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February 2012

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awards in the café cabinet

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  • intute UK joint university database recommended

     

     

  • Channel 4 recommended

     

     

  • BBC radio recommended
    Radio 4

     

     

  • SBC Education Blue Ribbon Hot Site!

     

     

  • March '06 páginas recomendado

     

  • May '05 Site of the Month by SovLit, Harvard University.

     

  • April '05 Birmingham GRID for Learning Site of the Week

     

     

worthies who have departed the café

being read on the terrace.....

  • Matthew Parker: The Sugar Barons. Matthew Parker

    Matthew Parker: The Sugar Barons. Matthew Parker
    Parkers history of the West Indies sugar industry is one of the most valuable reads of the year for students of industrial and imperial history. He outlines the origins of the industry which originated on the Caribbean island of Barbados and reached its peak with the cultivation of Jamaica. The final chapters look at eventual decline and collapse. The 17th century saw the cultivation of sugar following ideas first used in Brazil by the Dutch and Portuguese. Other islands soon followed as the price for sugar rocketed in Europe and fortunes were made by the estate owners. Sugar became an essential luxury and demand forced more and more land into cultivation. More was being made in profit than could be spent on the islands- the growing surplus was being spent and invested in England - providing funds for other commercial and early industrial ventures. So far so good, but it is in exploring other aspects of this growth that the book excels: the growth of privateering - the use of ships to attack and loot Spanish treasure ships was encouraged; relations with the New England colonies; the growth of sugar as the key element of the English 18th century economy and the emergence of a sugar lobby that would determine English foreign and economic. However the key thread of the book is that of slavery. Parker makes it very clear that this "modern" slavery was driven by the needs of the Indies. Sugar cultivation is very labour intensive. The islands were amongst the least healthy places on earth with mortality, especially amongst Europeans being very high. Slaves brought in from Africa were the answer for the owners and were employed in ever growing numbers from the mid 17th century, despite their own high death rates. They were considered of little value other than as an economic commodity and Parker shows clearly how dehumanised the owners and their white management had become to slavery. Supported throughout by individual histories with a focus on the Landowners, this is well written and accompanied by good maps and illustrations. Dec '11 (****)

  • Alice Hogge : God's Secret Agents

    Alice Hogge : God's Secret Agents
    Tells the story of Roman Catholic missions and Jesuit priests in England during the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. A detailed and thorough account, with care taken to inform the general reader of the specialist contexts and terminology used by historians as the narrative progresses. She tells of the early missionaries from the continent, often educated in colleges founded in Europe by English Catholic exiles and how they travelled the country and lived within the "underground" recusant community. The main thrust of the book outlines the different and changing reaction of government. Initially tending to tolerance, this hardens, culminating in the post 1605 Oath of Allegiance and anti Roman Catholic legislation. The Apellant episode is also explored. Yet the Jesuits seem to have been opposed to regime change, the eventual Gunpowder Plot being the product of the frustration of home-grown subversives (assisted or not by government agents to increase the eventual anti-Catholic spin) at the lack of official change. Hogge paints a credible picture of the Jesuits as scapegoats for both James and Elizabeth’s Government to blame their troubles on. An interesting aspect of the book is the story of the Jesuit Nicholas Owen, arrested and racked to death in 1606, who was the builder of many of the priest-holes found in the country's great houses and used to hide Catholic clergy when a house was searched. Two final sections of note indicate where Owen's building work may be seen today, and draw parallels (already emerging to the reader as the story unfolds) with present day British changes to torture and terrorist legislation and practice in response to current concerns over militant Islam.However, this may be more a book to be dipped into (using the index - for some unexplained reason chapters are numbered like a novel but given no other description to assist partial reading for research) rather than read cover to cover. Perhaps tighter editing might have helped but I found the initial chapters and the final post 1600 section of most use and value (especially those outlining James I's early religious inclinations). During the 1580's and 1590's I tended to get lost amongst the places, names, conversations, letters and travels of those being described. Oct '11 (***)

  • John Simpson: Unreliable Sources: How the Twentieth Century Was Reported: How the 20th Century Was Reported

    John Simpson: Unreliable Sources: How the Twentieth Century Was Reported: How the 20th Century Was Reported
    John Simpson, BBC World Affairs editor, writes an account of how he sees the press reported on key stories from the Boer War to the Iraq invasion. As the focus is on the British press, so the themes are those that affected Britain and its press most strongly over the last 110 years. This probably means it will be of most direct interest to students of modern British history, but the story it tells of relationships between the press and its readers, of press owners and government as well as how far the press supports, questions and/or is restricted by government policy is more global in its significance. Simpson devotes a chapter to a key period that affected how the press operated: clearly Britain’s main wars and conflicts, but also issues such as the Abdication crisis, interwar attitudes to Hitler, Suez, Ireland, and the rise of the Murdoch press. I found the most useful chapters to be ones that examined the press response to government policy during the Boer and First World Wars (in the final chapters Simpson draws several parallels of approach between the Boer War and Iraq invasion). He shows clearly for example how loathe the press was to present the realism of the western front and how much his was resented by those at the front. Students (and teachers preparing courses on the impact of the media) will also find much of value on the interwar chapters which shows clearly which papers were most behind Hitler and the differing views on Appeasement and the actions of Chamberlain. Individual reporters are given mini pen portraits - many seem to be “gentle” and/or “generous…… Meanwhile he explains how the new kid on the block, news reporting on BBC radio, tried to catch up until coming into its own during World War II. Well written and reads easily, it is a large tome with a basic but useful bibliography for each section (although it publishes all chapter notes and the origin of specific sources online). It is sufficiently self-contained so that chapters could be taken on their own. This is worthwhile as Simpson provides many extracts from press reports (good for using as source questions?) and numerous worthwhile, not to say often enjoyable, anecdotes about the individuals he is describing. As for the Beeb, it might have been more valuable to have more on the impact of the BBC World Service reporting after 1945 and less on the BBC’s more recent conflict with the Blair government, which if we are being pedantic was not in the 20th century. Another point of issue is that the book seems to focus on issues that are exclusively political or to do with international conflicts that involved the UK. No mention is made at all of how BBC reporting made the world aware of the famine in Ethiopia and produced such global impact and consequences. Such “social” reporting has grown considerably since the 1980’s even if its thrust has been blunted/hijacked by more recent governments – however is this not the theme of the book? Aug '11 (****)

  • Philipp von Boeselager: Valkyrie - The Plot To Kill Hitler

    Philipp von Boeselager: Valkyrie - The Plot To Kill Hitler
    This is a memoir of Philipp von Boeselager, traditional German aristocrat, cavalry officer and last surviving member of the 1944 Bomb Plot to assassinate Hitler. In many ways this would seem to be of limited value to a historian: it is as said, a personal memoir, and would seem to be ghost written at that. Much of it is devoted to uncritical praise of an elder brother, also involved in the Plot and the amount of the (slim) work on the actual Plot is minimal. Nonetheless, this is a significant piece of history, but not so much on what it says about 1944, rather, it gives an interesting insight into the mentality of the Junker officer class during the Third Reich. Implicitly, the content and presentation of the narrative in the memoir makes clear that the aristocracy saw the Fuhrer as an upstart, but did not intervene to obstruct his accession to power seeing this more as "the will of the people" with which they should not deign to interfere. They also appeared to have exercised considerable informal local authority, but without too much accountability, or desire to use this considerable local and historic influence to resist or reduce the impact of national socialist policies (although a incident of the family assisting fleeing Jews early on is described). Von Boeselager and his brother join the cavalry and there is little questioning of German war aims/strategy until the war turns against the Germans, especially in the east, although the memoir states it was a growing awareness of SS atrocities in the east rather than growing Soviet pressure that brought about plans to assassinate Hitler and stage a coup. We read of how the July 1944 plotters gradually came together and instigated several attempts to kill Hitler in preparation of seeking an anti-Soviet alliance with the western allies, but ultimately failing and most facing arrest, torture and execution. Several take their own lives. The von Boeselager brothers are not betrayed by fellow plotters and survive (although Phillips brother is killed later fighting the Red Army), with Philipp himself living until 2008. These officers of the Junker class were undoubtedly brave and fought determinedly and with a strong sense of historic duty to defend Germany and ensure the well being of their men (Von Boeselager distinguished himself in combat on the Eastern Front, was wounded several times in combat and was awarded the Knights Cross with Oak Leaves for bravery in combat). It is clear that they were principled and honourable with a genuine sense of chivalry. The plotters themselves became the conscience of postwar (western initially) Germany. Unfortunately, these memoirs do little to remove the notion that the principles and sense of duty were misdirected. They had the political awareness, skills and inherited authority to prevent or restrain national socialism at its birth but chose to wait too long to act and when they did von Boeselager's account still makes it is difficult to remove the impression that they did so at a time when their historic interests and privileged lifestyle were most under threat - by the advance of Soviet communism. July '11 (****)

  • Christopher Meyer: Getting Our Way: 500 Years of Adventure and Intrigue: The Inside Story of British Diplomacy

    Christopher Meyer: Getting Our Way: 500 Years of Adventure and Intrigue: The Inside Story of British Diplomacy
    Meyer's book (he was the UK Washington Ambassador 1997-2003) is subtitled "500 years of adventure & Intrigue - the Inside Story of British Diplomacy" but is pretty selective in the episodes it examines. A series of chapters look at specific a stages in the story, some more successful than others. The initial chapter on the Elizabethan ambassador Killigrew in Edinburgh is an interesting example of the rudiments of modern diplomacy at work, as are the three on British relations with China (or should it be the British abuse of those relations?). There is a valuable section for students of the interwar period on Sir Robert Vansittart, Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office from 1930 to 1938 which clarifies Britain's ignominious role in the collapse of the League of Nations. Least successful chapter is the final somewhat diffuse one on Bosnia in the 1990's. However this is not a history book - footnotes are sparse, bibliographies are limited and contain largely the standard works that might appear on a decent piece of IB/A level coursework. The value of this readable book though is the insight it provides into the mindset of a modern successful British diplomat. From its introduction onwards it provides an argument in favour of reinforcing British diplomacy, and British support for how this branch of government should be enabled to strongly pursue and protect British interests and values in the world. In doing this Meyer writes little of the advantages of internationalism, and seems to ignore what even he writes about regarding the impact of the blind pursuit of British values and interests on 19th century China or on the Ethiopians in the 1930's. He argues diplomacy has to adapt and modernise to protect national interest. There is nothing inherently wrong with this, but not at the cost of a "beggaring my neighbour" approach that was so prevalent in the past. He correctly argues that following an ethical foreign policy (as recently with early New Labour) is itself problematical but that should be no reason to revert to past methods (he believes Margaret Thatcher's time was "a notably successful period for British diplomacy").It is telling that there is no chapter on the one great challenge - and questionably greatest failure of modern British diplomacy - Europe. Nothing on how diplomats failed to engage with the early moves for closer co-operation. Even in his own terms of reference, no mention of how greater involvement from the start might have delivered the British influence and values he seeks and how a successful British diplomatic offensive might have embedded them in the heart of the European project. Perhaps because this is the one big area Britain did not "get its way". This is a quick read and it reads well with much to fascinate - not the least of which is as an aid to understand the attitudes and objectives that formed so much of British foreign policy for so long. June '11 (***)

  • Barry Strauss: The Spartacus War

    Barry Strauss: The Spartacus War
    This slim volume is the story of Spartacus, leader of the slave revolt against the Romans in 73BC. Spartacus gathered a force of up to 40,000 slaves and in the course of two years was able to lead them up and down the length of Italy resisting all attempts by the Roman legions to suppress them - until the final campaign against Crassus when he was defeated and killed in battle (in contrast to the Kubrick film which shows him captured - the famous "I am Spartacus" scene happening in Hollywood only!). Spartacus is seen as a charismatic and very able commander and leader, his eventual vanquisher Crassus was not one of Rome's most sympathetic generals - he took 6,000 prisoners and proceeded to crucify each one along the road to Rome.To someone accustomed to reading about modern history, the style is unsettling at first - too many mentions of "might", "perhaps", "likely", "uncertain but" suggest a vagueness that makes for a lack of certainty, but gradually you realise Strauss is using the only evidence available - which is patchy and unreliable. The historians role in the ancient world here is to map a probable route through the possibles for the layman and build up a picture of what might have been. The available evidence allows for no more. Strauss does this well, giving his views on how much value to place on evidence at each stage of the campaign. Good maps and a thoroughly explained bibliography at the end make this a useful read for the non-specialist who wants to find out a little more about the considered reality beyond the film set. May '11 (****)

  • John le Carre: Our Kind of Traitor: A Novel

    John le Carre: Our Kind of Traitor: A Novel
    I am pleased to say this is a return to le Carré’s old hunting ground – the spy novel. As in the past, it also sees the British Secret Service ranged against the Russians and focuses around a high level defection from Russia. But here similarities with the Cold War novels end. The defection is not from the KGB or its modern successor but from the Russian mafia. Nor is the British secret service portrayed as it once was by le Carré. There is still internal rivalry but the conflict is now with a service deeply inbred with the London’s city establishment and it’s role as a financial capital. This is a darker, more political le Carré who is taking aim at what he perceives as another threat to liberal, compassionate, democratic society. The “Constant Gardener” took aim at the hypocrisy of the international aid and pharmaceutical communities, “A Most wanted Man” tackled international terrorism. Now it is the turn of the global banker and the way the establishment of a nation desperate for foreign capital fawns towards them. Perhaps because it is more of a “spy” novel than has recently been the case, this is le Carrés most successful work for some time (although his young central characters do appear to be drawn from the sixties rather then the facebook/twitter generation of today). A good read that encourages you to move through it quickly! April '11 (****)

  • John Keegan: The American Civil War

    John Keegan: The American Civil War
    Keegan, a war historian best known for his surveys of 20th century warfare writes well and clearly. I should imagine that the book provides more than sufficient detail on the campaigns and key meetings between both sides to satisfy most students researching the conflict (however some reviews have expressed concern with accuracy). What is irritating is the habit of repeating points made earlier on in the narrative.The battle maps are particularly useful (although I must admit to moving quickly through some of the land campaign details, lack of personal familiarity with the basic geography of the area trying my patience a little. This though is a personal failing, not one of the authors.). What is made very clear is how inexperienced and unprepared both sides were in the craft of warfare and it is interesting to read the process of natural selection required to find able military commanders. Keegan also provides a number of chapters prior to and after the conflict that are extremely useful articles in their own right on key aspects of the conflict (such as the Life of the Soldier, Generalship, Nature of the Civil War Battle, Home fronts, Black soldiers). In many ways these are just as valuable as (if not more so than) the account of the war itself. One omission is a discrete chapter focusing on the war role of Lincoln himself, which is a pity. Given Keegan's interest in 20th century warfare there are many instances where he shows how the Civil War displayed and introduced features of later wars (as well as how it did not and drew rather on earlier conflict experience in Europe). All in all this is an easily recommendable narrative cum basic analysis of the war if what is required is a primer. March '11 (****)

  • Matthew Brzezinski: Red Moon Rising: Sputnik and the Hidden Rivalries that Ignited the Space Age

    Matthew Brzezinski: Red Moon Rising: Sputnik and the Hidden Rivalries that Ignited the Space Age
    It tells the story of "Sputnik and the rivalries that ignited the Space Age". Indeed it starts well with a very atmospheric description of a V2 launch against London, and then goes on to tell the story of the early pre Sputnik US and Soviet space programmes and the internal politics that lay behind them. Centre-stage is rightly given to von Braun, ex member of Hitler's SS and Korolev, survivor of Stalin's Gulag camps (interesting that Korolev had as many failures - probably more than the US before his successful Sputnik launch) with an examination of their respective relationships with Eisenhower and Khrushchev but beyond telling the story, rather like early US attempts to get into space, it fails to really ignite. Brzezinski is a former journalist (for the Wall Street Journal) and this reads like an extended piece of journalism - rather like a long series of articles that you might find in a weekend supplement. The US political context is more satisfactory than the Soviet. The end notes suggest that research is essentially secondary - and much of that from the internet.An appropriate read perhaps if you are new to the period (having just seen the forthcoming movie on "Ham" the space chimp maybe) but don't look to find any novel insights or new archival research. Jan'11 PS If you are wondering why the next two reviews have no images it is because they are available on Kindle only in the US!! (***)

  • David Olusoga, Casper Erichsen: The Kaiser's Holocaust: Germany's Forgotten Genocide and the Colonial Roots of Nazism
    Tells the story of German colonialism in South West Africa, showing how German policy towards the native Herero and Nama peoples developed into one of genocide. Shows how a philosophy of white racial supremacy emerged out of the ideas of Charles Darwin and was put into practice. Survival of the fittest becomes justification for white dominance over "inferior" indigenous peoples and genocide an acceptable option. This process is shown though as not just a German process and the German experience is placed in a global context: with British colonists in Tasmania, the US frontier wars, the Argentine wars of the desert all showing the same features.In the German genocide against Herero and Nama we read of extermination orders, forced labour and concentration camps designed to kill off indigenous peoples who were articulate, politically able and well resourced, but ultimately doomed as the Kaiser's troops introduce a policy of "absolute terror and cruelty" in which missionary churches were actively complicit.The second part of the work shows the significance of this colonial experience for future nazism. The colonies first Governor was the father of Hermann Göring, the uniform of the SA was that of the Wilhelm II's brown shirted colonial army. The colonial period saw the emergence of the pseudo science of eugenics and the legal framework to protect the purity of German settlers from racial contamination for a Volk that needed Lebensraum to expand into and escape population pressure at home. These ideas survive the collapse of 1918 and become a core element of the politics of the right.After 1933 races considered impure, German Jews and Gypsies, are subjected to the treatment first employed in South West Africa: Nuremberg Laws to end racial mixing; control and internment in concentration camps, forced labour, extermination. Hitler's war, it is also argued, was ultimately one for colonial Lebensraum in the east. The German treatment of the eastern populations and Red Army was different to the western conflict as Hitler considered the eastern peoples to be similar to uncivilised indigenous colonial peoples. Fighting was more brutal, civilians were treated with even less regard. Necessary he believed to ensure Lebensaum and civilisation. The nazis compared this push East to how Wilhelm's troops had fought the Herero, or the British the Sudanese & Tasmanians, the US the Native Indians, or the Argentines with the tribes of the south. Thought provoking, this is an important, thorough and well written work. It ranks with Hochschild's "King Leopold's Ghost" as an indictment of European colonialism but develops its arguments beyond normally considered confines to place the events of a short-lived German colony in a far wider context. Jan '11 (*****)
  • Jane Conway: Mary Borden: A Woman of Two Wars
    The story of Ma(r)y Borden, one of those dynamic women who managed to flourish in the male dominated world of the early 20th century. Borden had been given a huge headstart as the daughter of a millionaire from Chicago and this she used to the full. A writer of books achieving both popular and critical acclaim and (second) marriage to a British politician ensured equal social acclaim across the Atlantic. The book is illustrated with many useful photos including several society magazine shots showing her in the 1920's as quite the society woman and hostess. However there was more to Borden than this. She was a Chevalier of the French Legion of Honour and bearer of the Croix de Guerre presented for her war work in setting up and managing hospitals very close to the Front and also those with the lowest mortality rates. She repeated this war work in the Second World War and continued to write successfully until late in life. Conway provides a literary commentary on her books as they were published, attempting to link them into Borden's experiences, but for historians what is most interesting are her sections on Borden's war work. In 1914-18 she used innovatory portable hospitals with reinforced windows to withstand blast damage that could be dismantled and rebuilt in a matter of hours. The section on her work in World War II is even more historically interesting. Leading the Hadfield-Spears mobile ambulance unit she managed front line Franco-British nursing care in France, Italy, north Africa and the Middle East and found herself more involved in the political machinations of the Franco-allied relationship. Conway is perceptive on the chaos and amateurism shown during the Fall of France as well as the in-fighting involving De Gaulle (which ultimately sees the disbanding of the unit in 1945). It is hard though to escape the paradoxes of her existence. Living a privileged lifestyle she was critical of the British Labour Party for not doing enough to relieve poverty. Given the hectic nature of her life it is clear that she spent little of what would be called "quality time" with her young family despite fighting a long and (clearly for them) disturbing battle with her first husband for custody of them. A more direct approach at times to some of the paradoxes outlined above would also help ensure that Borden could be seen more clearly in the context and standards of her time if not those of today. It is these contrasts that make understanding the assertive and successful women of the early 20th century (as well as today?) so interesting. In the last few years many unsung stories of the role played by key women in both world wars have become more public. Conway presents us here with the life of one such woman whose work and enthusiasm deserves to be remembered by a clear biography such as this. I would recommend this a book to be read in particular by students of social as well as women's history. Dec '10 (****)
  • Michael Howard: Otherwise Occupied: Letters Home from the Ruins of Nazi Germany

    Michael Howard: Otherwise Occupied: Letters Home from the Ruins of Nazi Germany
    Howard was a 19 year old officer sent to the Ruhr in 1946 as an intelligence officer for Britains T-Force to help administer British seizures and this is his story of his time as part of that process. He has used the 67 letters he sent home to his mother during the period as a structure to hang the development of the general account on, a narrative that reads well and is clear to follow. Maps and photographs by the author help general understanding and the personal story element of the book. Interesting aspects emerge on the nature of the early British occupation (for example it seemed many of the initial military administrators had a pre-war background in Britain's colonial administrations - his own father was in the Fiji Colonial Service) as well as the reality of life in the immediate postwar period for occupied and occupier and the issue of "fraternisation". Little is said about the wider picture of T-Force work (and indeed this is not the purpose of the book), rather the focus is on the experiences and impressions of a young officer who happened to be part of a wider process (so despite the described efficiency of the authors section, day to day military administration in general during the period comes over as somewhat ad hoc with officers clearly enjoying their occupying role, and much reliance on a public school ethos that was perhaps typical of the period). This is perhaps the key significance of Howards writing. Letters from the war period are relatively common, far less common are letters with a commentary written 60 years later by the same writer. Here this provides not just elaboration but a modern self-evaluation of attitudes and actions contemporary to the period that help the context to be better understood. Of particular value is the (empathetic) development of the author's response to German nationals. As a junior officer the author had no real part in key zonal decisions, so do not look here for new evidence on British postwar occupation policy or relations with the Soviets. However the book has real value to the historian in another way. Recent years have seen an explosion in German witness accounts of the immediate postwar period. Here we have what amounts to an annotated contemporary account of early occupation life by a member of a western occupying force to set alongside them. Nov '10 (****)

  • Sean McMeekin: The Berlin-Baghdad Express: The Ottoman Empire and Germany's Bid for World Power, 1898-1918

    Sean McMeekin: The Berlin-Baghdad Express: The Ottoman Empire and Germany's Bid for World Power, 1898-1918
    A thorough and almost magisterial acount of an area of World War 1 not normally given a prime focus; the Ottoman front. It is a very contemporary work using terms very familiar today: the creation of a jihad against the Entente and Britsh in particular; rivalry between Shia and Sunni; Caucasian minority struggles; strategies to control modern Iraq & Iran and at the end a push for middle east oil. McMeekin shows how Wilhelmine Germany had a rich seam of middle east specialist archaeologists. He records the excellent use made of this by Berlin in working on the Ottomans, Arabs, Persians, Afghans and others to promote an anti British & French jihad policy from Constantinople to Kabul via Baghdad. The ultimate aim was to bring about a collapse of British India. New light is cast on the context of many elements of Great war strategy & campaigns: the German push to india increased a British focus on Iraq and Iran that has persisted; the Armenian massacres as an element of Ottoman great war strategy; the success of the Tsarist Russian army and the later growth from it of Yudenich's White forces.The Turks were diplomatically, and often militarily, sharper and shrewder than usually given credit for. McMeekin argues that the Balfour declaration was made by a largely pro arab British government, partly out of pique with German advances to Zionists and a desire to win US zionist support for a speedier US mobilsation. It also traces German - muslim relations to the end of World War 2 showing how these were cultivated as part of the Nazi anti-semitic program. Given the unfamiliarity of the characters to most readers a list of Dramatis Personae would have been helpful. Equally the title perhaps suggests more of a focus on the actual Berlin-Baghdad railroad. Although a vital thread in the narrative, it is no more than that. Railway enthusiasts will be disappointed early on by what is perhaps the title of an over-zealous editor. Nov '10 (****)

  • David Finkel: The Good Soldiers

    David Finkel: The Good Soldiers
    Finkel spent 8 months in Iraq during the "Surge"with the US 2-16 Ranger division and reports on their deployment there, as he himself writes "without agenda". This is not a strategic analysis of their role within the Iraq theatre. Rather the focus is on an infantry battalion of young soldiers who see themselves as being there to do as good (hence the title) and decent a job as possible. They are not politicians or ideologues. Finkel draws a series of pen portraits of key figures – battalion leader, soldiers going out in their humvees to face yet another patrol route seeded with remote controlled bombs, the Iraqis who work with them. Then there are the casualties. The book presents them in their truly awful detail – especially in one chapter which describes a visit by the commander to severely his severely wounded men in hospital in the States. Good Soldiers puts the troops in their human context. Finkel writes empathetically of men trying to survive and do a job they were sent out to do but who grow increasingly disillusioned as their deployment comes to an end. The 2-16 Rangers live in fortified areas as separate from the Iraqi population as it is possible to be and still be in Iraq. This is necessary – they appear to be under constant deadly attack. This is not the more secure confines of Baghdad's Green Zone, but in Rustamiya, on the eastern edge of the city, a violent place where 350,000 Iraqis were hanging on as the war ground ahead. The enemy are faceless, nameless, not explored by Finkel and neither are their motives. This makes them perhaps perceived all the more as the Good Soldiers saw them. This is no gung-ho account. The reader though is left with a great deal of sympathy for those involved, regardless of what might be thought of the reasons for them being there in the first place. For this reason The Good Soldiers is likely to remain a valuable source for understanding the bravery and ferocity but also the futility of the Iraq occupation. Sept '10 (****)

  • Greg Grandin: Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City

    Greg Grandin: Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City
    Tells the story of Henry Ford's attempt to build a settlement in the Amazon jungle during the 1920's and 1930's. Ostensibly to provide rubber for Ford's factories and so break the monopoly of the Dutch and British plantations of the Far East, in reality Fordlandia was an attempt by the US industrialist to build what he considered a model industrial settlement in the heart of the Brazilian rainforest. Grandin tells the story well, of how Henry Ford was hoodwinked into buying a 5,000 square mile tract of land which he might have gained for nothing from the government; how a New England type town was built in the middle of nowhere for brazilian and expat workers complete with company shops, golf course, barn for square dancing and clapboard hoiuses each with a garden ready for planting flowers; and how ultimately the project collapsed. But the story is more than this. We are taken on an intriguing journey into the mind of the founder of Fordism and his theories of small planned industrial communities which he had already tried out in Michigan. Here was paternalism at its height. Quality housing, above average wages, planned communities with clinics and schools. In this Ford also displayed some ideas recently quite fashionable: dislike of big banking, direct government control and monopoly producers. His communities were planned where possible without any of this. But the downside was company control. No organised labour, intolerance of those who failed to think as Ford men should, entertainment outside the (Ford) approved parameters (ie alcohol, gaming, close-up dancing) frowned upon. There was also a disdain for specialists in favour of individuals who were self trained, who learned from experience. All of this was to come to a head in Brazil. Fordlandia becomes the island of homely "mid-western" modernity in the Amazon. Well laid out housing, clinics and schools combined with above average wages to spend in company shops selling at reasonable rates to encourage the purchase of clean clothing. But the cracks appear. The dislike of experts mean the Ford team in the Amazon have to learn on the job (the pretty houses were solid, but their thick walls and tin roofs made them like ovens to live in). More importantly scant attenton was paid to cultural differences. Clocking in helped produce a riot that destroyed much of the early settlement. The rubber was also a disaster. Blight and bugs spread easily in the damp heat of the Amazon. Plantations at Fordlandia and a new site further north were devastated by disease. Agronomists could have told this to the Ford team of car engineers before they went to Brazil. Eventually after World War II Ford's grandson sold Fordlandia to the Brazilian government. It is now overgrown and much is used for soy production. The inexperienced Ford technicians did devise a new way of cross cutting plants to improve them genetically that was soon to be copied across the globe. A visit to the Ford plantations inspired Brazil's dictator Vargas to make his 1940 "March to the West" speech that formally announced the drive to open up Brazil's interior. In a final irony Grandin explains how this has since led not only to the erosion of the rainforest but also to the explosion of an industrial region in the mid Amazon with squalid living conditions that are the antithesis of Ford's hopes fo rhis Fordlandia. And the irony? This industrialisation is based on the unskilled assembly of parts made elsewhere - the essentials of those Fordist principles which made Henry his fortune. An intriguing and provoking book. Reads well and is accompanied by many instructive photographs. Sept '10 (****)

  • Dee Brown: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West (Arena Books)

    Dee Brown: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West (Arena Books)
    Brown shows clearly, and with a regularity that begins to distract, how the Plains Indians were dealt with one by one from the 1850's to the 1890's as they fell foul to a combination of the white man's greed, lack of humanity and an almost universal desire to rid the growing USA of an unwelcome people. When written forty years ago the use of the word "genocide" was not one in general use. However this is what Brown is describing. Villages wiped out, tribes herded onto reservations where the land was worthless, meaning they had nothing to hunt or could not grow anything. Then when something of value was found - gold for example - they were moved on to another reservation. All this despite signing supposedly binding agreements with Washington. The Indians were innocent, naive, unable to grasp at first the self interest of what Brown describes as the military-washington-reservation complex which saw them and their original lands (and later on the provisions provided by Washington) exploited for personal and commercial gain. Even those who adopted the "white" lifestyle advocated by Washington: who settled in one place, grew crops and went to church were eventually dispossessed through trickery and military force. Very few whites understood or attempted to understood the Indian position -that they were trying to live with the whites and a culture alien to them but were forced to resist when their lands were illegally settled on or buffalo being hunted out of existence. The old chiefs tried hard to restrain their younger members realising that the white man's power was much greater and resistance would only bring even greater retribution. When finally realising the true determination of the growing white population it was too late. The tribes were too few in number, too divided in intention and left facing an arrogant US military busily building forts across their original lands, equipped with the latest technology (magazine loading rifles, mobile artillery, and the beginning of long distance communications) and using them to ride out and deal with Indian problems and ultimately to round up the survivors of their raids and campaigns and imprison them on reservations. In 1970 this had definite echoes of US military policy in Vietnam but depressingly still equally for modern Iraq. So the tactics developed against the north American Indian continue to drive US military policy. Brown uses a strange mechanism to increase the readers sympathy for the Indians - the narrative is written as if by the Indians themselves. Today this can seem patronising and an encumbrance to a reasoned understanding of the aboriginal position, and although the work is widely sourced, it makes sourcing what is written difficult. Nonetheless the work remains a powerful piece of writing, if not strict history. Aug '10 (****)

  • Rowland White: Vulcan 607: The Epic Story of the Most Remarkable British Air Attack since WWII

    Rowland White: Vulcan 607: The Epic Story of the Most Remarkable British Air Attack since WWII
    This is the story of the first Black Buck V-bomber raid on Stanley airport during the Falklands/Malvinas war. It recalls much that is to be admired from a purely logistical and management aspect: the ingenuity of the engineers as well as the planners, coaching the old superannuated nuclear bombers (due to be scrapped in June 1982) into service and planning a massive in-flight refueling programme to ensure one Vulcan made the islands and was able to disable the runway and prevent its use by Argentine jets, so ensuring the eventual success of the British campaign. A role that has perhaps been underplayed in the past. It also paints a magnificent picture of two of the legendary V-bombers, Vulcan & Victor, at work. However the cover has a quote recommending the book written by BBC petrolhead Jeremy Clarkson which sets its tone quite accurately. This is very much a "Boys Own" account which makes only a limited attempt to view the raid in a broader context than the RAF and the crews involved. This is served especially poorly by brief anecdotal inserts that appear to tell the story of some of the islanders after the Argentine landings. The sources listed at the end are extremely thin on Argentine materials/interviews. This may be a good beach read but it is no Frederick Taylor (Dresden) or Leo McKinstry (Dambusters). July '10 (**)

  • Mark Urban: The Man Who Broke Napoleon's Codes: The Story of George Scovell

    Mark Urban: The Man Who Broke Napoleon's Codes: The Story of George Scovell
    Although this does what it says on the tin and tells the story of how Scovell broke the Napoleonic codes during the Peninsular Wars, the key thread is that of the campaigns rather than the code-breaking (presumably because this is not an Enigma type process, rather it relied on the interpreting of a few, albeit vital coded letters and how these contributed to Wellington's eventual victory. Knowing too little of the Iberian theatre this suited me as it would a general reader (it also has excellent maps), but anyone seeking an in depth look at Napoleonic cipher breaking will be disappointed. July '10 (***)

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Entries categorized ".. imperialism"

britain's 2002 plans to hand over some sovereignty of historic territory

New memoirs of Peter Hain, a former minister in Tony Blair's British government indicate that the then-Prime Minister was "contemptuous" toward the desire of Gibraltar residents to remain under the British flag and tell how close Britain came to handing over the rocky territory to the Spanish in 2002.

Hain explains how once he became Europe minister in June 2001, he wanted to work to "do something about Gibraltar", which has been a British overseas territory since 1713. This was based on a "gut instinct that it is ridiculous in the modern age for Britain to have a colony on the tip of Spain nearly 2,000 miles away". His "African roots" (Hain has south African connections and was a leader in the UK's anti-apartheid movement) made it easy for him to understand the strong feelings aroused by "a little bit of England trying eccentrically to cling on to Spain".

Hain's plan would see Britain and Spain co-share the island's sovereignty, along with "maximum self-government for Gibraltarians", with economic assistance from the European Union. It was "enthusiastically" backed by Blair during a flight in February 2002. Blair reportedly told him on the flight: "It is really important to get a better future for Gibraltar, to secure a better relationship with Spain and to remove it as an obstacle to our relations within Europe."

Hain says that a deal was done with the Spanish Government on 18 April 2002 to allow the British to keep control of a naval base on the island, while the people of Gibraltar could hold a binding referendum. However the deal was short-lived and hours after agreeing it, the Madrid government had vetoed it. It seems though that this was to suit Prime Minister Blair who was being faced by increasing and angry opposition from Gibralterians suspicious of the talks with Spain. Hain writes that Blair was now "relieved" to have been "let off the hook" by the Spanish. Since 2006, Gibraltar has governed its own affairs, although defence and foreign relations matters, are Britain's responsibility.

What is of interest perhaps is that this story has been given prominence by Britains right-wing press at a time when the question of the sovereignty of that other colonial remnant, the Falkland/Malvinas Islands is making headlines again. The Daily Mail writes on Hain's story that: "Labour's willingness to sell out the people of Gibraltar stands in contrast to the firm line taken by the Coalition. David Cameron has repeatedly said Gibraltar should stay British". Warning shots across bows in case he should change his mind about territories with disputed sovereignty?

  

 

Image origin………………… .post source: Daily Telegraph

linked casahistoria site: Falklands/Malvinas Islands

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Posted on Saturday, January 28, 2012 at 06:55 PM | | Comments (0)

images of scott - nippy for his nipper & more

In the week that Scott reached the Pole 100 years ago, a new exhibition of scientific specimens and artefacts belonging to Captain Scott and his Antarctic team opens at the Natural History Museum, London, this month. This BBC gallery shows some of the fascinating objects on display.

Scott and his party of men reached the south pole only to find that they had been beaten to their destination by a Norwegian team led by explorer Roald Amundsen, in a sense signifying the end of the high point of Empire for Britain.

The image alongside shows one of the expedition dogs, Chris, listening to the gramophone in the pose of Nipper, the dog on the His Master's Voice record label. The picture was taken by Herbert Ponting, the expediton's photographer and cinematographer. Amundsen was much more dispassionate and pragmatic towards his use of dogs. Scott was never able to master this which is now recognised as one of the reasons for the failure of his expedition.

Image origin………………… .post source: BBC History Extra

linked casahistoria site: South Atlantic and Empire

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Posted on Monday, January 16, 2012 at 10:51 AM | | Comments (0)

black britons during the period of the british slave trade

Following on from the post below of the Sugar Barons, a recent podcast from the UK National archives draws attention to what life was like for the 'average' black person in England before the 20th century.

in the podcast, Dr Kathleen Chater, an independent historian and writer challenges some commonly held assumptions that have been made about the lives of black Britons during the period of the British slave trade. Most apparently were quietly getting on with their lives, seeking employment, getting married and raising families. It takes a lot of work to uncover their life histories because there was no legal discrimination against these individuals. Glimpses into their lives can be found buried in The National Archives' vast collection, which reveals unexpected stories.

The 44 minute talk draws from Chater's doctoral thesis: Untold Histories: Black people in England and Wales during the period of the British slave trade, c. 1660-1807. She came to the history of Black British people through genealogy and has written books and articles on this subject. This talk was part of the National Archives diversity week event in November, highlighting the variety of The National Archives' collection.

Image origin………………… .post source: UK National Archive

linked young casahistoria site: The Slave Trade

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Posted on Monday, December 26, 2011 at 12:32 PM | | Comments (0)

reading the sugar barons by matthew parker

Parkers history of the West Indies sugar industry is one of the most valuable reads of the year for students of industrial and imperial history. He outlines the origins of the industry which originated on the Caribbean island of Barbados and reached its peak with the cultivation of Jamaica. The final chapters look at eventual decline and collapse.

However, this is much more than a narrative. It's value is in how it draws in key strands of Britains early imperial history showing how they all worked together - but reading between the lines it also makes clear modes of behaviour that still exist amongst the descendants of the sugar barons today - the bankers of the city.

The 17th century saw the cultivation of sugar following ideas first used in Brazil by the Dutch and Portuguese. Other islands soon followed as the price for sugar rocketed in Europe and fortunes were made by the estate owners. Sugar became an essential luxury and demand forced more and more land into cultivation. More was being made in profit than could be spent on the islands- the growing surplus was being spent and invested in England - providing funds for other commercial and early industrial ventures. so far so good, but it is in exploring other aspects of this growth that the book excels:

  • the early years coincided with Spain's domination of the area. London encouraged the settlers to help defend and expand their investments. Privateering - the use of ships to attack and loot Spanish treasure ships was encouraged. This would become little more than blatant piracy, especially as it happened consistently, not just during war due to the odd concept that the West Indies were "beyond the line" of normal diplomatic niceties. By the late 17th century this was real "Pirates of the Caribbean territory.
  • Sugar is not an easy crop to produce. It requires complex processing from cane and as such represents one of the first areas of agriculture heavily dependent on capital and expertise - key elements of the later industrial revolution in Britain.
  • From the start the significance of the wealth generated from sugar for the English economy was recognised in London. Cromwell and the restored Stuarts introduced the Navigation Acts to ensure that the industry and its transportation and sale remained in English hands. so developed close ties with that less important part of England's American empire - the New England colonies. Newport, Rhode Island grew in direct response to the profits to be made by trade with the Indies. Many new England families bought land and ran sugar estates in the West indies making vast profits for themselves and giving them political influence in new England. Several are eventual signatories of the Declaration of Independence.
  • Attitudes of the most powerful and influential families towards law and authority from London were selective at best. As time went on and they amassed wealth greater than most others they formed a powerful lobby on the English parliament ensuring financial and foreign policy was directed their way. Government seemed to fear upsetting their perceived interests in way familiar to their modern relations with the Banks.
  • The mid 18th century Sugar and Stamp Acts which ultimately led to the US War of Independence were introduced to provide funding to protect the Indies at the expense of what was considered at the time the less significant colonial territory.

However the key thread of the book is that of slavery. Generally little focus is placed on the use of slaves in British colonies. Writers (and syllabuses) tend to focus on the slave trade - the inference being the slaves were carried to be used elsewhere - presumably the US southern plantations. Parker makes it very clear that this "modern" slavery was driven by the needs of the Indies. Sugar cultivation is very labour intensive. The islands were amongst the least healthy places on earth with mortality, especially amongst Europeans being very high. Slaves brought in from Africa were the answer for the owners and were employed in ever growing numbers from the mid 17th century, despite their own high death rates. On some islands they eventually outnumbered whites 16 to 1. They were considered of little value other than as an economic commodity and Parker shows clearly how dehumanised the owners and their white management had become to slavery. In places I was reminded of the treatment in Schindlers List of the Jews by the Feinnes character in the Labour camp. Harsh, brutal treatment was considered by many as correct. Even those arriving from England with initial scruples, usually lost them pretty soon. In one of the books most valuable chapters though Parker uses the diaries of an English overseer Thomas Thistlewood, to draw attention to the complexities of the white-black relationship as well as its sexual consequences for women slaves.

Supported throughout by individual histories with a focus on the Landowners, this is well written and accompanied by good maps and illustrations.

Other Reviews of the Sugar Barons: The Literary Review, History Extra, The Guardian

linked young casahistoria site: The Slave Trade

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Posted on Tuesday, December 20, 2011 at 10:54 AM | | Comments (0)

hong kong’s colonial cemetery - podcast

The most recent UK National Archives podcast provides an interesting look at one little known aspect of colonial life (and death) in the Far East. It focuses on the former British Colony of Hong Kong - a thriving trading centre and home to merchants, the military and members of the colonial service - and specifically the quiet spot in Happy Valley which became last resting place for many who travelled to the Far East from Europe during the 19th century. Christine Thomas takes listeners on a 40 minute virtual walk through the cemetery, stopping to examine the stories of a few very ordinary people who are buried there.

Ms Thomas spent a 40-year career with the police in Hong Kong and London working in the fields of research and archival records management. For the past few years she has run her own research service specialising in families with ancestors who spent time in Hong Kong and China.

Good listening for those researching family ties in the Far East.

image origin

post source: National Archives

linked casahistoria sites:

Emigration; British Imperialism

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Posted on Wednesday, October 05, 2011 at 10:25 AM | | Comments (0)

revealed: britain’s likely duplicity in the death of the un secretary general

It seems that the mystery of the 1961 death of the UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld in a plane crash into the African jungle, may lead to shady dealings involving the British colonial office.... New evidence has emerged suggesting that the plane carrying Hammarskjöld was shot down over what then was the British colony of Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) 50 years ago, and that the details were covered up by British colonial authorities.

Hammarskjöld was flying to Ndola for peace talks with the Katanga Congo leadership at a meeting that the British helped arrange. The Swedish Secretary General had, by then, enraged almost all the major powers on the Security Council with his support for decolonisation and more darkly, he may have upset British mining interests with his support of the Congolese government against a rebellion backed by western mining companies and mercenaries in the mineral-rich Katanga region. Formally, the UK backed the UN mission, but, privately, the secretary general and his aides believed British officials were obstructing peace moves, possibly as a result of mining interests and sympathies with the white colonists on the Katanga side.

A British-run commission of inquiry at the time blamed the crash in 1961 on pilot error and a later UN investigation largely rubber-stamped its findings. They ignored or downplayed witness testimony of villagers near the crash site which suggested foul play. Now though the Guardian newspaper has talked to surviving witnesses who were never questioned by the official investigations and were too scared to come forward. These residents of the western outskirts of the town of Ndola described Hammarskjöld's DC6 being shot down by a second, smaller aircraft. They say the crash site was sealed off by Northern Rhodesian security forces the next morning, hours before the wreckage was officially declared found, and they were ordered to leave the area.

Many of these witnesses were located and interviewed over the past three years by Göran Björkdahl, a Swedish aid worker based in Africa. The investigation led Björkdahl to previously unpublished telegrams from the days leading up to Hammarskjöld's death on 17 September 1961, which illustrate US and British anger at the Secretary Generals support for the Congo government. Amongst other points Björkdahl concludes that:

  • Hammarskjöld's plane was almost certainly shot down by an unidentified second plane.
  • The actions of the British and Northern Rhodesian officials at the scene delayed the search for the missing plane and that the wreckage was found and sealed off by Northern Rhodesian troops and police long before its discovery was officially announced.
  • The one survivor of the crash could have been saved but was allowed to die in a poorly equipped local hospital.

Historians at the British Foreign Office said they could not comment. British officials believe that, at this late date, no amount of research would conclusively prove or disprove what they see as conspiracy theories that have always surrounded Hammarskjöld's death.

How many more colonial skeletons remain in the British cupboard…..

Image origin…………………… ……….post source: Guardian

Linked casahistoria site: decolonisation

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Posted on Monday, August 22, 2011 at 10:56 AM | | Comments (0)

the gauchos who came from beyond the pale of imperial russia

An item by the US National Public Radio (Download and listen here) on the 1890s the wave of European emigration to Argentina shows that they included Russian Jews fleeing anti-Semitic violence and discrimination. So far nothing new here, but NPR reports how many moved out of Buenos Aires (most emigrants remained in the city) and onto the Pampas where they founded hamlets similar to the shtetls they left behind. They spoke Yiddish, built synagogues and traditional Jewish schools — and became farmers and gauchos: Argentine cowboys.

Only a few of their descendants remain, and in Entre Rios province, which became the centre of Argentina's rural Jewish communities, there are still gauchos, Hebrew lessons and sacred scrolls to be found. The few remaining gauchos from the European east live on farms that go back more than a century. Most though have given up and live in the cities.

In the late 19th century, entire Jewish towns packed up and fled czarist pogroms (attacks on Jewish communities). A German-Jewish philanthropist, the Baron Maurice de Hirsch, planned a Jewish homeland not in the Middle East but in the Americas. He recruited would-be pioneers from the so-called Pale of Settlement (the part of the Russian empire where the czar permitted Jews to live) that today forms parts of Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine and other countries. Hirsch bought up vast areas of farmland in the United States, Canada, Brazil and Argentina, renting them out to Jewish arrivals. Some 50,000 Jews made it to Entre Rios and other rural provinces. They built up dozens of towns with names like Sajaroff, Sonnenfeld and Moises Ville. Some had two or three synagogues, community farms like the ones they left behind in Russia and schools that taught in Yiddish and Hebrew

Remnants of that past remain. In the town of Villa Clara, lessons are still taught in Hebrew. A couple of blocks away is the town synagogue, carefully restored through donations. Other towns have storerooms still containing the items brought by the emigrants on their journey to Argentina: old framed photographs of men in black hats and long beards; wooden clocks; heavy metal typewriters; old deeds and titles as well as religious scrolls. The image shows an 1895 synagogue built in Colonia Lucienville.

Not enough for a museum perhaps, but on a Friday night, there are still enough of the old Jewish residents in several towns and villages for Sabbath services, just like old times in eastern Europe, and on Argentina's Pampas.

Image origin…………………… ……….post source: NPR

Linked casahistoria sites: Emigration to Argentina, Pampas Tales

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Posted on Sunday, August 14, 2011 at 04:01 PM | | Comments (0)

past imperial wars continue to haunt britain - now it's the boer war

A case of British military justice during the Boer war in South Africa is making headlines in Australia. It involves a trio of three men, Harry 'Breaker' Morant and fellow soldiers Peter Handcock and George Witton who were convicted in 1902 of shooting 12 Boer prisoners of war. Readers may have seen the excellent 1980 Australian film (part of the wave of films from australia in the 1980's that included 'Gallipoli' directed by Bruce Beresford and starring British actor Edward Woodward as Harry "Breaker" Morant. (if not, it is well worth seeking out) which tells their story. The men did not deny shooting the prisoners but claimed that they were following orders from British officials, a claim that Britain denied then and still does. Morant and Handcock were sentenced to death by firing squad (Morant is famous for his last words to the firing squad: "Shoot straight, you bastards!"), becoming the only Australians in history to be executed for war crimes. Witton had his sentence commuted to life in prison but was released after three years.

But evidence that the convictions were unsafe has been growing and for several years campaigners have been calling for an independent review into the convictions Several descendants of the men have recently sent letters to Robert McClelland, the Australian Attorney General, demanding that he open an independent inquiry into the convictions. In one letter, Beverly Little said the execution of her great-grandfather Peter Handcock had caused her family great hardship. Last year, the British government rejected pleas to grant the trio a posthumous royal pardon, forcing campaigners to turn their attention to systems of redress under Australian law.

James Unkles, a military lawyer, is coordinating the new campaign. He claims to have evidence that will prove the men were denied a fair trial under the military law of the time. More significantly, he also claims to have proof, including a British parliamentary transcript, that Lord Kitchener instructed his soldiers in South Africa to take no prisoners. His dossier of evidence has been reviewed by barrister David Denton SC, who also believes that serious errors of law mean their convictions were not legally sound. Unkles said the British government has tried to make the case go away because it was "embarrassed" by the string of legal errors and cover-ups and is hopeful that the Attorney General would agree to open a judicial inquiry in Australia but if he did not then the next step would be an appeal in the British High Court against the original court martial.

The best known of the three, Morant, was born in Somerset in 1864 and moved to Australia when he was 19, finding fame as a horse-breaker (hence his nickname), drover and poet in the 1890s. He earned a reputation as a charming scoundrel, but also a heavy drinker and a womaniser. When war broke out in South Africa he volunteered to fight with the English against the Boers.

Given Britain's present legal cases involving British colonial policy in Kenya this is another example of how an imperial past continues to bite back many years later...

Image origin………………… .post source: Telegraph

linked casahistoria site: British Imperialism

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Posted on Monday, August 01, 2011 at 11:48 AM | | Comments (0)

visualising china, a massive new visual resource on 1850-1950

One of the largest online collections of historical photographs of China has just been launched by the University of Bristol today. Called the Visualising China project, this virtual archive of Chinese life, gives users the opportunity to explore and interact with more than 8,000 digitised photographs of China taken between 1850 and 1950. Whilst offering images such as rare photographs by the Chinese ambassador to the USSR during World War Two, Fu Bingchang, and rare shots of the nationalist leader of China Chiang Kai-Shek, it also shows photos of everyday life such as the one alongside of a young man on a 'motorbike' in a photographer's studio, probably in Shanghai, c.1950 which was purchased in a Shanghai junk shop in 2010.

The site offers free open access to major online collections such as Historical Photographs of China (University of Bristol), the Sir Robert Hart Collection (Queen's University, Belfast) and Joseph Needham's Photographs of Wartime China (Needham Research Institute, Cambridge), as well as to previously unseen and private collections and a selected Google Books library of China-related publications.

Users may submit comments or annotations to the image entries, organise images on to their own workbenches, download low-resolution images, and explore the collections by word searches, date ranges, photographer, people depicted, maps and classification terms.

The Visualising China project grew out of five years of digitisation work undertaken by HPC in the Department of Historical Studies, culminating in one of the largest online collections of historical photographs of China, which is still growing. Images come from a variety of sources – archival (e.g. School of Oriental and African Studies archive; the National Archives; British Steel Collection), commercial (e.g. John Swire and Sons Ltd), as well as privately-held collections, including family albums, prints and negatives, often somewhat neglected in attics and cupboards. The web site was built by ILRT, with additional support from the British Academy, the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the Worldwide University Network and the University of Bristol.

Image origin………………… .post source: Visualising China 

linked casahistoria site: China & the West 

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Posted on Sunday, July 17, 2011 at 10:30 AM | | Comments (0)

a little history of libya

As the NATO guarantors of the Libya No Fly Zone meet to discuss their next move, this may be the place for the café to provide readers with a little back-history….

Chapter 1: Antiquity: Modern Libya as two -Tripolitania and Cyrenaica.

From 700 BC, much of the coast of modern western Libya developed as links in a Phoenician chain of ports (Lebdah (Leptis Magna), Oea (Tripoli) and Sabratha) stretching from the Levant around to Spain. The region was known as Tripolitania

About 70 years later Greek settlers came to the east of Libya and built cities. This region was known as Cyrenaica. After the fall of Carthage both Tripolitania and Cyrenaica came under Roman control to become prosperous Roman provinces. It was the Romans who first unified these regions of Libya (adding a third, northern Fezzan) into one single new province for admin reasons.

Chapter 2: Arabisation of the provinces

In AD 643, the provinces were taken by the armies of Islam which were advancing across northern Africa towards Spain. Roman irrigation systems were repaired, order restored and a prosperity returned to the region. Two tribes – the Bani Salim and Bani Hilal – from the Arabian Peninsula moved in and displaced the Berber tribes people from their traditional lands cementing the cultural and linguistic Arabisation of the region. The Ottoman Turks occupied Tripoli in 1551 and remained in control of much of what is now modern Libya until 1911.

Chapter 3: The Europeans arrive – the creation of "Libya"

On 3 October 1911, the Italians attacked Tripoli claiming to be liberating Libya from Ottoman rule. Few in Libya today have forgotten the three decades of Italian presence, largely because it was extremely repressive. It's estimated that up to half the population in Cyrenaica died during the Italian occupation. Probably the most important legacy of the Italian rule - according to historians like Chapin Metz- is the political creation of "Libya" with the unification of Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan in 1934. (The map alongside shows Italian Libya as the Fourth Shore was the southern part of "Greater Italy" (orange borders), a Fascist project to enlarge Italy's national borders)

Then in World War II the British attacked the Italians from Egypt which they controlled. Germany sent Rommel and the Afrika Korps to support the weak Italian resistance. By January 1943, Tripoli was in British hands and the last German and Italian soldiers were driven from Libya.

In reality this created a situation whereby Libya transferred from Italian control to British and French control, predominately British. The US was also granted the use of two massive airbases, Wheelus, just outside Tripoli, and another one, El Adem, just outside Benghazi in the east. Both formed part of the strategic overlay for the Mediterranean region at the beginning of the Cold War. It was in this environment of foreign control and influence that Colonel Gadhafi himself grew up in and that certainly marked him.

Chapter 4: Oil and Gadhafi

Desperately poor, Libya became independent in 1951, but the country's fortunes were transformed by the discovery of oil in 1959 at Zelten in Cyrenaica. Over the decade that followed, Libya was transformed from an economic backwater into one of the world's fastest-growing economies. Political instability followed and with the region in turmoil, a little-known but charismatic 27-year-old Mu'ammar Gadhafi, seized power in Libya in September 1969. Riding on a wave of anti-imperialist anger, the new leader closed British and American military bases, expanded the armed forces and closed all newspapers, churches and political parties. Some 30, 000 Italian settlers were deported.

Internally, opposition was crushed, many dissidents were deported or threatened with liquidation. Externally Gadhafi became famous for assassinating political opponents throughout Europe, the US accused Libya of involvement in a string of terrorist attacks across Europe and on 15 April 1986, the US Navy fired missiles into Tripoli and Benghazi. In 1988 Libyan agents were charged with the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie and the 1989 explosion of a French UTA airliner over the Sahara. UN sanctions came into effect. Finally, in early 1999, a deal was brokered and the suspects were handed over for trial by Scottish judges in The Hague. The sanctions, which had cost Libya over US$30 billion in lost revenues and production capacities, were immediately lifted.

So where does that leave us in looking at events today?

  1. It is clear that Libya has not always been one state. Generally unity was imposed from outside over regions of disparate development, and often to satisfy imperial concerns. To be split again would not be out of keeping with the past.
  2. The no fly zone's most active participants: Britain and France have a relatively recent history of involvement in the region for their own interests (and much of that was before the discovery of oil). Italy so far is not flying warplanes to bomb, but is supplying the airbases for those who do….
  3. Gadhafi is doing no favours for modern Libya or its neighbours – but those who oppose him perhaps need to have a keen sense of history with regard to the motivation (and staying power?) of their external support – and that external support needs to be aware of this.

Image origin…………………… ……….post source: Lonely Planet NPR

Linked casahistoria site: Imperialism

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Posted on Wednesday, April 13, 2011 at 09:03 PM | | Comments (0)

brazilian football - the scots connection

As Scotland is defeated 2:0 by Brazil and here in the UK we are all completing our (last?) census forms, the BBC has come up with an apt story of how Brazilian footie was in fact started by a Scot!!

Information available on the census of 1891 has confirmed that Thomas Donohoe, originally from Busby, Renfrewshire (where the cafe used to hale from), arranged Brazil's first organised football match.

The Scottish Football Museum has used the 1891 census to piece together the story of Mr Donohoe's links with Brazil. Apparently he organised Brazil's first football match, a five-a-side game in April 1894. (This is a full six months before the previously recorded first match - a Sao Paulo team set up by Charles Miller.)

Donohoe, a dye expert, moved from Scotland to Brazil in 1893 to work in a textile factory near Rio de Janeiro.31 at the time, he had played for teams in Busby before his move to South America. He had to import a football and boots from Britain as there were none in Brazil.

so where does an earlier census come in? The Scottish Football Museum claims the census records were crucial in linking the Tom Donohoe of Brazil with his early upbringing in Scotland. This has confirmed his Scottish roots and believes it has helped to "add a new chapter to Scotland's proud football history."

Perhaps we can have some reverse cultural imperialism - Scotland's international history has been dire recently and a wee bit of Brazilian input in exchange for those first matches would not be amiss to help the Scots qualify for the next World Cup.

Image origin………………… .post source: BBC

linked casahistoria site: Brazil?

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Posted on Sunday, March 27, 2011 at 11:08 PM | | Comments (0)

the photography of colonial africa

The National Archives of the UK has digitised thousands of unique images of Africa and published them on Flickr this week. The collection spans more than 100 years of African history, from as early as the 1860s, including images of people, places, national and imperial events, conflict and natural disasters.

The images were transferred to The National Archives from the Colonial Office Library's photographic collection and offer a unique insight into life in the colonies. Approximately 10,000 images, a third of the entire collection, have been digitised so far.

As some of the images have minimal context, the Archive is asking the public to contribute to these historical assets by adding comments and captions, filling in knowledge gaps. They would like to know in particular if anything or anyone in the photographs is recognised by a visitor and if they provoke any personal memories. They are also keen to post links to photos held by the public of the same period.

The 'Africa through a lens' collection is available now for to view at: nationalarchives.gov.uk/africa.

Image origin………………… .post source: National Archives of Britain

linked casahistoria site: Imperialism in Africa

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Posted on Sunday, February 13, 2011 at 11:02 AM | | Comments (0)

freed slave to remain in britain

William Hoare's painting of Ayuba Suleiman Diallo, also known as Job ben Solomon, which was purchased by the Qatar Museums Authority (QMA) in 2009 is to remain in Britain. (See earlier post)

Diallo, known in England as Job Ben Solomon, was born around 1701 into a wealthy and scholarly family of Muslim clerics in Senegambia, west Africa. He was highly educated and spoke several languages. However the former slave owner and trader was captured by a rival tribe, humiliated by having his beard shaved, and enslaved. He was rescued from a tobacco plantation in Maryland by Thomas Bluett, an English lawyer and missionary, and brought to England where he became a celebrity, meeting George II and the intellectuals of the 1730s, and translating Arabic documents and inscriptions for Sir Hans Sloane, whose collections would become the nucleus of the British Museum.

Hoare's painting shows Diallo as a devout Muslim, holding his Qur'an, which he had written himself from memory in London, and was apparently made at the request of his English friends despite his religious misgivings over being portrayed.

The painting is believed to be the earliest known British oil portrait of a freed slave which honours a named African subject and Muslim as an individual and equal. However to prevent it leaving the country the British government imposed a temporary export bar last year and money was raised by the National Portrait Gallery of London to buy the work back, but, perhaps taking the pragmatic view given the export ban, the QMA agreed to lend it instead.

The QMA will also support a programme of conservation and research on the work, which will tour the UK and visit Doha in 2013.

Given the nature of the painting and the dignified and non-stereotypical way it portrays (freed) slaves and Muslims it will perhaps do more good if it remains in the United Kingdom……

Image origin…………………… ……….post source: Guardian

Linked (young) casahistoria site: The Slave Trade

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Posted on Sunday, January 23, 2011 at 03:35 PM | | Comments (0)

the kaiser's holocaust, review of an important read

Olusoga and Erichsen's book is really in two parts. The first tells the story of German colonialism in South West Africa, showing how German policy towards the native Herero and Nama peoples developed into one of genocide. In chapters that are crucial reading to all who seek to understand the motives behind 19th century colonialism and imperialism the authors show how a philosophy of white racial supremacy emerged out of the ideas of Charles Darwin and was put into practice. Survival of the fittest becomes justification for white dominance over "inferior" indigenous peoples and genocide an acceptable option. This process is shown though as not just a German process and the German experience is placed in a global context: with British colonists in Tasmania, the US frontier wars, the Argentine wars of the desert all showing the same features.

In the German genocide against Herero and Nama we read of extermination orders, forced labour and concentration camps designed to kill off indigenous peoples who were articulate, politically able and well resourced, but ultimately doomed as the Kaiser's troops introduce a policy of "absolute terror and cruelty... by shedding rivers of blood and money" (General von Trotha) in which the missionary churches were actively complicit.

This alone is a story that needs telling widely, but the second part of the work shows the significance of this colonial experience for future nazism. The colonies first Governor was the father of Hermann Göring, the uniform of the SA was that of the Wilhelm II's brown shirted colonial army. More significantly, the colonial period saw the emergence of the pseudo science of eugenics and the legal framework to protect the purity of German settlers from racial contamination. Terms appear that are to be more infamously used later: Rassenschande (Racial shame), Rassenreinheit (Racial purity). Interracial marriage is made illegal. This was all to make the colony racially safe for emigration for a Volk that needed Lebensraum (living space) to expand into and escape population pressure at home. In the final chapters Olusoga and Erichsen skillfully show how these ideas survive the collapse of 1918 and become a core element of the politics of the right. Hitler uses his Landsberg imprisonment to read much of the work on race that emerged out of the Wilhelmine colonial experience. After 1933 races considered impure, German Jews and Gypsies, are subjected to the treatment first employed in South West Africa: Nuremberg Laws to end racial mixing; control and internment in concentration camps, forced labour, extermination. One chilling story is that of the 400 "Rhineland Bastards", children fathered by French colonial troops occupying the Rhineland after 1918. By 1937 all are sterilised.

There is a final twist in the argument. Hitler's war, it is argued, was ultimately one for colonial Lebensraum in the east. The German treatment of the eastern populations and Red Army was different to the western conflict as Hitler considered the eastern peoples to be similar to uncivilised indigenous colonial peoples. Fighting was more brutal, civilians were treated with even less regard. Necessary he believed to ensure Lebensaum and civilisation. The nazis compared this push East to how Wilhelm's troops had fought the Herero, or the British the Sudanese & Tasmanians, the US the Native Indians, or the Argentines with the tribes of the south.

Thought provoking, this is an important, thorough and well written work. It ranks with Hochschild's "King Leopold's Ghost" as an indictment of European colonialism but develops its arguments beyond normally considered confines to place the events of a short-lived German colony in a far wider context.

Two final points: my copy had a few minor issues with proof reading: several wrongly spelt German terms, but most crucially the map was missing. Lastly: given an earlier post I take it that this is one area of Wilhelmine Germany the Chinese are taking in given their moves into Africa and latin America.....

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linked casahistoria sites:

German Imperialism

Weimar Germany

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Posted on Sunday, January 02, 2011 at 10:27 AM | | Comments (0)

france to return korea's royal books

News of another western museum item going home: According to South Korea's Foreign Ministry, Korea's ancient royal books, looted by the French navy in the late 19th century and kept by the National Library of France until now, may return to Korea next year.

This follows a face-saving (for the french) agreement between Korean President Lee Myung-bak and Nicholas Sarkozy at the G20 Seoul Summit this November: France is to "loan" the 297 Uigwe books on a five-year basis to the National Museum of Korea in Seoul, after which the loan will be automatically renewed every five years.

There has been strong resistance from curators at the National Library of France, who have started a petition against Sarkozy's announcement. They argue the five-year loan runs counter to French law, which prohibits the leasing of a public collection. The Uigwe books are registered as French property. They also demand a digitization of the Uigwe books which many observers believe is aimed at delaying the loan.(if this is so crucial, why did they not do it already?)

The Uigwe books are unique in that they display both text and hand-drawn illustrations of significant rites and ceremonies of the royal family of Joseon, including weddings, funerals, banquets and receiving of foreign missions as well as other state rituals and celebrations.The 297 Uigwe books in France were made in the 17th and 18th centuries and stored in Oegyujanggak, an annex of Gyujanggak, or the Royal Library, on Ganghwa Island, ironically, for safe keeping against invaders. The first Uigwe book is believed to have been published during the reign of King Taejo, the first Joseon king, in the 14th century but the surviving Uigwe books are mostly from the 17th century.

Image origin………………… .post source: Korea Herald

linked casahistoria site: french imperialism

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Posted on Wednesday, December 22, 2010 at 05:06 PM | | Comments (0)

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