Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM

History of Britain and the USA – 1 BA, 2011-12

LECTURE FOURTEEN

Victorian Age

1

Reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901)

•

longest reigning queen

•

Grandmother of Europe - extensive dynastic links

•

married to her cousin Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha - hence the name of the dynasty
until 1917. Prince Albert dies in 1861 - the Queen remains widow until her death.

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE AGE

-

top era of British Empire – about 1/4 of the globe – “the sun never sets on the
British Empire”

-

Britain becoming the world's greatest military and industrial power – the workshop
of the world

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the only democratic country in Europe

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gradual social reforms with no turbulent events.

-

Victorian culture and society

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scientific discoveries and explorations

-

cities, suburbs

-

sports and organized leisure, seaside resorts

Victorian Politics

•

The true age of parliament

•

Two parties exchanging in power:

o

Tories give rise to the Conservative Party (1832)

o

Whigs give rise to the Liberal Party (1859)

The era marked with famous PMs - often in rivalry - reflecting the characteristic British two-
party system

Robert Peel

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economic expansion by cutting import duties

-

repeal of Corn Laws

-

advocate of free trade

Lord Palmerston

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aggressive foreign policy “gunboat diplomacy”

-

Pax Britannica – Britain as a world policeman

The Victorian political duel: Gladstone vs. Disraeli

William Ewart Gladstone (Whig)

Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM

History of Britain and the USA – 1 BA, 2011-12

LECTURE FOURTEEN

Victorian Age

2

-

strongly opposed to imperialist policies

-

politics as a mission

-

sound finances

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aiming at Irish Home Rule

-

free education

Benjamin Disraeli (Tory)

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imperialist policies and purchases

-

Victoria becomes Empress of India

Chartist Movement, 1838-48

Born out of economic and political frustrations of working masses and limited changes of the
Reform Act of 1832.

The People's Charter (1838) - demands of universal suffrage, annual Parliament election,
voting by secret ballot, no property qualification for MPs, salaries for MPs and equal electoral
districts.

Consequences:

-

huge million signature petitions to the government

-

riots often resulting in sending people to colonie

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lack of serious upheavals like the Spring of Nations in Europe.

All postulates refused by the House of Commons.
Impact on the future: great working-class movement before the birth of the Labour Party

Gradual franchise reforms

Second Reform Act (1866) - franchise still based on property but extended to everyone
except for women, farm laborers, very poor in the cities.

Third Reform Act (1885) - franchise to all adult males except for domestic servants

Hungry 1840s:

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low wages

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Corn Laws - repealed 1846

Potato blight and Great Famine in Ireland (1845-48)

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death, depopulation and immigration (8 to 3 mln)

-

ineffectiveness of the British government

-

1851 - the Great Exhibition of the Industries of All Nations in London

Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM

History of Britain and the USA – 1 BA, 2011-12

LECTURE FOURTEEN

Victorian Age

3

-

to show English industrialized power - WORKSHOP OF THE WORLD

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to compare the development of England to that of other nations

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specially built Crystal Palace

THE BRITISH EMPIRE

1583-1783 – First Empire
1783-1815 – Second Empire
1815-1914 – Imperial Century

•

splendid isolation and Pax Britannica

•

informal Empire (China, Middle East, South America)

•

Empire gained as if “in a fit of absence of mind”

•

imperial wars

•

expanding Empire but also reforming it - the concept of Dominions.

EUROPE

•

balance of power growing into industrial and military competition leading to WWI

•

competing with France, Germany and Russia

•

protector of Turkey against Russian influences

The Crimean War (1854-56)
Britain, France, Turkey vs. Russia

•

international intervention to maintain the balance of power

•

appalling conditions - frost, cholera, hunger - massive casualties

•

battles of Alma, Inkerman, Balaclava -

the Charge of the Light Brigade

(1854)

•

siege of Sevastopol

•

the war remembered today with reverence - Victoria Cross established.

-

Florence Nightingale - "Lady with the Lamp" military hospital reforms -
inspiration for the suffragettes.

-

William Howard Russell of The Times - modern war repporting

CANADA

The British North America Act (1868) - Canada becomes a dominion, i.e.:

•

a self-governing colony with autonomy in domestic and foreign affairs

•

British government represented by Governor General

Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM

History of Britain and the USA – 1 BA, 2011-12

LECTURE FOURTEEN

Victorian Age

4

•

The act followed by other countries becoming a REFORM PATTERN for the
British Empire

NEW ZEALAND AND AUSTRALIA

1840 - treaty of Waitangi signed by Maori chiefs - Britain annexes New Zealand.
1907 - New Zealand becomes a dominion.

1868 - Australia ceased to be a penal colony (since 1788) and given representation.
1901 - Commonwealth of Australia established:

•

6 states and 2 territories become united

•

federal parliament

CHINA

Trade wars and foreign spheres of interest

Opium War (1839-42) - Palmerston’s gunboat diplomacy
Treaty of Nanking, 1842: five Chinese ports open to Britain and cession of Hong Kong (a
crown colony until 1997)

The Arrow War (1856-1860): opening more ports, foreigners reside in Beijing

Boxer Rising (1899) of the nationalist "Secret Society of Harmonious Fists" against the
western division of China into spheres of interest.

The first international force (Eight-Nation Alliance) suppresses the rebellion - western power
in China becomes strengthened.

INDIA

THE RAJ: India + Pakistan + Bangladesh + Burma

- Jewel in the Crown

•

East India Company rule until 1858

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voluntary association of local rulers with the Crown

•

British law and education

•

armies of local volunteers - huge Indian Army – small Indian civil service

•

British army based on Indian forces: Sikhs, Gurkha (Nepal), Sepoys

1857-58 - the INDIAN MUTINY

Causes:

•

religious and economic westernization

•

sati - widow burning

•

annexation of Indian dominions cooperating with British India - Doctrine of Lapse

•

paper cartridges with animal fat - the spark.

Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM

History of Britain and the USA – 1 BA, 2011-12

LECTURE FOURTEEN

Victorian Age

5

Massacres of European population - garrisons and big Indian cities taken, e.g. Delhi,
Lucknow.

Rebellion crushed with savage reprisals - leaders blown from the mouth of cannons.

1858 India Act:

•

more British soldiers in the army

•

abolishing East India Company - transfer of its forces and territories to the Crown

•

Queen Victoria proclaimed Sovereign of India and in 1877 the Empress of India.

AFRICA

EXPLORATION:

Richard Francis Burton and John Hanning Speke (1856-63)

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search for the source of the Nile

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exploration of Great African Lakes (Lake Victoria, Tanganyika)

David Livingstone

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gospel, medicine, geographical exploration

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exploration of Great African Lakes (Lake Malawi)

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Victoria Falls on the Zambezi River – Zambia/Zimbabwe

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his reports trigger British interests in Africa

Henry Morton Stanley

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searching for Livingstone - 1871

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exploration of the Congo river – claiming Congo for Leopold King of the Belgians

SCRAMBLE FOR AFRICA (1881-1914)

EGYPT

1869 – opening of the Suez Canal
1875 - Disraeli buys half of Suez Canal shares
1882 - Egypt becomes a British colony - Suez declared neutral and secured by Britain
1883 - Mahdi (the Guided One) declares jihad - occupies Sudan and Khartoum and the British
evacuate
1885 - Gen. Charles Gordon – dies defending Khartoum. Mahdi establishes a theocratic state
with capital in Omdurman.

1896-99 - the Sudan War

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Lord Kitchener's army goes down to Sudan to recapture

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1898 - battle of Omdurman - the whole Nile valley under British rule.

1898 - Fashoda incident

Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM

History of Britain and the USA – 1 BA, 2011-12

LECTURE FOURTEEN

Victorian Age

6

SOUTH AFRICA

After the Great Trek of 1833 four states established in South Africa:

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Cape Colony - British

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Natal - British

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Transvaal - Boer

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Orange Free State - Boer

1877-79

•

Cetshawayo of Zululand threatens the Boer republics

•

Boers submit to the British for protection - the Zulu war starts - 1879

•

massacre of the British at Insandhlwana; battle of Rorke’s Drift

•

Zululand becomes part of Natal

1880-81 - First Boer War - victorious for the Boers.

Cecil Rhodes

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visionary, statesman, adventurer, ambitious man

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diamond miner – establishes De Beers company

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sponsoring of scholarships

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Rhodesia - Northern (Zambia) and Southern (Zimbabwe)

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ambitions to link Cape Town with Cairo by building a transcontinental railway

1899-1902 - Second Boer War - the bloodiest colonial war.

•

bloody battles - heavy involvement and casualties of the British

•

huge guerilla activity of the Boers

•

Boer sieges of Kimberley, Ladysmith, and Mafeking (LORD BADEN - POWELL
and later boy scouts)

•

Kitchener's concentration camps

Treaty of Vereeniging (1902) - annexation of the Boer republics.

South Africa becomes a dominion in 1910

SCIENCE

Isambard Kingdom Brunel

(1806–59) - technological genius.

Achievements: the Great Western Railway from London to Bristol, Paddington Station,
Clifton Suspension Bridge, Great Britain - the first steam ship to make regular transatlantic
crossings, Great Western and Great Eastern – huge monster ships.

Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM

History of Britain and the USA – 1 BA, 2011-12

LECTURE FOURTEEN

Victorian Age

7

Michael Faraday - ion, anode, cathode, electrode; electromagnetic induction
James Clerk Maxwell - electromagnetic theory
Lord Kelvin

Charles Darwin -

evolution/natural selection

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HMS Beagle voyage 1831-36

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On the Origin of Species (1859)

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The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871)

1880 - Greenwich Mean Time introduced
1884 – Prime Meridian introduced