The database holds information on people of European origin who lived and worked in East Africa from about 1880 to 1939.

It concentrates mainly on Kenya, but there are a some entries for Uganda and Tanzania .

It was begun by Peter Ayre, who worked on it from 1993 until his death in 2018. His interest in East African history and its participants had developed from his business as a dealer in second-hand books about East Africa. The sources are books, journals, newspapers, magazines, private papers and emails, Club records, cemeteries, schools, baptismal and marriage registers, and recorded interviews. After Peter Ayre died Christine Nicholls took over work on the database, editing it and adding a great deal of new information and uploading the database to the internet. It is an ongoing project.

The database is searchable. If you have any corrections or additional information, please contact Christine Nicholls at cs.nicholls@tiscali.co.uk, and she will add it to the database.  She also has a website at http://www.christinenicholls.co.uk

Peter Ayre’s wife Caro (caro25ayre@gmail.com) has a vast collection of the database source books, which are for sale – see https://caroayre.co.uk and https://www.abebooks.co.uk/peter-j-ayres-books-somerset/92468/sf

Notes:

Dates appear in two forms: 12/2/1894 and 12 Feb 1894. The former style was discontinued after it was misinterpreted in the USA, where the month is placed before the day.

To see full citations of the abbreviated references, click on Sources on the database homepage.

Christine Nicholls