A deluxe production to accompany the diorama at the newly opened Gallery of Illustration in early 1850.
The Overland Route … was essentially a celebration of Thomas Waghorn, “an officer in the Bengal naval service and later in the Royal Navy, who had made the direct route between Britaind and India, via the Mediterranean, Alexandria, and Suez, more practicable by setting up a chain of resting places and hotels at strategic locations along the rigorous desert portions of the route. He had thus cut the time of the journey … to less than a month” (Altick).
Illustrating Waghorn’s route, the plates include several of Egypt, but also Jeddah, Mocha and Aden. Others include three of Great Britain, five of Spain and Portugal, Gibraltar, Malta, Algiers and three of India and Sri Lanka. “[A] consortium of artists [were employed], the theatrical scenery specialists Thomas Grieve and William Telbin, … David Roberts, and assistants who painted the human figures and the animals” (ibid). Other artists included Capt Robert Moresby, Lt Bellairs, Lt-Col D’Aguilar; Dr Moore, George Thompson, and Thomas Marsh Nelson.
Joachim Hayward Stocqueler (1801-1886), the prolific author, acted as a guide to the show and gave lectures. Stocqueler joined the army of the East India Company and arrived in India in 1819. He bought himself out of his contract and “became a clerk in India, serving in the secretariat of the commander-in-chief at Bombay, Sir Charles Colville, while also writing occasionally for the Bombay Argus. After briefly visiting England in 1826 he returned to India, where he edited several newspapers and journals, including Iris, the Bengal Hurkaru, the Bengal Herald, The Englishman, the Bengal Sporting Magazine, and the East India United Services Journal” (ODNB).
The show was a tremendous success “By the first anniversary of its opening, it had been shown 900 times and therehad been over 20 admissions” (Altick).
The Gallery of Illustration was originally built in 1824 by John Nash for his own use.
Not in Ibrahim-Hilmy; Altick, R.D., Shows of London … (London, 1978), p.207.
