The Outcomes of the Boer War

In May 1902, the Peace of Vereeniging was signed and The Transvaal and the Orange Free State became part of the British Empire. There were many changes in Britain as well.

Army Reforms

The Esher Reforms:

• Improvements to army organisation through better defined roles, such as that of the chief of the general staff, who had responsibility for planning and training.
• Improved training and professionalism through the introduction of new drill books and the establishment of the military training base at Salisbury Plain and officer training at Camberley.
• New and better weapons were introduced such as an improved Lee-Enfield Rifle.

The Haldane Reforms: 

• The British Expeditionary Force (BEF), a permanent, battle-ready fighting force was introduced. The BEF made an important contribution during the First World War.
• The organisation of the Territorial Army (TA) was improved and it was strengthened. The TA also played an important role during the First World War.

The combined impact of these Army Reforms made the British Army stronger, more effective and more efficient.

Social Reforms 

The Liberal Reforms of 1906 - 1914

These were a range of measures designed to improve the health and well-being of the poorest in society. The reforms were introduced partly as a result of the Boer War. The Interdepartmental Committee of Physical Deterioration of 1904 highlighted how poverty and associated problems such as rickets weakened the physical condition of British people. Among the measures were:

• The Free School Meals Act of 1906 where local authorities could provide meals for the poorest children in schools.
• The National Insurance Act of 1911 made it compulsory for the poorest workers and workers in industries most prone to unemployment to participate in a government-backed scheme to provide insurance against sickness and unemployment.
• Measures were also taken to restrict exploitation of workers and provide medical checks for school children.

http://www.ibatpv.org/projects/wars/boerwar/effects.htm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_7yNjQquik

Key Battles of the Boer War

First Phase (October 1899 - June 1900) : British defeats

On the 12th October 1899, the Boers declared war on the British after the British refused to withdraw the troops they had gathered on the borders of Boer territory. The British suffered a series of humiliating defeats during Black Week and at Spion Kop, and were besieged at Ladysmith, Kimberley and Mafeking. The commander of British forces was General Buller.

Second Phase (February 1900 - June 1900) : British victories

The British managed to break or relieve the sieges and capture key Boer settlements. In February 1900, Kimberley and Ladysmith were relieved, while Bloemfontein was captured in March, and Mafeking finally relieved in May. By June 1900, with Boer capitals Johannesburg and Pretoria taken, the British believed that they had won. The British commander during the second phase was Field Marshall Lord Roberts.

Third Phase (late 1900 and throughout 1901) : Guerrilla war

The Boers fought back with a determined guerrilla campaign. Boer commandos attacked British railways and supply lines. The British responded by destroying Boer farms, clearing Boer areas and establishing concentration camps. Eventually they gained the upper hand and in May 1902 the Peace of Vereeniging was signed: The Transvaal and the Orange Free State became part of the British Empire. The British commander during the third phase was Field Marshall Horatio Kitchener.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Battles_of_the_Second_Boer_War

The People of the Boer War

Chamberlain

Joseph Chamberlain (1836-1914) became Colonial Secretary in Prime Minister Salisbury's government in 1895. He could have been placed in a more senior role however, wanted this job as he would be in control of Britain's colonies. He wanted to forge a closer union between the colonies and Britain, bring together the diverse collection of territories to create an Empire. Chamberlain was pro Boer. But not everybody shared his enthusiasm for the Boer War and subsequently he became the target of the anti-war movements anger. His rivalry with David Lloyd George was legendary. Chamberlains party represented the Conservative Party and imperialism. In 1900 Chamberlains party would storm home under the banner of social imperialism and the coming victory in the Boer War.

Lloyd George

David Lloyd George (1863-1945) was Prime Minister from 1916 to 1922 and becaradicalism and earned notoriety for his opposition to the Boer War. Lloyd George had a huge rivalry with Chamberlain. But in 1906 there was a change as Lloyd George had his hands on the levers of power in Britain and Chamberlains legacy was consigned to the dustbin of history. Lloyd George stressed that the British Empire needed to be based on freedom, but he wasn't an opponent of the British Empire.
me known for his

Milner

Alfred Milner (1854-1925) was selected by Chamberlain to become the most important diplomat in South Africa - the High Commissioner. Although Milner didn't have the power to declare war, his political union with Chamberlain unquestionably made it happen. They both had the same views on the Boer Republics. Milner saw the British as a superior race compared to the Boers. In his opinion the British aristocracy ruled the world and his views allowed the thinking for ethnic cleansing and concentration camps, which came around in a couple of years.

Kitchener

Lord Herbert Kitchener (1850-1916) was a senior British Army Officer and colonial administrator who won fame for his imperial campaigns and later played a central role in the First World War. He felt that the press needed to be controlled and introduced greater censorship during the guerrilla phase of the war in 1900-1901.

Roberts

Frederick Roberts (1832-1914) was a British soldier who was one of the most successful commanders of the 19th Century. He realised the value of  the press in maintaining morale and in generating a positive public image. He tries to get press support by supplying war correspondents with information and allowing them to use army telegraph systems to relay dispatches to London.

Hobhouse

Emily Hobhouse (1860-1926) was a British welfare campaigner. Much like Florence Nightingale and Mary Seacole during the Crimean War, Emily Hobhouse traveled overseas to explore the cruelties of war. In 1901, she visited the concentration camps of Bloemfontein and was shocked by the suffering of the Boer women and children in the camps. She famously took the photograph of the young Boer girl Lizzie Van Zyl who was starving to death. She increased the pressure on leading politicians to come out against the war. And around the country a growing anti-war movement was repulsed by the photograph of what the camps had done to Van Zyl. Hobhouse's photography also continued the tradition of photography bringing people at home closer to the reality of war.

Hobson

John Hobson (1858-1940) was an English economist and critic of imperialism. Hobson was a Marxist writer. He wrote regularly in the anti-war newspaper, The Manchester Guardian. The newspaper, edited by C.P.Scott. gave regular column space to Marxist writers like Hobson to argue fiercely against the war before, during and after it. In The Guardian, Hobson even exposed the fact that Chinese slaves were being used in the gold mines to increase profits further for the fat cats of the Empire. The Marxist political party of the day, the Labour Party was just starting to grow in strength and size, organizing itself through trade unions - ready for a political fight against the aristocracy. Marxists like Hobson would be at the front of the fight, questioning how on earth British working class soldiers were dying for gold profits that go to the aristocrats in South Africa.

Campbell-Bannerman

Henry Campbell-Bannerman (1838-1908) was the leader of the Liberal Party during the Boer War. He wanted to become the next Prime Minister replacing Robert Salisbury of the Conservative Party. But in a time of war that would be incredibly hard because the country was largely supportive of the war and the Empire and the Conservative Party best represented such views. The Liberal Party was less supportive of imperialism and the Boer War, but even if he was strongly against the war, Campbell-Bannerman couldn't come out and say so because in a highly jingoistic country like Britain, it would be equal to political suicide. It took Hobhouse exposing the conditions in the concentration camps to make him finally speak out against the war. He moved the Liberal Party to an anti-war position in the following years but unlike Lloyd George, could never say he fully opposed the war from start until end.

Causes of the Boer War

Countries involved

The Second Boer War was fought between the British Empire and the Boer Republic of South Africa. The British controlled parts of southern Africa while the Boers, who were the descendants of Dutch settlers to the region and usually farmers, controlled the Orange Free State and the Transvaal.

Causes of the war

• Strategic: the British were interested in expanding their empire in southern Africa as this region was of key strategic importance to them as a route to India and other parts of the British Empire. They did not want to see the Boers join their territories to German possessions nearby.
• Gold: Boer regions became more attractive to British miners and speculators such as Cecil Rhodes when gold was discovered there in 1886. The discovery of gold also worried the British as they felt that with this new wealth Boer areas would become too powerful.
• The Uitlanders: the British were annoyed that the so-called Uitlanders, the mainly British foreigners living in Boer lands, were denied the vote in the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. 

http://www1.somerset.gov.uk/archives/sli/boer.htm

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/victorians/boer_wars_01.shtml

The Outcomes of the Crimean War

Countries 

The 9th September 2855 was the end of the Siege of Sevastopol where the Russians evacuated Sevastopol and the British and French finally attained their target. On the 29th February 1856, armistice in the Crimea meant it was a British, French and Ottoman victory. On the 30th March 1856, The Treaty of Paris was formed which settled the Crimean War. Russia regained the land that had been occupied; the Black Sea was neutralised for open international trade. The treaty marked a severe setback to Russian influence in the region.

Individuals

Lord Cardigan was initially perceived as a hero after the Charge of the Light Brigade after he charged out ahead of his troops. He was later accused of deserting the Brigade at a crucial moment of the battle and of incompetence in relation to his failure to distribute provisions in Balaclava.
Lord Lucan received most of the blame for the Charge. He was accused of implementing an order he knew to be senseless and of failing to seek proper clarification of it.
Lord Raglan died in the Crimea in June 1855 and was held responsible for many of the problems of leadership and organisation during the Crimean campaign.

Changes in Britain

Nightingale's work and her iconic status helped to establish nursing as a respectable profession for women. Her name was used to raise funds to establish nursing training; £45000 was raised by 1859.St Thomas' Hospital in London established a training school for ten nurses in 1860. Nightingale used her statistical work on mortality rates to illustrate the need for sanitary reform in all military hospitals; in 1857 a Royal Commision on the Health of the Army was set up.
One military development after the Crimean war was the establishment of the Victoria Cross in 1856, the highest award for bravery in the British Army. The Victoria Cross embodied the new, more meritocratic approach in the British Army as soldiers of any rank could receive it. The Cardwell Army Reforms (1870-1871) were introduced and involved:

• Purchase of commision was abolished: promotion in the British Army was now through merit.
• Conditions for ordinary soldiers were improved: the period of overseas service was reduced from twelve years to six; pay was increased and flogging was abolished in peacetime. 
• The structure of army organisation was simplified and combined under the responsibility of the War Office.
• The Commander in Chief of the army was made responsible to the Secretary of War and through him, to Parliament.
• The country was divided into local regimental districts and each area had two battalions. One would stay at home to train and the other could be sent overseas.

The move to a more meritocratic system in Britain following the Crimean War also extended to the Civil Service where, during Gladstone's first administration (1868-1874), all departments except for the Foreign Office adopted a system of recruiting by competitive examination.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Paris_(1856)

The key battles of the Crimean War

Commanders of the British Army

• Lord Raglan (Commander-in-chief of the British Army during the Crimean War)
• The Earl of Lucan (Lord Lucan) (Commander of the Cavalry Division which included the Heavy Brigade and the Light Brigade)
• The Earl of Cardigan (Lord Cardigan) (Commander of the Light Brigade)

The Thin Red Line

Early on in the Battle of Balaclava, Russian soldiers advanced on the British line, organised in an unusual formation of two rows. The 93rd Highlanders stopped the Russians by firing volleys of musket shots.Watching from the hills above, William Howard Russell memorably depicted the soldiers as a 'thin red streak'. The soldiers of the Thin Red Line have been remembered as a symbol of the determination and heroism of the British soldier.

The Charge of the Light Brigade

During the Battle of Balaclava, Lord Raglan issued a hurried and poorly explained order to Lord Lucan to charge at the Russian guns. Lord Raglan intended Lucan to focus upon retaking British guns that the Russians had taken. His orders were vague and Captain Nolan, the officer in charge of delivering the message to Lord Lucan was not able to clarify the order properly. Lucan pushed ahead with the charge and mistakenly sent the Light Brigade down a valley where they were surrounded by Russian forces who attacked them from higher ground.
The Charge of the Light Brigade had gone down in history as a horrendous military blunder accompanied by astonishing heroism of ordinary soldiers but this had been challenged by recent historians. Of the 661 who set off on the charge, 113 were killed, 134 were wounded and 45 were taken prisoner- the Russian casualty rate was similar. However, the Light Brigade were only saved from complete destruction by a French charge. Eye witness accounts like Russell's created the impression of a monumental error of army leadership and a tragic waste of life. Depictions such as Tennyson's poem reinforced this picture of blunder redeemed by the bravery and heroism of soldiers.

http://poetry.eserver.org/light-brigade.html

The people of the Crimean War

There were many key figures during the Crimean War:

Lord Raglan (30th September 1788 - 29th June 1855) was the commander-in-chief of the British Forces during the Crimean War. Raglan was most known for ordering the British Light Brigade to take back guns that the Russians had seized. The orders involved the British cavalry racing uphill to face Russian cannons. This order contradicted all military wisdom especially considering that Raglan could see the battlefield and the Russian guns but still went through with the orders. After Balaclava, Raglan fought hard through official correspondence to pin the blame on Lucan however with events in the Crimea going badly, the pressure mounted on Raglan. He was heavily criticized in parliament and as leader of the military, the buck stopped with him. With time, Raglan has become the epitome of incompetence due to his lack of leadership qualities and his poor military strategies. His army didn't rate him and the politicians wanted him gone but in the aristocracy society of the time, he was never sacked.

Lord Aberdeen (28th January 1784 - 14th December 1860) served as Prime Minister of Britain from 1852 to 1855. Despite trying to avoid it, he took Britain into the Crimean War. The war forced Lord Aberdeen to resign from his post. Pressure from The Times newspaper and outrage from the middle classes at the incompetence the Conservative Party aristocrats managing the commissariat led to Aberdeen tendering his resignation to Queen Victoria. The Light Brigade, the Russian winter and the incompetence of the military led by Lord Raglan were also highly significant factors. The most powerful man in Britain and arguably the world at the time, was brought down by the war in the Crimea.  

Florence Nightingale (12th May 1820 - 13th August 1910) led a team of 38 nurses to the Crimea to help improve standard of care and ease suffering of the regular troops. She addressed the issues of sanitation and ventilation by washing out the sewers and cleaning the ventilation systems that were the breeding ground of disease. With standards improving, the death rate of injured or sick soldiers dropped from 42.2% to 2%. Nightingale was one of the heroines from the war and she was considered the remedy to the bungling incompetence of the leadership of the country. On arrival home, Queen Victoria invited her to set up a Royal Commission to address the poor medical standards in the Army. The findings of the commission recommended an Army Medical School and more use of statistics when analysing the success of health care. She also inspired middle and upper women to pursue careers at a time when women were not expected to work.

Mary Seacole (1805 - 14th May 1881) ,after numerous rejections from the government, decided to pay her own way to the Crimea to help with the soldiers. At Crimea, Seacole was known for her heroism as she tended to soldiers on the battlefield as the fighting went on around her. She constructed a boarding house from the scrap materials left around by the army that treated the sick and wounded. Seacole sold alcohol to the soldiers and was often frowned upon by Nightingale who referred to her boarding house as a 'broffle'. Nonetheless, her popularity in the Crimea and at home went through the roof. Her self-sacrifice and determination to make a difference ensured she was known as a heroine throughout the empire. However upon her return to Britain, she lived in poverty due to the social hierarchy that still existed within Britain.

William Howard Russell (28th March 1820 - 11th February 1907) was the first ever war correspondent, sending his dispatches from the front line by telegram. He wrote for The Times newspaper which was increasingly read by the growing middle classes during the war. The Times was openly critical of the way the war was being managed by the aristocratic political and military leaders. Russell spent December 1854 away from the harsh Russian winter, living in Constantinople. John Delane (11th October 1817 - 22nd November 1879) was the editor of The Times during the Crimean War and helped in determining public opinion. Russells reporting and Delanes critical editorial stance inspired Tennyson to write poetry, Nightingale to head out to the Crimea and Lord Aberdeen to resign.

Roger Fenton (28th Match 1819 - 8th August 1869) was the first war photographer and was paid by the commercial company 'Thomas Agnew & Sons' to go to the Crimea and produce an album of photographs that could be sold and exhibited in museums. He was asked to produce an album that showed the landscapes of the Crimea rather than an accurate picture of war with the death, destruction and inhumane conditions that the troops served in. His camera was big and needed a horse and cart to transport it and couldn't take images of moving objects. He arrived in March 1855 which meant that he missed the most extreme part of the war for the British troops - the Russian winter of 1854 and 1855.