I'm trying to track down a small book published by the Andover Advertiser in the late 1920s / early 1930s, called Behind Mount Lion – treks and tours in Sierra Leone by Lt. Harold James Holmes, who went under the pseudonym 'Homo'. I've seen this book on booksellers' lists, but I can't track it down in any UK libraries and I wonder if any readers of the Advertiser had a copy at all?

I'm researching the history of the Sierra Leone Railway for a group that supports the Sierra Leone National Railway Museum, which amazingly survived their civil war.

As far as my research has got, Holmes' account is one of the earliest accounts of travelling on Sierra Leone's railway, which was controversially scrapped in the 1970s.

His account predates Graham Greene's famous journey recounted in Journey without Maps. 

The talk I'm researching will raise awareness and funds for the museum in Freetown, the Friends are a registered charity run by volunteer trustees, so all our fundraising benefits the museum.

But we don't do handouts - we help them buy supplies to maintain and restore the collection, which they couldn't otherwise afford, we help the team set up heritage clubs with local schools and with community events (the museum is a real community venue), and we curatorial training and staff visits to the UK to learn about railway preservation and heritage management.

Here's the link where people can find out what we're about - sierraleonerailwaymuseum.org/help-us-now. 

If anyone can help, or would like to know more, please email me on tprocter40@googlemail.com

Tim Procter

York

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