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The English East India Company and the British Crown: c. 1795-1803, the first occupation at the Cape of Good Hope

- Jordan, Calvin

  • Authors: Jordan, Calvin
  • Date: 2018
  • Subjects: East India Company , East India Company -- Influence , Cape of Good Hope (Colony) , Cape of Good Hope (South Africa) -- History -- 1795-1872 , Cape of Good Hope (South Africa) -- Politics and government -- 1795-1872 , British -- South Africa -- History -- 19th century , Great Britain -- Colonies -- Commerce , Great Britain -- Colonies -- Administration -- History -- 19th century , Merchant marine -- Great Britain -- History
  • Language: English
  • Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
  • Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63164 , vital:28369
  • Description: My thesis aims to investigate the relationship between the English East India Company (EEIC) and the British colonial administration at the Cape of Good Hope during the first British occupation (1795 to 1803). Studies and literature that concern the EEIC have rarely gone beyond the surface, detailing the presence of the EEIC at the Cape, and neglecting the Company’s involvement in the administration thereof. My thesis draws on prior works but attempts to address both temporal and spatial gaps in this literature on the Atlantic and Indian Ocean, and the history of the EEIC. This study takes note of the seaborne related activity around the ports, bays and islands at the Cape – including the regulation of these spaces and issues related to securing British trade and colonial possessions more generally. I question the framing of the Cape primarily as a constituent of a national unit by locating the colony within a broader global and maritime context. A key interest is to determine the degree to which the EEIC influenced and participated in the British governance of the Cape, particularly by exploring the maritime dimensions of the relationship between the EEIC and colonial governance during this particular period. This involves understanding the embeddedness of the Cape in British (Crown and Company) networks and the constitution of a ‘British maritime zone’. This study uses archival sources drawn from the British colonial government records, Company records, and the private diaries and letters of Lady Anne Barnard that relate to the Cape. It is shown that a uniquely configured governance convention was constituted to secure the mutual commercial and imperial interests of both Crown and Company. By keeping the Cape secure, the British sought to keep their greater seaborne Empire secure. This study reveals that the EEIC was significantly involved in and influenced the way the British administration governed the Cape.
  • Full Text:
  • Date Issued: 2018

The development and failure of the Eastern Cape separatist movement with special reference to John Paterson

- Stead, J L

  • Authors: Stead, J L
  • Date: 1974
  • Subjects: Paterson, John, 1822-1880 , Cape of Good Hope (South Africa) -- Politics and government -- 1795-1872 , Eastern Cape (South Africa) -- History -- Autonomy and independence movements , Stormberg Range Region (South Africa) -- History
  • Language: English
  • Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
  • Identifier: vital:2593 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007343
  • Description: From Preface: In 1960 Pamela Ffolliott and E.L.H. Croft wrote a biograpby of John Paterson entitled One Titan at a Time. This concentrated mainly on his business activities and his civic role to the virtual exclusion of his political opinions and career even though contemporaries often regarded him as second only to John X. Merriman. The result of diligent enquiry for further biographical detail both in South Africa and in the United Kingdom has been disappointing. A close examination of such evidence as there is, suggests that his political abilities have been over-rated rather than under-rated. It is now nearly forty years since the study of separatism was first seriously undertaken. The period 1854-72 was studied by N.H. Taylor (M.A. Thesis, University of Cape Town, 1938) and D.B. Sole undertook a broader survey (M.A. Thesis, University of South Africa (R.U.C.), 1939). Neither study used the Godlonton papers. The Godlonton-White correspondence is at Rhodes House, Oxford and this mainly concerns business matters and news of prominent local people. The collection of Godlonton papers housed in the Historical Papers section of the Library of the University of the Witwatersrand proved more interesting. The use of these papers made it possible to make a new approach to the critical period of representative government and to explore in more detail lines suggested in part by J .L. McCracken in the more general study, The Cape Parliament 1854-1910 published in 1967. Yet because in many cases the leaders of the movement after 1854 carried into the new era ideas and attitudes formed in earlier years, it was necessary to consider also the origins of the separatist impulse. Separatism had many roots: as a term it had many meanings. Clearly the meaning attached to the word varied from time to time, from place to place and even from person to person. The goal varied too. Sometimes the Eastern Province wanted to move the centre of government from Cape Town; sometimes the cry was for a completely separate colony to be established in the East; sometimes the theme was federal devolution of powers, to a resident government. Indeed among the many reasons for the failure of the separatist movement was the inability of the Easterners to agree among themselves about what they were seeking. This exposed and emphasised their political ineptitude.
  • Full Text:
  • Date Issued: 1974

Robert Godlonton as architect of frontier opinion, with special reference to the politics of separatism, 1850-57

- Le Cordeur, Basil Alexander

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