This family biography begins with the story of Fred and Catherine Smithyman of Africa. They met in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, before the 1899 Boer War. After the Great War they moved to Zomba, Nyasaland. There they forged a life for their ten children. The second part follows the life of my father, Mervyn Vice Smithyman, who was one of their children. With Audrey, his new wife and my mother, he joined the British Colonial Administration in Tanganyika and took up political postings in remote villages. In 1956 our family moved to Zanzibar as the islands proceeded on a path to independence. This story ends with the events of the Zanzibar Revolution of 1964 and our departure from East Africa.