Violence, Colonialism and Empire in the Modern World

by Philip Dwyer

  Moreover, scholars have underscored how famine conditions in the country were exploited by the British for the war effort and have shown how the general population suffered greatly as a result. 86 Throughout the reconquest campaign, the local population also endured raids at the hands of the Mahdists and they clearly found themselves caught in the middle of the conflict. 87 It has been argued that Kitchener’s actions after the reconquest worsened conditions as he prioritised the building of his ‘new Anglo-Egyptian capital’ over alleviating the peoples’ suffering. 88 ‘Kitchener’, for example, ‘adamantly refused to cancel some of the trainloads of building materials destined for Khartoum which were needed to supply grain for the famine stricken provinces.’ 89 Indeed, Kitchener exploited the inhabitants’ situation in order to gain cheap labour for the building of new infrastructure, including his planned new railway. He justified the exploitation of local labour on the grounds that the railway ‘could never be made nearly as cheaply as at present’. 90

  The ‘Man on the Spot’ and the Escalation of Violence

  British politicians in London were reliant on colonial administrators on the periphery for accurate assessments of colonial conflicts and were subject to the objectives of these men. 91 The case of Perak demonstrates the difficulties of the Colonial Office’s reliance on Jervois. Carnarvon received a request for troop reinforcements before having received a full explanation of events on the ground, due to delays in communication. 92 He was particularly concerned regarding Jervois’ motivation and noted his dismay: ‘I am utterly disenchanted with Jervois. I believe he is getting up a little war of annexation but I am nearly powerless to stop it.’ 93 The cases of Perak and Sierra Leone particularly demonstrate the inability and refusal of administrators to consider the perspectives of the local leaders. Furthermore, in both cases these men ignored peaceful Indigenous opposition and their actions contradicted the official policy of the Colonial Office. Both Jervois and Cardew discounted Indigenous perspectives and their opposition as ‘illegitimate’; their actions were influenced by racial prejudices , a belief in their own innate ‘superiority’ and the knowledge that they could rely on the full might of the British Empire on the periphery if faced with Indigenous resistance. Importantly, within these two cases a pattern can be identified in which the British colonial authorities provoked the local population, which then led to retaliation, and was followed by condemnation and used to justify brutal suppression by the British. The ultimate result was the increased presence of the colonial power. Hence, the ‘men on the spot’ were integral to creating precarious situations in which a violent outcome was increasingly probable.

  The manner in which the colonists dealt with the native populations demonstrates a sense of superiority typical of the British Empire ; racial prejudice is essential to an understanding of outbreaks of British colonial violence and the nature of this violence. 94 For example, in the Protectorate, Cardew displayed great arrogance and prejudice towards the Indigenous population and he appears to have made no genuine attempts to communicate with the chiefs and continually blamed them and their aversion to the ‘methods of civilisation’ for the hostilities. 95 The ‘civilised’ versus ‘barbaric’ dichotomy was key to justifications for colonial conquest and contemporary accounts of Birch’s murder in Perak were also viewed within this dichotomy. In response to his murder The Times wrote, ‘Whether the Malays have only broken out in a momentary spasm of that savage frenzy peculiar to their race we must wait patiently to see.’ 96 Cardew rationalised that ‘petty wars’ in West Africa were largely ‘the result of the contact of the forces of civilisation with those of barbarism’, 97 and stated that he was dealing ‘with a people that are practically savages—some are cannibals…accustomed to the most despotic sway on the part of their chiefs.’ 98 Clearly, this way of thinking was used to justify colonial interference.

  The Colonial Office had officially been in favour of a more moderate approach regarding the establishment of British colonial authority in both Perak and Sierra Leone and was keen to avoid prolonged military interventions, as Carnarvon articulated in his hope of containing the conflict in Perak:My hands are extraordinarily full of very heavy work now. Moreover I shall probably be obliged to annex Zululand…I therefore much desire to keep the existing system in the Malay Peninsula for a time at all events: and I think it can be done. 99

  However, just because politicians in London may have been reluctant to engage in hostilities on the periphery in the first place, as in Perak and Sierra Leone, does not mean that they were averse to the use of more extreme tactics when it came to it. Regarding actions on the ground, the colonial system of administration was often criticised by contemporaries. In the case of Perak, for example, British officials were criticised by The Straits Times: ‘Officials are getting too much addicted to asking for leave to go home…This leads to endless acting appointments…confusion and delay in the transaction of public business.’ 100 However, in the case of the Sudan, the role of administrators and communications between the metropole and the periphery were of less importance as Kitchener’s objectives were clear and while Lord Cromer , Consul-General of Egypt, was ultimately responsible for the campaign, Kitchener was clearly accountable for the methods used and troop conduct. 101 Nevertheless, with regards to Kitchener’s orders and the levels of force to be used, he was decidedly vague. 102 While the majority of the troops present were Egyptian and Sudanese, 103 the campaign was very much led by the British and although it seems unlikely that Kitchener gave explicit orders to massacre the wounded and those trying to surrender—although such claims were made 104 —it is clear that troops were able to freely interpret his orders and there were moments in which the Anglo-Egyptian troops had ‘free rein’, as in the case at the Atbara, and as Ernest Bennett stated in his controversial article, with regards to the massacring and looting of the wounded, ‘certainly no protest was made’ by British officers. 105 It seems that in each case, the levels of force were at the discretion of the colonial forces. In Perak, Jervois refused to provide McNair with precise instructions regarding ‘the pacification of the country’ and stated, ‘I am unwilling to hamper you with minute instructions which you may find it impossible to carry out, but I desire you in all eventualities to keep these ends in view.’ 106

  In all three cases examined in this chapter, British violence was justified as necessary to ‘liberate’ the local inhabitants from ‘barbarism’, whether from ‘Malay fanaticism’, the ‘despotic’ chiefs in Sierra Leone or the ‘fanatic’ Mahdia. 107 In addition, the ‘natives’ were viewed as ‘inferior’ and hence, undeserving of ‘civilised’ methods of warfare. 108 For example racist assumptions were in evidence regarding the use of explosive bullets in the colonies and these debates highlight the contradictory nature of British colonialism and the concept of ‘civilised warfare ’. While the St. Petersburg Declaration in 1868 had banned the use of these bullets, it was argued by the British that their use was justified against ‘uncivilised’ foes such as the Mahdists, as ‘Civilised man is much more susceptible to injury than savages.’ 109

  The second half of the nineteenth century was a time of immense international pressure for the British Empire , which could not afford to expose any weakness in its colonial authority. 110 The context of the ‘Scramble for Africa’ and Britain’s waning colonial dominance is important here. Mark Levene has emphasised the relevance of perceived threats to European imperialism at the fin de siècle and measures of extreme violence on the part of European colonists. 111 The extreme nature of colonial warfare was heightened by the imbalance of relations between the ‘coloniser’ and the ‘colonised’ in the Empire because of Britain’s vastly larger number of troops and supplies, in the face of which the native populations could not hold out long and certainly not without suffering significant casualties. This colonial imbalance was compounded by perceptions of the ‘nature’ of the ‘natives’ in the face of any opposition and British force could become entirely disproportionate to the s
ituation at hand. On the part of the indigenous opposition it has been noted that colonial wars were often fought with a sense of fatalism, as the indigenes were ‘staring into the abyss…with their one and only chance to break free’. 112 Henk Wesseling has also emphasised that ‘colonial wars were absolute: The colonial conquerors came to stay. Their aim was the permanent and total subjection of the population.’ 113

  Lessons were ‘learnt’ across the empire in relation to dealing with recalcitrant Indigenous populations and precedents of violence were constantly being set, which demonstrated that both politicians in London and the ‘men on the spot’ were able and willing to accept the utilisation of more extreme methods if necessary. The Indian Mutiny in 1857 is a case in point and Kim Wagner has argued that the Mutiny was instrumental to an approach by the British in which they responded to what the violence ‘could become’ and this approach, Wagner argues, contributed to the ‘disproportionality of colonial state violence’. 114 Individual instances of British colonial violence need to be viewed within their broader historical context and this includes the wider framework of extreme violence and mass killing. Until recently, there appears to have been reluctance within imperial history to engage in discussions regarding the more negative aspects of the British Empire and, in particular, the role of genocide and atrocity. 115 The extent of the use of violence in the British Empire is often underplayed and its history sanitised. 116 Clearly, force was integral to the Empire’s continued existence and as the instances of violence discussed above demonstrate, brutal methods could and would be utilised against perceived British colonial ‘enemies’ when it was felt that colonial authority was challenged. Outbreaks of extreme violence were accompanied by everyday colonial violence and studies on this subject convey the ways in which quotidian violence continued in a variety of forms after the establishment of colonial rule. 117 As Jill Bender argues in reference to the Indian Mutiny in 1857, these two types of violence are connected and ‘macromoments’ of violence, ‘dramatically shaped the accepted use of force in the colonies’. 118

  Scholars are considering the importance of ‘knowledge’ and ‘learning’ with regards to European colonial violence and the extent to which an ‘archive’ of colonial violence was ‘transferred’ both within and across European empires. 119 Instances of unrest—including the Morant Bay Rebellion in Jamaica in 1865—loomed large in the minds of British colonists and their actions were informed by this ‘knowledge’ . 120 Colonel Anson made it clear that individual colonists considered instances of violence elsewhere. Not only was he involved in the operations in both Perak and Sungei Ujong, on his way to Penang to deal with disturbances there, Anson stated, ‘Just before leaving England I had read the whole account of Governor Eyre’s riots in Jamaica, and having no one on whose advice I could rely, and having had no time to make myself acquainted with the customs and habits of the nations, I felt doubtful and somewhat nervous in regard to the measures I should take.’ 121

  Concluding Remarks

  By examining lesser-known cases of British colonial violence , a pattern emerges regarding the ways in which communication between the periphery and the metropole and the actions of the men on the spot affected conditions on the ground, antagonising the Indigenous peoples and contributing to the outbreak of conflicts and the escalation of violence. The British Empire repeatedly became immersed in cycles of violence on the ‘turbulent frontier’ as ‘Governors continued to try and eliminate the disorderly frontier by annexations which in turn produced new frontier problems and further expansion.’ 122 The actions of colonial administrators—informed as they were by ideas of racial superiority—ensured that outbreaks of violence were all but inevitable. Due to the continuously hasty actions of individuals such as Clarke, Birch and Jervois, who sought to make their mark and refused to negotiate with local leaders, the end result was an intensification of violence, colonial domination and suffering for the population. Vague orders and an imbalance in resources intensified the violence once it broke out. The willingness of British colonial forces to carry out extreme methods of violence in the colonies further ensured the continuance of British colonial power; this willingness was also informed by views of Indigenous populations as ‘inferior’ and ‘illegitimate’. While sometimes small in scale, these wars nevertheless devastated whole communities and they warrant further examination—it is important to look beyond ‘a few striking examples’ to understand the nature and extent of British colonial violence . 123 Considerations of the dynamics of British colonialism offer an important historical context in which European colonialism provided experiences of extreme violence and precedents of brutal conquest; within this context, the British Empire was a key driving force. 124

  Notes

  1.Charles Edward Callwell, Small Wars: Their Principles and Practice (Tales End Press, 2012 [London: Stationery Office, 1899]), Kindle edition.

  2.Explorations of violence and decolonisation have been particularly fruitful. See for example, Caroline Elkins, Britain’s Gulag: The Brutal End of Empire in Kenya (London: Jonathan Cape, 2005); Benjamin Grob-Fitzgibbon, Imperial Endgame: Britain’s Dirty Wars and the End of Empire (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011).

  3.Jill C. Bender, The 1857 Indian Uprising and the British Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), 11.

  4.First through the East India Company and then the Straits Settlement, which became a Crown Colony in 1867. See A. J. Stockwell, ‘British Expansion and Rule in South-East Asia’, in Andrew Porter (ed.), The Oxford History of the British Empire: The Nineteenth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 377. C. D. Cowan, Nineteenth Century Malaya: The Origins of British Political Control (London: Oxford University Press, 1961), 1.

  5.Petition to Ord, Correspondence Relating to the Affairs of Certain Native States in the Malay Peninsula, in the Neighbourhood of the Straits Settlements, C.1111 (1874), 30–32; C. Northcote Parkinson, British Intervention in Malaya 1867–1877 (Singapore: University of Malaya Press, 1960), 109–110.

  6.See for example: W. David McIntyre, ‘Britain’s Intervention in Malaya: The Origin of Lord Kimberley’s Instructions to Sir Andrew Clarke in 1873’, Journal of Southeast Asian History, 2:3 (1965), 47–69.

  7.P. L. Burns, ‘Introduction’, in Burns and C. D. Cowan (eds), Sir Frank Swettenham’s Malayan Journals 1874–1876 (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1975), xvi.

  8.See M. A. Mallal, ‘J. W. W. Birch: Causes of his Assassination’ (M. A. thesis, University of Malaya, 1952); Emily Sadka, The Protected Malay States 1874–1895 (Kuala Lumpur: University of Malaya Press, 1970 [1968]); Cowan, Nineteenth Century Malaya.

  9.As Mary Turnbull explains, Perak had an intricate power structure: the sultan was at the apex, followed by the raja muda and then a hierarchy of chiefs: see C. Mary Turnbull, A Short History of Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei (Singapore: Graham Brash, 1981), 130. See Parkinson, British Intervention in Malaya, 73.

  10.See Sadka, Protected Malay States The Protected Malay, 47.

  11.Sadka, Protected Malay States, 80.

  12.The Pangkor Engagement is reproduced in Parkinson, British Intervention in Malaya, 323–325.

  13.Cowan, Nineteenth Century Malaya, 223.

  14.Parkinson, British Intervention in Malaya, 222.

  15.Parkinson, British Intervention in Malaya, 223.

  16.Frank Swettenham, British Malaya: An Account of the Origin and Progress of British Influence in Malaya, rev. edn. (London: Lane, 1929 [1927]), 199.

  17.Jervois set out his plans in his despatch on 16 October 1875 to Carnarvon, but this was not received until 22 November 1875, Correspondence Relating to the Affairs of Certain Native States in the Malay Peninsula, in the Neighbourhood of the Straits Settlements, C.1505 (1876), 31–38.

  18.Cited by Jervois as he addressed the Straits Settlements Legislative Council on 29 October 1875, C.1505, 75.

  19.For an assessment of the events leading up to Birch’s death see, Mallal, ‘J. W. W. Birch’.

&n
bsp; 20.J. F. A. McNair, Perak and the Malays (London: Tinsley Brothers, 1878), 377; Cowan, Nineteenth Century Malaya, 234.

  21.P. Benson Maxwell, Our Malay Conquests (London: P. S. King, 1878), 60.

  22. The Times, 21 December 1875.

  23.Jervois to Colonial Office, 13 November 1875, C.1505, 54.

  24.Carnarvon to Jervois, 27 December 1875, C.1505, 111.

  25.Jervois to Carnarvon, 2 December 1875, C.1505, 119.

  26.Jervois to Colborne, Enclosure 7 in No. 93, 18 November 1875, C.1505, 127–128.

  27.Stirling to Ryder, 16 November 1875, C.1505, 235.

  28.‘The Malay Peninsula’, The Times, 25 December 1875.

  29.Jervois to Carnarvon, 29 December 1875, C.1505, 244.

  30.Jervois to Ismail, Enclosure 40 in No. 93, 29 November 1875, C.1505, 140.