Everyone agreed that Russia had the advantage of manpower, and much was made of the legendary endurance and ferocity of the Cossacks. Against such an adversary, the fleet would be of marginal value, although in 1832 a naval officer observed that ‘if the Russians think of going to Calcutta, we may think of visiting St Petersburg’.20 Two years later, Wellington, who was as fearful as anyone of the threat to India, put his faith in the training and courage of the Indian army. There were, however, a few isolated voices who asked the pertinent question as to how the torpid and hidebound Russian military bureaucracy would cope with the management of supply lines stretching across the Himalayas to the Caspian.21 Nevertheless, there were some Russian generals who imagined that the campaign was practical and talked airily of an expedition to India.
Their boasts, and Russian activities in Persia and on the fringes of the Turkish empire, were taken very seriously in London and Calcutta. Somehow the Russians had to be checked and it became axiomatic that Britain’s foreign policy should be directed towards this end. The Czar’s fleet had to be kept out of the Mediterranean; the integrity of Turkey, and particularly its Middle Eastern provinces, had to be preserved; and the rulers of Persia and Afghanistan had to be taught to fear Britain more than Russia.
The 1830s and 1840s witnessed all the activities which marked a cold war: diplomatic manoeuvre, intrigue, subversion and, in 1838, a British invasion of Afghanistan which went horribly awry. A Russian invasion of the Turkish Balkans in 1853 also went wrong, and led to a direct clash between Britain and France and Russia. Although the Russian army got bogged down, its navy sank the Turkish fleet near Constantinople, and Britain immediately responded by sending its Mediterranean fleet into the Bosphorus. Russia, its bluff called, tried to evade a confrontation and withdrew its ships into Sevastopol harbour, where they were later scuttled. Under pressure from the Admiralty, the British cabinet approved a seaborne expedition to the Crimea with orders to capture Sevastopol and demolish its dockyards and storehouses.
The Crimean War (1854–6) was an imperial war, the only one fought by Britain against a European power during the nineteenth century, although some would have regarded Russia as essentially an Asiatic power. No territory was at stake; the war was undertaken solely to guarantee British naval supremacy in the Mediterranean and, indirectly, to forestall any threat to India which might have followed Russia replacing Britain as the dominant power in the Middle East.
The war’s outcome was a crushing defeat for Russia. Her armies were beaten four times and Sevastopol was abandoned. Now chiefly remembered in Britain for the blunders of the British high command and the War Office’s and the Treasury’s mismanagement of the army’s logistics (which was quickly rectified), the war exposed the emptiness of Russia’s military pretensions. Its army was poorly led, armed with antiquated weaponry, supported by systems that fell apart under the slightest pressure and which could not be repaired. As British, French and some intelligent Russian observers concluded, two ‘modern’ nations had beaten one which was hopelessly backward in terms of its government, society and economy.
The status quo had been maintained in Britain’s favour. In November 1856 a British army landed in Persia to persuade the Shah Nasr-ud-Din to abandon his claim to Herat. This fortress on the Afghan-Persian frontier was one of those distant places which had achieved an immense symbolic and strategic importance during the Anglo-Russian cold war. The Russians had urged the Shah to hold on to it in defiance of Britain, but faced with an Anglo-Indian army, Nasr-ud-Din gave way. India’s security had been preserved, although Russia continued her advance eastwards beyond the Caspian towards the northern border of Afghanistan. Between 1864 and 1868 Russian forces occupied Khiva, Tashkent, and Samarkand.
While Russian armies were tramping towards the foothills of the Himalayas, Europe was being dramatically changed. The Crimean War had destroyed the harmony between the big powers which had prevailed since 1815. The immediate beneficiaries were the Italian and German nationalists. Between 1859 and 1870 Italy was united, with French and Prussian assistance and British approval. In three successive wars, Prussia defeated Denmark, Austria and the South German States and, supported by the rest of Germany, France. The final victory was marked by the declaration of the German empire in Louis XIV’s former palace at Versailles. Britain’s influence over the reshaping of Europe had been slight, since her strategic and commercial interests were not endangered. Indeed, the latter were advanced by the 1870–71 Franco-Prussian War during which 300 million pounds of woollen cloth were exported to make uniforms for both armies.
Some of the deals for this cloth may well have been settled in the Bradford Exchange, an imposing building finished in 1867. Its Gothic exterior was ornamented with medallions showing the features of the men who had contributed to Britain’s present wealth and greatness. Palmerston, who had died in 1865, represented firmness in dealing with anyone who interfered with Britain’s right to do business everywhere; Cobden appeared as the champion of free trade; James Watt, Richard Arkwright and the railway engineer George Stephenson were reminders of the inventive genius of the Industrial Revolution; and the features of Drake, Raleigh, Anson and Cook proclaimed the triumphs of seapower. The spirit behind this choice of images was caught by Charles Dickens in his Dombey and Son, which had first appeared in 1848:
The earth was made for Dombey and Son to trade in, the sun and the moon were made to give them light. Rivers and seas were formed to float their ships; rainbows to give them the promise of fair weather; winds blew for or against their enterprises; stars and planets circled in their orbits, to preserve inviolate a system of which they were the centre.
2
We are Going as Civilisers: Empire and Public Opinion, 1815–80
What did the empire mean to the British public? This question became a vital one as the nineteenth century proceeded. The thoughts and feelings of the people on this and other subjects of national concern mattered more and more as the country moved towards democracy. The 1832 Parliamentary Reform Act created a middle-class electorate, and the Reform and Redistribution Acts of 1867 and 1884–5 extended the vote to most urban and rural working men. Contemporaries sensed that they were living in an age of political progress, in which reasoned debate between educated men was being proved as the most perfect means of solving all human problems. Simultaneously, there was a growth in the numbers and readership of daily newspapers and weekly journals which disseminated information and fostered discussion of national issues. The London press took advantage of the extension of the railway network between 1840 and 1860 to build up a national circulation, and with it the ability to influence opinion throughout the country.
Views on the empire differed enormously during this period, and there was much passionate debate about how it should be managed, the best treatment for its subjects, and whether or not it should be extended. There was, on the whole, general agreement that the empire was a powerful force for the spread of civilisation through trade and the imposition of superior codes of behaviour on its ‘savage’ inhabitants. Few would have disagreed with an editorial in the Sun, which welcomed the announcement of the form of government chosen for Britain’s newest colony, New Zealand, in January 1847. ‘So speedy an attainment of the choicest fruits of civilisation, in a country where, a few years since, a hardy race of savages alone ranged free, ignorant of their better nature, is without parallel in history.’1
There were, however, profound differences of opinion as to whether the Maoris and other races possessed a ‘better nature’, and how it could be cultivated. On one side there were the pragmatists, who were for the most part soldiers, sailors and administrators (often former servicemen), colonists and their adherents in Britain who were sceptical about the capacity of native peoples for advancement. On the other hand there was a powerful body of Christian philanthropists who believed that these races could be raised to standards of education and conduct which would place them alongside Europeans. Members of this group te
nded to be Nonconformists, middle-class, and Liberal or Radical in their politics. Their opponents were largely Anglicans with aristocratic or gentry backgrounds and Whig or Tory sympathies, although this was a period when party labels mattered far less than they did later.
At the beginning of the century the great imperial issue was slavery. The movement for its abolition had gained impetus during the 1770s and won considerable support from all classes. Evangelicals, with their strong belief in salvation through saving others, were naturally attracted towards a campaign which was pledged to release the slaves from bondage and convert them. Much anti-slavery propaganda was emotional, highlighting the callous treatment of slaves and their inner suffering, and this appealed to those under the influence of the Romantic Movement. Reason might, and did argue that slavery was vital to the country’s economy, but sentiment replied that the misery it inflicted alone justified its abolition.
The power of the anti-slavery movement owed much to the energy and singlemindedness of its leaders, William Wilberforce and Thomas Clarkson. To demonstrate their faith in the ability of the negro to regenerate himself, they joined the sponsors of an experimental colony, Sierra Leone, founded in 1787. The Sierra Leone Company’s object was to ‘introduce civilisation among the natives and to cultivate the soil by means of free labour’ and to educate them to a level which proved them the equals of Europeans in accomplishments and civilisation. Sierra Leone flourished and, in 1808, became a crown colony and its capital, Freetown, one of the bases for the new Royal Navy anti-slaving squadron.
Britain’s abolition of the slave trade in 1807 was the movement’s first triumph. Thereafter, British statesmen and diplomats did their utmost to induce other governments to follow Britain’s example. Squadrons of warships were deployed to pursue and arrest slavers, first off the West African and Congo coasts, and later in the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf to suppress the Arab slave trade.
What, at first, was Britain’s singlehanded war against the slave trade aroused considerable fervour and was universally regarded as a source of national pride. During the annual meeting of the Society for the Extinction of the Slave-Trade and for the Civilisation of Africa, held in Exeter Hall in June 1840, Prince Albert opened the proceedings with a speech which praised the nobility of the cause. He was wildly cheered and there were cheers too for Sir Robert Peel, the Tory leader and future prime minister. Speaking impromptu, he asserted that Britain ‘never would be able to convince the black population of Africa of the superiority of their European fellow men’ until slave trading had been eradicated from the continent.2 Eight years later, one who shared Peel’s sentiments expressed the view that his prediction was being fulfilled:
The name of Englishman is already, through the African continent, becoming a simple passport of safety. If a white missionary visits a black tribe, they ask only one question, does he belong to the people who liberated our children from slavery?3
In 1855, when David Livingstone took some Africans on board British men-o’-war anchored off Luanda, he introduced the sailors with the words, ‘Now these are all my countrymen, sent by our Queen for the purpose of putting down the trade of those that buy and sell black men.’4
Britain’s moral uprightness and its will to enforce justice were themes in the play Freedom, first staged in 1883, in which a young naval officer, Ernest Gascoigne, rescues some Egyptian girls from slavery. Confronted by the local authorities, he proclaims, ‘These girls were slaves, they are free! England has decreed it, and in England’s name I speak. Touch them at your peril! I defy you!’5 His speech brings loud hurrahs from his sailors, and no doubt cheers from audiences, delighted by a stirring reminder that their nation was the banner-bearer of liberty and civilisation.
The global war against the slave trade was advertised as the most glowing example of Britain’s humanity and enlightenment. The concept of slavery had become abhorrent to a people which, thanks to the propaganda of the French wars, was increasingly aware that personal freedom was their birthright. Reginald Heber, the hymn-writer and Bishop of Calcutta, felt an inner chill whenever, as was customary, an Indian servant used the expression, ‘I am your slave.’6
It proved easier to outlaw the traffic in slaves than it did to abolish the institution of slavery in the British empire. There was unremitting resistance from the West Indian plantocracy and its allies in parliament. Some of their apologists sniffed hypocrisy, and asked why those who made so much fuss about the slaves did so little about the sufferings of their destitute countrymen. According to one pro-slavery pamphlet of the early 1800s, ‘Many a Gentleman’s gelding, or high-mettled racer, and many a Lady’s pad, in England, is looked after and tended with kinder treatment than some of our own poor.’7 Moreover, as the Tory Anti-Jacobin claimed in 1807, the ‘Crying, methodistical philanthropists’ were mistaken in their assumption that every planter maltreated his slaves.8 Plantation owners went to some lengths to present themselves as humane men; in 1816 those of Barbados pointed out that pregnant women were excused field work and added, with unintentional irony, that when they gave birth they received a payment.9 Such generosity seems to have made little impression for there were slave uprisings in Barbados in 1816, in Jamaica in 1823, 1824 and 1830, and in British Guiana in 1823. The last was a nuisance to the Colonial Office which was hard pressed to find additional troops to put it down.10
A reformed Commons, in which Whigs and Radicals dominated, abolished slavery in 1833, allowing several years for the transition from unpaid to paid labour on the plantations. Throughout the debate over slavery the issue of what would happen to the slaves after emancipation had been central. Supporters of slavery had repeatedly argued that the slaves would ‘soon sink into miserable penury, and languishingly pine away in their old African laziness, inaction and want’.11 As a result, the local economy would dissolve.
Abolitionists had always held that the end of slavery was the first stage in the elevation of the West Indians. Released from servitude, they would be free to make their own future and raise themselves by their own efforts. An abolitionist who visited Antigua in 1839–40 found encouraging signs that this was happening. Seven thousand children were attending schools, where there was regular Bible-reading, and the Methodist meeting house at St John’s was filled with a congregation of ‘respectable-looking’ worshippers drawn from a community of busy smallholders. Equally gratifying was the evidence of a long overdue sexual reformation. ‘Even the overseers are ceasing, one after another, from the sinful mode of life, and are forming reputable connexions and marriages.’12
The view from the top was less sanguine. Giving evidence to a Commons committee in 1849, Sir James Light, the governor of British Guiana, feared that many ex-slaves had imagined that emancipation meant equality with the white man. He lamented the decay of deference within his colony, where he and other men of substance were now exposed to the ‘jeering and impertinent remarks of loungers’ as they rode through the capital, Georgetown.13 What was worse was that former slaves shunned plantation work, forcing the owners to look elsewhere for labour. An early seventeenth-century precedent was resurrected and indentured servants were imported. In what was one of the first internal migrations within the empire, poor Indians and Chinese were hired and shipped to the West Indies. By 1857 well over a half of the 14,000-strong workforce on the Trinidadian plantations were from China and India. The number would have been larger, but many immigrants died during the six-month voyage in insanitary and ill-ventilated ships.14
* * *
The campaign to end slavery within the British empire coincided with the growth of organisations devoted to Christian missions throughout the world. Conversion was one of the highest forms of Christian service: ‘And a vision appeared to Paul in the night: There stood a man of Macedonia, and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia and help us’ (Acts, XVI, 9). This injunction had a powerful appeal to evangelicals, many of whom experienced that form of personal conversion in which they sensed God’s grace come al
ive inside them. The ‘soul of a poor heathen was as valuable as his own to God’ claimed Thomas Kendall, who, from the moment of his salvation, was determined to bring others to that grace he had found within himself. He began missionary work among the Maoris of New Zealand in 1817.15
The Christian missions of the nineteenth century not only redeemed souls, they regenerated whole races. An account of Cape Colony written in 1819 praised the work there of the Moravian missionaries, who ‘have converted the indolent degraded Hottentot into an active moral member of society’.16 ‘We were going as civilisers as well as preachers,’ wrote James Stewart in 1874. He was one of a new generation of evangelists, having studied medicine as well as theology, who set off into Central Africa with a party of practically qualified men to carry on the work of his mentor, Livingstone. He had taken artisans to teach new crafts to his flock and to build a new, self-sufficient, ordered Christian society where there had once been chaos. What he helped to achieve was revealed to him some years later when a tribesman told him, ‘Give me a Gospel for an assegai as the love of war has been taken out of my heart.’17
As well as preaching the Gospel, missionaries were also responsible for bringing their congregations into contact with the values of the West. George Brown, a stouthearted Methodist missionary who began his work on the island of New Britain, west of Papua, in 1875 was more than a saver of souls. Within three years he ‘succeeded in opening up a large extent of the coast of New Britain and New Ireland to the influence of Civilisation and Christianity so that Traders were allowed to land and live on the islands in comparative safety.’18 This praise came from a naval officer who warmly endorsed his methods. On one occasion, when inland tribal chiefs had threatened to kill him, his flock and every European they could find, Brown attacked and defeated them with a small force of Fijian converts armed with two fowling pieces and a revolver. Such men were useful; writing about his experiences in Sarawak in the 1860s Charles Brooke believed that missionaries would help make the head-hunting Dyaks more tractable.19
The Rise and Fall of the British Empire Page 23
