Kitty and the Prince: A Victorian Tragedy

In 1899, a South African showman chartered a liner and filled it with 200 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 trying to marry Kitty Jewell, a pretty, respectable Cornish girl. 'There is nothing more disgusting than the mating of a white woman and a black savage,' declared the Daily Mail. This is the story of their doomed love affair, of the taboos it broke and of what happened to both of them in Africa, London and Salford.