Kitty and the Prince: A Victorian Tragedy

by Ben Shephard

The story of the love affair between Kitty Jewell and Prince Lobengula. A heart-breaking tale, a real mystery, and a window into Victorian attitudes to race, the beginnings of tabloid journalism, and feminism, in the 1890s. In short, a true story that has everything. In 1899, a South African showman chartered a liner and filled it with two hundred Africans, countless wild animals and a man who claimed to be the son of the Matabele king, Lobengula. He brought all these ingredients together at Earl's Court in London, in a show called 'Savage South Africa', which combined thrilling re-enactments of the Matabele Wars of the 1890s and a 'Kaffir Kraal', where the British public could wander among Africans in their natural setting. At first all went well. Then Prince Lobengula, the star of the show, caused a scandal by marrying Kitty Jewell, a pretty, respectable Cornish girl, 'There is something inexpressibly disgusting in the idea of the mating of a white girl with a dusky savage,' declared the Evening News. Kitty and the Prince tells of their doomed romance, of the taboos it broke and of what happened to both of them in Africa, London and Salford.

Hardcover

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Ben Shephard was an English historian, author and television producer. He was educated at Diocesan College, Cape Town and Westminster School. He graduated in history from Oxford University and he made many historical documentaries for the BBC and Channel 4, including producer of The World at War and The Nuclear Age.