This is the biography of an Anglo-Saxon American born 1846 in Hudson, NY, who, in the shake-up/-down that followed the Civil War, embarked on a spiritual quest leading, in his case, from “church-Christianity”, as he called it, through free thought on to Theosophy, to Buddhism and ultimately to Islam. After many years spent chiefly in journalism, and propelled by his thirst for oriental spirituality, he seized the opportunity in 1887 to become US Consul in the Philippines. He converted to Islam with his family after a brief correspondence with Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, controversial founder of the heretical Qadiyani/Ahmadi sect, without ever meeting a Muslim face to face. By 1893 he was back in Manhattan, where he established the headquarters of the American Islamic Propaganda, publishing two periodicals, thereby challenging to the Christian missionaries on their home turf. Later that year, all those invited from overseas having declined, he acted as the only Muslim representative at the Parliament of Religions on the fringe of the Chicago World Fair, which unbelievably  “Almost half of the total population of the United States at some time visited” (p.212). However, despite this early success, by 1896 the fizzling out of his financial backing from India coupled with allegations, never proven, of embezzling charitable funds, led to the collapse of his mission. Made Honorary Ottoman Consul-General in New York in 1901, partly in recognition for publishing pamphlets favourable to Sultan Abdul Hamid II’s Armenian policy, he slipped from notoriety into obscurity.

Beginning with a detailed, but fascinating, insight into society and culture in the 19^th century America from Webb’s birth to early adulthood, Abd-Allah rightly casts doubt on aspects of Webb’s own claims of his precocious rejection of the Trinity (p.49), redolent of the Prophet Muhammad’s childhood aversion to idols, but nevertheless shows how Webb’s spiritual path matched the Zeitgeist. What would have helped our understanding of his conversion, however, is a fuller account of the books on Islam available for him to read - Webb knew neither Arabic nor Persian. Mention is made of the influence of the Aligarh Movement (insufficiently distinguished from the apparently separate ‘Modernist Muslim Movement’, p.5 et passim), particularly Syed Ahmad Khan, Chiragh Ali, and Syed Ameer Ali, but without reference to specific books. The British Library’s and other catalogues reveals fewer than twenty titles published by these three thinkers in English before 1890, ranging from “A critical examination of the life and teachings of Mohammed” (1873) to “The Indian law reports” (1876) and “Hyderabad (Deccan) under Sir Salar Jung : an account of the Civil, Military and Public Works Departments” (1881). This makes one wonder to what extent he was converted not by the writings of Muslims but, ironically, of the now reviled Orientalists, including (p.152) R.B. Smith’s “Mohammed and Mohammedanism” (1875). Again, it would have been fascinating to learn with what works Webb stocked the library of his first headquarters.

Abd-Allah’s rejection of the relevance of the modern notion ‘Islamophobia’ applied to nineteenth century America, as other studies have done, appears absolutely correct. And though the author’s urge to gloss the obvious archaism (e.g. p.75: “&c [sic, i.e. etc.]” and “viz. [i.e. namely]”) seems superfluous, this remains a valuable and scholarly study, over a quarter of which is given over to the notes and index.

In the 21^st century, after 9/11, Camp Delta, the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, it may seem absurd to many, but for Webb and his educated contemporaries, no contradiction existed between being a proud American and steadfast adherence to Islam. Webb died in 1916, buried by a Unitarian woman minister, a Muslim bereft of co-religionist companionship.