10. Attitudes to empire - the role and influence of individuals Flashcards
Role of Joseph Chamberlain?
Opposed Gladstone’s proposal for Irish Independence and joined a conservative-led coalition as Colonial Secretary between 1895 and 1903
Initiated the Uganda Railway
Sanctioned the conquest and annexation of Ashantiland in the Gold Coast in 1900
Tried to develop closer imperial ties at the 1902 Colonial Conference with ‘Imperial preference’
1899 Chamberlain got £3m worth of colonial loans through parliament – Cyprus got a whole new irrigation and railway system, first railways were built in Sierra Leone, Lagos and the Gold Coast
Set up two Schools of Tropical Medicine and numeral institutes to research into better methods of colonial agriculture and husbandry
Seen as a national hero in the Second Boer war but as the war dragged on lost most of his prestige
Resigned in 1903
“I believe that the British race is the greatest of the governing races that the world has ever seen”
Role of Cecil Rhodes?
Secured Primeministership of the Cape in 1890
Established Fort Salisbury in Matabeleland 1890
Did this by using fighting the Matabele War in 1893 and taking the land against the Ndebele Kingdom
Used his vast fortune, political power and control of Cape newspapers he imposed the right of the British to rule Africa
Wanted to build a railway from the Cape to Egypt but was never completed due to German occupation of East Africa from 1891
Resigned as Prime Minister in 1896
His influence created the Round Table, an imperial pressure group established in 1910
Maintained Nyasaland through BSAC for the British until it was made a protectorate in 1907
Role of Viceroy Curzon?
Curzon did not believe that Indians were equals
Delhi Durbar 1903 and restored the Taj Mahal.
Promoted an Anglo-Indian nationality not a native Indian one
Appointed during conservative Imperialism
Created the North-West Frontier Province in 1901 and dispatched a military expedition to Tibet to defend against Russian expansion
Wanted to consolidate British control of India, created 6000 more miles of railway
Founded the Imperial Cadet Corps to give Indian Nobels military training and prospect of officer commissions
Division of Bengal caused his resignation in 1905
Role of Evelyn Baring?
Consul-General in Egypt from 1883-1907
Saw himself as a moral reformer as well as an administrator - “code of Christian morality is the only sure foundation on which the whole of our vast Imperial fabric can be built if it is to be durable”.
Established the ‘Granville Doctrine’ which allowed him to dismiss Egyptian Ministers
Worked well as Twefik was weak and happy to accept British guidance
Egyptian army disbanded
1892 the new leader Abbas Hilmi II comes to power and wants to throw off British rule
Baring bullied him into submission
He stopped slave trade
Outlawed the use of the kurbash
halted the import of hashish by establishing a camel corps
regulate alcohol sale licenses
stopped local money-lending and extortion by establishing the National Bank and Post Office Savings Bank
Forced to resign after Denshawai incident in 1906
Received £50,000 in 1907 for his service
Role of Alfred Milner?
Hand picked by Chamberlain to become Britain’s High Commissioner for Southern Africa from 1897
Regarded Africans as “children, needed and appreciating a just paternal government”
Founded ‘Milner Schools’ in Pretoria and Johannesburg
Demanded full citizenship rights for the Uitlanders after five years of residence
Was very aggressive with Kruger
By the Bloemfontein Conference (May-June 1899) he had decided that a war was the only way to get this
Kruger declared war in October 1899
Led the annexation of the Orange Free State in 1901
Became Governor of the Cape and the Orange free State
Negotiated the Peace of Vereeniging May 1902
Established ‘Milners Kindergarten’ after the war to resettle the Boers and promote economic growth
Hoped to attract British settlers and Anglicise the area
Most British settlers left due to the depression and the British brought in Chinese workers, the ‘Coolies’
Public outrage of the exploitation of the coolies
Contributing factor to the loss of the Conservative election in January 1906
