John Hanning Speke

Speke accompanied Burton on his 1854-5 Somali Expedition, then again on the 1857-9 East Africa expedition, which aimed to find the sources of the Nile.   The expedition discovered Lake Tanganyika in 1858, and explored part of its extent. Speke supposed that Lake Victoria, which he discovered and named, while off on a foray of his own to the North of the chief route of the expedition, was the source of the Nile. 

Speke later returned to lead his own expedition, 1860-3, which confirmed that Lake Victoria is the chief reservoir of the Nile, though controversy over the question was kept alive for another decade, largely because of Burton's vigorous opposition.  Burton supposed the Tanganyika was the Nile reservoir, and that Victoria was a seasonal collection of lakes or lagoons with no outlet.  Speke died in a hunting accident in 1864.

Articles

'Journal of a Cruise on the Tanganyika Lake' and 'Captain J. H. Speke's Discovery of the Victoria N'Yanza Lake, Supposedly the Source of the Nile',
Blackwood's Magazine, 1859.

'Captain Speke's Adventures in Somali Land',
Blackwood's Magazine, 1860.

Books

Journal of the Discovery of the Nile Sources.

First edition of 1863.
Blackwood, London.

PDF Page Images.
HTML Transcription.

What Led to the Discovery of the Nile.

First edition of 1864.
Blackwood, London.

PDF Page Images.
HTML Transcription.