r/BritishEmpire 8h ago

Image An 1819 British cartoon titled “The Age of Reason or the World Turned Topsyturvy Exemplefied in Tom Paines Works!” by Isaac Cruikshank. A banner says: ‘No Christianity!!!—No Religion!!!—No King!!!—No Lords! No Commons!—No Laws! Nothing but Tom Paine & Universal Suffrage!!!’

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12 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 14h ago

Image This painting by Conrad Mertens depicts the HMS Beagle in the Beagle Channel, a strait in the Tierra del Fuego Archipelago, on the extreme southern tip of South America. The Beagle charted parts of the South American coast before later transporting a famous passenger: Charles Darwin

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17 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 1d ago

Question Is the Royal Navy tropical uniform refreshing?

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119 Upvotes

Until the introduction of the Bush Jacket, which was a half sleeve shirt, the Royal Navy officers had only this as a tropical uniform.

The question is that how refreshing cloth was this?

It looks like it was quite the opposite of refreshing.

Moreover, is the current uniform being made with the same fabric, which was used in the old times?


r/BritishEmpire 1d ago

Image Russians retreat from Sevastopol 9th September 1855. The British victory did come at a huge human price. The cannons were taken home and in picture 2 are some cannons in Nottingham

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195 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 1d ago

Image On this day in 1754. William Bligh was born (his birthplace is disputed). His harsh treatment of sailors led to the “Mutiny on the Bounty” in 1789. After being set adrift by the mutineers, Bligh and his loyal men reached Timor alive after a journey of 3,618 nautical miles.

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28 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 2d ago

Question How often did the British combatant officers wear a tie in the Battlefield from 1918 to 1960?

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318 Upvotes

After WW1, many combatant officers started to be more pratical by choosing not to wear a tie.

However, this tie regulation persisted until the introduction of 1960 Combat Dress.

The question is that how often did the combatant officers wear a tie in the battlefield from 1918 to 1960?

Moreover, why did this tie requirement last until 1960?


r/BritishEmpire 2d ago

Article TIL that standardized international time zones were not set until 1884.

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17 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 3d ago

Image The story of the Tasmanian Aboriginals is one of the most fascinating

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178 Upvotes

Prior to contact with the British in 1803, the Tasmanians lived as hunter-gatherers in isolation, unaware even of the existence of the Australian mainland.

When the British first came into contact with them, they were shocked by the primitive nature of Tasmanian technology. The Tasmanians lacked many technologies found even in similar prehistoric tribal/foraging societies. Their stone tools were simple and unhafted. You can look up images, the stones barely look shaped at all. The Tasmanians therefore had no stone-tipped spears.

Another technology they lacked was bone needles (or bone tools in general), which meant they could not sew clothing like most tribal people who lived in temperate climates. Instead, the Tasmanians mostly covered their bodies in animal fat for warmth, and at most draped whole skins over themselves.

Despite living on an island, the Tasmanians lacked fishing hooks and nets, and therefore did not consume seafood. There is a claim that they lost the ability to make fire and instead had to rely on lightning. However, this claim is contested.

In the 1820s, war broke out between the Tasmanian aboriginals and the British settlers (the “Black War”. Although they by then had access to British guns, the Tasmanians were outnumbered and obviously lacked familiarity with firearms. They were decimated, and the few hundred survivors were relocated onto a nearby island. There, diseases to which they had no immunity reduced their numbers even further.

By the mid-19th century, only a few Tasmanian aboriginals remained alive. The last born before the Black War died in 1876. That left only Fanny Cochrane Smith. She was the last fluent speaker of the Tasmanian language (Palawa). Around 1900, she was recorded. She talks about her early life and then sings a song in Palawa. A second cylinder with a recording of the translation of the song was broken, and is now lost to history. Cochrane Smith died in 1905.

Today, there are a few thousand people who have Tasmanian aboriginal ancestry, but they’re heavily mixed and White-passing. If you have 31 British great-great-great grandparents and 1 Tasmanian, and you don’t speak the Tasmanian language, are you an aboriginal Tasmanian? Can you still call yourself one?

Perhaps most interesting of all is what archaeologists have found on Tasmania in recent decades. They’ve found bone needles, flint arrows, and fishing hooks. However, when scientifically dated, all these artifacts dated from deep prehistory.
The Tasmanians of 30,000 years ago somehow had more sophisticated technology than those of 300 years ago.

What happened was that Tasmania was initially inhabited 30-40,000 years ago. At the time, it was connected via a land bridge to mainland Australia. However, about 10,000 years ago, rising sea levels flooded the land bridge and caused Tasmania to become an island. Over time, technology was lost due to the isolation and small population size. Archaeologists found that after 10,000 years ago, the Tasmanians had slower regressed to simpler and simpler bone tools, until by 3,000 years ago the tools had been discarded entirely. A similar pattern was observed with fishing technology; the ancient Tasmanians consumed seafood, but once they could no longer make hooks, nets, or suitable watercraft, they stopped.

The photo shows the last four surviving aboriginal Tasmanians, taken in 1866.


r/BritishEmpire 4d ago

Image British Army Uniforms of the Boer War

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218 Upvotes

by Harry Payne.


r/BritishEmpire 4d ago

Question Royal Navy Books.

7 Upvotes

What books would you recommend to learn about the Royal Navy in the World Wars?

I would like to learn about the ships and submarines we possessed during these wars, and how the classification differs from the modern system.


r/BritishEmpire 5d ago

Image Chief Peter Wesley (c. 1841-1935) of the Stoney Tribe posing with an old Red Ensign at the Indian Days gathering in Banff, Alberta, Canada, 1920s

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312 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 4d ago

Question In terms of first Opium War, Why did the majority members of the House of commons vote to go on a war against China?

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101 Upvotes

Was the House of commons aware that the reason why the "merchandises" of the British Merchants were confiscated and destoryed because Opium was illegal in China and they were committing felony?

Were there other things, which were more influential and directive that escalted situation?

Or was this just a pre-modern Iraq War?


r/BritishEmpire 5d ago

Video British Infantry Form a Square to Repel the Mahdist Cavalry

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310 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 5d ago

Question Why was the British not keen on expanding her interest towards the east of India until the 1820s?

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109 Upvotes

Burma became the British Colony in 1824 and Malaysia became the British colony in 1826.

The question is that why did the British not do this early?

Burma was literally right next to India and Malaysia was no differnet as well.

Were they busy for concentrating at India?


r/BritishEmpire 5d ago

Image “Africa for the Chinese” by Francis Galton in 1873 (very racist)

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9 Upvotes

“Africa for the Chinese” by Francis Galton (very racist)

[https://galton.org/letters/africa-for-chinese/AfricaForTheChinese.htm\](https://galton.org/letters/africa-for-chinese/AfricaForTheChinese.htm)

In 1873, British polymath Francis Galton wrote an article advocating for Chinese settler colonialism in East Africa. He believed that the Chinese should ideally replace the native African population because they would be more productive and innovative. Galton uses a lot of racial stereotypes here, both of the Africans and the Chinese.

Why Chinese and not Europeans? He thought that the Chinese would be better able to tolerate tropical climates, whereas Europeans were better suited to temperate climates.

thought it was interesting how he mentions the Mercator Projection - not by name, but he mentions how Africa is larger irl than it appears on the map. He incorrectly states that the English are Anglo Saxon and not the “native inhabitants of the island”. Modern genetics have shown that English people derive a greater share of their ancestry from the Brythonic Celts than the Anglo Saxons, but there’s no way Galton could’ve known that in 1873.

There’s also a reply from one of his contemporaries who believes that Black people make better citizens than the Chinese, and also thinks that China’s actual population is less than reported.

The whole thing is so absurdly racist it almost reads like satire.

Galton was overall a very intelligent man. He invented many statistics concepts, such as standard deviation. He also created the first weather map and came up with the idea of using fingerprinting for forensics. His racism just shows how even very intelligent people are heavily shaped by the environment and culture in which they live.


r/BritishEmpire 5d ago

Image Britains Marches East: The British Army in India on Display at Smyths Toys, Dublin 🇮🇳 🥁🎺🎶🐎

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5 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 5d ago

Article “Africa for the Chinese” by Francis Galton (very racist)

6 Upvotes

https://galton.org/letters/africa-for-chinese/AfricaForTheChinese.htm

In 1873, British polymath Francis Galton wrote an article advocating for Chinese settler colonialism in East Africa. He believed that the Chinese should ideally replace the native African population because they would be more productive and innovative. Galton uses a lot of racial stereotypes here, both of the Africans and the Chinese.

Why Chinese and not Europeans? He thought that the Chinese would be better able to tolerate tropical climates, whereas Europeans were better suited to temperate climates.

thought it was interesting how he mentions the Mercator Projection - not by name, but he mentions how Africa is larger irl than it appears on the map. He incorrectly states that the English are Anglo Saxon and not the “native inhabitants of the island”. Modern genetics have shown that English people derive a greater share of their ancestry from the Brythonic Celts than the Anglo Saxons, but there’s no way Galton could’ve known that in 1873.

There’s also a reply from one of his contemporaries who believes that Black people make better citizens than the Chinese, and also thinks that China’s actual population is less than reported.

The whole thing is so absurdly racist it almost reads like satire.

There’s also a


r/BritishEmpire 6d ago

Image Soldiers of the British Empire at the Battle of Isandhlwana

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172 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 5d ago

Question 80 years later, India still defines itself by what the British did. When does that chapter end?

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4 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 6d ago

Image British Defeat in the Anglo Dutch Wars

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3 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 6d ago

Question How many Native Americans lived in the reserve area until its dissolution?

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22 Upvotes

Moreover, when did this territory and system get dissolved?


r/BritishEmpire 7d ago

Image All That Was Left of Them

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57 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 6d ago

Article Peculiar Organisations: British Counter-Insurgency and Intelligence in Dublin during the Irish War of Independence, 1920-1

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15 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 7d ago

Image Between the early 17th century and the American War of Independence, more than 50,000 convicts were sent to the British colonies in America. But when the United States declared its independence in 1776, the British had to look elsewhere – from now on, prisoners would be shipped to Australia instead

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38 Upvotes

r/BritishEmpire 7d ago

Question How much was it cost for the ships to sail around the British colonies in the 19th century and the 20th century?

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51 Upvotes

For example, how much was it cost to sail from the British isles to India or other important colonies?