Relations with indigenous peoples (1890-1914)

Question 1

Describe the local challenge in British Somaliland:

Answer 1

• Sayyid Hassan: a self styled Somali religious warrior known to the Br as the Mad Mullah - saw it as his duty to resist Br authority:
• Hassan built up a force of 20,000 Dervish forces armed with wepaons from Ottoman Empire
• Aim to drive all Christian forces into the sea
• 1900 onwards - His forces mounted raids on Br Somaliland antagonising local communities
• To counter this - Br conducted joint militray action with Ethiopia’s EMperor Menelik - no conclusive success
• Dervish victory over the Br outnumbered ‘Camel Constabulary’ at the Battle of Dul Madoba Aug 1913
• Never fully suppressed till after WW1

Question 2

Describe the local challenge in Zanzibar:

Answer 2

• Br control challenged briefly by Khalid bin Barghash who assumed power Aug 1896 following suspicious death of the pro Br sultan Hamoud
• Khalid commanded 3000 men
• But he quickly fled following heavy bombardment from br ships anchored nearby
• This challenge lasted 2 days

Question 3

Describe the local challenge in West Africa:

Answer 3

• 1898 - Br GG of Sierra Leone - Colonel Cardew
• Introduced a new severe tax on dwellings - HUT TAX
• Insisted that local chiefs organise their followers to maintain roads
• Demands - reistance
• Cardew adopted scorched earth policy
• This tactic secured surrender from Cardew’s main adversary: Chief Bai Bureh - Nov 1898
• Hundreds killed in the process
• Cardew had 96 of the chief worrier’s hanged - although on this matter - went against Br govn.

Question 4

What demonstrates economic development in the Sudan by the British?

Answer 4

• Mainly in the Nile Valley area
• telegraoh and railway lines extended the link to key areas in northern Sudan
• Port Sudan opened - 1906 - as the country’s principal outlet to sea
• 1911 - a joint government/private initiative set up the Gezira Scheme to provide high-quality cotton for Br’s txtile industry and there were improvements in irrigation systems.

Question 5

Describe the local challenge in Sudan:

Answer 5

• Kitchener conquest of Egyptian Sudan - Battle of Omdurman - fall of Khartoum in 1898 - reported in the Daily Mail as having secured the ‘downfall of the worst tyranny in the world’.
• It took teh Br more than 30 years to subdu the tribes in the S of Sudan.
• Br atteempted to modrnise govn intrdouce new penal codes, establish land tenure rules and establish a system of taxation for the 1st time in Sudan’s history.
• This incnsed the Sudanese
• Tribes refused to renounce their customs and pay taxation
• Inter-tribal feuds persisted - bringing down the heavy hand of Br law
• 33 punitive expeditions mounted to force teh tribesmen to accept the new order and rebellious natives were often brutally treated.
• Mahdist uprisings: 1900/1902-3/1904/1908
• Series of swift public hangings - Br sought to make an example of the rebels

Question 6

Why did many Sudanese welcome the downfall of the Mhadist regime?
Although were they happy about the arrival of the Br?

Answer 6

Many welcomed the downfall of the Sudanese Mahdist regime which had all but destroyed the Sudanese economy and seen a decline of 50% in the population through famine, disease, persecution, and warfare.
- Although teh arrival of the British - menat little more than exhanging an oppressor for another oppressor.

Question 7

When did Cecil Rhodes become PM of the Cape?

Answer 7

1890

Question 8

What was Rhodes’ overridding aim?

Where did this ambition stem from?

Answer 8

In SA politics: To bring the Boer Republics (The Transvaal and the Orange Free State) into a southern african federation - in ehich the British Cape would be the dominant partner.
- This ambition stemmed from irritation at teh damage which teh high tariffs imposed by the British were causing to trade and partly from his personal hostility to Paul Kruger - the leading Boer politician.

Question 9

How did Transvaal’s power and prestige grow?

Answer 9

The disover of gold on the Witwatersrand in 1886 and its extended control over Swaziland - by estbalishing its own independent rail network to teh Portugese controlled port of lourenco Marques.

Question 10

What was the Jameson raid and why did Cecil Rhodes and Colonial Secretary Chamberlain support it?

Answer 10

Rhodes and Chamberlain were concerned that Br’s dominance in s Africa was threatened.
- Resulted in their upport for the ill fated Jameson Raid of 1895 which attemoted to topple Kruger’s government and in continuing clashes over the voting rights of the Uitlanders.

Question 11

Who were the Uitlanders and what was their conflcit?

Answer 11

• The Br settlers who had flocked into the Transvall in search for gold
• They paid taxes but were denied the vote - they had to secure 14 years residency in the Transvaal and be over 40 to qualify
• This meant 50,000 Britons were excluded from political rights, despite the fact that Boer residents living in the Br run Cape Colony were given voting rights

Question 12

Who was Alfred Milner?

Answer 12

The South African High Commissioner from 1897 who encouraged the Br to pursue a vigorous policy.

Question 13

What happened in Dec 1898?

What did this do?

Answer 13

An Englishman, Tom Edgar, was shot by Transvaal policeman in Dec 1898.
This prompted Uitlander outrage and pressure on the br government from the Uitlanders for firm action.

Question 14

What was the Bloemfontein Conference?

Answer 14

May-June 1899
Milner demanded that the Transvaal grant voting rights to the Uitlanders - Kruger refused.
Both sides began to build up troops
October 1899 Kruger issued an ultimatum demanding a Br withdrawal from the bordrs of the Boer Republics
War broke out when the Br stood firm.

Question 15

When was Br victory in the Boer war?

Answer 15

May 1902

Question 16

What policy did Br use in the Boer war?

Answer 16

Commander in Chief General Kitchener deployed a scorched earth policy which involved incinerating Boer farms and livestock.
Boer families and black Africans were interned in concentration camps and suffered horrendous conditions.

Question 17

Further info on concentration camps:

Answer 17

• By the end of the war 115,000 people were living in these camps and many more - mainly women and children had died in them.
  Epidemics spread easily within the camps due to medical and sanitary ignorance.
  Humanitarians, left wing liberals and socialists in Br refused to believ that the ‘ends justified the means’ and described the use of camps as ‘methods of barbarianism’.

Question 18

How many Br soliders killed by disease?

Answer 18

16,000 - nearly 3x as many died from enemy action.

Question 19

What effect did the war have on Br?

Answer 19

It shook Br’s confidence as an imperial power.
It dictated the drive for national efficency and dampened the jingoism that had charcterised the 1890s.
Thereafter, only the Conservatives spoke out politically for imperialism, although the sentiment was far from dead.

Question 20

How long did the Br anticipate the war would last?

How long did it last?

Answer 20

3-4 months, involving 75,000 troops and costing £10 million

3 years, 400,000 troops and cost £230 million

Question 21

How many Br and Boer killed in war?

Answer 21

22,000 Br military

6000 Boer troops

Question 22

Defeat in the war prompted th Boers to do what?

Answer 22

Devlop a more distinctive Afrikaner culture
The Taalbond (language union) was formed in 1903 to promote the use of the collquial version of Durch spoken by Boers, rather than English.  
Political organisations committed to Afrikaner self government were formed: Het Volk (The People) established in the Transvaal in 1906 and the Orangia Unie (Orange Union) in the Orange River Colony 1906.

Question 23

What did the Treaty of Vereeniging do?

Answer 23

May 1902

• Granted Boers £3 million compensation in order to restore and restock farms.
• Milner also worked to integrate the econimies of the Br and Boer colonies brinign them into a single customs union and amalgamating their railway systems.
• As promised - Transvaal granted self-governing status in 1906 and the Orange River Colony in 1907.

Question 24

What was and when was the Union of SA?

Answer 24

In 1910 the parliaments of the Cape Colony, the Transvaal and the Orange River Colony as well as the people of Natal who voted in a referendum , agreed to the establishment of the Union of SA, as an independent Dominionn within the Br Empire.

Question 25

What did the constitution allow the SA states to do?

Answer 25

To retain their own voting policies: a compromise that wa to store up trouble for the future.

Question 26

When had dominion status been given to Australia, and NZ?

Answer 26

1901 and 1907

Question 27

Was Cape Colony the only SA colony to permit all races to vote in its parliament?

Answer 27

Yes