Lillibullero or The Golden Road

Zanzibar: Printed Privately, 1944. The hand-numbered, limited, privately printed issue of the first edition. Half leather. Lillibullero or The Golden Road contains the author’s reminiscences of the colorful Tich Miles in the Northern Frontier District of Kenya in the first half of the twentieth century. Though certainly not common (the book can be fairly readily found in first and later editions) we have not previously encountered a copy thus – the numbered and limited issue of the first edition. This copy is hand numbered on the copyright page “No. 14” of 100 copies privately printed in Zanzibar in 1944, and is finely bound in half green morocco over green cloth boards with raised spine bands, gilt print and rules, head and foot bands, gilt top edge, and marbled endpapers.

The author, Eric Aldhelm Torlogh Dutton (1895-1973) was a British veteran, civil servant, and writer. Dutton was educated at Oxford and served during the First World War in Gallipoli. He passed the Indian Civil Service examination in 1920 and in the same year was appointed as private secretary to Sir Robert Coryndon, Governor of Uganda and subsequently of Kenya. Dutton worked with Coryndon until 1925 at which point he became private secretary to Lieutenant Colonel Sir Edward Grigg, Governor of Kenya (1925-1930). In 1930, Dutton transferred to Northern Rhodesia where he held the posts of principal assistant chief secretary (1930), chairman of the Northern Rhodesian Finance Commission (1932), chairman of the Town Planning Board (1935), and administrative secretary (1938). He was also deputy to the governor for various periods between 1932 and 1937. Dutton was appointed to the post of colonial secretary in Bermuda in 1938. He left this post in 1942 and transferred to Zanzibar where he was chief secretary (1942-1952), chairman of the Town Planning Board (1943-1952), and chairman of the Central Development Authority (1946-1952). During 1948 he was also a delegate at the First African Conference in London. He was awarded the OBE (1930), CBE (1938), CMG (1946), and was appointed Commander of the Crown of Belgium, and Commander of the Order of Brilliant Star (2nd class) of Zanzibar (1947). (Biographical information from The Bodleian Library) Born in England, Arthur “Tich” Miles arrived in Kenya in 1909 at the age of nineteen, where he made a name for himself as a soldier, entrepreneur, administrator, and raconteur, dying in 1934 at the age of 45.

The book is in fine condition. The half-morocco binding is exceptional, with no wear, soiling, or fading. The contents remain bright and clean, with no previous ownership marks and only a trace of intermittent spotting, substantially confined to prelims and page edges.