all this is done on a stove that burns wood and in a kitchen with no sink…

We were on safari all last week…visited parts of the district where we neither of us had been before including two small gold mines, one owned and run by a Chinaman and the other by S Africans. Stayed one night in a RC mission with a White Father we know well, camped in a tent for two nights and spent the 4th in a rest house at one of the native courts.

They were only in Geita for just over a year, as after a short leave to Uganda, Congo, Rwanda and Burundi (see separate page) they were posted to Tukuyu in November 1955.