Africa

Madagascar: The Great Island

Reputed to be a place of enormous wealth and during the seventeenth century known as “the golden isle”, Madagascar, before it achieved its independence, was long the subject of contention between French and British empire-builders.

Trek and Counter-Trek in South Africa

The inward movement of European peoples and the southward migration of Bantu tribes supply the key to South African history and, write Edna and Frank Bradlow, to the problems that confront the country today.

The Disaster at Majuba, 1881

The Battle of Majuba Hill during the First Boer War, had immense political and military significance to British armsand not only in South Africa. Its chief cause, writes Brian Bond, was a gross underestimation of the Boer’s tactical aptitude and courage.

Stanley’s Second African Journey

On November 17th, 1874, when Henry Morton Stanley marched away from Bagamoyo on what was to be his greatest exploring achievement, he was retracing his own steps of 1871 along the well-worn caravan route used by Burton and Speke in 1857; by Speke and Grant in 1860, and, writes C.E. Hamshere, many Arab traders before them.

Jacobins in Africa

The traditions of organized statehood in the countries of French West Africa stretch back for some fifteen centuries. During the past sixty years, writes Basil Davidson, French influence has greatly strengthened the feeling of federal community that inspires many of the newly evolving republics of the Western Sudan and the Guinea coast.

The Siege of Mafeking

“A game of bluff from start to finish,” said Robert Baden-Powell, British commander during the Second Boer War. Nicholas King describes the seven-months’ siege, that took place in present day South Africa.

An African Holocaust: Rwanda, 1994

In Rwanda, Hutu turned on Tutsi and a genocide lasting 100 days began, an episode of intense violence many thought impossible in the late 20th century.