As one of twenty-one children of Queen Victoria's Surveyor-General, Grogan had to confront the question of whether to sink or swim early in life. He chose to follow the example of his headstrong Irish forebears, and swim. By the age of twenty-one he had: already been elected the youngest ever member of the Alpine Club; been sent down from Cambridge for his predilection for practical jokes; walked out of the Slade School of Art; and had become a veteran of the 1896 Matabele War, during which he served in Cecil Rhodes' personal escort.

In order to recover from his experiences as a "bloody trooper", Grogan took a sea voyage to New Zealand, where he fell in love with Gertrude Watt. But Gertrude's stepfather was not impressed by Grogan's credentials and told him that if he wanted her hand in marriage he had better prove himself. Grogan responded to this challenge with characteristic flamboyance, declaring that he intended to be the first man totrek from Cape Town to Cairo.

Having already completed the first leg of the trek (from Cape Town to Beira) during the Matabele War Grogan returned to Beira in February 1898 to start the 4,000-mile second leg to Cairo. He was accompanied by Arthur "Harry" Sharp, Gertrude's uncle, who shared his enthusiasm for big game hunting. Their plan was to strike north along the Rift Valley lakes-Nyasa, Tanganyika, Kivu, Victoria, Edward and Albert-and thence up the Nile, surveying a possible route for Rhodes' planned Cape-to-Cairo railway as they went. Although they used canoes or steamboats to negotiate their way up the lakes, the substantial distances between the lakes were covered on foot with the assistance of more than a hundred porters.

It was an expedition which called for the greatest powers of endurance, bravery and resourcefulness. Grogan and Sharp were bedevilled by ill-luck and the continual threat to their well-being posed by wild animals, successive bouts of malaria and dysentery, over-attentive Baleka cannibals, and the theft of vital pieces of equipment. Grogan subsequently described their experiences of central Africa as being "not polite", but eventually the caravan made it to the British Protectorate of Uganda. There, Sharp decided he had had enough. All but a handful of the porters were paid off and Grogan resolved to travel fast towards the Nile.

Having struggled most of the way through the marshlands of the Upper Nile, continually harassed by pugilistic Dinkas, Grogan and his retinue stumbled across a surveying expedition led by a Captain Dunn. This fortuitous meeting was Grogan's salvation: his supplies of both food and ammunition were completely spent.

In early 1900 Grogan returned to London a hero. He became the youngest man ever to address the Royal Geographical Society, and later in the year published the best-selling account of his trek, From The Cape to Cairo, before embarking on a lecture tour of America. In October, having proved his mettle, Grogan married Gertrude.

After serving in Lord Milner's elite "Kindergarten", the body charged with the post-war reconstruction of South Africa, Grogan became one of the pioneer white settlers in Kenya. There he and Lord DeIamere vied with each other as to who could do the most to further colonisation. Grogan's contribution was colossal. It included founding the country's timber and building materials industries, stocking its first trout, building its first deep-water port, and being one of its largest sisal growers. His foresight was so great that it was widely said of him that he was fifty years ahead of his time. In politics he was always to the fore as a public speaker and economist, and he served with distinction in World War I, earning the DSO.

After more than 60 years of usually controversial prominence in Kenyan public life, Grogan died unnoticed in Cape Town in 1967, aged 92. Asked in later life to reveal the secret of his longevity, Grogan replied, "to smoke very heavily, drink and eat very little, and not take anything in life too seriously".

Written with input from Edward Paice, the author of a new biography of Ewart Grogan, Lost Lion of Empire, to be published by HarperCollins in September 2000.

Published in Travel Africa Edition Eleven: Spring 2000 Text is subject to Worldwide Copyright (c)