12. Relations with indigenous people

Question 1

Challenges in India?

Answer 1

In the 1890s the British found opposition in the Indian Professional classes and nationalist newspapers
Tilak the editor of ‘Kesari’ and Paranjape who founded ‘Kaal’ in 1898 were sentenced to imprisonment for stirring up hostility in 1908 - released in 1910
Kaal was banned
The Young India organisation, founded in 1903, became the home of political activists who planned and carried out assassinations of British officials, including Arthur Jackson a magistrate
The partition of Bengal started the swadeshi campaign which carried out protests and most importantly boycotts of British goods, Bengal was reunited in 1911

Question 2

Challenges in Africa (Somaliland)?

Answer 2

Sayyid Hassan, religious warrior built up a force of 20,000 Dervish forces armed with Ottoman Empire weapons
Wanted to drive all Christians into the sea
From 1900 his forces raided British Somaliland
The British joined forces with the Emperor of Ethiopia but did not stop the raiders until after the First World War
The British lost the battle of Dul Madoba in August 1913 with their Camel Constabulary

Question 3

Challenges in Africa (West Africa)?

Answer 3

Colonel Cardew introduced the ‘hut tax’ and instead local chiefs maintained the roads
The locals resisted this
Cardew started a ‘scorched earth’ policy and hung 96 of the chief’s warriors
The primary adversary Chief Bureh was defeated in November 1898

Question 4

Challenges in Africa (Zanzibar)?

Answer 4

August 1896, suspicious death of pro-British leader Sultan Hamoud
Khalid bin Barghash assumed control of Zanzibar with his 6000 troops
The British heavily bombarded the city from ships anchored nearby and the war was over in less than two days

Question 5

Challenges in the Sudan?

Answer 5

Kitchener’s conquest of the Sudan was covered by the Daily Mail as the fall of ‘the worst tyranny in the world’
Battle of Omdurman and the fall of Khartoum 1898
Many Sudanese welcomed the fall of the Mahdist Regime as the Sudanese economy had declined and 50% of the population died through famine, disease and warfare
Took British more than 30 years to subdue the tribes in the south of the Sudan
The Sudanese did not agree with the implementation of a modern government, lad tenure rules and taxation
Tribes refused to pay tax or renounce their customs, the British acted heavily
33 British punitive expeditions
Mahdist uprisings in 1902-03, 1904, 1908
Public hangings without trial for the rebels
British increased economic development, telegraph poles and railway lines in the north of Sudan, Port Sudan opened in 1906, 1911 Gezira Scheme to provide high quality cotton for Britain

Question 6

Causes of the Second Boer War?

Answer 6

Cecil Rhodes became Prime Minister of the Cape in 1890 and heavily pushed for the collection of the Boer Republics into a South African Federation, in which the British and Cape would influence - stemmed from the Transvaal hurting his business with high tariffs and from his personal hatred of Paul Kruger
Transvaal was strong since 1886 discovery of gold on the Rand and then it opened a rail network to Portuguese-controlled port of Lourenco Marques
Chamberlian and Rhodes worried about Britain losing its dominance in the region
They then supported the Jameson raid which failed in 1895
Continuing clashes over the voting rights of Uitlanders
Alfred Milner, South African High Commissioner from 1897, was very aggressive with Kruger and at the Bloemfontein Conference of May-June 1899 he demanded voting rights to the Uitlanders, Kruger refused
In October 1899 Kruger issued an ultimatum which Milner refused and so the Boers attacked the Cape initiating war

Question 7

Consequences of the Second Boer War?

Answer 7

Kitchener started a ‘scorched earth policy and burnt farms and livestock
Boer families (mainly women and children) and black Africans were placed in concentration camps (20,000 died)
Boers surrendered in May 1902
War dragged on for over 2 and a half years
Cost £230,000
Involved 400,000 troops
22,000 British were killed
6000 Boer troops killed
Showed the vulnerability of the British imperial control
Had to call on troops from all over the Empire, mainly India, leaving other colonies badly defended
Dampened jingoism and led to a need for national efficiency
Treaty of Vereeniging May 1902 granted the Boers £3 million compensation for their farms
Milner worked to integrate the Boer and British economies
Transvaal given self-governing status in 1906
Orange River Colony given self-governing status 1907
Union of South Africa 1910, a British dominion