Event: John Clayton and Alice Rutherford were married offstage.
Source: This is not an actual date presented in Tarzan Of The Apes nor is it revealed by Edgar Rice Burroughs. April 31 is derived from the statement, that Clayton and Alice were married scarcely three months before receiving his first mission. The year 1871 is based on the fact that the Greystoke's set sail in May 1872.
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| Tarzan Of The Apes |
Date: July 15, 1871
Event: While in search of the Nile River's source, David Livingston witnessed the Nyangwe Massacre by Arab slavers.
Source: David Livingston's Field Diary.
Chat: ERB does not mention Livingston or Stanly in Tarzan Of The Apes. Chances are, however, the Nyangwe Massacre was the event that landed John Clayton a post in Walvis Bay, which is also not named in Tarzan Of The Apes.
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| David Livingston |
Event: John Clayton receives his first mission from the Colonial Office.
Source: This is not an actual date presented by Edgar Rice Burroughs in Tarzan Of The Apes. It is, however, derived from the statement that Clayton and Alice were married scarcely three months before receiving his first mission. It is important to note that when Clayton receives this mission Burroughs in no way implies that Lady Alice is with child, or that the newlyweds leave England immediately after receiving Clayton's mission.
In fact, Burroughs hints at the opposite. If Clayton was married to Alice for three months when they left Dover for Africa, they would have been married for four months when they reached Freetown. From Freetown, twelve days pass before the Fuwalda sights land and the Greystoke's are put ashore. On the thirteenth day, Clayton starts work on a one-room cabin that takes approximately two months to build and furnish. Now we have a passage of six months and thirteen days.
Burroughs tells us Clayton likes working hard because it helps him not to concentrate on their situation. By this statement, we can conclude that when the first section of the cabin was completed the Englishman immediately begin work on the second edition. If the first section took only one month, minus the door and furnishings, to build; it is simple logic that the second would take no longer. In fact, less time, for Clayton did not have to build a second chimney and fireplace.
Since the Mangani bull attacked while Clayton was cutting logs, it is quite apparent the Englishman was still involved in early building operations. Most likely, no more than two weeks at the most. Adding these passages of time together no more than eight months pass since the Greystokes were married, yet Lady Alice has a child that very night. Under these circumstances, Tarzan would have been born premature or Lady Alice was pregnant before marrying Clayton. The latter is very very unlikely for Burroughs plainly says Clayton is a very moral and honorable man.
It is also unlikely that the Colonial Office would take a man out of the Army, raise him to a higher position, and then send him and his wife of three months to Africa for five to eight years without letting them spend some time with relatives before they go. That is not to mention the fact that Clayton would have to have at least a minimum amount of training to handle his new position.
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| Tarzan Of The Apes |
Date: October 23, 1871
Event: David Livingston arrives in Ujiji, an Arab settlement on the eastern shore of Lake Tanganyika after exiting Nyangwe.
Source: Based on a historical fact.
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| Ujiji |
Date: November 19, 1871
Event: Henry Morton Stanley, hired by the New York Herald newspaper to find Livingston, found him in Ujiji.
Source: Based on a historical fact.
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| Stanley Meets Livingstone In Ujiji |
Event: Lady Alice becomes pregnant offstage.
Source: This is my own provided date derived from counting backward nine months from the day Tarzan was born. One must keep in mind that although Burroughs does not mention that Lady Alice is with a child when Clayton receives his first Colonial Office assignment, the narrator does imply that she is before they set sail in May. "In his leisure Clayton read, often aloud to his wife, from the store of books he had brought for their new home. Among those were many for little children - picture books, primers, readers - for they had known that their little child would be old enough for such before they might hope to return to England." ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
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| Tarzan Of The Apes |
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.
