Date: very late January or very early February 1872
Event: Lady Alice discovers she is with child and the Greystokes buy child provisions to take along to Africa.
Source: This event could take place any time between very late January and very early February 1872 and be consistent with ERB's storyline. This theory is based on the premise that most women are approximately two months pregnant before they discover it.
Event: Lady Alice discovers she is with child and the Greystokes buy child provisions to take along to Africa.
Source: This event could take place any time between very late January and very early February 1872 and be consistent with ERB's storyline. This theory is based on the premise that most women are approximately two months pregnant before they discover it.
Date: May 14, 1872
Event: Greystokes set sail from Dover, England.
Source: In Tarzan Of The Apes, Burroughs states it is on a "bright May morning." The author does not reveal the exact day in May.
Event: Greystokes set sail from Dover, England.
Source: In Tarzan Of The Apes, Burroughs states it is on a "bright May morning." The author does not reveal the exact day in May.
Chat: This is a very important event and to form a solid chronology, we must produce some sort of acceptable calendar date. Since we have no ERB-provided clues to work with, I will resort to the Memoirs Of A War Bride to see if any noteworthy occasions occurred in May 1872 that could possibly be used as a source. I discovered the author's brother, Frank, was born on May 14. Until a more researched date is provided I will use May 14, 1882, as a working date.
Date: June 14, 1872
Event: Greystoke's arrive at Freetown where they chartered the barkentine Fuwalda.
Source: "A month later," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Event: Greystoke's arrive at Freetown where they chartered the barkentine Fuwalda.
Source: "A month later," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: June 16, 1872
Event: In the morning of the second day aboard the Fuwalda, Captain Billings shot Black Michael in the leg.
Source: "The morning of the second day," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Event: In the morning of the second day aboard the Fuwalda, Captain Billings shot Black Michael in the leg.
Source: "The morning of the second day," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: June 18, 1872
Event: On the fourth day aboard the Fuwalda, Clayton came on deck that morning just in time to see the limp body of one of the crew, being carried below by four sailors while the first mate stood glowering with a heavy belaying pin in his hand.
Source: "The second day after the wounding of Black Michael," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Event: On the fourth day aboard the Fuwalda, Clayton came on deck that morning just in time to see the limp body of one of the crew, being carried below by four sailors while the first mate stood glowering with a heavy belaying pin in his hand.
Source: "The second day after the wounding of Black Michael," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: noon June 19, 1872
Event: At noon the Fuwalda passed a British man-of-war.
Source: "The following day" ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Event: At noon the Fuwalda passed a British man-of-war.
Source: "The following day" ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: June 20, 1872
Event: The Fuwalda mutiny.
Source: "The next morning," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Event: The Fuwalda mutiny.
Source: "The next morning," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: June 25, 1872
Event: The Fuwalda sights land and that night ERB mentions for the first time that Lady Alice is pregnant.
Source: "On the fifth day following the murder of the ship's officers land was sighted." ERB-
Event: The Fuwalda sights land and that night ERB mentions for the first time that Lady Alice is pregnant.
Source: "On the fifth day following the murder of the ship's officers land was sighted." ERB-
Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: June 26, 1872
Event: The Greystokes are put ashore with all their belongings and Clayton builds a tree shelter. That night the two saw their first Mangani.
Source: "Early next morning" ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. "At night upon their first day upon land," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Event: The Greystokes are put ashore with all their belongings and Clayton builds a tree shelter. That night the two saw their first Mangani.
Source: "Early next morning" ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. "At night upon their first day upon land," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: June 27, 1872
Event: Clayton begins work on a one-room cabin.
Source: The morning after seeing the Mangani, ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Event: Clayton begins work on a one-room cabin.
Source: The morning after seeing the Mangani, ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: July 27, 1872
Event: Clayton finishes a one-room cabin built of small logs about six inches in diameter and completely covered on the outside with four inches of mud. He had also completed a stone fireplace and chimney but had not yet made a door or furnishings.
Source: "Took the better part of a month," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Source: "Took the better part of a month," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Chat: Any calendar day in late July 1872 fits the presented storyline. To keep life simple I used 30 days as a working date until someone provides a better-researched one.
Date: August 14, 1872
Event: British warships search for the Fuwalda and find her wreckage on the shores of St. Helena.
Source: "Two months after the Greystoke's leave Freetown," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes
Event: British warships search for the Fuwalda and find her wreckage on the shores of St. Helena.
Source: "Two months after the Greystoke's leave Freetown," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes
Date: August 27, 1872
Event: Clayton hung the cabin door, completed the furnishings, and moved all their belongings inside.
Source: "By the end of the second month they were all settled," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Event: Clayton hung the cabin door, completed the furnishings, and moved all their belongings inside.
Source: "By the end of the second month they were all settled," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: September 1, 1872
Event: A Mangani bull attacks Clayton while he is working on an addition to the cabin. That night Lady Alice gives birth to a healthy son.
Source: This event is impossible to calendar date with an undebatable date because Burroughs skips some time without telling us how much. "One afternoon while Clayton was working upon an addition to their cabin he was interrupted by a group of fleeing monkeys," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. As you can see there is no way to present an undebatable date by using this source only. By using other passages and the Burroughs family genealogy, Memoirs Of A War Bride, we can arrive at a very logical working date.
Event: A Mangani bull attacks Clayton while he is working on an addition to the cabin. That night Lady Alice gives birth to a healthy son.
Source: This event is impossible to calendar date with an undebatable date because Burroughs skips some time without telling us how much. "One afternoon while Clayton was working upon an addition to their cabin he was interrupted by a group of fleeing monkeys," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. As you can see there is no way to present an undebatable date by using this source only. By using other passages and the Burroughs family genealogy, Memoirs Of A War Bride, we can arrive at a very logical working date.
ERB says the one-room cabin was built, furnished, and moved into by the second month. If Clayton begins work on June 27th, that means the Greystokes were well settled by August 27th. Once the first room was completed it is most probable Clayton began working on the second addition almost immediately. "There is but one thing to do, Alice, and that is work. Work must be our salvation. We must not give ourselves time to think, for in that direction lies madness," ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Since Clayton was cutting down a tree for building purposes when the Mangani bull attacked him, it is obvious the Englishman was just beginning the expansion. In fact, the second edition was so early in its beginning stages that Clayton was just beginning to cut timber for future construction. When Tarzan investigated his father's cabin, at age ten, for the first time, nowhere in any of the descriptions does it hint at a semi-erected second room?
When the Porter party was beached twenty years after the cabin was built, there is no hint of a semi-erected second room. The Greystoke cabin, in all provided descriptions, has only one room. From these disclosures, it is perceivable that the Mangani attacked Clayton within a few days of his August twenty-seventh completion of the first edition.
Chat: Since no calendar date is provided by the author for Tarzan's birth date, a researcher must come up with an acceptable working date to continue the chronology. To find out the exact date I will once again depend on the Burroughs family genealogy, Memories Of A War Bride, to provide a credible date that the author could use as a source. That day is September 1st, the author's own birthday.
About The Author
James Michael Moody is a lifelong fan and collector of Edger Rice Burroughs. Moody has contributed over two hundred articles to various ERB-related fanzines, over a span of forty-five years. He also manages an unauthorized Tarzan blog titled, Greystoke Chronologist: James Michael Moody. There the researcher chronologies the Tarzan books starting in May 1872 (known as the pushback theory).instead of the more excepted date May 1888.
James Michael Moody is also the author of the action-packed Sci-Fi fantasy adventure Unium series. Pioneers On Unium, published December 31, 2019, and Exiled On Unium, published August 25, 2022. Swordsman On Unium is going through the publishing process.
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