Travel Diaries and Journals

James Adam diary: 1857-1863 (Ms. Codex 1948)

Diary comprising two volumes spanning the years from 1857 to 1863 written by James Adam. Volume 1 contains Adam's descriptions his journey from Scotland to India as a medical officer. On August 15, 1857 Adam departed from London on a steamer ship the Candia. He wrote of his sea voyage including officers he traveled with, the weather, landscapes, missing his family, sea sickness, and miles traveled. He arrived at Kalkota on November 5, 1857. Adam worked at a hospital and witnessed a portion of the Indian Rebellion of 1857. In February 1858 Adam was deployed to the ship Belgravia to take charge of the wounded and sick at the South African Cape. He traveled with his servant Harold. Once anchored at Table Bay Adam described the native people, seeing Dr. Livingstone. Adam noted he had a muster of forty natives whom he reluctantly treated for skin diseases. There is a copy of a letter to his parents and pencil drawings of the Cape of Good Hope. On the journey back to Calcutta there was an incident with the captain regarding ailing horses. In June 1858 Adam mentioned seeing cholera cases, reading Waston and works on homeopathy. Adam also worked off of the H.M.S. Proserpine. In March 1859 Adam began his voyage back to England on the Ivanhoe he mentioned playing chess and catching fish. Reading volume 1 from back to front are poems and songs. One of the poems was "written on board the Candia". Tables of daily latitude and longitude for the voyages to India and England are in the volume. Some accounting of receipts and expenditures is in the volume. Adam arrived back in Edinburgh on August 5, 1859. Volume 2 commences in 1861. In sporadic entries Adam described his arrival and work at Bethnal House Asylum with Dr. Ritchie. and Dr. Miller. In August 1863 Adam wrote of his trip to Scotland and attending a wedding in Portobello. He mentioned seeing family members in Edinburgh. Reading volume 2 from back to front is a clipping of an epitaph for Lord Clyde pasted over writing in pencil. Adam wrote an autopsy of a young woman named Ann Jones aged 23. A majority of volume 2 is blank. Inscribed on the first leaf of volume 1: J. F. Adam journal, commenced August 13, 1857 on leaving home for the first time to sail for India. Inscribed on the last leaf of volume 1: James F. Adam, Surgeon, H.M.S. Proserpine. Volume 2 is inscribed: Private, Jame Adam M.D., January 20, 1861. https://franklin.library.upenn.edu/catalog/FRANKLIN_9977359130603681

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mercy from the maddened & infuriated watcher hands they had fallen in England

[clippings from Punch pasted over pencil text] PUNCH,

[August 29, 1863.

Colin Campell, Lord Clyde.

Died, Friday, August 14, Buried, Saturday, August 22, 1863.

Another great, grey-headed, chieftain gone To join his brethren on the silent shore! Another link with a proud past undone! Another stress of life-long warfare o'er!

Few months have passed since that grey head we saw Bending above the vault where OUTRAM slept; Lingering as if reluctant to withdraw From that grave-side, where sun-bronzed soldiers wept.

The thought filled many minds, is he the next To take his place within the Abbey walls? A gnarled trunk, by many tempests vext, That bears its honours high, even as it falls.

He is the next! the name that was a fear To England's swarthy foes, all India through, Is now a memory! No more fields will hear His voice of stern command, that rand so true.

The tartaned ranks he led and loved no more Will spring like hounds unleashed, at his behest; No more that eye will watch his soldiers o'er, As mother o'ers their babes, awake, at rest.

A life of roughest duty, from the day When with the boy's down soft upon his chin, He marched to fight, as others run to play, Like a young squire his knightly spurs to win.

And well won them ; in the fever-swamp, In foughten field, by trench and leaguered wall,

[pencil text] a Swan spreading her plumage as she goes. at last She leaves the river the passengers Crowd the decks & take a last look of their beloved. land gradually the outline of the white cliffs of old England

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It was a bright [afternoon scored through] morning in the month of August that month in which the heat of Summer gets mellowed down with a more genial temperature & the leaves lately so bright & green begin to assume a yellow tinge. That month also when the sportsmen seek the hills & glens [of the last of the brown scored through] [heath & shaggy wood scored through] & enjoy for a time the sport the bracing air & healthful exercise [written above of>in bonny Scotland ] & thus recruit the health broken down by living in the business of cities. It was in this month I say that a gallant ship lay moored in Southampton Docks. She was destined to receive the noble hearted men who [disregarding scored through] fling aside all the comforts of home & [parted from scored through] the society of their nearest & dearest friends, sought but to avenge the foul deeds done in the east, they had heard of Husbands Wives Children mangled torn limb from limb even the young & beautiful received no

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