Britain Northern Rhodesia And The First World War

An insightful account of the devastating impact of the Great War, upon the already fragile British colonial African state of Northern Rhodesia. Deploying extensive archival and rare evidence from surviving African veterans, it investigates African resistance at this time.

An insightful account of the devastating impact of the Great War, upon the already fragile British colonial African state of Northern Rhodesia. Deploying extensive archival and rare evidence from surviving African veterans, it investigates African resistance at this time.

In discussing British policy towards the Northern Rhodesian settlers during the period 1924 to 1945, an attempt has been made in this study to explore the various factors as well as the personalities, both in England and Northern Rhodesia, which influenced this policy. Although it became customary by the end of the First World War to describe British colonial policy in Africa as being mainly based on the principle of trusteeship for the native peoples, the application of this principle in Northern Rhodesia between 1924 and 1945 was mostly half hearted, desultory and, in the end, ineffective. Throughout the period covered by this study, Northern Rhodesia hovered precariously between the sphere of white domination in the south and the sphere of African paramountcy in the north. Not until the setting up of the Central African Council in 1945 did it finally become clear that British policy was firmly set on a policy of binding Northern Rhodesia's destiny with the south rather than with the north. From the late 1920s onwards British policy towards the Northern Rhodesian settlers became largely influenced by the territory's copper production which became very vital to Great Britain's economic and military position as the European powers began to drift towards another bloody conflict. The first chapter deals with the issue of amalgamation between Northern and Southern Rhodesia from the announcement of the British South Africa Company's amalgamation proposals in December, 1915 to the publication of the East African Commission Report in January, 1929. Particular stress has been laid on the views and attitudes of the Colonial Office, the Southern Rhodesian Government leaders and the Northern Rhodesian settlers regarding the suggested union between the two Rhodesias. The chapter also discusses the beginnings of settler politics in Northern Rhodesia in 1924 and analyses the political aspirations of the Northern Rhodesian Elected Members of the Legislative Council under the leadership of Leopold F. Moore. The second chapter discusses the origins of the conflict between the Colonial Office and the Northern Rhodesian settlers during the period of the second Labour Government in Great Britain, 1929 to 1931, in which amalgamation became the battlefield. The third chapter deals with the impact of the depression on Northern Rhodesia's economy and how its political effects helped to drive the settlers and the Colonial Office further apart, particularly with regard to the so-called issue of Africanisation. Chapter four deals with the growing pressure for amalgamation from both the Northern and the Southern Rhodesian settlers and the British Government's attempt to relieve this pressure by sending out a Royal Commission to examine the entire issue of closer union between the two Rhodesias and Nyasaland. The fifth chapter deals with the response of the British Government, on the one hand, and the Rhodesian settlers, on the other, to the recommendations of the Rhodesia-Nyasaland Royal Commission whose Report was published in March, 1939. The chapter also discusses the London talks later in the same year between British authorities and Godfrey M. Huggins, the Southern Rhodesian Prime Minister, on the Report. This led to Lord Hailey's visit to Southern Rhodesia at the end of his African tour in 1940 in order to make a comparative study of the native policies of the three Central African territories in relation to the question of amalgamation. The last chapter examines the change in British policy towards the issue of closer union movement in British Central Africa during wartime culminating in the setting up of the Central African Council in April, 1945.

*Includes pictures *Includes a bibliography for further reading The modern history of Africa was, until very recently, written on behalf of the indigenous races by the white man, who had forcefully entered the continent during a particularly hubristic and dynamic phase of European history. In 1884, Prince Otto von Bismark, the German chancellor, brought the plenipotentiaries of all major powers of Europe together, to deal with Africa's colonization in such a manner as to avoid provocation of war. This event-known as the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885-galvanized a phenomenon that came to be known as the Scramble for Africa. The conference established two fundamental rules for European seizure of Africa. The first of these was that no recognition of annexation would granted without evidence of a practical occupation, and the second, that a practical occupation would be deemed unlawful without a formal appeal for protection made on behalf of a territory by its leader, a plea that must be committed to paper in the form of a legal treaty. This began a rush, spearheaded mainly by European commercial interests in the form of Chartered Companies, to penetrate the African interior and woo its leadership with guns, trinkets and alcohol, and having thus obtained their marks or seals upon spurious treaties, begin establishing boundaries of future European African colonies. The ease with which this was achieved was due to the fact that, at that point, traditional African leadership was disunited, and the people had just staggered back from centuries of concussion inflicted by the slave trade. Thus, to usurp authority, to intimidate an already broken society, and to play one leader against the other was a diplomatic task so childishly simple, the matter was wrapped up, for the most part, in less than a decade. There were some exceptions to this, however, the most notable of which was perhaps the Zulu Nation, a centralized monarchy of enormous military prowess that required a British colonial war, the storied Anglo-Zulu War of 1879, to affect pacification. Another was the amaNdebele, an offshoot of the Zulu, established as early as the 1830s in the southeastern quarter of what would become Rhodesia, and later still Zimbabwe, in the future. Both were powerful, centralized monarchies, fortified by an organized and aggressive professional army, subdivided into regiments, and owing fanatical loyalty to the crown. The Zulu were not dealt with by treaty, and their history is perhaps the subject of another episode of this series, but the amaNdebele were, and early European treaty and concession gatherers were required to tread with great caution as they entered their lands. It would be a long time before the inevitable course of history forced the amaNdebele to submit to European domination. Although treaties and British gunboat diplomacy played a role, it was ultimately war, conquest, and defeat in battle that brought the amaNdebele to heel. As various European interests tried to reach economic-based deals with the tribe's King Lobengula in Matabeleland, others considered how to actually physically seize it. Lobengula and his army may not be capable of deflecting the might of the British Empire, but they certainly retained the potential to fight. Rumors of gold in the land helped lead to Cecil John Rhodes obtaining a royal charter in October 1889 for a private company to exploit the resources. After tricking the amaNdebele with a dubious agreement, members of Rhodes' company began to establish a fledgling colony, and after the British defeated the amaNdebele and began driving them away from the land during the First Matabele War, the seeds were sown for two colonies to take root. But little did the British know just how politically turbulent those efforts would be, and how much more fighting would have to take place to consolidate their position.

"Largely confines itself to the sotry of Nrothern Rhodesia under British governance."--Preface

To Arms is Hew Strachan's most complete and definitive study of the opening of the First World War. Now, key sections from this magisterial work are published as individual paperbacks, each complete in itself, and with a new introduction by the author.The First World War was not just fought in the trenches of the western front. It embraced all of Africa. Many of those who fought this white man's war were black. The dangers they confronted went beyond those of the battlefield. They fell prey to malaria and dysentery, and they were attacked by lions and crocodiles. But it was a vast and spectacular theatre of operations, in which great personalities - thrusting German officers like Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, or big-game hunters like PeterPretorious - could impose themselves. Embracing the perspectives of all the nations who fought there, this is the first ever full account of the Great War in Africa.

From 1942 to 1950, nearly twenty thousand Poles found refuge from the horrors of war-torn Europe in camps within Britain’s African colonies, including Uganda, Tanganyika, Kenya and Northern and Southern Rhodesia. On the Edges of Whiteness tells their improbable story, tracing the manifold, complex relationships that developed among refugees, their British administrators, and their African neighbors. While intervening in key historical debates across academic disciplines, this book also gives an accessible and memorable account of survival and dramatic cultural dislocation against the backdrop of global conflict.