Restaging Mafeking in Muswell Hill: performing patriotism and charitability in London's Boer War carnivals*

Georgiou, Dion

doi:10.1111/1468-2281.12248

“…The Anglo-South African War was the most large-scale, industrialised effort the British world had seen, and as Dion Georgiou argues, the British discourse was often centred on the 'dehumanising of a white enemy previously reserved for non-white natives.' 167 Robley's image of Kruger seemed to encapsulate this notion, but it also appears to reference the prominent place that Tāwhiao held in the imagination of Maoriland. Particularly because Tāwhiao had travelled to Auckland in 1882 after the opening of the King Country and to London in 1884 where he was constantly stalked by metropolitan journalists.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…168 The war had, in 1900, inspired a flurry of carnivals and events around London in order to raise funds for families of deceased combatants. 169 One of these events was London's 'National Bazaar' held at Kensington Palace in July 1900, where those representing the different colonies within the empire put up stalls to sell themed goods. 170 Robley, who along with a few of the diplomats' wives, was involved in setting up the New Zealand stall and had contributed a 'large portrait' version of his Kruger-Tāwhiao sketch to be sold alongside 'Maori dolls and greenstone ornaments'.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Memory and Forgetting in the Nascent New Zealand Histories of James Cowan, Edith Statham and Horatio Gordon Robley

Whiting¹

0

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This thesis examines the nascent, early twentieth-century New Zealand histories created by James Cowan (1870-1943), Edith Statham (1853-1951), and Horatio Gordon Robley (1840-1930). It asks how their histories of the colonial past were shaped by their own experiences and by the contexts of the period c.1863-1940. In the early twentieth-century Cowan was a journalist, best known for his publication The New Zealand Wars (1922-23). Statham was an active volunteer in the Victoria League and then a government employee, dedicated to the work of refurbishing old soldier graves. Robley was a veteran of the New Zealand Wars residing in London, known for his ethnographic collecting, publications and artwork. This thesis considers how their work converged in efforts to preserve and narrate New Zealand’s colonial history. The discussion charts the lives and careers of these three history-makers through their publications, correspondence, manuscripts, reports and newspaper reports. It begins by situating each of the history-makers within the colonial era, considering their proximity to the events they would come to memorialise. The discussion then traces the three history-makers as they stepped into the new century, their work sitting within the tensions of belonging in New Zealand at this time. What they conveyed was both a sense of a belonging to a particular geographical and cultural locale, along with a strong allegiance to empire in wake of the Anglo-South African War and the death of Queen Victoria. The discussion then considers the era when all three focused in on the conflicts of the colonial period, beginning with Statham’s soldier grave work from 1910 and ending with Cowan’s publication of The New Zealand Wars in 1923. Funding this converging work was the New Zealand government. Preserving and narrating the history had gained public and political support, partly due to the sense of urgency that the generation who had fought in the wars was fast disappearing. The degree to which this historical work was considered valuable was underscored by both government funding and public interest at the same time as the country was facing a costly and confronting world war. The discussion then traverses their attempts to continue their historical work after 1923 and in the lead up to the 1940 centenary celebrations, a period when new forms of cultural belonging and modern scholarship moved away from those that had emboldened the work of Cowan, Statham and Robley decades earlier. The nascent histories of Cowan, Statham and Robley represent a powerful and perplexing moment in the formation of New Zealand. They each narrated histories and public memories of and for ‘New Zealand’ in a particular context, one marked by both an intense attention to the local and a powerful imperial loyalty. Statham, having pursued a sense of progressive female citizenship in Dunedin, took up the commemoration of men who had died for empire as an extension of her public work. In doing so, Statham embodied the dichotomy of belonging in New Zealand. Cowan’s candidacy for writing an official New Zealand War history was due to his proximity to those informants who were still alive at the end of the Great War. Cowan hoped to cultivate a habit of remembering actors and events of New Zealand’s colonial past, but by rendering past conflict as resolved in the present, he only enabled the lapse into forgetting thereafter. Despite his London locale, Robley was intimately tied to New Zealand activities and aspirations over a span of 30 years. Robley was both an actor in the colonial past and a creator of its historical renderings, demonstrating that these nascent New Zealand histories were not just produced in New Zealand.

show abstract

“…The Anglo-South African War was the most large-scale, industrialised effort the British world had seen, and as Dion Georgiou argues, the British discourse was often centred on the 'dehumanising of a white enemy previously reserved for non-white natives.' 167 Robley's image of Kruger seemed to encapsulate this notion, but it also appears to reference the prominent place that Tāwhiao held in the imagination of Maoriland. Particularly because Tāwhiao had travelled to Auckland in 1882 after the opening of the King Country and to London in 1884 where he was constantly stalked by metropolitan journalists.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…168 The war had, in 1900, inspired a flurry of carnivals and events around London in order to raise funds for families of deceased combatants. 169 One of these events was London's 'National Bazaar' held at Kensington Palace in July 1900, where those representing the different colonies within the empire put up stalls to sell themed goods. 170 Robley, who along with a few of the diplomats' wives, was involved in setting up the New Zealand stall and had contributed a 'large portrait' version of his Kruger-Tāwhiao sketch to be sold alongside 'Maori dolls and greenstone ornaments'.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Memory and Forgetting in the Nascent New Zealand Histories of James Cowan, Edith Statham and Horatio Gordon Robley

Whiting¹

0

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This thesis examines the nascent, early twentieth-century New Zealand histories created by James Cowan (1870-1943), Edith Statham (1853-1951), and Horatio Gordon Robley (1840-1930). It asks how their histories of the colonial past were shaped by their own experiences and by the contexts of the period c.1863-1940. In the early twentieth-century Cowan was a journalist, best known for his publication The New Zealand Wars (1922-23). Statham was an active volunteer in the Victoria League and then a government employee, dedicated to the work of refurbishing old soldier graves. Robley was a veteran of the New Zealand Wars residing in London, known for his ethnographic collecting, publications and artwork. This thesis considers how their work converged in efforts to preserve and narrate New Zealand’s colonial history. The discussion charts the lives and careers of these three history-makers through their publications, correspondence, manuscripts, reports and newspaper reports. It begins by situating each of the history-makers within the colonial era, considering their proximity to the events they would come to memorialise. The discussion then traces the three history-makers as they stepped into the new century, their work sitting within the tensions of belonging in New Zealand at this time. What they conveyed was both a sense of a belonging to a particular geographical and cultural locale, along with a strong allegiance to empire in wake of the Anglo-South African War and the death of Queen Victoria. The discussion then considers the era when all three focused in on the conflicts of the colonial period, beginning with Statham’s soldier grave work from 1910 and ending with Cowan’s publication of The New Zealand Wars in 1923. Funding this converging work was the New Zealand government. Preserving and narrating the history had gained public and political support, partly due to the sense of urgency that the generation who had fought in the wars was fast disappearing. The degree to which this historical work was considered valuable was underscored by both government funding and public interest at the same time as the country was facing a costly and confronting world war. The discussion then traverses their attempts to continue their historical work after 1923 and in the lead up to the 1940 centenary celebrations, a period when new forms of cultural belonging and modern scholarship moved away from those that had emboldened the work of Cowan, Statham and Robley decades earlier. The nascent histories of Cowan, Statham and Robley represent a powerful and perplexing moment in the formation of New Zealand. They each narrated histories and public memories of and for ‘New Zealand’ in a particular context, one marked by both an intense attention to the local and a powerful imperial loyalty. Statham, having pursued a sense of progressive female citizenship in Dunedin, took up the commemoration of men who had died for empire as an extension of her public work. In doing so, Statham embodied the dichotomy of belonging in New Zealand. Cowan’s candidacy for writing an official New Zealand War history was due to his proximity to those informants who were still alive at the end of the Great War. Cowan hoped to cultivate a habit of remembering actors and events of New Zealand’s colonial past, but by rendering past conflict as resolved in the present, he only enabled the lapse into forgetting thereafter. Despite his London locale, Robley was intimately tied to New Zealand activities and aspirations over a span of 30 years. Robley was both an actor in the colonial past and a creator of its historical renderings, demonstrating that these nascent New Zealand histories were not just produced in New Zealand.

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List of publications on the economic and social history of Great Britain and Ireland published in 2018

Hale¹,

Raymond²,

Wright³

2019

The Economic History Review

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Restaging Mafeking in Muswell Hill: performing patriotism and charitability in London's Boer War carnivals*

Cited by 3 publications

References 21 publications

Memory and Forgetting in the Nascent New Zealand Histories of James Cowan, Edith Statham and Horatio Gordon Robley

Memory and Forgetting in the Nascent New Zealand Histories of James Cowan, Edith Statham and Horatio Gordon Robley

Memory and Forgetting in the Nascent New Zealand Histories of James Cowan, Edith Statham and Horatio Gordon Robley

List of publications on the economic and social history of Great Britain and Ireland published in 2018

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