Epilogue

Almost Home ◽  
2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruma Chopra
Keyword(s):  
British Empire ◽  
West Indian ◽  
British Government ◽  
Labor Shortage ◽  
Return Home ◽  
Sugar Plantations

When the British Empire abolished slavery in 1833, their West Indian colonies confronted a severe labor shortage. Caribbean elites knew that slaves despised fieldwork and would not be ready to voluntarily perform the labor they had endured as slaves. Unprepared to forgo the profits of sugar plantations, the British government looked to Africa and Asia for new sources of dependent labor. The Maroons of Trelawney Town unexpectedly found a route to return home.

A West Indian Midwife’s Tale

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine Paugh
Keyword(s):  
Population Growth ◽  
Family Life ◽  
West Indian ◽  
Wage Labor ◽  
British Government ◽  
Costs Of Reproduction ◽  
Radical Reform ◽  
Registry System ◽  
Sugar Market ◽  
The Caribbean

The abolition of the Atlantic slave trade by the British government in 1807 was prompted by a confluence of geopolitical developments and concerns about reproduction. Shifts in the Atlantic world sugar economy had led to a glut on the British sugar market, and boosting production was therefore less of an economic concern than safeguarding reproduction. After 1807, demographic and financial calculations regarding the future of the plantation system intensified with the institution of a registry system designed to track slave populations. By 1823, British politicians, both abolitionists and West Indian planters, agreed to further radical reform: they hoped that encouraging Christian marital mores would finally bring about economically beneficial population growth. Acts legalizing Afro-Caribbean marriage were subsequently passed throughout the Caribbean. The outcome of this new emphasis on family life was ironic: as slavery gave way to wage labor, the costs of reproduction were shifted to Afro-Caribbean parents.

IV. The Colonial Office and the Abolition of Slavery

1971 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 723-734 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Reckord
Keyword(s):  
West Indian ◽  
Slave System ◽  
British Government ◽  
House Of Commons ◽  
The West ◽  
Reform Programme ◽  
Viable Solution ◽  
Indian Slavery ◽  
Slave Population ◽  
Colonial Office

Under pressure from the anti-slavery interest in the House of Commons, the British Government undertook, in 1823, to reform West Indian slavery and prepare the slaves for eventual freedom. This policy of amelioration was based on the assumption that the West Indian planters would co-operate with the British Government to improve slave conditions. As George Canning explained to the House of Commons, ‘The masters are the instruments through whom, and by whom, you must act upon the slave population.’ Ten years later the reform programme was abandoned in favour of abolition. This change of policy reflected, in part, the conversion of officials at the Colonial Office who began to urge the need for emancipation in 1831. For eight years the Colonial Office made persistent efforts to induce the co-operation of the West Indian planters; these attempts failed and a mass of evidence accumulated which suggested that the slave system could not be improved, it could only be abolished. This article demonstrates the efforts made by the Colonial Office to effect amelioration in the legislative colonies with particular reference to Jamaica and the nature of the evidence which demonstrated that emancipation was the only viable solution to the problem of West Indian slavery.

Mutinies after War

2021 ◽  
pp. 166-190
Author(s):  
Keith Grint
Keyword(s):  
Far East ◽  
First World War ◽  
Canadian Forces ◽  
British Government ◽  
World War ◽  
Canadian Army ◽  
The Far East ◽  
The First World War ◽  
Return Home ◽  
First World

If mutinies are significant threats to those military parties facing defeat during wars, they are still more dangerous to the victors after the war is ended, when those conscripted for the duration of the war are desperate to return home. This chapter covers three such mutinies: those affecting British forces in 1918 and 1919; those facing Canadian forces in 1919; and finally the mutiny that literally grounded the RAF in 1946 in India and the Far East. The first cases occur in the south of England and France as the First World War is ending, but Churchill in particular was keen to retain both naval and army units to continue the fight against the fledgling Bolshevik regime. What is intriguing about these is just how militant the mutineers were and how the British government treated them with kid gloves, unlike those in the British Foreign Labour units who we meet in chapter 6. For the Canadian army the problem starts in Russia but end up in Wales, as the troops kick their heels waiting to return home and frustrations boil over into gunfights near Rhyl in 1919. Finally, we consider the similar issues prevailing over the RAF in India and the Far East as it becomes clear to the subordinates that they are a long way from home and have little immediate prospect of going home—unless they mutiny.

British Communists, the British Empire and the Second World War

2004 ◽  
Vol 65 ◽  
pp. 117-135 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neil Redfern
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
British Empire ◽  
Great Majority ◽  
Second World War ◽  
British Government ◽  
World War ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
War Effort ◽  
Second World

For a few years after its foundation in 1920 the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) attempted, energetically prompted by the Comintern, to work in solidarity with anticolonial movements in the British Empire. But after the Nazi victory in Germany the Comintern's principal concern was to defend the Soviet Union and the liberal democracies against the threat of fascism. British communists criticized the British Government for failing to defend the Empire against the threat from its imperial rivals. After the entry of the Soviet Union into the war in 1941 they vigorously supported the British war effort, including the defense of Empire. This was not though simply a manifestation of chauvinism. British communists believed that imperialism was suffering a strategic defeat by “progressive” forces and that colonial freedom would follow the defeat of fascism. These chimerical notions were greatly strengthened by the allies' promises of postwar peace, prosperity and international cooperation. In the last year or so of war British communists were clearly worried that these promises would not be redeemed, but nevertheless supported British reassertion of power in such places as Greece, Burma and Malaya. For the great majority of British communists, these were secondary matters when seen in the context of Labour's election victory of 1945 and its promised program of social-imperialist reform.

scholarly journals Starving Ireland, Hungry Australia: The Irish Female Orphan Emigration Scheme, 1848-1850

2010 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily Lieffers
Keyword(s):  
British Empire ◽  
Physical Appearance ◽  
British Government

From 1848-50, the British government sent 4,175 famine-stricken orphan girls from Ireland to Australia to give them a better life and fulfill population needs in the colony. The controversy surrounding the orphan emigration scheme suggests that prejudices against the Irish and their poverty were easily exported to a colonial setting. The girls’ physical appearance and ignorance, largely a result of poverty and terrible conditions in workhouses, were taken as racial deficiencies, while their religion was viewed as a threat. This orphan scheme is thus a valuable case study for historians seeking to explore the limits of colonial citizenship in the British Empire and to reinvigorate historiography concerning Anglo-Irish relations in the Famine era.

An Uncertain Inheritance: The Imperial Travels of Legal Migrants, from British India to Ottoman Iraq

2014 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 749-772 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Stephens
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Middle East ◽  
British Empire ◽  
Legal Systems ◽  
British Government ◽  
British India ◽  
Princely State ◽  
Uncertain Outcomes ◽  
The Doors

Like many nineteenth-century travelers, Iqbal al-Daulah, a cousin of the Nawab of the Indian princely state of Awadh, navigated multiple legal systems as he migrated across Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. Living through the absorption of Awadh into the expanding British Empire, he eventually joined a community of Indian Shias in Ottoman Iraq, who regularly used British consular courts. While still in India, Iqbal al-Daulah composed a tribute in Persian and English to British justice. He described British courts in the following laudatory terms: “What Ease is afforded to Petitioners! The Doors of the numerous Courts being open, if any by reason of his dark fate, should be disappointed in the attainment of his desire, in one Court, in another he may obtain the Victory and Succeed.” Iqbal al-Daulah secured a sizeable pension and knighthood from the British government. However, at the end of his life, he had lost faith in British courts. In his will he lamented: “British courts are uncertain, stock in trade of bribery, wrong, delay…the seekers of redress, are captives of the paw of the Court officials; and business goes on by bribery not to be counted or described.” Despite Iqbal al-Daulah's words of caution, his friends and relatives became enmeshed in legal battles over his inheritance in British courts in India and Ottoman Iraq. In doing so, they joined the crowds of colonial subjects who flooded the courts, enduring expense and annoyance despite the prospect of uncertain outcomes.

Newfoundland Reverts to the Status of a Colony

1934 ◽  
Vol 28 (5) ◽  
pp. 895-900 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert A. MacKay
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
British Empire ◽  
West Indian ◽  
Responsible Government ◽  
The Status ◽  
History Of ◽  
Commonwealth Of Nations ◽  
British Commonwealth ◽  
British Commonwealth Of Nations

Newfoundland, which proudly boasts that she is “Britain's oldest colony,” which has enjoyed responsible government since 1855, and which has been ranked by the Statute of Westminister as one of the Dominions of the British Commonwealth of Nations, voluntarily reverted to the status of a crown colony governed by a commission responsible to Whitehall. The event is without precedent in the history of the Empire. While certain West Indian colonies which have enjoyed representative assemblies have voluntarily given up their elected legislatures, no colony which had attained responsible government has ever before renounced it. The incident is sufficiently unique to be of interest alike to students of the history of the British Empire and of political science in general.

Britain's Intervention in Malaya: The Origin of Lord Kimberley's Instructions to Sir Andrew Clarke in 1873

1961 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 47-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. MacIntyre
Keyword(s):  
British Empire ◽  
Political Control ◽  
British Government ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Government ◽  
New Phase

It is well known that British political control in the Malay States began with the Pangkor agreement of January 1874, which was soon followed by the appointment of the first Resident in Perak. The Earl of Kimberley's famous instructions' of 20 September 1873 have generally been accepted as providing the basis for this new phase in the history of Malaya and of the British empire. Sir Andrew Clarke was told that the conduct of Britain's relations with the Malay States which were not subject to Siamese influence, would be an important part of his duties as governor. Since growing anarchy was injuring trade and British interests generally, the government had to consider whether it could do anything to improve matters in the States. Although the British government had no desire to interfere in the affairs of the Peninsula, said Kimberley, Clarke should inquire into the condition of each state and report any steps which the Straits government could take to restore peace and to protect trade. Kimberley also added the often-quoted words:“I would wish you especially to consider whether it would be advisable to appoint a British Officer to reside in any of the Malay States. Such an appointment would only be made with the full consent of the native government.…”

CHANGING LANGUAGES OF EMPIRE AND THE ORIENT: BRITAIN AND THE INVENTION OF THE MIDDLE EAST, 1917–1918

2007 ◽  
Vol 50 (3) ◽  
pp. 645-667 ◽  
Author(s):  
JAMES RENTON
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Ottoman Empire ◽  
British Empire ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
British Government ◽  
War Effort ◽  
International Demand ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Military ◽  
The Great War

ABSTRACTDuring the last two years of the Great War the British government undertook a global propaganda campaign to generate support for the military advance into the Near East, British post-war domination of the region, and the war effort in general. The objective was to transform how the West and the peoples of the Ottoman empire perceived the Orient, its future, and the British empire. To fit with the international demand that the war should be fought for the cause of national self-determination, the Orient was re-defined as the Middle East: a region of oppressed nations that required liberation and tutelage by Britain and the entente. Great Britain was portrayed as the pre-eminent champion of the principle of nationality, which was behind its move into the Middle East. It is argued in this article that these narratives constituted a significant change in Western representations of the Orient and the British empire.

scholarly journals ‘The grand strategy of an observatory’: George Airy's vision for the division of astronomical labour among observatories during the nineteenth century

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Belteki
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
British Empire ◽  
Division Of Labour ◽  
Public Utility ◽  
Grand Strategy ◽  
British Government ◽  
Royal Observatory ◽  
Vast Network

The downfall of the Parramatta Observatory during the 1840s led the British Government to reconsider the funding it provided to observatories. George Biddell Airy—the Astronomer Royal at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich—recommended the establishment of a central Colonial Board of Visitors (based in London) to oversee the management of observatories within the British Empire. The recommendation ultimately never materialized, but it showcased the support of the astronomical community and the British Government for centralizing the management of the vast network of observatories. This centralized vision continued to influence the founding of new observatories and the organization of their work. The article examines Airy's vision of a centralized organization of division of labour among observatories through his involvement in the discussions about the Colonial Board of Visitors. It also examines how he continued supporting the same vision through articles about the work of observatories, and through written advice about establishing observatories. The article demonstrates how he envisioned the grand strategy of an observatory to encompass public utility while also fitting it within the general policy of observatories in relation to the division of astronomical labour.

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