约翰汉宁斯皮克是一个36，当他的尼罗河杂志出现的人。他曾在1844年进入军队，并完成服务10年在印度，通过旁遮普运动服务。他已经怀了孕，探索非洲的想法，在他10年来增长，并在他们的最后，他被任命为准备下的理查德爵士（当时中尉伯顿）开始向索马里国家考察的成员。他受伤的索马里人，并返回到英格兰病假;克里米亚战争爆发后，通过它可以送达，后来，1856年12月，参加在伯顿另一个探险。然后是，对尼罗河源头的可能性上溯到内陆湖之一，似乎打了他。
    伯顿的疾病预防后者陪同他访问现在被称为维多利亚湖的尼安萨斯皮克。在这次远征斯皮克到达湖最南端点，并给它现名。斯皮克返抵
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    John Hanning Speke was a man of thirty-six, when his Nile Journal appeared. He had entered the army in 1844, and completed ten years of service in India, serving through the Punjab Campaign. Already he had conceived the idea of exploring Africa, before his ten years were up, and on their conclusion he was appointed a member of the expedition preparing to start under Sir Richard (then Lieutenant Burton) for the Somali country. He was wounded by the Somalis, and returned to England on sick leave; the Crimean War then breaking out, be served through it, and later, December 1856, joined another expedition under Burton. Then it was that the possibility of the source of the Nile being traced to one of the inland lakes seems to have struck him.
    Burton's illness prevented him accompanying Speke on the latter's visit to the lake now known as Victoria Nyanza. During this expedition Speke reached the most southerly point of the lake, and gave it its present name. Speke arrived back in England in the spring of 1859, Burton being left behind on account of his illness. The relations between the two had become strained, and this was accentuated by Speke's hast to publish the account of his explorations. He was given the command of another expedition which left England in April 1860, in company with Captain James Augustus Grant, to ascertain still further if the Victoria Nyanza were indeed the source of the Nile. He met Sir Samuel Baker, to whom he gave valuable assistance, and who with his clue discovered the third lake, Albert Nyanza.
    Speke telegraphed early in 1863, that the Nile source was traced. Returning to England that year he met with an ovation, and addressed a special meeting of the Geographical Society, and the same year, 1863, published his "Journal of the Discovery of the Nile." Opposed in his statements by Burton and M'Queen (The Nile Basin, 1864"), it was arranged that he and Burton should meet for a debate, when on the very day fixed, Speke accidentally shot himself while out partridge-shooting.