The Height of Imperialism€¦ · Imperialism 1800–1914 Key Events As you read this chapter, look for the key events in the history of imperialism. • Competition among European

426

The Height ofImperialism

1800–1914

Key EventsAs you read this chapter, look for the key events in the history of imperialism.

• Competition among European nations led to the partition of Africa.• Colonial rule created a new social class of Westernized intellectuals.

• British rule brought order and stability to India, but with its own set of costs.• As a colonial power, the United States practiced many of the same imperialist policies

as European nations.

The Impact TodayThe events that occurred during this time period still impact our lives today.

• Rhodesia became the nation of Zimbabwe.• India adopted a parliamentary form of government like that of Great Britain.

• The United States gave up rights to the Panama Canal Zone on December 31, 1999.• Europeans migrated to the Americas, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa.

World History—Modern Times Video The Chapter 14 video,“Imperialism,” chronicles imperialism on three continents.

1810 1820 1830 1840 1850 1860

1848Mexico loses almosthalf of its territory tothe United States

1855David Livingstone isfirst European to seeVictoria Falls

1819British colony of Singaporefounded

Sir Thomas Raffles,founder of Singapore

Victoria Falls, in Zimbabwe

427

British family celebrating Christmas in India, c. 1900

HISTORY

Chapter OverviewVisit the Glencoe WorldHistory—Modern Times Web site at

and click on Chapter 14–Chapter Overview topreview chapter information.

wh.mt.glencoe.com1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920

1879Zulu king meetswith Britishambassadors

1898The UnitedStates defeatsSpain forcontrol over the Philippines

1884France makesthe VietnamEmpire aprotectorate

1896Britain and Franceagree to maintainThailand as abuffer state

1900Virtually all ofSoutheast Asiais underEuropean rule

1880“Newimperialism”begins

1910Emiliano Zapataleads peasantmovement inMexico

Zulus meet the British.

Emiliano Zapata

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Livingstone in African 1841, the Scottish doctor and missionary David Living-stone began a series of journeys that took him through

much of central and southern Africa. Livingstone was a gen-tle man whose goal was to find locations for Christian mis-sions on behalf of the London Missionary Society. He tookgreat delight in working with the African people.

Livingstone’s travels were not easy. Much of his journeywas done by foot, canoe, or mule. He suffered at times fromrheumatic fever, dysentery, and malaria. He survived anattack by armed warriors and a mutiny by his own servants.

Back in Great Britain, his exploits made Livingstone anational hero. His book Missionary Travels and Researches inSouth Africa was a best-seller. People jammed into lecture hallsto hear him speak of the beauty of Africa. As the London Jour-nal reported, “Europe had always heard that the centralregions of southern Africa were bleak and barren, heated bypoisonous winds, infested by snakes . . . [but Livingstonespoke of] a high country, full of fruit trees, abounding inshade, watered by a perfect network of rivers.”

Livingstone tried to persuade his listeners that Britainneeded to send both missionaries and merchants to Africa.Combining Christianity and commerce, he said, wouldachieve civilization for Africa.

I Why It MattersDuring the nineteenth and earlytwentieth centuries, Western colo-nialism spread throughout the non-Western world. Great Britain, Spain,Holland, France, Germany, Russia,and the United States competed formarkets and raw materials for theirexpanding economies. By the end ofthe nineteenth century, virtually allof the peoples of Asia and Africawere under colonial rule. AlthoughLatin America successfully resistedEuropean control, it remained eco-nomically dependent on Europe andthe United States.

History and You Territorial andtrade dominance are among the pri-mary goals of imperialist nations.Create a map of either Asia orAfrica to help you understand howthe various imperialists viewedthose regions. Code the territoriesaccording to exports or Europeandominance.

David Livingstone

Livingstone expedition in Africa, c. 1855

1887France completes its control of Indochina

Guide to Reading

Colonial Rule in Southeast Asia

Preview of Events

1930Saya San leadsBurma uprising

!1850 !1870 !1890 !1910 !1930 !1950

In 1860, E. Douwes Dekker wrote a book on the Dutch colonial system on theisland of Java. He said:

“The [Dutch government] compels [the Javanese farmer] to cultivate certain prod-ucts on his land; it punishes him if he sells what he has produced to any purchaser butitself; and it fixes the price actually paid. The expenses of transport to Europe througha privileged trading company are high; the money paid to the chiefs for encourage-ment increases the prime cost; and because the entire trade must produce profit, thatprofit cannot be got in any other way than by paying the Javanese just enough to keephim from starving, which would lessen the producing power of the nation.”

—The World of Southeast Asia: Selected Historical Readings,Harry J. Benda and John A. Larkin, eds., 1967

Dekker, a Dutch colonial official, was critical of the havoc the Dutch had wreakedon the native peoples of Java.

The New ImperialismIn the nineteenth century, a new phase of Western expansion into Asia and

Africa began. European nations began to view Asian and African societies as asource of industrial raw materials and a market for Western manufacturedgoods. No longer were Western gold and silver traded for cloves, pepper, tea,

Voices from the Past

Main Ideas• Through the “new imperialism,” West-

erners sought to control vast territories.• Colonial export policies exploited native

populations and opened up markets forEuropean manufactured goods.

Key Termsimperialism, protectorate, indirect rule,direct rule

People to IdentifyKing Mongkut, King Chulalongkorn, Com-modore George Dewey, Emilio Aguinaldo

Places to LocateSingapore, Burma, Thailand, Philippines

Preview Questions1. Why were Westerners so determined

to colonize Southeast Asia?2. What was the chief goal of the West-

ern nations?

Reading StrategyIdentifying Information Make a chartshowing which countries controlled whatparts of Southeast Asia.

CHAPTER 14 The Height of Imperialism 429

Spain (until 1898)HollandUnited States (after 1898)FranceGreat Britain

1896France and Great Britain agree tomaintain Thailand as a buffer state

Dutch plantation in Java, mid-1800s

“all great nations in the fullness of their strength havethe desire to set their mark upon barbarian lands andthose who fail to participate in this great rivalry willplay a pitiable role in time to come.”

In addition, imperialism was tied to Social Dar-winism and racism. Social Darwinists believed thatin the struggle between nations, the fit are victori-ous. Racism is the belief that race determines traitsand capabilities. Racists erroneously believe thatparticular races are superior or inferior. Racist beliefshave led to the use of military force against othernations. One British professor argued in 1900, “Thepath of progress is strewn with the wrecks ofnations; traces are everywhere to be seen of the[slaughtered remains] of inferior races. Yet thesedead people are, in very truth, the stepping stoneson which mankind has arisen to the higher intellec-tual and deeper emotional life of today.”

Some Europeans took a more religious andhumanitarian approach to imperialism. They arguedthat Europeans had a moral responsibility to civilizeprimitive people. They called this responsibility the“white man’s burden.”

These people believed that the nations of the Westshould help the nations of Asia and Africa. To some,this meant bringing the Christian message to the“heathen masses.” To others, it meant bringing thebenefits of Western democracy and capitalism tothese societies.

Describing What were four primarymotivations for the “new imperialism”?Reading Check

430 CHAPTER 14 The Height of Imperialism

Britain

Belgium

France

Germany

Italy

Netherlands

Portugal

Spain

SoutheastAsia

Africa IndiaMajor Regions of European Control

and silk. Now the products of European factorieswere sent to Africa and Asia in return for oil, tin,rubber, and the other resources needed to fuel Euro-pean industries.

Beginning in the 1880s, European states began anintense scramble for overseas territory. Imperialism,the extension of a nation’s power over other lands,was not new. Europeans had set up colonies in Northand South America and trading posts around Africaand the Indian Ocean by the sixteenth century.

However, the imperialism of the late nineteenthcentury, called the “new imperialism” by some, wasdifferent. Earlier, European states had been content,especially in Africa and Asia, to set up a few tradingposts where they could carry on trade and perhapssome missionary activity. Now they sought nothingless than direct control over vast territories.

Why did Westerners begin to increase their searchfor colonies after 1880? There was a strong economicmotive. Capitalist states in the West were looking forboth markets and raw materials, such as rubber, oil,and tin, for their industries. Europeans also wantedmore direct control of the areas with the raw materi-als and markets.

The issue was not simply an economic one, how-ever. European nation-states were involved in heatedrivalries. As European affairs grew tense, statessought to acquire colonies abroad in order to gain anadvantage over their rivals.

Colonies were also a source of national prestige.To some people, in fact, a nation could not be greatwithout colonies. One German historian wrote that

In the late 1800s a “new imperialism”flourished, with most of the majorEuropean countries attempting totake control of territories in Asia andAfrica.

1. Identifying Look at a politicalmap of Europe in Chapter 13.Which European countries did not try to colonize parts of Asia or Africa?

2. Analyzing It has been said aboutone of the countries identified inthe chart that “the sun never sets”on this particular empire. Towhich country does this phraserefer? What do you think thephrase means?

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Colonial Takeover in Southeast Asia

The new imperialism of the late nineteenth centurywas evident in Southeast Asia. In 1800, only two soci-eties in this area were ruled by Europeans: the Span-ish Philippines and the Dutch East Indies. By 1900,virtually the entire area was under Western rule.

Great Britain The process began with Great Britain.In 1819, Great Britain, under Sir Thomas StamfordRaffles, founded a new colony on a small island at thetip of the Malay Peninsula called Singapore (“city ofthe lion”). In the new age of steamships, Singaporesoon became a major stopping point for traffic goingto or from China. Raffles was proud of his new cityand wrote to a friend in England, “Here all is life andactivity; and it would be difficult to name a place onthe face of the globe with brighter prospects.”

During the next few decades, the British advanceinto Southeast Asia continued. Next to fall was thekingdom of Burma (modern Myanmar). Britainwanted control of Burma in order to protect its pos-sessions in India. It also sought a land route throughBurma into South China. Although the difficult ter-rain along the frontier between Burma and China

caused this effort to fail, British activities in Burmaled to the collapse of the Burmese monarchy. Britainsoon established control over the entire country.

France The British advance into Burma waswatched nervously by France, which had some mis-sionaries operating in Vietnam. The French mission-aries were persecuted by the local authorities, whoviewed Christianity as a threat to Confucian doc-trine. However, Vietnam failed to stop the Christianmissionaries. Vietnamese internal rivalries dividedthe country into two separate governments, in thenorth and the south.

France was especially alarmed by British attemptsto monopolize trade. To stop any British move intoVietnam, the French government decided in 1857 toforce the Vietnamese to accept French protection.

The French eventually succeeded in making theVietnamese ruler give up territories in the MekongRiver delta. The French occupied the city of Saigonand, during the next 30 years, extended their controlover the rest of the country. In 1884, France seized thecity of Hanoi and made the Vietnamese Empire aFrench protectorate—a political unit that depends onanother government for its protection.

431CHAPTER 14 The Height of Imperialism

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Imperialism in Southeast Asia, 1900

BritishDutchFrench

Coffee

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GermanPortugueseUnited States SPICES

Sugar

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Possessions: Raw materials:

In search of new marketsand raw materials, severalEuropean nations workedaggressively to colonizeSoutheast Asia in the late1800s.

1. Interpreting MapsWhich two Europeannations had the most ter-ritory in Southeast Asia?

2. Applying GeographySkills Using the mapand information fromyour text, describe Thai-land’s unique status inSoutheast Asia.

0426-0443 C14SE-860705 10/10/03 1:51 PM Page 431

In the 1880s, France extended its control overneighboring Cambodia, Annam, Tonkin, and Laos.By 1887, France included all of its new possessions ina new Union of French Indochina.

Thailand—The Exception After the French con-quest of Indochina, Thailand (then called Siam) wasthe only remaining free state in Southeast Asia. Dur-ing the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Britishand French rivalry threatened to place Thailand, too,under colonial rule.

Two remarkable rulers were able to prevent thatfrom happening. One was King Mongkut (known totheatergoers as the king in The King and I), and theother was his son King Chulalongkorn. Both pro-moted Western learning and maintained friendlyrelations with the major European powers. In 1896,Britain and France agreed to maintain Thailand as anindependent buffer state between their possessionsin Southeast Asia.

The United States One final conquest in SoutheastAsia occurred at the end of the nineteenth century. In1898, during the Spanish-American War, UnitedStates naval forces under Commodore GeorgeDewey defeated the Spanish fleet in Manila Bay.

Believing it was his moral obligation to “civilize”other parts of the world, President William McKinleydecided to turn the Philippines, which had been underSpanish control, into an American colony. This action would also prevent the areafrom falling into the hands of the Japanese. In fact, the islands gave the United States a convenientjumping-off point for trade withChina.

This mixture of moral idealismand desire for profit was reflectedin a speech given in the Senate inJanuary 1900 by Senator AlbertBeveridge of Indiana:

“Mr. President, the times call for candor. The Philippines are ours forever. And just beyond thePhilippines are China’s unlimitedmarkets. We will not retreat fromeither. We will not abandon anopportunity in [Asia]. We will notrenounce our part in the mission of our race, trustee, under God, of the civilization of the world.”


Scene from decisive Manila Bay battle

The Filipinos did not agree with theAmerican senator. Emilio Aguinaldo(ah•gee•NAHL•doh) was the leaderof a movement for independence inthe Philippines. He began his revoltagainst the Spanish. When the UnitedStates acquired the Philippines,Aguinaldo continued the revolt andset himself up as the president ofthe Republic of the Philippines. Ledby Aguinaldo, the guerrilla forcesfought bitterly against the UnitedStates troops to establish their inde-pendence. However, the United Statesdefeated the guerrilla forces, and Pres-ident McKinley had his stepping-stone to the rich markets of China.

Identifying What spurred Britain tocontrol Singapore and Burma?

Colonial Regimes in Southeast AsiaWestern powers governed their new colonial

empires by either indirect or direct rule. Their chiefgoals were to exploit the natural resources of theselands and open up markets for their own manufac-tured goods. To justify their actions, they often spokeof bringing the blessings of Western civilizations totheir colonial subjects.

Reading Check

Emilio Aguinaldo

Indirect and Direct Rule Sometimes, a colo-nial power could realize its goals most easilythrough cooperation with local political elites. Inthese cases, indirect rule was used. Local rulerswere allowed to maintain their positions ofauthority and status in a new colonial setting.

In Southeast Asia, colonial powers, whereverpossible, tried to work with local elites. Thismade it easier to gain access to the region’s nat-ural resources. Indirect rule also lowered the costof government, because fewer officials had to betrained. Moreover, indirect rule had less effecton local culture.

One example of indirect rule was in the DutchEast Indies. Officials of the Dutch East India Com-pany allowed local landed aristocrats in the DutchEast Indies to control local government. Theselocal elites maintained law and order and col-lected taxes in return for a payment from theDutch East India Company.

Indirect rule, then, was convenient and cost less. Indirect rule was not always possible, however,especially when local elites resisted the foreign con-quest. In such cases, the local elites were removedfrom power and replaced with a new set of officialsbrought from the mother country. This system iscalled direct rule.

In Burma, for example, the monarchy staunchlyopposed colonial rule. As a result, Great Britain abol-ished the monarchy and administered the countrydirectly through its colonial government in India.

In Indochina, France used both direct and indirectrule. It imposed direct rule on the southern provincesin the Mekong delta, which had been ceded to Franceas a colony after the first war in 1858 to 1862. Thenorthern parts of Vietnam, seized in the 1880s, weregoverned as a protectorate. The emperor still ruledfrom his palace in Hue, but he had little power.

To justify their conquests, Western powers had spo-ken of bringing the blessings of advanced Western civ-ilization to their colonial subjects. Many colonialpowers, for example, spoke of introducing representa-tive institutions and educating the native peoples inthe democratic process. However, many Westernerscame to fear the idea of native peoples (especially edu-cated ones) being allowed political rights.

Colonial Economies The colonial powers did notwant their colonists to develop their own industries.Thus, colonial policy stressed the export of raw mate-rials—teak wood from Burma; rubber and tin fromMalaya; spices, tea, coffee, and palm oil from the East

Indies; and sugar from the Philippines. In manycases, this policy led to some form of plantation agri-culture, in which peasants worked as wage laborerson plantations owned by foreign investors.

Plantation owners kept the wages of their workersat poverty levels in order to increase the owners’ prof-its. Conditions on plantations were often so unhealthythat thousands died. In addition, high taxes levied bycolonial governments to pay for their administrativecosts were a heavy burden for peasants.

Nevertheless, colonial rule did bring some benefitsto Southeast Asia. It led to the beginnings of a moderneconomic system. Colonial governments built rail-roads, highways, and other structures that could ben-efit native peoples as well as colonials. Thedevelopment of an export market helped to create anentrepreneurial class in rural areas. In the Dutch EastIndies, for example, small growers of rubber, palm oil,coffee, tea, and spices began to share in the profits ofthe colonial enterprise. Most of the profits, however,were taken back to the colonial mother country.

Explaining Why did colonial powersprefer that colonists not develop their own industries?

Resistance to Colonial RuleMany subject peoples in Southeast Asia were quite

unhappy with being governed by Western powers. Atfirst, resistance came from the existing ruling class. InBurma, for example, the monarch himself foughtWestern domination. By contrast, in Vietnam, after

Reading Check


Local peasants, shown here in Ceylon in the late 1800s, worked at poverty-level wages for foreign plantation owners during the colonial period.

the emperor had agreed to French control of his coun-try, a number of government officials set up an organ-ization called Can Vuoug (“Save the King”). Theyfought against the French without the emperor’s help.

Sometimes, resistance to Western control took theform of peasant revolts. Under colonial rule, peasantswere often driven off the land to make way for plan-tation agriculture. Angry peasants then vented theiranger at the foreign invaders. For example, in Burma,in 1930, the Buddhist monk Saya San led a peasantuprising against the British colonial regime manyyears after the regime had completed its takeover.

Early resistance movements failed, overcome byWestern powers. At the beginning of the twentiethcentury, a new kind of resistance began to emergethat was based on the force of nationalism. The lead-ers were often a new class that had been created bycolonial rule: westernized intellectuals in the cities.

In many cases, this new urban middle class—com-posed of merchants, clerks, students, and profession-als—had been educated in Western-style schools.They were the first generation of Asians to under-stand the institutions and values of the West. Manyspoke Western languages and worked in jobs con-nected with the colonial regimes.

At first, many of the leaders of these movementsdid not focus clearly on the idea of nationhood butsimply tried to defend the economic interests or reli-gious beliefs of the natives. In Burma, for example,the first expression of modern nationalism came fromstudents at the University of Rangoon. They formedan organization to protest against official persecutionof the Buddhist religion and British lack of respect forlocal religious traditions. They protested againstBritish arrogance and failure to observe local customsin Buddhist temples. Not until the 1930s, however,did these resistance movements begin to demandnational independence.

Summarizing Explain three forms ofresistance to Western domination.Reading Check


Checking for Understanding1. Define imperialism, protectorate, indi-

rect rule, direct rule.

2. Identify King Mongkut, King Chula-longkorn, Commodore George Dewey,Emilio Aguinaldo.

3. Locate Singapore, Burma, Thailand,Philippines.

4. Explain how the “new imperialism” differed from old imperialism. Alsoexplain how imperialism came to beassociated with social Darwinism.

5. List some of the benefits colonial rulebrought to Southeast Asia. Do youthink these benefits outweighed the disadvantages? Why or why not?

Critical Thinking6. Making Inferences Why were resist-

ance movements often led by nativeswho had lived and been educated inthe West? Initially, what were the goalsof these resistance leaders? How didtheir goals change over time?

7. Cause and Effect In a diagram like theone below, identify the effects of colo-nial rule on the colonies.

Analyzing Visuals8. Describe the situation being endured

by the Vietnamese prisoners in thephoto above. Be specific in yourdescription of their confinement. Basedon your reading of the living conditionsin Southeast Asian colonies at this time,do you think you would have riskedthis type of punishment if you hadbeen in their position? Explain.

9. Expository Writing Use variedmedia to determine what the UnitedStates’s relationship is today with thePhilippines and how Filipino politicalgroups view this relationship. Writean essay based on your findings.

Effects of colonial rule

In 1907, Vietnamese prisoners await trial for plotting against the French.

435

A Call to Arms

Analyzing Primary Sources

1. What do the writers of the quoted lines want their fellow Vietnamese to do?

2. What are the writer’s feelings toward those who worked with the French administration? How can you tell?

IN 1862, THE VIETNAMESEemperor granted threeprovinces in southern Vietnam to the French. In outrage, many patrioticVietnamese military officers and governmentofficials appealed to theirfellow Vietnamese to riseup and resist the foreign-ers. The following lineswere written in 1864.

“This is a general procla-mation addressed to thescholars and the people. . . .Our people are now suffer-

ing through a period ofanarchy and disorder. . . .

Let us now consider our situation with the Frenchtoday.

We are separated from them by thousands ofmountains and seas.

By hundreds of differences in our daily customs.Although they were very confident in their copper

battleships surmounted by chimneys,Although they had a large quantity of steel rifles and

lead bullets,These things did not prevent the loss of some of

their best generals in these last years, when theyattacked our frontier in hundreds of battles. . . .

You, officials of the country,Do not let your resistance to the enemy be blunted

by the peaceful stand of the court,Do not take the lead from the three subjected

provinces and leave hatred unavenged.So many years of labor, of energy, of suffering—shall

we now abandon all?Rather, we should go to the far ends of jungles or to

the high peaks of mountains in search of heroes.

Rather, we should go to the shores of the sea insearch of talented men.

Do not envy the scholars who now become provin-cial or district magistrates [in the French adminis-tration]. They are decay, garbage, filth, swine.

Do not imitate some who hire themselves out to the enemy. They are idiots, fools, lackeys,scoundrels.”

—An Appeal to Vietnamese Citizens to Resist the French

French troops battle Vietnamese resistance fighters.

Empire Building in Africa

1869Suez Canalcompleted

1884-1885Berlin Conference dividesAfrica among Europeans

1914Egypt becomesBritish protectorate

Guide to Reading

Preview of Events

1896Ethiopia defeatsItalian forces

!1860 !1870 !1880 !1890 !1900 !1910 !1920

A southern African king, Lobengula, wrote a letter to Queen Victoria about how hehad been cheated:

“Some time ago a party of men came to my country, the principal one appearing tobe a man called Rudd. They asked me for a place to dig for gold, and said they wouldgive me certain things for the right to do so. I told them to bring what they could giveand I would show them what I would give. A document was written and presented tome for signature. I asked what it contained, and was told that in it were my words andthe words of those men. I put my hand to it. About three months afterwards I heardfrom other sources that I had given by the document the right to all the minerals of my country.”

—The Imperialism Reader, Louis L. Snyder, ed., 1962

Europeans did not hesitate to deceive native Africans in order to get African lands.

West AfricaBefore 1880, Europeans controlled little of the African continent directly. They

were content to let African rulers and merchants represent European interests.Between 1880 and 1900, however, fed by intense rivalries among themselves,Great Britain, France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Spain, and Portugal placed virtually all of Africa under European rule.


Main Ideas• Great Britain, France, Germany,

Belgium, and Portugal placed virtuallyall of Africa under European rule.

• Native peoples sought an end to colonial rule.

Key Termsannex, indigenous

People to IdentifyMuhammad Ali, David Livingstone, HenryStanley, Zulu

Places to LocateSuez Canal, Rhodesia, Union of SouthAfrica

Preview Questions1. What new class of Africans developed

in many African nations?2. What was the relationship between

the Boers and the Zulu?

Reading StrategyCategorizing Information Make a chartlike the one below showing what coun-tries controlled what parts of Africa.


Controlling Country Part of AfricaWest AfricaNorth Africa (including Egypt)Central AfricaEast AfricaSouth Africa

King Lobengula, seated, c. 1880

West Africa had been particularly affected by theslave trade, but that had begun to decline by 1800. By1808, both Great Britain and the United States haddeclared the slave trade illegal. Other Europeancountries eventually followed suit. Slavery was abol-ished in the United States in 1865 and in Cuba andBrazil within the next 25 years. By the 1890s, slaveryhad been abolished in all major countries of theworld.

As slavery declined, Europe’s interest in otherforms of trade increased. Europeans sold textiles andother manufactured goods in exchange for such WestAfrican natural resources as peanuts, timber, hides,and palm oil. Encouraged by this growing trade,European governments began to push for a morepermanent presence along the coast. Early in thenineteenth century, the British set up settlementsalong the Gold Coast and in Sierra Leone.

The growing European presence in West Africa ledto increasing tensions with African governments inthe area. For a long time, most African states wereable to maintain their independence. However, in1874, Great Britain stepped in and annexed (incorpo-rated a country within a state) the west coastal statesas the first British colony of Gold Coast. At about thesame time, Britain established a protectorate over


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Imperialism in Africa, 1914

More so in Africa than in Asia, European countries competed against each other in their attempts to colonize new territories.

1. Interpreting Maps Identify the two independent coun-tries in Africa in 1914.

2. Applying Geography Skills Describe the changes thatoccurred in Africa from 1880 to 1914 for the OttomanEmpire, France, Britain, and the Boers.

BelgianBoerBritishFrenchGermanIndependentItalianOttomanPortugueseSpanish

Imperialism in Africa, 1880

ships, gave Europeans thedesire to build a canal eastof Cairo to connect theMediterranean and RedSeas. In 1854, a Frenchentrepreneur, Ferdinandde Lesseps, signed a con-tract to begin building theSuez Canal. The canal wascompleted in 1869.

The British took anactive interest in Egyptafter the Suez Canal was opened. Believing that thecanal was its “lifeline to India,” Great Britain soughtas much control as possible over the canal area. In1875, Britain bought Egypt’s share in the Suez Canal.When an Egyptian army revolt against foreign influ-ence broke out in 1881, Britain suppressed the revolt.Egypt became a British protectorate in 1914.

The British believed that they should also controlthe Sudan, south of Egypt, to protect their interests inEgypt and the Suez Canal. In 1881, Muslim clericMuhammad Ahmad, known as the Mahdi (“therightly guided one,” in Arabic), launched a revolt

that brought much of the Sudan under his control.Britain sent a military force under General

Charles Gordon to restore Egyptian authority overthe Sudan. However, Gordon’s army was wipedout at Khartoum in 1885 by Muhammad Ahmad’stroops. Gordon himself died in the battle. Not until1898 were British troops able to seize the Sudan.

The French also had colonies in North Africa.In 1879, after about 150,000 French people had settled in the region of Algeria, the French government established control there. Two yearslater, France imposed a protectorate on neigh-boring Tunisia. In 1912, France established a protectorate over much of Morocco.

Italy joined in the competition for colonies inNorth Africa by attempting to take over Ethiopia,but Italian forces were defeated by Ethiopia in1896. Italy now was the only European statedefeated by an African state. This humiliating lossled Italy to try again in 1911. Italy invaded andseized Turkish Tripoli, which it renamed Libya.

Explaining Great Britain wasdetermined to have complete control of the Suez Canal. Why?

Central AfricaTerritories in Central Africa were also added to

the list of European colonies. Explorers aroused

Reading Check


warring groups in Nigeria. By 1900, France hadadded the huge area of French West Africa to its colonial empire. This left France in control of thelargest part of West Africa. In addition, Germanycontrolled Togo, Cameroon, German SouthwestAfrica, and German East Africa.

Explaining Why did the slave tradedecline in the 1800s?

North AfricaEgypt had been part of the Ottoman Empire, but

as Ottoman rule declined, the Egyptians sought theirindependence. In 1805, an officer of the Ottomanarmy named Muhammad Ali seized power andestablished a separate Egyptian state.

During the next 30 years, Muhammad Ali intro-duced a series of reforms to bring Egypt into themodern world. He modernized the army, set up apublic school system, and helped create small indus-tries in refined sugar, textiles, munitions, and ships.

The growing economic importance of the Nile Val-ley in Egypt, along with the development of steam-

Reading Check

Ferdinand de Lesseps

General Gordon’s Last Stand by George William Joy

439CHAPTER 21 The Height of Imperialism 439CHAPTER 5 Rome and the Rise of Christianity 439CHAPTER 5 Rome and the Rise of Christianity

The Role of QuinineBefore 1850, the fear of disease was a major factor

in keeping Europeans from moving into Africa. Espe-cially frightening was malaria, an often fatal diseasespread by parasites. Malaria is especially devastating intropical and subtropical regions, which offer good con-ditions for breeding the mosquitoes that carry andspread the malaria parasites.

By 1850, European doctors had learned how to treatmalaria with quinine, a drug that greatly reduced thedeath rate from the disease. Quinine is a bitter drugobtained from the bark of the cinchona tree, which isnative to the slopes of the Andes in South America. TheIndians of Peru were the first people to use the bark ofthe cinchona tree to treat malaria.

The Dutch took the cinchona tree and began to growit in the East Indies. The East Indies eventually becamethe chief source of quinine. With the use of quinine andother medicines, Europeans felt more secure aboutmoving into Africa.

By the beginning of the twen-tieth century, more than 90 per-cent of African lands were underthe control of the European pow-ers. A drug found in the bark ofLatin American trees, which werethen grown in Asia, had beenused by Europeans to make pos-sible their conquest of Africa.

darkness which envelops whole populations, is acrusade, if I may say so, a crusade worthy of this cen-tury of progress.” Profit, however, was equallyimportant to Leopold. In 1876, he hired Henry Stan-ley to set up Belgian settlements in the Congo.

Leopold’s claim to the vast territories of the Congoaroused widespread concern among other Europeanstates. France, in particular, rushed to plant its flag inthe heart of Africa. Leopold ended up with the terri-tories around the Congo River. France occupied theareas farther north.

Examining What effect did KingLeopold II of Belgium have on European colonization of theCongo River basin?

East AfricaBy 1885, Britain and Germany had become the

chief rivals in East Africa. Germany came late to theranks of the imperialist powers. At first, the Germanchancellor Otto von Bismarck had downplayed theimportance of colonies. As more and more Germanscalled for a German empire, however, Bismarckbecame a convert to colonialism. As he expressed it,“All this colonial business is a sham, but we need itfor the elections.”

Reading Check

The bark from cinchona !

trees dries in the sun.

popular interest in the dense tropical jungles of Cen-tral Africa. David Livingstone, as we have seen, wasone such explorer. He arrived in Africa in 1841. For 30years he trekked through unchartered regions. Hespent much of his time exploring the interior of thecontinent.

When Livingstone disappeared for a while, theNew York Herald hired a young journalist, Henry Stanley, to find him. Stanley did, on the eastern shoreof Lake Tanganyika, and greeted the explorer with the now famous words, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume.”

After Livingstone’s death in 1873, Stanleyremained in Africa to carry on the great explorer’swork. Unlike Livingstone, however, Stanley had astrong dislike of Africa. He once said, “I detest theland most heartily.”

In the 1870s, Stanley explored the Congo River inCentral Africa and sailed down it to the AtlanticOcean. Soon, he was encouraging the British to sendsettlers to the Congo River basin. When Britainrefused, he turned to King Leopold II of Belgium.

King Leopold II was the real driving force behindthe colonization of Central Africa. He rushed enthu-siastically into the pursuit of an empire in Africa. “Toopen to civilization,” he said, “the only part of ourglobe where it has not yet penetrated, to pierce the

Fear of disease kept Europeans from moving intoAfrica. Once quinine was discovered, Europeansfelt safer about Africa.

1. What fears do we have today that prevent orinhibit exploration or research?

2. What technological advances would berequired to overcome those fears?

Who Benefited fromthe New Imperialism?Europeans justified colonizationof Africa and Asia in manyways. Native peoples viewedthe takeover of their landsdifferently. Rudyard Kiplingand Edward Morel wereBritish journalists whoheld opposing view-points about imperialism.

“Take up the White Man’s burden—Send forth the best ye breed—Go bind your sons to exileTo serve your captives’ needs;To wait in heavy harness,On fluttered folk and wild—Your new-caught sullen peoples,Half-devil and half-child. . . . Take up the White Man’s burden—And reap his old reward:The blame of those ye better,The hate of those ye guard—The cry of hosts ye humour(Ah, slowly;) toward the light: —‘Why brought he us from bondage,Our loved Egyptian night?’”

—Rudyard Kipling, 1899The White Man’s Burden

“It is [the Africans] who carry the ‘Black man’sburden. . . . ’ In hewing out for himself a fixedabode in Africa, the white man has massacred theAfrican in heaps. . . .


In addition to its West African holdings, Germanytried to develop colonies in East Africa. Most of EastAfrica had not yet been claimed by any other power.However, the British were also interested in the areabecause control of East Africa would connect theBritish Empire in Africa from South Africa to Egypt.Portugal and Belgium also claimed parts of EastAfrica.

To settle conflicting claims, the Berlin Conferencemet in 1884 and 1885. The conference officially recog-nized both British and German claims for territory in East Africa. Portugal received a clear claim onMozambique. No African delegates were present atthis conference.

Evaluating What was significantabout the Berlin Conference?

South AfricaNowhere in Africa did the European presence

grow more rapidly than in the south. By 1865, the

Reading Check

total white population of the area had risen to nearlytwo hundred thousand people.

The Boers, or Afrikaners—as the descendants ofthe original Dutch settlers were called—had occupiedCape Town and surrounding areas in South Africasince the seventeenth century. During the NapoleonicWars, however, the British seized these lands from theDutch. Afterward, the British encouraged settlers tocome to what they called Cape Colony.

In the 1830s, disgusted with British rule, the Boersfled northward on the Great Trek to the regionbetween the Orange and Vaal (VAHL) Rivers and tothe region north of the Vaal River. In these areas, theBoers formed two independent republics—theOrange Free State and the Transvaal (later called theSouth African Republic). The Boers, who believedwhite superiority was ordained by God, put many ofthe indigenous (native to a region) peoples in theseareas on reservations.

The Boers had frequently battled the indigenousZulu people. In the early nineteenth century, the

war between the British and the Boers, however.This war, called the Boer War, dragged on from

1899 to 1902. Fierce guerrilla resistance by the Boersangered the British. They responded by burningcrops and herding about 120,000 Boer women andchildren into detention camps, where lack of foodcaused some 20,000 deaths. Eventually, the vastlylarger British army won.

In 1910, the British created an independent Unionof South Africa, which combined the old CapeColony and the Boer republics. The new state wouldbe a self-governing nation within the British Empire.To appease the Boers, the British agreed that onlywhites, with a few propertied Africans, would vote.

Describing What happened to theBoers at the end of the Boer War?

Colonial Rule in AfricaBy 1914, Great Britain, France, Germany, Belgium,

Italy, Spain, and Portugal had divided up Africa.Only Liberia, which had been created as a homelandfor freed United States slaves, and Ethiopia remainedfree states. Native peoples who dared to resist weresimply devastated by the superior military force ofthe Europeans.

As was true in Southeast Asia, most Europeangovernments ruled their new territories in Africawith the least effort and expense possible. Indirectrule meant relying on existing political elites andinstitutions. The British especially followed thisapproach. At first, in some areas, the British simplyasked a local ruler to accept British authority and tofly the British flag over official buildings.

The concept of indirect rule was introduced inthe Islamic state of Sokoto, in northern Nigeria,beginning in 1903. This system of indirect rule inSokoto had one good feature: it did not disrupt localcustoms and institutions. However, it did havesome unfortunate consequences.

The system was basically a fraud because Britishadministrators made all major decisions. The nativeauthorities served chiefly to enforce those decisions.Another problem was that indirect rule kept the oldAfrican elite in power. Such a policy provided fewopportunities for ambitious and talented youngAfricans from outside the old elite. In this way Britishindirect rule sowed the seeds for class and tribal ten-sions, which erupted after independence came in thetwentieth century.

Reading Check


Zulu, under a talented ruler named Shaka, hadcarved out their own empire. After Shaka’s death, theZulu remained powerful. Finally, in the late 1800s,the British became involved in conflicts with theZulu, and the Zulu were defeated.

In the 1880s, British policy in South Africa wasinfluenced by Cecil Rhodes. Rhodes had foundeddiamond and gold companies that had made him afortune. He gained control of a territory north of theTransvaal, which he named Rhodesia after himself.

Rhodes was a great champion of British expan-sion. He said once, “I think what [God] would likeme to do is to paint as much of Africa British red aspossible.” One of Rhodes’s goals was to create aseries of British colonies “from the Cape to Cairo”—all linked by a railroad.

Rhodes’s ambitions eventually led to his downfallin 1896. The British government forced him to resignas prime minister of Cape Colony after discoveringthat he planned to overthrow the Boer government ofthe South African Republic without his government’sapproval. The British action was too late to avoid a

What the partial occupation of his soil by thewhite man has failed do; . . . what the [machinegun] and the rifle, the slave gang, labour in thebowels of the earth and the lash, have failed todo; what imported measles, smallpox andsyphilis have failed to do; whatever the overseasslave trade failed to do; the power of moderncapitalistic exploitation, assisted by modernengines of destruction, may yet succeed inaccomplishing. . . .

Thus the African is really helpless against thematerial gods of the white man, as embodied inthe trinity of imperialism, capitalistic exploitation,and militarism.”

—Edward Morel, 1903The Black Man’s Burden

1. What was the impact of imperialism on thecolonized territories in Africa, according to Morel?

2. Quote lines in Rudyard Kipling’s poem that reflecthis view of colonized peoples. What values didKipling assume his readers shared with him?

Most other European nations governed theirAfrican possessions through a form of direct rule.This was true in the French colonies. At the top was aFrench official, usually known as a governor-general.He was appointed from Paris and governed with theaid of a bureaucracy in the capital city of the colony.

The French ideal was to assimilate African subjectsinto French culture rather than preserve native tradi-tions. Africans were eligible to run for office and evenserve in the French National Assembly in Paris. Afew were appointed to high positions in the colonialadministration.

Comparing How did the French sys-tem of colonial rule differ from that of Great Britain?

Rise of African NationalismAs in Southeast Asia, a new class of leaders

emerged in Africa by the beginning of the twentiethcentury. Educated in colonial schools or in Westernnations, they were the first generation of Africans toknow a great deal about the West.

On the one hand, the members of this new classadmired Western culture and sometimes disliked theways of their own countries. They were eager tointroduce Western ideas and institutions into theirown societies.

On the other hand, many came to resent the for-eigners and their arrogant contempt for African peo-ples. These intellectuals recognized the gap betweentheory and practice in colonial policy. Westerners hadexalted democracy, equality, and political freedombut did not apply these values in the colonies.

Reading Check


Checking for Understanding1. Define annex, indigenous.

2. Identify Muhammad Ali, David Living-stone, Henry Stanley, Zulu.

3. Locate Suez Canal, Rhodesia, Union ofSouth Africa.

4. Explain why the British were interestedin East Africa. What other countriesclaimed parts of East Africa?

5. List the ways in which the French sys-tem of direct rule included Africans.

Critical Thinking6. Drawing Conclusions What can you

conclude from the fact that African del-egates were not included in the BerlinConference of 1884?

7. Organizing Information Using a chartlike the one below, identify key figuresof African resistance to colonial rule.

Analyzing Visuals8. Examine the painting on page 438.

What was the painter trying to sayabout the hostilities between the Britishand the people of the Sudan? If forcedto choose, whom would you support inthis confrontation?

9. Expository Writing Research theimportance of the Suez Canal today.Write a paper comparing the present-day significance of the canal to its historical significance.

Leader Country Dates ofopposed resistance

There were few democratic institutions. Nativepeoples could have only low-paying jobs in the colo-nial bureaucracy. To many Africans, colonialism hadmeant the loss of their farmlands or employment onplantations or in factories run by foreigners.

Middle-class Africans did not suffer as much aspoor African peasant plantation workers. However,members of the middle class also had complaints.They usually qualified only for menial jobs in thegovernment or business. Even then, their salarieswere lower than those of Europeans in similar jobs.

Europeans expressed their superiority overAfricans in other ways. Segregated clubs, schools,and churches were set up as more European officialsbrought their wives and began to raise families.Europeans also had a habit of addressing Africans bytheir first names or calling an adult male “boy.”

Such conditions led many members of the newurban educated class to feel great confusion towardtheir colonial masters and the civilization thecolonists represented. The educated Africans werewilling to admit the superiority of many aspects ofWestern culture. However, these intellectuals fiercelyhated colonial rule and were determined to asserttheir own nationality and cultural destiny. Out of thismixture of hopes and resentments emerged the firststirrings of modern nationalism in Africa.

During the first quarter of the twentieth century,resentment turned to action. Across Africa, nativepeoples began to organize political parties and move-ments seeking the end of foreign rule.

Evaluating Why were many Africanintellectuals frustrated by colonial policy?Reading Check

443

Evaluating a Web SiteWhy Learn This Skill?

Your little sister has developed a strange rashon her back, so you decide to check the Internet tosee whether or not it might be chicken pox andhow the rash should be treated. When you lookfor a Web site, however, you find dozens, and theyare all giving different advice. How do you deter-mine which site is giving the most accurate andup-to-date information?

The Internet has become a valuable researchtool. It is convenient to use and contains plentifulinformation. Unfortunately, some Web site infor-mation is not necessarily correct or reliable.When using the Internet as a research tool, theuser must distinguish between quality informa-tion and inaccurate or incomplete information.

Learning the SkillTo evaluate a Web site, ask yourself the

following questions:

• Where does the site originate? If it is a univer-sity, a well-known organization or agency, or arespected publication, then the information islikely to be trustworthy.

• Are the facts on the site documented? Wheredid this information originally come from? Isthe author clearly identified?

• Are the links to other parts of the site appropri-ate? Do they take you to information that helpsyou learn more about the subject?

• Is more than one source used for backgroundinformation within the site? If so, does the sitecontain a bibliography?

• When was the last time the site was updated?

• Does the site explore the topic in-depth?

• Does the site contain links to other useful andup-to-date resources? Although many legiti-mate sites have products to sell, some sites aremore interested in sales than in providing accu-rate information.

• Is the information easy to access? Is it properlylabeled?

• Is the design appealing?

Practicing the SkillVisit the Web site about Mohandas Gandhi

at http://www.mkgandhi.org featured on this page.Then, answer the following questions.

1 Who is the author or sponsor of the Web site?

2 What information does the home page linkyou to? Are the links appropriate to the topic?

3 What sources were used for the informationcontained on the site? When was it lastupdated?

4 Does the site explore the topic in-depth? Whyor why not?

5 Are there links to other useful sources and arethey up-to-date?

6 Is the design of the site appealing? Why orwhy not? When was Gandhi born? How easyor difficult was it to locate this information?

Applying the Skill

Comparing Web Sites Locate two other Web sitesthat provide information about Mohandas Gandhi.Evaluate each one for accuracy and usefulness, andthen compare them to the site featured above(http://www.mkgandhi.org).


In October 1869, James GordonBennett, son of the publisher of theNew York Herald, met with reporterHenry M. Stanley in the Grand Hotelin Paris. “Go and find him whereveryou may hear that he is and get whatnews you can of him,” Bennett toldStanley. “And perhaps the old manmay be in want; take enough with youto help him should he require it. Ofcourse, you will act according to yourown plans, and do what you thinkbest—but find Livingstone!”

The man Stanley was supposed tofind was known and admired both forhis achievements as an explorer andfor his dedicated efforts to end theslave trade. Since going out to Africain 1841 as a 27-year-old medical

MMore than three years had passed with no word from

Dr. David Livingstone. The renowned Scottish mission-

ary and explorer had left Britain in August 1865, bound

for East Africa, where the Royal Geographical Society

had asked him, among other things, to try to determine

the source of the Nile River. The explorer Richard Bur-

ton favored Lake Tanganyika while the late John Han-

ning Speke had been certain the Nile arose in Lake

Victoria. The 52-year-old Livingstone had arrived at the

island of Zanzibar in January 1866. He and his party of

about 60 men were taken to the mainland some six

weeks later and were known to have headed into the

interior. Months later, the first rumors of his death

reached the coast.

missionary, David Livingstone hadcovered thousands of miles of terri-tory previously unexplored by Euro-peans. Sometimes he traveled bycanoe or on the back of an ox, butmostly he went on foot. In the earlyyears he traveled with his wife, Mary,and their young children.

Though he suffered from malariaand had lost the use of his left armafter being attacked by a woundedlion, Livingstone remained deter-mined. He made detailed notes andreports, which he sent to Londonwhenever he could. The informationhe sent was used to revise the maps ofAfrica.

All the exploration that Living-stone did in the mid-1850s had one

goal: to find a navigable river thatwould open the center of Africa tolegitimate European commerce andto Christianity. In so doing, Living-stone hoped to drive out the slavetrade, an evil that he called “this opensore of the world.”

In the spring of 1852, Livingstonesent his family back to England.Then, starting from Cape Town,South Africa, he trekked north to theUpper Zambezi and then west toLuanda on the Atlantic coast (in pres-ent-day Angola). After a brief rest, he headed to Quelimane on the eastcoast (now in Mozambique). The tripof some 4,300 miles (6,919 km) finallyended in May 1856. Livingstone trav-eled with a small party of 25 or so

In africastanley and livingstone

1


S P E C I A L R E P O RT

445

Africans. In contrast to other Euro-pean expedition leaders, the missionaryregarded the men not as his servantsbut as his friends. His loyalty to themwas returned manyfold.

The expedition traveled light,although Livingstone always carriedhis navigational instru-ments, a Bible, a nauticalalmanac, and his journal.He also carried a magiclantern (an early slideprojector) and slides, sohe could tell Bible storiesto any who would listen. On thesecond half of the journey, fromthe interior to the mouth of theZambezi River, Livingstone becamethe first European to see the spectacu-lar waterfall the Africans called “Mosi-oa-tunya” (the smoke that thunders).

Livingstone named it Victoria Falls,after the British queen.

When the missionary got back toBritain in late 1856, he found thatword of his explorations and discov-eries had preceded him. He was now

famous. The following yearLivingstone turned his jour-nals into a book—MissionaryTravels and Researches in South Africa—which quickly becamea best-seller. In his book andat every public opportunity

he could find, he raised theissue of the slave trade. Hecondemned those who toler-

ated it and profited by it.When he sailed back to Africa in

the spring of 1858, Dr. Livingstonewas the newly appointed British Con-

1 Tipping his pith helmet, Henry Mor-ton Stanley greets the explorer with hisrestrained inquiry: “Dr. Livingstone, Ipresume?”

2 The scarcity of paper did not pre-vent Livingstone from recording hisobservations in meticulous detail, asseen in this fragment from his journals.He would also record topographicalmeasurements taken with the sextant.

3 “It had never been seen before byEuropean eyes,” Livingstone wrote ofhis first view of Victoria Falls, “butscenes so lovely must have beengazed upon by angels in their flight.”His drawing of the falls and the mean-dering Zambezi River below it (inset)hardly does the scene justice.

3

2


sul for the East Coast of Africa. Withsubstantial government backing andfar more equipment and personnelthan he had previously enjoyed, hecontinued to explore the Zambezi andits tributaries. His wife sailed with himbut then fell ill and went to rest inCape Town.

Despite its advantages, this expedi-tion was plagued with problems.There was quarreling among Living-stone’s six European assistants, and thefuel-eating boat he had been given wasmore trouble than it was worth.

Worst of all was the discovery thaton his previous trip down the Zambezihe had bypassed a bend in the riverthat held big problems. When theparty headed upriver from the eastcoast of Africa, they came around thatbend only to be stopped by the Que-brabasa Rapids. Try as he might—andLivingstone insisted on trying, until

everyone in his expedition wasexhausted— this was an obstacle noboat could get past.

Even though his efforts wereadding daily to European knowledgeof the African interior and would beof benefit to all who came after him,Livingstone was frustrated at not find-ing the navigable river that wouldsurely bring an end to the slave trade.

Then, tragedy struck. In early1862, Mary Livingstone was wellenough to join her husband, but a fewmonths later she fell ill again. In April,she died. Grief stricken, Livingstonethrew himself into his work, but hisincreased efforts did not pay off. InJuly 1863, the expedition was orderedto return home.

Livingstone stayed in Britain onlylong enough to write a second book,The Zambezi and Its Tributaries, and todrum up support for his next expedi-

tion. On his third and final trip toAfrica, the great explorer disappeared.

Henry Stanley left to carry out hisemployer’s orders soon after the Parismeeting. He took a roundabout routeto Africa to cover other stories for theHerald, including the opening of theSuez Canal in Egypt. James Bennetthoped that by delaying Stanley’sarrival in Africa, the reporter wouldcome back with definite news of Liv-ingstone—that he was dead or aliveand not just missing. (“If he is dead,”Bennett had said, “bring back everypossible proof of his death.”)

By the time Stanley finally reachedAfrica in late January 1871, Living-stone had been struggling with near-starvation, chronic dysentery,sore-covered feet, and hostile groups.Of the 60 men he had started with,only a small handful remained,including Chuma, a freed slave, and

Cabora Basa (Quebrabasa)Rapids

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A F R I C A

Ujiji Tabora

MikindaniLuanda

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Cape Town Port Elizabeth

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Z A M B

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Livingstone, 1852–1856Livingstone, 1858–1863Livingstone, 1866–1871Livingstone-Stanley, 1871–1873Livingstone, 1872–1873

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4


S P E C I A L R E P O RT

4 Livingstone made two significantcrossings of the African continent—fromthe interior west to Luanda in 1853–1854, and then east to Quelimane in1855–1856. On his expedition in 1866to find the source of the Nile, illnessand other difficulties hampered hisprogress. Henry Stanley found him atUjiji on November 10, 1871.

5 The all-too familiar sight of captivesin chains drove Livingstone to denouncethe collaboration of European authori-ties in the widespread traffic in slaves.

6 Henry Morton Stanley developed agreat interest in exploring Africa afterhe found Livingstone.

Susi, a Yao servant. Both of them had been with him for years. Desper-ately sick and without medicine, Liv-ingstone had been repeatedly nursedback to relatively good health by Arab slave traders. The passionateanti-slavery activist owed his life tothe very people he wished to banishfrom Africa.

In July 1871, ill and discouraged,Livingstone headed to Ujiji, on theeast bank of Lake Tanganyika. Heexpected to find several months’worth of supplies, medicine, and mailwaiting for him there. In late October,“reduced to a skeleton,” as he put it,he hobbled into the village—only tolearn that all his supplies and preciousmedicines had been plundered by theheadman of the place. Extremelydepressed, he felt he couldn’t do any-thing but wait for a miracle.

Several weeks later, the miraclearrived under a waving Stars andStripes. Henry Stanley could hardlycontain his emotion as he approachedthe pale white man.“I would have runto him, only I was a coward in thepresence of such a mob,” Stanley laterwrote, “[I] would have embraced him,only he being an Englishman, I didnot know how he would receive me;so I did what cowardice and falsepride suggested was the best thing—walked deliberately to him, took offmy hat, and said: ‘Dr. Livingstone, I

presume?’ ‘Yes,’ said he, with a kindsmile, lifting his cap slightly.”

Stanley remained with Livingstonefor five months and explored LakeTanganyika with him. That tripproved that Burton was wrong aboutthe Ruzizi, the river he thought ledfrom the lake to become the Nile.Livingstone was now determined toprove his own theory, which was thatthe Nile originated with the headwa-ters of a river called the Lualaba. (Asit turns out, the Lualaba is actuallypart of the Congo River system.Speke was right all along: The Nile’ssource is Lake Victoria.)

Unable to persuade the older man to return to Britain, Stanley left in March 1872. Reaching thecoast in May, his news of finding Livingstone reached Europe andAmerica in August. At about thattime, Livingstone received the freshsupplies and men that Stanley hadpromised to send back to him. Hepromptly set off toward Lakes Tan-ganyika and Bangweulu.

The old explorer’s will was great,but his long-suffering body was nolonger up to the demands of the trip.By April 22, 1873, he was being car-ried in a litter. On the night of April

INTERPRETING THE PAST

1. What were two of Dr. Livingstone’sreasons for exploring Africa?

2. What waterfall did Livingstoneencounter on his trip from the interiorto the mouth of the Zambezi River ?

3. What were the main obstacles thatLivingstone faced?

5

30, in the village of Chitambo, Susihelped him to bed, last speaking withhim at midnight. The next morning,his companions found Livingstonekneeling by the bed, his head in hishands in prayer—dead.

Resolving that Livingstone shouldbe returned to Britain, they buried hisheart under a large tree near the hutwhere he died. Then they filled thebody with salt, smeared it withbrandy, and left it to dry for twoweeks before beginning the long jour-ney to the coast. Eight months and a thousand miles (1,609 km) later,they delivered Livingstone’s body tothe British Consul in Zanzibar. April18, 1874, was declared a national dayof mourning and all of London cameto a halt as Dr. Livingstone wasburied in Westminster Abbey.

6

Guide to Reading

British Rule in India

Preview of Events

1876Queen Victoria is named“Empress of India”

1885Indian NationalCongress forms

Thomas Macaulay, who was charged with the task of introducing an educational system into India, decided that it would use the English language:

“What, then shall the language of education be? [Some] maintain that it should bethe English. The other half strongly recommend the Arabic and Sanskrit. The wholequestion seems to me to be, which language is the best worth knowing? . . . It is, I believe, no exaggeration to say that all the historical information which has been collected from all the books written in the Sanskrit language is less valuable than what may be found in short textbooks used at preparatory schools in England.”

—A New History of India, Stanley Wolpert, 1977

Macaulay’s attitude reflects the sense of superiority that the British brought withthem to India.

The Sepoy MutinyOver the course of the eighteenth century, British power in India had increased

while the power of the Mogul rulers had declined (see Chapter 8). A trading com-pany, the British East India Company, was given power by the British governmentto become actively involved in India’s political and military affairs.

To rule India, the British East India Company had its own soldiers and forts. Italso hired Indian soldiers, known as sepoys, to protect the company’s interests inthe region.

In 1857, a growing Indian distrust of the British led to a revolt. The revolt wasknown to the British as the Great Rebellion or the Sepoy Mutiny. Indians call it theFirst War of Independence.


Main Ideas• British rule brought stability to India but

destroyed native industries anddegraded Indians.

• Mohandas Gandhi advocated non-violent resistance to gain Indian inde-pendence from Great Britain.

Key Termssepoy, viceroy

People to IdentifyQueen Victoria, Mohandas Gandhi

Places to LocateKanpur, Mumbai

Preview Questions1. What was the goal of the Indian

National Congress?2. Why was India called the “Jewel in

the Crown” of Queen Victoria, theEmpress of India?

Reading StrategyCause and Effect Using a chart like theone below, identify some causes andeffects of British influence on India.


Cause Effect1. British textiles2. cotton crops 3. school system 4. railroad, telegraph,

telephone services

!1840 !1850 !1860 !1870 !1880 !1890 !1900

1857Sepoy Mutinyfails

Thomas Macaulay

As a result of the uprising, the British Parliamenttransferred the powers of the East India Companydirectly to the British government. In 1876, the title ofEmpress of India was bestowed on Queen Victoria.The people of India were now her colonial subjects,and India became her “Jewel in the Crown.”

Describing What were two effects ofthe Great Rebellion?

Colonial RuleThe British government ruled India directly

through a British official known as a viceroy (a gover-nor who ruled as a representative of a monarch), whowas assisted by a British civil service staff. This staff ofabout 3,500 officials ruled almost 300 million people,the largest colonial population in the world. Britishrule involved both benefits and costs for Indians.

Reading Check


After the 1857 revolt, officials of the British governmentruled India. The sepoys were unsuccessful and paiddearly, as is shown by the British execution of Indiansoldiers above. Why did the Indian revolt fail?

History

Indian sepoyBritish viceroy

The major immediate cause of the revolt was thespread of a rumor that the British were issuing theirIndian troops new bullets that were greased withcow and pig fat. The cow was sacred to Hindus; thepig was taboo to Muslims. A group of sepoys at anarmy post near Delhi refused to load their rifles withthe new bullets. When the British arrested them, thesepoys went on a rampage and killed 50 Europeanmen, women, and children.

From this beginning, the revolt quickly spread.Within a year, however, Indian troops loyal to theBritish, along with fresh British troops, had crushedthe rebellion. Although Indian troops fought bravelyand outnumbered the British by about 230,000 to40,000, they were not well organized. Rivalriesbetween Hindus and Muslims kept Indians fromworking together.

Atrocities were terrible on both sides. At Kanpur(Cawnpore), Indians armed with swords and knivesmassacred two hundred defenseless women andchildren in a building known as the House of theLadies. When the British recaptured Kanpur, theytook their revenge before executing the Indians.

During the time that India was a Britishcolony, many British government offi-

cials spent a considerable amount of timethere fulfilling their administrative duties.Their families usually came with them dur-ing their tours of duty, bringing their Victo-rian lifestyle and many of the furnishingsthat went with it.

British officials in India built comfortablebungalows, as they were called. Bunga-lows (The name comes from the Indianword bungla, which means Bengali.) wereelegant and spacious country houses.Many had large porches that were open tobreezes while protecting the inhabitantsfrom the sun. Surrounding the bungalows

were cottages where dozens of Indian ser-vants lived with their families.

The official was the sahib—the master.The official’s wife was the memsahib, ormadam-sahib. The memsahib wasexpected to oversee the running of thehousehold on a daily basis, especially sincethe sahib was often away on official busi-ness. At the beginning of each day, sheassigned duties to all the servants. Forexample, she fixed the menu for the daywith the cook and directed the gardenersabout how to plant the gardens with seedsfrom home. In the evening, she wasexpected to entertain. Supper parties withother British families were the usual formof entertainment.

450

by British rule. Perhaps the greatest cost waseconomic. British entrepreneurs and a small numberof Indians reaped financial benefits from British rule,but it brought hardship to millions of others in boththe cities and the countryside. British manufacturedgoods destroyed local industries. The introduction ofBritish textiles put thousands of women out of workand severely damaged the Indian textile industry.

In rural areas, the British sent the zamindars tocollect taxes. The British believed that using theselocal officials would make it easier to collect taxesfrom the peasants. However, the zamindars in Indiatook advantage of their new authority. Theyincreased taxes and forced the less fortunate peasantsto become tenants or lose their land entirely. Peasantunrest grew.

The British also encouraged many farmers toswitch from growing food to growing cotton. As aresult, food supplies could not keep up with thegrowing population. Between 1800 and 1900, thirtymillion Indians died of starvation.

Finally, British rule was degrading, even for thenewly educated upper classes, who benefited the

British Official’s Home in India

Benefits of British Rule British rule in India hadseveral benefits for subjects. It brought order and stability to a society that had been badly divided bycivil war. It also led to a fairly honest and efficientgovernment.

Through the efforts of the British administratorand historian Lord Thomas Macaulay, a new schoolsystem was set up. Its goal was to train Indian chil-dren to serve in the government and army. The newsystem served only elite, upper-class Indians, how-ever. Ninety percent of the population remainedilliterate.

Railroads, the telegraph, and a postal service wereintroduced to India shortly after they appeared inGreat Britain. In 1853 the first trial run of a passengertrain traveled the short distance from Bombay toThane. By 1900, 25,000 miles (40,225 km) of railroadscrisscrossed India. ; (See page 777 to read excerpts fromDadabhai Naroji’s The Impact of British Rule in India in the PrimarySources Library.)

Costs of British Rule The Indian people, however,paid a high price for the peace and stability brought

The wife of a British officer is attended by Indian servants.A British merchant waits to speak to her.

CONNECTING TO THE PAST

1. Identifying What were the responsibilities of thewife of a British officer in India?

2. Writing about History What do you learn aboutBritish-Indian social relations from this reading?

most from it. The best jobs and the best housing werereserved for Britons. Although many British colonialofficials sincerely tried to improve the lot of the people in India, British arrogance cut deeply into thepride of many Indians.

Despite their education, the Indians were neverconsidered equals of the British. Lord Kitchener, oneof Britain’s military commanders in India, said, “It isthis consciousness of the inherent superiority of theEuropean which has won for us India. However welleducated and clever a native may be, and howeverbrave he may prove himself, I believe that no rank wecan bestow on him would cause him to be consideredan equal of the British officer.”

The British also showed disrespect for India’s cul-tural heritage. The Taj Mahal, for example, a tomb forthe beloved wife of an Indian ruler, became a favoritesite for English weddings and parties. Many party-goers even brought hammers to chip off pieces assouvenirs. British racial attitudes led to the rise of anIndian nationalist movement.

Examining How was British ruledegrading to Indians?Reading Check

An Indian Nationalist MovementThe first Indian nationalists were upper class and

English-educated. Many of them were from urbanareas, such as Mumbai (then called Bombay), Chen-nai (Madras), and Calcutta. Some were trained inBritish law and were members of the civil service.

At first, many preferred reform to revolution, butthe slow pace of reform convinced many Indiannationalists that relying on British goodwill wasfutile. In 1885, a small group of Indians met in Mum-bai to form the Indian National Congress (INC). TheINC did not demand immediate independence butdid call for a share in the governing process.

The INC had difficulties because of religious differ-ences. The goal of the INC was to seek independencefor all Indians, regardless of class or religious back-ground. However, many of its leaders were Hinduand reflected Hindu concerns. Eventually, Muslimsbegan to call for the creation of a separate MuslimLeague to represent the interests of the millions ofMuslims in Indian society.

In 1915, the return of a young Hindu from SouthAfrica brought new life to India’s struggle for

Many British officials had a high stan-dard of living and were expected to have alarge number of servants. One womanwrote in 1882: “It is one of the socialduties of Indian life that you must keepthree servants to do the work of one.” Awell-to-do family had at least 25 servants.Even bachelors had at least a dozen. Indi-ans served as cooks, maids, butlers, gar-deners, tailors, and nursemaids for thechildren. All household servants wore uni-forms—usually white with bands on theirturbans—and went barefoot in the house.

A Britishofficer

receives a pedicure from

an Indianservant.

451

Checking for Understanding1. Define sepoy, viceroy.

2. Identify Queen Victoria, IndianNational Congress, Mohandas Gandhi.

3. Locate Kanpur, Mumbai.

4. Explain why the Muslim League wascreated. What were the advantages of its formation? What were the disadvantages?

5. List the economic costs to the Indianpeople that resulted from India beingruled by the British. What benefits tothe Indian population, if any, resultedfrom British rule?

Critical Thinking6. Predict Consequences Many British

lived in India for decades. Do you thinkliving in India would have changed Brit-ish attitudes toward Indians? Explain.

7. Organizing Information Draw a graphlike the example below to show thepercentage of India’s population thatdied of starvation in the 1800s.

Analyzing Visuals8. Interpret the messages conveyed by

the two images on page 451. Describeyour reactions to the paintings. Whymight your reactions be the same as or different from reactions of Englishteenagers viewing these paintings inthe late 1800s?

independence. Mohandas Gandhi was born in 1869in Gujarat, in western India. He studied in Londonand became a lawyer. In 1893, he went to SouthAfrica to work in a law firm serving Indian workersthere. He soon became aware of the racial exploita-tion of Indians living in South Africa.

On his return home to India, Gandhi becameactive in the independence movement. Using hisexperience in South Africa, he set up a movementbased on nonviolent resistance. Its aim was to forcethe British to improve the lot of the poor and grantindependence to India. Ultimately, Gandhi’s move-ment would lead to Indian independence.

Summarizing What were the twogoals of Mohandas Gandhi?

Colonial Indian CultureThe love-hate tension in India that arose from

British domination led to a cultural, as well as a polit-ical, awakening. The cultural revival began in the earlynineteenth century with the creation of a British col-lege in Calcutta. A local publishing house was opened.It issued textbooks on a variety of subjects, includingthe sciences, Sanskrit, and Western literature. The pub-lisher also printed grammars and dictionaries in thevarious Indian languages.

This revival soon spread to other regions of India,leading to a search for modern literary expression anda new national identity. Indian novelists and poets

Reading Check

began writing historical romances and epics. Somewrote in English, but most were uncomfortable with aborrowed colonial language. They preferred to usetheir own regional tongues.

The most illustrious Indian author wasRabindranath Tagore. A great writer and poet, Tagorewas also a social reformer, spiritual leader, educator,philosopher, singer, painter, and internationalspokesperson for the moral concerns of his age. Heliked to invite the great thinkers of the time to hiscountry estate. There he set up a school that becamean international university.

Tagore’s life mission was to promote pride in anational Indian consciousness in the face of Britishdomination. He wrote a widely read novel in whichhe portrayed the love-hate relationship of Indiatoward its colonial mentor. The novel depicted acountry that admired and imitated the British modelwhile also agonizing over how it could establish amodern identity separate from that of Great Britain.

Tagore, however, was more than an Indian nation-alist. His life’s work was one long prayer for humandignity, world peace, and the mutual understandingand union of East and West. As he once said, “It is myconviction that my countrymen will truly gain theirIndia by fighting against the education that teachesthem that a country is greater than the ideals ofhumanity.”

Comparing How did the nationalistmovement parallel cultural developments in India?Reading Check


9. Descriptive Writing Imagine youare a member of India’s upper-class.You have just attended a receptionat the home of a British official.Describe in writing your impressionsof the home, making a comparisonto your own residence.

Death due to

starvation

Nation Building in Latin America


Guide to Reading

Preview of Events

1810Mexico experiencesits first revolt

1821Mexico declaresindependence

On August 10, 1819, Simón Bolívar issued a proclamation to the people of NewGranada (present-day Colombia):

“Granadans! America’s day is come; no human power can stay the course of natureguided by the hand of Providence. Join your efforts to those of your brothers:Venezuela marches with me to free you, as in past years you marched with me to freeVenezuela. Already our advance guard fills whole provinces of your territory with theluster of its arms; and the same advance guard, powerfully aided, will hurl thedestroyed of New Granada into the seas. The sun will not have completed the courseof its present round through the heavens without beholding in all your territory theproud altars of liberty.”

—World Civilizations, Philip J. Adler, 1996

Bolívar was one of the leaders in liberating South America from Spanish and Portuguese control.

Nationalist RevoltsBy the end of the eighteenth century, the new political ideals stemming from the

successful revolution in North America were beginning to influence Latin Amer-ica. European control would soon be in peril.


Main Ideas• Latin American countries served as a

source of raw materials for Europe andthe United States.

• Because land remained the basis of wealth and power, landed elitesdominated Latin American countries.

Key Termscreole, peninsulare, mestizo, Monroe Doctrine, caudillo

People to IdentifyJosé de San Martín, Simón Bolívar, Anto-nio López de Santa Anna, Benito Juárez

Places to LocatePuerto Rico, Panama Canal, Haiti,Nicaragua

Preview Question1. How did the American Revolution

inspire political changes in Latin America?

Reading StrategyCompare and Contrast Create a Venndiagram comparing and contrasting colo-nial rule in Africa and in Latin America.

Africa Latin America

!1800 !1805 !1810 !1815 !1820 !1825 !1830

Portrait of Simón Bolívar

1825Most of Latin Americabecomes independent

Before the main independence movements began,an unusual revolution took place in the French colonyof Saint Domingue, on the island of Hispaniola. Led byFrançois-Dominique Toussaint-Louverture (TOO•SAN LOO•vuhr•TYUR), more than a hundred thousandslaves rose in revolt and seized control of all of His-paniola. On January 1, 1804, the western part of His-paniola, now called Haiti, announced its freedom andbecame the first independent state in Latin America.

Describing How did Napoleon’swars affect Latin America?

Revolt in Mexico Beginning in 1810, Mexico, too,experienced a revolt. The first real hero of Mexicanindependence was Miguel Hidalgo, a parish priest in asmall village about a hundred miles (160 km) fromMexico City.

Hidalgo, who had studied the French Revolution,roused the local Native Americans and mestizos(people of European and Native American descent)to free themselves from the Spanish: “My children,this day comes to us as a new dispensation. Are youready to receive it? Will you be free? Will you makethe effort to recover from the hated Spaniards thelands stolen from your forefathers 300 years ago?”

On September 16, 1810, a crowd of Native Ameri-cans and mestizos, armed with clubs, machetes, anda few guns, formed a mob army to attack the Span-iards. Hidalgo was an inexperienced military leader,however, and his forces were soon crushed. A mili-tary court sentenced Hidalgo to death, but his mem-ory lived on. In fact, September 16, the first day of the uprising, is Mexico’s Independence Day. One ofHidalgo’s followers, José Morelos, then took up thecampaign, capturing Acapulco in 1813, but finally he,too, was caught and executed.

The participation ofNative Americans andmestizos in Mexico’srevolt against Spanishcontrol frightened bothcreoles and peninsularesthere. Afraid of themasses, they cooperated indefeating the popular rev-olutionary forces. Conser-vative elites—both creolesand peninsulares—thendecided to overthrowSpanish rule as a way of

Reading Check


HISTORY

Web Activity Visitthe Glencoe WorldHistory—Modern Times Web site at

and click on Chapter 14–Student Web Activityto learn more aboutindependence move-ments in Latin America.

wh.mt.glencoe.com

Father Hidalgo leads Mexicans in revolt against the Spaniards.

Social classes based on privilege divided colonialLatin America. Peninsulares, at the top, held allimportant positions. Creoles controlled land andbusiness but were regarded as second-class citizensby peninsulares. Mestizos were the largest group butworked as servants or laborers.

Prelude to Revolution The creole elites were espe-cially influenced by revolutionary ideals. Creoleswere descendants of Europeans born in Latin Amer-ica and lived there permanently. They supported thelegal equality of all people, free trade, and a freepress. In addition, they, along with a growing class ofmerchants, disliked the domination of their trade bySpain and Portugal. Creoles deeply resented thepeninsulares, Spanish and Portuguese officials whoresided temporarily in Latin America for politicaland economic gain and then returned to their mothercountries.

The creole elites soon began to denounce the rule ofthe Spanish and Portuguese. At the beginning of thenineteenth century, Napoleon’s wars provided themwith an opportunity for change. When Napoleonoverthrew the monarchies of Spain and Portugal, theirauthority in the colonies was severely weakened.Between 1807 and 1825, a series of revolts freed mostof Latin America.

0448-0461 C14SE-860705 10/10/03 8:44 AM Page 454

preserving their own power. Theyselected a creole military leader, Agustínde Iturbide (EE•TUR•BEE•thay), as theirleader.

In 1821, Mexico declared its independ-ence from Spain. Iturbide named himselfemperor in 1822 but was deposed in 1823.Mexico then became a republic.

Revolts in South America José de SanMartín of Argentina and Simón Bolívarof Venezuela, both members of the creoleelite, were hailed as the “Liberators ofSouth America.” These men led revolu-tions throughout the continent. SanMartín believed that the Spaniards mustbe removed from all of South America ifany South American nation was to be free.

By 1810, the forces of San Martín hadliberated Argentina from Spanish author-ity. Bolívar began the struggle for independence inVenezuela in 1810 and then went on to lead revolts inNew Granada (Colombia) and Ecuador. In January1817, San Martín, joined by Bernardo O’ Higgins, leda force over the Andes to attack the Spanish in Chile.The journey was an amazing feat. Two-thirds of thepack mules and horses died during the trip. Soldierssuffered from lack of oxygen and severe cold whilecrossing mountain passes that were more than twomiles (3.218 km) above sea level.

The arrival of San Martín’s forces in Chile com-pletely surprised the Spaniards. Spanish forces werebadly defeated at the Battle of Chacabuco on Febru-ary 12, 1817. In 1821, San Martín moved on to Lima,Peru, the center of Spanish authority.

Convinced that he could not complete the libera-tion of Peru alone, San Martín welcomed the arrivalof Bolívar and his forces. The “Liberator of Vene-zuela” took on the task of crushing the last significantSpanish army at Ayacucho on December 9, 1824.

By the end of 1824, Peru, Uruguay, Paraguay,Colombia, Venezuela, Argentina, Bolivia, and Chilehad all become free of Spain. Earlier, in 1822, theprince regent of Brazil had declared Brazil’s inde-pendence from Portugal. The Central Americanstates had become independent in 1823. In 1838 and1839, they divided into five republics: Guatemala, ElSalvador, Honduras, Costa Rica, and Nicaragua.

In the early 1820s, only one major threat remainedto the newly won independence of the Latin Ameri-can states. Members of the Concert of Europe favoredthe use of troops to restore Spanish control in Latin

America. The British, who wished to trade with LatinAmerica, disagreed. They proposed joint action withthe United States against any European moves inLatin America.

Distrustful of British motives, United States presi-dent James Monroe acted alone in 1823. In the Mon-roe Doctrine, he guaranteed the independence of thenew Latin American nations and warned against anyEuropean intervention in the Americas.

More important to Latin American independencethan American words, however, was Britain’s navy.Other European powers feared British naval power,which stood between Latin America and any Euro-pean invasion force.

Evaluating How did the French Rev-olution affect Mexico?

Difficulties of Nation BuildingThe new Latin American nations faced a number

of serious problems between 1830 and 1870. Thewars for independence had resulted in a staggeringloss of people, property, and livestock. Unsure oftheir precise boundaries, the new nations went towar with one another to settle border disputes. Poorroads, a lack of railroads, thick jungles, and moun-tains made communication, transportation, andnational unity difficult. During the course of thenineteenth century, the new Latin American nationswould become economically dependent on Westernnations once again.

Reading Check


Painting of early twentieth-century coffee plantation by Candido Portinari

0448-0461 C14SE-860705 10/10/03 8:44 AM Page 455

PanamaSan MiguelitoGamboa

Colón

Gatun Lake

AlajuelaLake

A t l a n t i c O c e a n

Gulf of

Mexico

P a c i f i cO c e a n

Chagres R.

Chagres R.

CULEBRA CUT

Gold Hill

P A N A M A R A I L R O A D

PEDRO MIGUEL

LOCKS

MIRAFLORES

LOCKSGATUNLOCKS

GATUNDAM

MADDENDAM

Spillway

Breakwater

Breakwater

Scale varies in this perspective.

The United States’s intervention in Latin America in theearly 1900s led to the building of the Panama Canal(opened in 1914). The United States controlled the canalthroughout most of the twentieth century.

1. Interpreting Maps The Panama Canal provides ashorter route between which two oceans?

2. Interpreting Maps What is the difference in milesbetween the two routes from New York City to SanFrancisco?

3. Applying Geography Skills Nicaragua was an alter-nate site for the canal. Determine why Panama wasselected.

Rule of the Caudillos Most of the new nations ofLatin America began with republican governments,but they had had no experience in ruling themselves.Soon after independence, strong leaders known ascaudillos came into power.

Caudillos ruled chiefly by military force and wereusually supported by the landed elites. Many keptthe new national states together. Some were alsomodernizers who built roads and canals, ports, andschools. Others were destructive.

Antonio López de Santa Anna, for example, ruledMexico from 1833 to 1855. He misused state funds,halted reforms, and created chaos. In 1835, Americansettlers in the Mexican state of Texas revolted againstSanta Anna’s rule.

Texas gained its independence in 1836 and UnitedStates statehood in 1845. War between Mexico and

the United States soon followed (1846–1848). Mexicowas defeated and lost almost one-half of its territoryto the United States in the Mexican War.

Fortunately for Mexico, Santa Anna’s disastrousrule was followed by a period of reform from 1855 to1876. This era was dominated by Benito Juárez, aMexican national hero. The son of Native Americanpeasants, President Juárez brought liberal reforms toMexico, including separation of church and state,land distribution to the poor, and an educational sys-tem for all of Mexico.

Other caudillos, such as Juan Manual de Rosas inArgentina, were supported by the masses, becameextremely popular, and brought about radical change.Unfortunately, the caudillo’s authority depended onhis personal power. When he died or lost power, civilwars for control of the country often erupted.


1,000 kilometers0Lambert AzimuthalEqual-Area projection

1,000 miles0

N

SEW

30°S

60°S

30°N

60°N

120°W90°W

30°W 0°60°W

EQUATOR

AtlanticOcean

PacificOcean

PanamaCanal

Strait ofMagellan

12,600miles

4,900miles

SanFrancisco

New York City

Route via the Strait of MagellanRoute via the Panama Canal

CanalRailroad

Panama Canal

Travel Distance

A New Imperialism Political independence broughteconomic independence, but old patterns werequickly reestablished. Instead of Spain and Portugal,Great Britain now dominated the Latin Americaneconomy. British merchants moved into Latin Amer-ica in large numbers, and British investors poured infunds. Old trade patterns soon reemerged.

Latin America continued to serve as a source ofraw materials and foodstuffs for the industrialnations of Europe and the United States. Exportsincluded wheat, tobacco, wool, sugar, coffee, andhides. At the same time, finished consumer goods,especially textiles, were imported.

The emphasis on exporting raw materials andimporting finished products ensured the ongoingdomination of the Latin American economy byforeigners. Latin American countries remained

economic colonies of Western nations, even thoughthey were no longer political colonies.

Persistent Inequality A fundamental, underlyingproblem for all of the new Latin American nationswas the domination of society by the landed elites.Large estates remained a way of life in Latin Amer-ica. By 1848, for example, the Sánchez Navarro fam-ily in Mexico possessed 17 estates made up of 16million acres (6,480,000 ha). Estates were often solarge that they could not be farmed efficiently.

Land remained the basis of wealth, social prestige,and political power throughout the nineteenth cen-tury. Landed elites ran governments, controlledcourts, and kept a system of inexpensive labor. Theselandowners made enormous profits by growing sin-gle, specialized crops, such as coffee, for export. The


Panama Canal LocksA ship arrives from the AtlanticOcean or the Pacific Ocean.

The ship enters the first lock andsteel gates close behind it.Water flows into the lock from anartificial lake. When the waterreaches the level of the next higherlock, gates open and the shipmoves forward.

Electric towing locomotives calledmules pull the ship by cablesthrough the locks.

In a descending lock, water isdrained to the level of the nextlower lock and the ship advances.

1

2

3

4

12

34

In 1534, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V ordered the first survey of a proposed canal route across the Isthmus of Panama. The survey came back “impossible.”

The canal was constructed in two stages: between 1881 and 1888 by a French company and between 1904 and 1914 by the United States.

The canal is 51 miles (82 km) long. The average time a ship spends in transit is 8 to 10 hours.

There are 6 pairs of locks, or a total of 12 locks. Each lock is 1,000 feet (305 m) long and 110 feet (34 m) wide. The lock system lifts ships 85 feet (26 m) above sea level.

About 140 million tons (127 million t) of commercial cargo pass through the canal each year.

•

•

•

•

•

Panama Canal Facts

Workers building the Panama Canal


(16.09 km) wide running from coast to coast inPanama. There, the United States built the PanamaCanal, which was opened in 1914.

American investments in Latin America soon fol-lowed, as did American resolve to protect thoseinvestments. Beginning in 1898, American militaryforces were sent to Cuba, Mexico, Guatemala, Hon-duras, Nicaragua, Panama, Colombia, Haiti, and theDominican Republic to protect American interests.

Some expeditions remained for many years. UnitedStates Marines were in Haiti from 1915 to 1934, andNicaragua was occupied from 1909 to 1933. Increasingnumbers of Latin Americans began to resent this inter-ference from the “big bully” to the north.

Revolution in Mexico In some countries, largelandowners supported dictators who looked out forthe interests of the ruling elite. Porfirio Díaz, whoruled Mexico between 1877 and 1911, created a con-servative, centralized government with the supportof the army, foreign capitalists, large landowners,and the Catholic Church. All these groups benefitedfrom their alliance. However, forces for change inMexico led to a revolution.

During Díaz’s dictatorial reign, the wages ofworkers had declined. Ninety-five percent of therural population owned no land, whereas about athousand families owned almost all of Mexico. When

a liberal landowner, Francisco Madero,forced Díaz from power in 1911, heopened the door to a wider revolution.

Madero’s ineffectiveness created ademand for agrarian reform. This newcall for reform was led by Emiliano Zapata. Zapata aroused the masses oflandless peasants and began to seize theestates of wealthy landholders.

Between 1910 and 1920, the MexicanRevolution caused great damage to theMexican economy. Finally, a new consti-tution enacted in 1917 set up a govern-ment led by a president, createdland-reform policies, established limitson foreign investors, and set an agendato help the workers. The revolution alsoled to an outpouring of patriotism. Intel-lectuals and artists sought to capturewhat was unique about Mexico, withspecial emphasis on its past.

Describing Whatwas the United States’s role as a colonial power?

Reading Check

United States marines hoist the American flag following aUnited States victory in the Spanish-American War. Whatterritories in addition to Cuba came under Americancontrol as a result of the Spanish-American War?

History

masses, with no land to grow basic food crops, expe-rienced dire poverty.

Describing What were some of thedifficulties faced by the new Latin American republics?

Political Change in Latin AmericaOne hundred years of direct United

States involvement in the Panama Canal ended onDecember 31, 1999, when the canal reverted to Pana-manian control.After 1870, Latin American governments, led by

large landowners, wrote constitutions similar tothose of the United States and European democra-cies. The ruling elites were careful to keep theirpower by limiting voting rights, however.

The United States in Latin America By 1900, theUnited States, which had emerged as a world power,had begun to interfere in the affairs of its southernneighbors. As a result of the Spanish-American War(1898), Cuba became a United States protectorate,and Puerto Rico was annexed to the United States.

In 1903, the United States supported a rebellionthat enabled Panama to separate itself from Colom-bia and establish a new nation. In return, the UnitedStates was granted control of a strip of land 10 miles

Reading Check

Economic Change in Latin America

After 1870, Latin America began anage of prosperity based to a largeextent on the export of a few basicitems. These included wheat and beeffrom Argentina, coffee from Brazil,coffee and bananas from CentralAmerica, and sugar and silver fromPeru. These foodstuffs and raw mate-rials were largely exchanged for fin-ished goods—textiles, machines, andluxury items—from Europe and theUnited States. After 1900, Latin Amer-icans also increased their own indus-trialization, especially by buildingtextile, food-processing, and construc-tion material factories.

One result of the prosperity that came fromincreased exports was growth in the middle sectors(divisions) of Latin American society—lawyers,merchants, shopkeepers, businesspeople, school-teachers, professors, bureaucrats, and military offi-cers. These middle sectors accounted for only 5 to 10percent of the population, hardly enough in numbersto make up a true middle class. Nevertheless, after1900, the middle sectors of society continued toexpand.

Regardless of the country in which they lived,middle-class Latin Americans shared some commoncharacteristics. They lived in the cities; sought educa-


Checking for Understanding1. Define creole, peninsulare, mestizo,

Monroe Doctrine, caudillo.

2. Identify José de San Martín, SimónBolívar, Antonio López de Santa Anna,Benito Juárez.

3. Locate Puerto Rico, Panama Canal,Haiti, Nicaragua.

4. Describe British motives for protectingLatin American states.

5. List the powers and privileges of thelanded elites.

Critical Thinking6. Examine Why did eliminating Euro-

pean domination from Latin Americanot bring about significant economicand social change?

7. Organizing Information Fill in thechart below to identify which countryexported each product listed.

Analyzing Visuals8. Describe the painting on page 454.

What action is taking place? How wouldyou describe the emotions of the peo-ple in the scene? How has the paintertried to convey the importance of theevent?

Product Countrycoffeebananas and coffeebeef and wheatsugar and silver

9. Expository Writing Why did LatinAmerican countries remain eco-nomic colonies of Western nationswhen they were no longer politicalcolonies? Write a brief essay explain-ing why this happened.

tion and decent incomes; and saw the United Statesas a model, especially in regard to industrialization.

The middle sectors in Latin America sought liberalreform, not revolution. Once they had the right tovote, they generally sided with the landholding elites.

Evaluating What caused the growthof a middle class in Latin America?Reading Check

This photo shows Montevideo, Uruguay, in theearly twentieth century. What signs of increas-ing prosperity do you see in this photo?

History


Using Key Terms1. The extension of a nation’s power over other lands is called

.2. A is a political unit that depends on another state for

its protection, such as Cambodia in its relationship withFrance in the 1880s.

3. The method of colonial government in which local rulersmaintain their authority is called .

4. When foreigners govern the colony instead of locals it iscalled .

5. Puerto Rico was by the United States.6. People who are native to a country are known as .7. Indian soldiers in the service of the British East India Com-

pany were called .8. The of India was assisted by a large British civil

service staff.9. To prevent foreign interference in Latin America, the presi-

dent of the United States issued the .10. The elite led the fight for independence in South

America.

Reviewing Key Facts11. Economics Why did European states wish to establish

colonies?12. Geography What African state was founded as a refuge

for former slaves?13. History By 1914, what European countries had divided up

Africa?14. Culture What were the effects of British rule in India?15. Government Describe the zamindar system, which was

used by the British in India.16. History What were the goals of Mohandas Gandhi?17. History Why was the Haitian revolution unique?18. History What arrangement did the United States make with

Panama?19. Geography What country in Southeast Asia remained inde-

pendent? Why?

Critical Thinking20. Analyzing Explain the circumstances surrounding the build-

ing of the Panama Canal. How did the United States benefit?21. Making Comparisons Discuss the various concerns of

people under colonial rule. Did social class affect how theyviewed colonial power? How were the concerns of differentsocial classes similar? How were they different?

The Age Of ImperialismThe imperialist powers of the nineteenth century conqueredweaker countries and carved up the lands they seized. Theiractions had a lasting effect on the world, especially the con-quered peoples of Asia and Africa. The chart below organizesselected events that occurred during the age of imperialismaccording to four themes.

• Imperialistic nations set up colonies and protectorates.• Christian missionaries preach in Africa and Asia.• Cecil Rhodes makes a fortune in South Africa.

• Ferdinand de Lesseps completes the Suez Canal in 1869.• King Leopold II of Belgium colonizes the Congo Basin.• The United States gains new territory after the Spanish-

American War.• The Panama Canal opens in 1914.

• The British East India Company controls India.• Afrikaners set up independent republics.

• The United States creates the Monroe Doctrine in 1823.• In May 1857, the sepoys rebel against British

commanders.• Afrikaners fight the British in the Boer War from

1899 to 1902.

Change

Reaction

Nationalism

Movement

Self-Check QuizVisit the Glencoe World History—Modern Times Website at and click on Chapter 14–Self-Check Quiz to prepare for the Chapter Test.

wh.mt.glencoe.com

HISTORY

Directions: Choose the best answer to thefollowing question.

Which of the following was a consequence of British colo-nial rule in India?A the defeat of the Mogul dynastyB the popularity of the joint-stock companyC the exploitation of resourcesD the Berlin Conference of 1884

Test-Taking Tip: If you do not immediately know the rightanswer to a question, look at each answer choice carefully.Try to recall the context in which these events were dis-cussed in class. Remembering this context may help youeliminate incorrect answer choices.

StandardizedTest Practice


100 kilometers0Lambert Azimuthal Equal-Area projection

100 miles0

S

N

EW

30°N

30°E 33°E

Red Sea

Nile

Riv

er

Gulf of Suez

Gul

f of A

qaba

SuezCanal

Mediterranean Sea

BitterLakes

JORDAN

ISRAEL

SINAIEGYPT

Cairo

GazaPort Said

Suez

Suez Canal

Analyzing Maps and ChartsUse your text and the map above to answer the followingquestions.29. Approximately how long is the Suez Canal?30. Why is control of the Suez Canal so important?31. What two seas are connected by the Suez Canal?32. What route was used for trade and transportation in this area

prior to the building of the Suez Canal?

Writing About History22. Persuasive Writing Pretend you are a British colonist who

has been living abroad for a year. Decide whether you arefor or against colonialism and write a letter to your familyconvincing them of your views. Use examples from the textor your own research.

Analyzing SourcesRead the following quote by Miguel Hidalgo:

“My children, this day comes to us as a new dispen-sation. Are you ready to receive it? Will you be free?Will you make the effort to recover from the hatedSpanish the lands stolen from your forefathers 300years ago?”

23. Describe the tone of this quote. What emotions is Hidalgotrying to arouse? Is Hidalgo correct when he claims that theSpanish stole the land?

24. Do you think Native Americans in North America are justi-fied in feeling that their lands were stolen? Why or why not?

Applying Technology Skills25. Using the Internet Use the Internet to research Emilio

Aguinaldo and the Philippine quest for independence. Create a map showing the various battle sites.

Making Decisions26. You are a local ruler in your country. You deeply resent the

colonial power that has asked you to rule in its interest. Do you continue to rule or do you resign? What are theconsequences of your decision?

27. Originally the Panama Canal was a French project. When theFrench ran into difficulties, they attempted to sell their proj-ect to the United States. As a United States senator, decidewhether or not the United States should take over the project. Give reasons for your decision.

28. Simón Bolívar is considered to be the George Washington ofSouth America. Do further research on Bolívar in yourschool library. If necessary, review information you havepreviously learned about George Washington. Decidewhether or not you think the comparison between Bolívarand Washington is fair. Explain your decision.

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Documents

The Height of Imperialism€¦ · Imperialism 1800–1914 Key Events As you read this chapter, look for the key events in the history of imperialism. • Competition among European