Britain, Northern Rhodesia and the First World War: Forgotten Colonial Crisis

by Edmund James Yorke

Overview

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

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781137435774
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan UK
Publication date:	06/29/2015
Series:	Studies in Military and Strategic History
Edition description:	2015
Pages:	337
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.04(d)

About the Author

Edmund Yorke is currently Senior Lecturer in the War Studies Department at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, UK. He has authored works on British Imperial and Commonwealth political and military affairs and his recent books include The New South Africa (1998), Playing the Great Game (2012), Battle Story's Rorkes Drift and Isandlwana (2011 and 2012), and Mafeking (2014).

Table of Contents

Foreword by Hew Strachan Introduction 1. Pre-war Northern Rhodesia: The Structural Weaknesses of Colonial Control 2. Labour Recruitment and Mobilisation: The Roots of Crisis 3. Advent of a 'White Man's War': Early Implications for the Survival of White Supremacy 4. Colonial Dependence and African Opportunity: The Indigenous Response to War Exigencies 5. Crumbling Colonial Foundations: Chiefs and Headmen at War 6. The Strain of Total War: A Colonial State In Retreat 7. The Nadir of Colonial Power in Northern Rhodesia 8. Re-conquest and Reconstruction

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"The ideas of "total war" may have been developed on the back of the First World War in Europe, but this book shows how relevant many were to the war outside Europe. Edmund Yorke weaves together economic, imperial and military history to show the impact of war in ways that each, in isolation, cannot begin to convey. He provides context and illumination from one to the others. Here in microcosm is a case study of the effects of "total" and protracted warfare in sub-Saharan Africa." - Hew Strachan, Chichele Professor of War Studies, University of Oxford, UK.

Editorial Reviews

The author has filled a gap in the early years of Northern Rhodesia dominated by WWI. No-one before has brought together so much relevant material in such a concentrated form. … The author is to be warmly congratulated for his contribution to such an important part of Northern Rhodesia’s social, imperial and military history and on the painstaking research entailed.” (Roland A. Hill, The Overseas Pensioner, Issue 111, April, 2016)

From the Publisher