The British in India and Native Soldiers – Image of the week

Our image of the week shows an impact of British colonial rule in India, the use of Indian soldiers as British forces.

The British ran India – or at least parts of it – for hundreds of years. This led to a number of, shall we say, interesting outcomes. From bizarre social customs to ‘White Mughals’, there were a number of fascinating results.

Another of these interesting outcomes is shown below in our image of the week.

The image shows us a group of redcoats, British soldiers, but with a twist. Rather than coming from Britain, these soldiers were Indian. Known as sepoys these troops were very important to British rule in India. Indeed, without them it would have been nearly impossible to run a country the size - and with the population - of India.

In the painting we can see troops in a variety of different-colored clothing, turbans, flags in their hands, and a variety of facial hair! Behind them are troops high-up on camels. A fascinating scene.

You can find more about the British in India in the new issue of History Is Now Magazine. The magazine is free now for one month or more on both Android and the iOS store.

Click here for more details: Android | Apple iOS

Image source

http://history1800s.about.com

How the Other Half Lived: Rich and Poor Women in Victorian Britain

In her latest article, Georgie Broad reflects on the life of women in Victorian Britain. She does so by contrasting the lives of rich and poor – and then showing just what these two very different groups had in common.

Few eras in history can evoke such ideas of contrast between the lives of different people as that of the Victorian era of 1837-1901 in Britain. The reign of Queen Victoria brought with it an age of prosperity and national pride in Britain, and is often considered one of the most important and influential times in the country’s history.

As easy as it is to romanticize this period, especially given the push toward arts, a more gentile and sentimentalized way of life, and the stirrings of a more liberal type of politics, we must also remember the vast divides in lifestyle, and gender and class equality. This can be seen in the rigid class division of the time. Four main classes existed: the nobility and gentry at the top of the ladder, trailed by the middle class (often these two are combined to cover the “upper class” in general), and then the “upper” working class, swiftly followed by the poorest of the poor, the “lower” working class (again, these latter two are often combined to form the “lower class” as a whole).

The best way to not only explain and investigate class differences, but to highlight just how vast the problems of inequality and division were at the time, is to consider rich and poor in turn. There was the rich lady, who led the nostalgically stylized view of Victorian life – all bustles, petticoats and jewels, and conversely there was the somewhat less rosy existence of the poor woman; a life of chimney sweeping, workhouses, and prostitution.

PART I: THE RICH

Victorian England was a man’s world. More specifically, it was a rich, upper-class, man’s world, and even better if you had land, a large house, a title, and a doting wife. Women of this class enjoyed a life full of all the things money could buy; travel, fine clothes, good food and of course, servants and staff to do chores for them. 

The Victorian upper-classes in their fine clothes.

Their allotted goal in life was to marry, have children and raise them in an appropriate and respectful manner. This in itself was seen to be sufficient fulfillment for an upper class woman and the role of devoted wife and mother was highly idealized in Victorian Britain. The perfect role model for the domesticity expected of upper, and especially middle class women, was that of Victoria herself, who doted upon her husband and children, and after Albert’s death remained loyal, modest and demure – engrossing herself in her regal affairs.

Unlike their lower class counterparts, upper class Victorian women more often than not had staff to help with the running of their home and the raising of their children, leaving them with plenty of time to enjoy the finer things in life. Dancing and grand social parties were commonplace in the lives of wealthy Victorian women, and offered them a chance to mingle with other women of similar backgrounds and to show off their fineries. However, in doing so, the ladies had to remember to adhere to certain unspoken rules of etiquette, lest they come across as vulgar and gain an unsavory reputation among the other members of the elite. The rules ranged from what kind of jewelry to wear, to where and with whom they were allowed to walk.

Aside from the work (or lack thereof) that upper class Victorian women did, the most interesting and noticeable way to distinguish between rich and poor women was clothing. The images we have today of Victorian women, clad in fine fabrics, grand dresses, bonnets and petticoats, are the clothes of the upper classes. They would be expensive, exotic and made to impress – but also came imbued with many subtle reminders of the upper class woman’s place. It was at this time in the 19th century that women’s clothes in the upper echelons of society came to be more sexualized. Women’s clothing accentuated and exaggerated the hips, breasts and derriere not only to make the wearer seem more attractive, but to separate these wealthy ladies from the world of work. Obviously, it would be beyond impractical to be in a workhouse or cleaning in a heavy and corseted dress, and so in wearing such clothes, the rich were making a subtle but definitive statement: no manual labor for us. Instead, the garments were designed beautifully so that women may resemble and compliment the décor of their lavish home, where they could look after their family and entertain, minus the strains and stresses of working and getting messy.

PART II: THE POOR

So, although the upper class life seemed pretty settled, they weren’t as secure as they may have appeared, as many of the middle class women risked slipping into the “upper” sector of the lower class through the death of a father or husband. As was and is often the case in noble families, inheritance would go to the eldest male child or next-of-kin, so many women were often left by the wayside, without money or a home. These women would be employed in jobs that required skills, often ones that had been acquired during their time in the upper and middle classes, such as teachers and governesses. Some even worked in shops or as bookkeepers. They had a comfortable life, not being exactly poor, with steady jobs and no manual labor involved; however it was a far cry from their previous lives of leisure, and an even further cry from the lives of the lowest class of Victorian women; those of the “lower” working class. 

Women working in the 'wash-house at the Brixton prison.'

t was the “lower” working class that we generally associate with the “other end of the spectrum” that we contrast with the lavish lifestyle of the ladies of leisure. Their food was tasteless and consisted of anything that they could afford, their clothes were vastly different from the luxurious outfits of the upper class women – consisting of rag and cheap cloth, and their homes would be cold, dank and dark. These women were usually single, and relied only upon themselves for support, often working among men of the same class in workhouses. Life in the workhouses was arduous and dangerous, but as long as the women were pronounced as “able bodied” they had to work, not only because of the legal requirement to do so, but to scrape together any money they could.

Another trade which lower class women could turn their hand to was that of domestic service. Although it was not as physically draining as factory work, it had its own difficulties. Catering for the demanding upper class ladies all day and cleaning up after their families seven days a week, for at least twelve hours a day, was in itself a monumental task, especially when if anything were to go wrong in the family it would be the servants who were to get the blame.

One of the less grim work options for women of this class was to turn to prostitution. Prostitution in Victorian Britain was a prevalent and often well earning business, with streets and streets dedicated to its work. Many girls turned to prostitution, viewing it as a means to an end - a way to build up capital so that they may invest in a business or live a more comfortable life. However, many of these young women had their lives cut tragically short by untreated sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), which of course they passed on to a great many of their customers who could also fall victim to the more fatal side of the trade.

NOT SO DIFFERENT

Although women in the upper and lower classes had many differences, they also had some similarities. Women in the Victorian era were very much seen as second best to men, as a trophy, a wife and a mother, and were expected to be content with this role in society. It was toward the end of the Victorian era that the women’s suffrage movement began in the United Kingdom. Women of every class came together to stand against the injustice and inequality of the voting system and to lobby for their right to vote.

So despite the vast differences between the women in this era, their similarities encouraged a change that shaped the history of Britain. Between the idealized view of Victorian life demonstrated by upper class women and the less desirable lifestyle of poorer women, we can learn a lot about the society of Victorian Britain, and begin to sense the stirrings of one of the most important and dramatic social changes in history.

Now, listen to our new podcast about a dark crime in Victorian London. Click here.

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References

Images

• http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6fgaguD08Jg/TV8-JCZxhbI/AAAAAAAAAo0/kHfS_ga-0rI/s1600/Victorian_fashions.jpg
• http://waywardwomen.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/brixton-prison.gif

Text sources

• www.newsteg.com/index.php/females-in-victorian-era
• www.bl.uk/learning/hiscitizen/victorians/peor/workingclass.htm
• kspot.org/holmes/kelsey.htm
• www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/sociology/staff/academicstaff/jonesc/jonesc_index/teaching/birth/uk11_victorian_britain_handout.pdf 

The legend of Giuseppe Garibaldi – A hero for all ages?

In this article, Helen Saker-Parsons considers the enduring legacy of Giuseppe Garibaldi, one of the founders of modern-day Italy. In his own lifetime he led armies and had numerous relationships. He was also adored by the great men of his age – and later ages. 

What makes a person more important, the legacy they leave or the reputation they hold whilst alive? For Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807 -1882), one of Italy’s founding fathers, his popularity since his death is only matched by the accolades he received when alive. At the time many women sought locks of his hair, some left their husbands and a few aristocratic ladies risked their reputations for him. American generals wanted him on their side in the US Civil War; Russian peasants carried his icon; Balkan revolutionaries waited for him to lead them and an Anglo-French dispute erupted when a bullet went missing in his ankle. In Italy there are streets, piazzas and buildings that bear his name. In England he was the inspiration for a football (soccer) kit, and more significantly, for a biscuit. So why is the ‘French’ mercenary soldier heralded as an Italian and international hero?

Giuseppe Garibaldi by Gerolamo Induno

Garibaldi was born in Nice in 1807, a town that vacillated between France and Italy throughout his life. He started his career as a merchant seaman and his travels brought him into contact with Giuseppe Mazzini’s Young Italy movement, la Giovine Italia – whose main aim was to bring about the Risorgimento or creation of a united Italian republic. It was his role in the failed Mazzini insurrection in Genoa in 1834 that forced his exile to South America and was to shape the person that became the legend. For twelve years Garibaldi combined sea-faring with guerrilla warfare in South America, fighting for the independence of southern Brazil and Uruguay. He discovered an aptitude for military leadership and a fascination for the gaucho traditions of his new home: adopting their fashions of red shirts and ponchos. When the Revolutions of 1848 broke out across Europe, he returned to Italy and led a heroic defense of the Republic of Rome against French and Papal forces. This brave but ultimately disastrous attempt won him fame and fans – both of which increased further after his conquest of Sicily in 1860. The world spoke of the charismatic commander who led an army of volunteers known as “The Thousand.” This army adorned red shirts like the gauchos and lassoed stray animals, but also vanquished a large professional army, swept across southern Italy and entered Naples in triumph - all within four months. Popular support for Garibaldi in Europe and the Americas reached near-hysterical proportions.

SPORT AND BISCUITS

When exiled to America, in the early 1850s, Garibaldi’s host in Staten Island was Antonio Meucci, the man often accredited with inventing the first telephone but now also renowned for having employed Garibaldi in his candle factory. Garibaldi’s reputation stretched further in the Americas; US President Abraham Lincoln even offered him the role of Major General in the US Army. But Britain was not to be outdone in its adulation. Having no Civil War to fight it honored the hero in other ways. In 1864 ‘Garibaldimania’ swept through England as Garibaldi paid a visit. After alighting from his train in London the newspapers reported it took him six hours to travel three miles through the crowds. Potteries in Staffordshire released popular figurines of him. Nottingham Forest football club, founded in 1865, designed their red kit in honor of him. But arguably more impressive was the honor bestowed by a Bermondsey factory, Peek Freans, which in 1861 gave their new biscuit his name - although the reasons why are disputed. In 1854, when visiting Tynemouth, Garibaldi allegedly sat on an Eccles Cake and flattened it, thus producing the familiar looking snack. Others claim that it was so-called because it had the appearance of the raison bread served to his troops, or more grotesquely that it resembled bread and berries soaked in horse’s blood which the redshirts were given and which attracted the flies.

Garibaldi’s international reputation was not merely on the political stage; it was also on the personal one. He proved a hit amongst the world’s women, as they adorned red dresses and blouses in honor of the Garibaldini. He showed a certain penchant for younger ladies and was already in his thirties when he acquired his first wife, a married Brazilian teenager: Anna Maria Reveira da Silva (known as Anita). Anita had been forced to marry a local shoemaker at fifteen, but he left her for army service. Whilst still only eighteen in 1839, she had been standing on a hill when Garibaldi’s ship sailed into port. He had spotted her through his telescope and on disembarkation made it his mission to find the woman who had entranced him so. He succeeded and she immediately fell for his charms, left with him, gave him a child, and eventually became his wife three years later, once widowed. She travelled to Europe to fight alongside her hero husband and bear him several more children. But in 1849, when fleeing Rome and heavily pregnant, she succumbed to malaria and died.

ADORED BY WOMEN AND INTELLECTUALS

Garibaldi’s love-life throughout the 1850s was less committed with several alleged engagements, at least one illegitimate child, and a marriage which lasted a day. His lovers were varied. They included the Englishwomen Emma Roberts and Jesse White, an Italian countess called Maria della Torre (the rebellious daughter of the Count of Salasco), and a divorced German baroness - Esperanza von Schwartz (who refused his proposal in 1857). He completed the decade through a dalliance with the housekeeper from Caprera (the island he bought in 1854 with money earned in America), Battistina Ravello, with whom he had a daughter in 1859. He began the next decade with his second marriage to Guisippina Raimondi, but he left her the following day having heard rumors she had spent the night before with another man and/or was five months pregnant with his child. Garibaldi was able to continue his merry-making simultaneously with his political campaigning. In 1879 he combined a trip to Rome to organize parliamentary opposition with having his 20 year marriage annulled so he could marry for a third time. Francesca Armasino had already borne him several children, and continued his preference for younger woman. She had arrived on Caprera in 1867, aged nineteen, as a nurse to Garibaldi’s grandchildren.

Garibaldi was a charismatic man with many honorable policies. He aroused the admiration of contemporary intellectuals such as Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas, as well as subsequent ones: the historian AJP Taylor describes him as the ‘only wholly admirable figure in history.’ He had seen for himself the hard democracy of the pampas, where all men were treated as equals. He was a republican foremost, but somebody who accepted the role of the monarchy as a means to an end. He called for the legal and political emancipation of women, racial equality, and the abolition of capital punishment. He was a tireless combatant against the clerical power of the Catholic Church, which he saw as the bastardization of religion, and instead adhered to the beliefs of St. Simonianism whose creed was: "from each according to his capacity: to each according to his works; the end of the exploitation of man by man; and the abolition of all privileges of birth.” Indeed, in 1861 he refused Abraham Lincoln’s requests to join his army when Lincoln would not make the abolition of slavery one of his war aims.

CREATING A NATION

Flattery and public adulation, however, never deflected Garibaldi from his chief objective, which was to free Italy from foreign oppression and bring about its unification. He had moved some way from the ideals of la Giovine Italia, believing that unification under the Piedmontese monarch was more viable than a republic. These aims were partly fulfilled in 1860 with the annexation of southern Italy to the Kingdom of Piedmont and the creation of the Kingdom of Italy, but neither Venice nor Rome and the Papal States formed part of the new political entity. Garibaldi was determined that Rome, the symbol of a united Italy, should be at the heart of the Kingdom of Italy. Although the Italian government was reluctant to launch a military campaign against the Pope, Garibaldi resolved to take matters into his own hands - with the aid of three thousand Garibaldini. Thus in August 1862 a sea of red marched on Rome in open defiance of Victor Emanuel II to whom he had previously pledged loyalty. Fearing international reactions, the Italian government hastily dispatched troops to stop his advance. The two armies came face to face on the mountain of Aspromonte in Calabria on August 29, 1862. When the regular troops opened fire, Garibaldi could not bring himself to shoot at fellow Italians and ordered a cease-fire. During the confusion he received three gunshot wounds, one of which entered his right ankle. Briefly imprisoned for treason in Spezia, Garibaldi continued to inspire support and sympathy from all quarters: Lady Palmerston sent him an invalid bed in which to recuperate. Without the benefit of x-rays, visiting physicians were unable to conclude whether the bullet remained in the ankle and it brought eminent experts from France and England in to dispute. Eventually the French won by inventing a porcelain-tipped probe that stained with the presence of lead and proved the existence of the bullet.

But the French were not to win against the Prussians in the war of 1870-71, and Italy took advantage of the French defeat to finally expel the last of the French troops from its land and achieve its Risorgimento in 1871. The ultimate success might have owed more to the pragmatic politician Camillo di Cavour than Garibaldi, but it is the latter who remains the resonating romantic hero. Garibaldi was a visionary; many of his ideals became reality. Italy has remained unified despite some toing and froing of territory during the two world wars and in spite of examples of extreme regional rivalries (especially over who has the best cuisine!). But another of Garibaldi’s dreams has also been theoretically realized – that of a unified Europe. He also believed that this would best be led by Germany. And so Garibaldi could add ‘visionary’ to his long list of admirable qualities. And if he were alive today, of which long-lasting legacy would he be most proud? I think he would be impressed with the achievements of the European community and Italy’s role within it. Europe as a united, peace-making body has progressed with the times in the post-war era; unfortunately the same cannot be said for the lowly ranked Nottingham Forest!

Helen Saker-Parsons is the author of a book about an Allied soldier who is captured and held prisoner in Italy during World War II. The fascinating book, A Captive Life, is available here: Amazon US | Amazon UK

Helen has also written a historical fiction book related to World War I, Searching for Cecil. It is available here: Amazon US | Amazon UK

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Charles Dickens & Poverty – And what he might think of Britain today

In this article, Jennifer Johnstone looks at what Charles Dickens thought about poverty in 19th century Britain. And considers what Dickens may think about modern-day attempts to reduce the size of the British Welfare State.

No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another.

- Charles Dickens

By observing Charles Dickens’ work, what is clear is that poverty is a major theme. Dickens was an outspoken social critic in general, but especially about poverty. Before the birth of Britain’s Welfare State, which aims to support the poor, Dickens sought to help the poor by highlighting the social inequality in his country. In this respect, Charles Dickens was a man ahead of his time. The British Welfare State was founded in 1945, with the aim of providing people with a safety net ‘from cradle to grave.’ Dickens identified the reality of poverty many years before that. He acknowledged that poverty was not the fault of the people who endured it, but rather, the fault of the establishment, including the government. Indeed, I daresay that he would be of the same view today – that poverty is the fault of the government.

Mr Bumble, the beadle from the workhouse, leading Oliver Twist. The painting is based on the book Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens.

How would Charles Dickens view modern poverty?

The short answer is: he would have had as much contempt for the way society treats the poor today as he did when he was alive. With modern Britain vilifying the poor, or those on benefits, Dickens would have seen this as an attack on the poor; instead of society trying to eradicate poverty, society is blaming the poor for something that is outside of their control. Victorian Britain condemned ‘idleness.’  This Victorian attitude is something that we see creeping back into modern society. Since Margaret Thatcher came to power in 1979, Britain has been slowly eradicating its Welfare State. This weakening of the Welfare State is essentially attacking the poor, because, the poor rely on the Welfare State, whether they are the working poor, or the unemployed poor.

Dickens would have seen this as classism. And condemned it as such. He quite clearly condemns classism in Oliver Twist, and A Christmas Carol. Dickens, in both these works, portrays the rich as greedy, and as people who are unsympathetic to the poor.

The Poor Law

Dickens condemned ‘The Poor Law.’ This law resulted in the middle and upper-classes paying less to support the poor. In much the same way, Dickens would have said that cutting poor people’s benefits in modern Britain, was about punishing the poor. The book A Christmas Carol comes to mind at this point; we can view Scrooge as the symbol of taking more and more from the poor. We can see similarities with the Poor Law, and cuts to unemployment benefits today.

But, was Dickens right, was the Poor Law an attack on those who were poor? I think the answer is yes. The first reason is that The Poor Law attacked the impoverished, and meant that the richest contributed less. The second reason why the Poor Law attacked the poorest was because it forced people into the horrible workhouses. Workhouses were deliberately cruel. Usually one would only enter a workhouse as a last resort; they were internationally hard places to live in, forcing people into work in harsh conditions, even children. Not only that, but, as we see in Oliver Twist, people were not given an adequate living area, and nor were they fed well. Proper nutrition was absent within workhouses, except for the rich who worked in them.

Within the workhouses, people were essentially treated like prisoners; not human beings who were just unlucky enough to be born into poverty. The only seeming difference with workhouses and prisons was that the door was always open with workhouses. But, in reality, people did not have the choice to leave as they had no means to support themselves.

Oliver Twist

Dickens novel Oliver Twist is about an orphan boy. In the novel, Oliver is born within a poorhouse, but his mother dies. Later Oliver is sent to an ‘infant farm.’ Finally escaping the poorhouse, Oliver is sent spinning into the dark underworld of London, working for a gang of thieves led by Fagan and the Artful Dodger, Bill Sykes and Nancy. The reader sees through Nancy’s character, that those who are forced into this criminal underworld (in Nancy’s case - prostitution), are forced into poverty because of the problems in the system. Not only does it destroy their lives, but it also has a negative impact on society at large. We often see Nancy as a sympathetic character, one who tries to get Oliver out of this life of crime. It is interesting that Dickens uses Nancy’s character, as a symbol of domestic abuse. Not only does Nancy represent domestic abuse, but she also seems to be symbolic of the Victorian’s beating down on those who were sympathetic to the poor. It also seems like an indirect criticism from Charles Dickens to the state for having such an attitude.

In Conclusion

Dickens was a writer who often injected his work with realism and social criticism. His work may have included ghosts or time travel (A Christmas Carol), but Dickens work was more about reality than fantasy. And that is what makes Dickens’ novels so memorable; we are being educated about Victorian Britain, but in a way that is engaging to the reader. At the very heart of Dickens’ writing is a very serious message: the tragedy of inequality, poverty, and deprivation. In the second part of my analysis of Dickens, I want to turn to what can only be described as the dark side of Dickens.

Part 2 in this series will follow soon. In the meantime you can read more about crime in 19th century Britain here.

Now, if you enjoyed the article, please like it, tweet about it, or share it by clicking on one of the buttons below!

References

• http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/dickens/bleakhouse/carter.html
• http://classiclit.about.com/od/dickenscharles2/a/aa_cdickensquot.htm
• http://exec.typepad.com/greatexpectations/dickens-attitude-to-the-law.html
• http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/dickens/diniejko.html
• http://orwell.ru/library/reviews/dickens/english/e_chd
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16907648
• http://www.dickens.port.ac.uk/poverty/
• http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/dickens/bleakhouse/carter.html
• http://charlesdickenspage.com/twist.html
• http://www.theguardian.com/politics/blog/2012/jan/12/welfare-reform-charles-dickens
• Little Dorrit: http://www2.hn.psu.edu/faculty/jmanis/dickens/LittleDorrit6x9.pdf
• Olive Twist: http://www.planetebook.com/ebooks/Oliver-Twist.pdf
• A Christmas Carol: http://www.ibiblio.org/ebooks/Dickens/Carol/Dickens_Carol.pdf
• The Noble Savage: http://www.readbookonline.net/readOnLine/2529/

Body snatchers and Dickens’ London – Shocking Crime in 19th Century Britain

In this article, Kevin K. O’Neill looks at crime in early 19th century London. This was an age before the birth of the police, and in this grimly Dickensian world, crime was rife. Some of the crimes committed were simply shocking.

A street scene from 19th century London.

“Napping a Tick”, “Doing Out and Out with a Pop”, and “Teased” were but a few examples of the slang used by the denizens of London’s underworld in the early 1800s for stealing a watch, killing someone with a gun, or being hung. Before the formation of the Metropolitan Police in 1829 by Sir Robert Peel, the original “Bobbie”, London was fertile ground for crime to take root and grow. Sparsely lit by gas in only a few select areas, London was dark, in some areas even by day. With the murk of burnt sea coal hanging over the docks that were busily taking in valuable goods from every corner of the world, all manner of crime was possible, crime that was abetted by this dim anonymity. With a population of about one million inhabitants in the early 19th century, London was sharply divided by class with much of the disenfranchised lower classes active only at night. The only official watchmen, known as “Charlies” because of their creation in 1663 during the reign of Charles the Second, were armed only with a stave, lamp and rattle. Often morally and physically decrepit, they were rarely effective and often the butt of jokes. Indeed, a pastime for the drunk or bored was knocking them over in their watch-boxes.

Social Issues Grow

By the mid-18th century many factors were contributing to the need for a unified police force and social reform. One of the main influences lied in the pervasive effect of cheap gin, or “Blue Ruin”, on the lower classes of England’s populace. In some areas there were unlicensed gin shops, and the crime rate was proportionate to the density of these establishment. Some gin houses, termed “Flash Houses”, were meeting spots for criminal gangs and liaisons between underworld operatives and the greater public, including law enforcement, who would drink and gather information. In 1780, fueled in part by Blue Ruin and economic disparity, peaceful demonstrations against laws emancipating Catholics turned into what history remembers as the Gordon Riots, as part of which there was mob rule during a week long orgy of window shattering and violent assault. Much was said in Parliament after these riots, but little was done.

A scene from a slum in London.

Crime was rampant in early 19th century London, with numerous types of thievery permeating many aspects of life in London. Burglary from houses was so common that elaborate precautions had to be taken before leaving home for any amount of time longer than an hour or two. Every coachman was a guard as trunks could be cut from their vehicles in the blink of an eye. Petty thievery was a threat from many vectors such as the destitute “Mudlarks”, who wallowed in the mud of the River Thames hoping for valuable goods to be dropped from ships by chance or on purpose. Swarms of pickpockets haunted the richer areas of the city. Many of the petty thieves were children as young as ten, but arrests are known of children aged six. Beggars, often living the most pitiable existence, lined many of the same streets.

This all meant that several private law enforcement agencies were formed so that businesses and citizens could protect themselves from loss. Known for their fleetness of foot, the exploits of the Bow Street “Runners”, employees of an organization created to watch and protect property on the docks, were followed by the public with sportsman’s glee as they pursued the more successful thieves before they gained safety in the dark slums or “Rookeries.” The rookeries were notoriously dangerous areas in which nobody or nothing was safe - be it life, limb, or property.  Charles Dickens once ventured into several rookeries, including the notorious “Rat’s Castle,” as the St. Giles Rookery was known, but did so only with an escort consisting of the Chief of Scotland Yard, an assistant commissioner, three guards, probably armed, and a squad within whistling distance. Perhaps more worryingly, a bold doctor who entered a rookery commented that he couldn’t even find his patient in his room until he lit a candle, despite the time being near noon.

Resurrection Men

And on to a crime that seems almost unbelievable…

Many of us are familiar with the horror movie theme of stealthy men with slotted lanterns lurking about graveyards with spades in hand in search of a fresh grave. This theme has more basis in fact than most realize as the “Resurrection Men” performed this ghoulish task on most every moonless night to supply the British medical community with fresh cadavers for study and dissection.

The story goes that as a deterrent to crime The Murder Act of 1752 allowed judges to substitute public display of an executed criminal’s body with dissection at the hands of the medical community thus giving the Resurrection Men legal elbow-room. The activities of the doctors and body snatchers were despised by many of the general public though. And mob justice was often dealt out to Resurrection Men caught performing their grim work, while patrols were increased at the upper-class graveyards and the rich bought special coffins to ensure their undisturbed rest peacefully. Finally, the public’s unease at the practice became anger with the Burke and Hare murders of 1828 in Edinburgh.

Burke and Hare, a pair of Irish immigrant laborers turned Resurrection Men, decided to expedite matters by killing sixteen people to be sold to the proxies of an Edinburgh anatomist, a doctor named Knox. The term “burking” traces its origins to the method they used for killing - the use of a pillow to smother victims. Once caught Hare turned the evidence against Burke in court. Ultimately, only Burke was convicted; after Burke’s execution, a hanging attended by thousands, he was publicly dissected in front of students at the University of Edinburgh. Those left outside without tickets demanded to be let in, until finally being led through the operating theater in groups of 50.  Never interred, Burke’s remains were doled out for medical study, with pieces of his skin being used for books and calling card cases.

There were other co-defendants in this trial and they suffered similar fates to each other. After release from prison they were hounded by mobs at first identification. All were aided by the authorities to flee in various directions in search of security through anonymity. Never prosecuted due to his insulating layer of agents and Burke’s denial of his involvement in his confession, even Dr. Knox was vilified by the populace who hung and burnt him in effigy. It is notable that Burke asked that Dr. Knox pay five pounds owed to him for his final victim’s body so he could be hung in new clothes. Trying to address both the needs of the medical community and the moral outrage of the people, The Anatomy Act was passed in 1832.  This law ended the use of executed murderers for dissection while enabling relatives to have the ability to release bodies of the newly deceased for the good of medical progress.  For those who passed without known relatives, legal custodians such as public health authorities and parish councils were allowed the same right.

Now read on to find out about more on crimes in 19th century England, including the original Tom and Jerry, and a famous death in London. Click here.

Did you enjoy the article? If so, let the world know by clicking on one of the buttons below! Like it, tweet about it, or share it in one of hundreds of other ways!

Bibliography

The Maul and the Pear Tree, Critchley and James, 1971

Thieves’ Kitchen, Donald Low, 1982

“Freedom, Equality and Brotherhood of the People” – The Key People in the Rise of Italy

In this article, George Broad introduces us to three of the main people involved in the Risorgimento, the process of Italian Unification that led to the formation of the Italy that we know today.

“Freedom, equality and brotherhood of the people” – sound familiar? To those who know their European revolutions it will be ringing some rather large bells in the form of the French Republic’s tagline of “freedom, equality, fraternity.”

As the scent and spirit of revolution drifted through Europe in the late 18th through to the early 19th century, Italy greeted it with open arms. The states of modern day Italy were itching to break away from the bonds of foreign rule. So, inspired by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, the people of Italy sought to set in motion a process of revolution and unification to bring into being the Italy we know today.

The Risorgimento (literally translating to resurgence or rising again) took place during 19th century. The term Risorgimento is the one given to cover the period of the uprisings, revolts and warring of the people of Italy in their struggle to make their nation independent. Its exact start date is much disputed as many revolts had been occurring sporadically throughout Italy for many years. One thing we do know for sure is that without a certain few individuals, the Risorgimento could have taken a very different turn…


Giuseppe Mazzini

Giuseppe Mazzini (1805-1872) was a politician and journalist, and it was he who coined the aforementioned title slogan of the Risorgimento.

Giuseppe Mazzini

Mazzini’s mother, who held solid republican and democratic ideals, was in part responsible for gearing her son toward his political future; however it was during his time at law school in Genoa that Mazzini developed a strong interest in politics and became more aware of the stirrings of the people and their movements toward Italian nationalism.

Mazzini was a member of the Carbonari – a revolutionary society with strong nationalistic leanings; however he felt that their aims were too unclear and lacklustre to bring about any real change. As a result, he created the group “Young Italy,” made up of young men who sought Italian Unification in a more effective and real sense. The group believed that through organised uprisings, the rule of Italy could be changed and that Austrian governance could be ousted. It was uprisings and revolts such as this which were vital to the success of the Risorgimento.

Camillo Cavour

Camillo Cavour (1810-1861) was a statesman and renowned diplomat. He was an advisor to the King of Sardinia, and as a result was able to raise the profile of Italy’s desire to unify throughout Europe, especially because Sardinia was a very important part of the fragmented Italy.

Camillo Cavour

Unlike Mazzini, Cavour wanted unification in a monarchical form as opposed to a Republican one, and it was under the rule of the king of Savoy that the unification was announced.

Cavour founded and wrote in a newspaper called “Il Risorgimento” in which he talked of constitutional reforms and anticipated the changes which Italy was beginning to go through on its way to becoming an independent nation. Some of his articles were very controversial, and one even caused a war a few days after it was released!

Cavour’s careful planning, the military help of Giuseppe Garibaldi in the South of Italy, and uprisings inspired by Mazzini, would ultimately lead to the eventual unification of all of Italy.

Giuseppe Garibaldi

Giuseppe Garibaldi

Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807-1882) won the majority of the military victories that came about as a result of the Risorgimento.

Garibaldi was formerly a sailor and had experience in combat prior to his victories in the Unification. He quickly became involved with Mazzini’s Young Italy movement, becoming very closely influenced by Mazzini himself, and although he had a history of exile, he was eventually returned to Italy under the command of Cavour in order for him to lead a war against Austrian forces.

Garibaldi’s actions were influenced by the guerrilla wars occurring in Uruguay around the same time, and in a nod to the soldiers there, Garibaldi’s men took up wearing similarly styled red clothing. This led them to be known as the Redshirts. The men in Garibaldi’s army were also all volunteers.

Without the three men above, the Risorgimento may not have ever happened, and without the creation of the Italy we know today, the history and geography of Europe as we know it would be vastly different.

In the modern age, Italy is separated into regions – five of which are autonomous and have the power of self-governance. However, as in many European countries, there are still areas and regions that wish to become more (or completely) independent - a fine example is that of Venice wanting to split from Rome, an issue that has recently stepped back into the spotlight.

Countries are always changing, but we must never forget the truly momentous changes of the Risorgimento. Its effects and legacy were to be heard around the world, influencing politics, culture, and history both at the time and today.

This article is provided by Georgie Broad.

You can also read longer history articles with interactive content in our magazine, History is Now, available for iPad and iPhone (and Android imminently!). Read more about it here.

Bibliography

• Hearder, H, Italy: A Short History, Cambridge University Press, 1990, pp153-187
• Banti, A.M, Il Risorgimento Italiano,  Laterza&Figli, ed. 2005
• Evans, M, The Italian Unification, All About History, Imagine Publishing, Issue 10, pp36-37

The Greatest Exhibition of the 19th century? – Image of the Week

This week’s image of the week is from the time when the British Empire was dominant.

It has been a few weeks since we shared an image of the week, so it is time for this majestic image…

The Great Exhibition, a type of World’s Fair, took place in London in 1851. Opened by Queen Victoria, it was a majestic event that happened at a time when the British Empire was at its peak. It was also well-attended and extremely popular among many of the local population, not least because it had exhibits from over 25 countries, so allowing people to marvel at wonders from the world over, as well as exhibits from closer to home.

The image above shows the main hall with flags from a variety of countries and well-dressed people visiting the different stands from all over the world. At the top we can see the roof, a glass structure known as the Crystal Palace, situated in Hyde Park, London. Light also fills the exhibition hall.

The second image shows a poster advertising trips to the Great Exhibition from Abergavenny in Wales. People traveled from very far to come to what was an unprecedented spectacle and a rare opportunity to see much of the world under one roof.

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George Levrier-Jones

The Forgotten War – The 3 Key Causes of the Anglo-American War of 1812

In this introduction to history that follows a piece on the American Revolution, Aidan Curran explores the reasons for the War of 1812. And he finds that there are three principal reasons for the war that broke out between Britain and the US.

Never heard of the War of 1812? Well, you are not alone. This war is often called the “Forgotten War,” as it is overshadowed by other conflicts in American history such as the American Revolution and the American Civil War. However, this is a significant event in American history as it was the first time that the United States declared war on another country. And guess who they declared war on? Yes, you guessed it – Britain. Even after the war of independence, it seems the British still wanted to stick their noses into American affairs, by impeding trade and taking men off American ships whom they believed were British.

This article is going to examine the three main causes of this “Second War of Independence,” - trade, impressment (kidnapping), and expansion.

US Frigate Constitution defeats the British Frigate Java in December 1812.

1. Trade      

In 1803, Britain was locked in a conflict with Napoleon’s France. In order to win this war, Britain had to cut off all supplies to France. This meant interfering with American shipping, and as you can imagine, the Americans were not too happy about this. According to international law, neutral countries could trade with whoever they wished, as long as they traded non-military goods.  Americans felt that their rights as a free nation were being violated, and introduced a number of restrictive trade measures, such as embargoes, in order to preserve the economic health of the United States. This could be called a cold war, as these trade restrictions were made in an effort to avoid full on, bloody war. James Madison, the fourth President of the United States, once exclaimed “What a noble stroke would be an embargo! It would probably do as much good as harm at home, and would force peace on the rest of the world, and perhaps liberty along with it.”

So in December 1807, Congress passed the Embargo, which banned all American ships sailing to foreign ports. In 1808, American exports plummeted by 80%. However, this Embargo Act had little effect on Britain. In all honesty, she couldn’t care less; the British were far more interested and consumed in their battle with the French. In fact, the only people who suffered were the Americans, as the economies of port cities suffered. Exports fell from $108 million in 1807 to $22 million in 1808, and imports fell from $138 million to less than $57 million. To say the Embargo Act backfired would be an understatement - it was an absolute disaster! The Non-Intercourse Act was introduced instead, which banned trade only with Britain and France, who were still locked in combat. To win this war, Britain saw it as necessary to “kidnap” sailors from American ships in order to increase manpower, which brings us on to the next cause of the War of 1812.

2. Impressment

If there was one thing in particulr that annoyed the Americans, it was impressment. This was when the British would board American ships, and take sailors they believed to be British citizens. Granted, many were, but many had also become naturalised Americans. Between 1793 and 1812, the British impressed more than 15,000 US sailors in an effort to boost fleet numbers in their war with France.

The process of impressment started back in 1664, as the Royal Navy organised gangs to roam the countryside, forcing British subjects to join. By the 18th century, these gangs were boarding neutral merchant ships to kidnap men to serve in the navy.

Americans regarded the practice of impressment as a violation of a person’s liberty, as stated in the Declaration of Independence. So when the British started boarding American ships and taking men, this was obviously going to cause considerable tensions.

Why were so many British men working on American ships? Simply put, American ships offered better pay and working conditions. It is estimated that 35 to 40 per cent of US naval crews were made up of British seamen in the nineteenth century, often deserters of the Royal Navy. Many of these had become naturalised Americans, but in British eyes, no subject could ever renounce their citizenship. The Americans conceded the right of the British to impress their own subjects from American ships. However, when legally naturalised Americans were taken, this was a cause of huge irritation. And when US-born people were impressed, this caused even greater tension. Between 1803 and 1812, at least 5,000 sailors were snatched from American ships and forced to serve in the Royal Navy, and it is estimated that three out of every four were Americans.

The most controversial case of impressment occurred in Virginia on June 22, 1807. A British warship called the HMS Leopard opened fire on an American ship called the USS Chesapeake. The British boarded the ship, looking for deserters from the Royal Navy. They found and impressed four men, but only one was an actual British citizen. The incident outraged the American public, with President Thomas Jefferson remarking: “Never since the Battle of Lexington have I seen this country in such a state of exasperation as at present, and even that did not produce such unanimity.” War was looming ever closer…

3. Expansion

American expansionism can also be cited as a cause of the War of 1812, as the country tried to extend its influence to the north-west, in places such as Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan. As the Americans tried to expand, they faced fierce resistance from Native Americans, who wanted to keep their land from the colonists, reform their habits, and establish a confederacy on American soil.

But what has this got to do with the British? Well, the British began to give support to the Native Americans by providing arms and supplies. They saw the Native American Nations as being valuable allies, while also hoping that a Native American buffer state would be formed, which would halt American growth and expansion, and ensure that Canada remained a British possession. In the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811, the defeated Native Americans left behind rifles of British manufacture on the battlefield. This confirmed to the Americans that the British were up to no good, and along with trade interference and impressment, it seemed that the only option was to go to war, and that’s exactly what they did.  On June 1, 1812, President James Maddison gave a speech to the US Congress, in which he described American grievances against the British. The war officially began on June 18, as President Maddison signed the measure into law. This was the first time America had ever declared war on another country.

To sum it all up

The fundamental cause of the War of 1812 between America and Britain is pretty straightforward – both sides could not agree on what was theirs. The British believed that no person could renounce their citizenship, while Americans recognised legally naturalised citizens. This led to a disagreement over impressment, and who exactly was British and American. Sometimes, the British did not even care, and took whoever they wanted off ships, including Americans. This angered the Americans, as their freedom was being violated. On trade, Americans believed that as a neutral country, they should be able to exchange goods with whoever they wanted. Again, there was dispute over this, as the British disagreed. Finally, greed was also a major cause of war, as America wanted to expand its territory, but Britain did not want this, in fear of losing Canada.

America and Britain were like two children in a sweet shop, stealing each other’s sweets and arguing over which sweets were theirs, while also looking to expand their number of sweets! If only they had learned to get along…

You can find out more from Aidan Curran on his site here or his Twitter feed here.

Finally, read more about an adventure from the War of 1812 in issue 4 of History is Now magazine here.

References

• Eric Foner, Give Me Liberty!
• John Garraty, Short History of the American Nation
• Maldwyn Jones, The Limits of Liberty
• Bradford Perkins.  Embargo: Alternative to War 
• John P. Foley, The Jeffersonian Cyclopedia.
• Samuel Eliot Morison, A Concise History of the American Republic
• http://www.jstor.org/stable/1901937?seq=3
• http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/feature/british-navy-impressment/
• http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2012/summer/1812-impressment.html

Tsar Alexander III of Russia - A Paranoid Life. Pogroms, Pokers and Blame

Helen Saker-Parsons follows up her article on Tsar Alexander II, and considers how Alexander II’s death influenced his son, Tsar Alexander III. The results included suspicion against those inside and outside of Russia, and making scapegoats of the Russian Jewish population.

Alexander witnessed his father’s body as it was stretchered up the stairs of his home in the Winter Palace; the stubs of his blown-off legs hemorrhaging blood onto the plush carpet. His father was Alexander II, Tsar of Russia and assassinated by social revolutionaries. His son, the new Tsar Alexander III, accepted that he was their target now: affirmation of which came on his return to his own St Petersburg residence, Anichkov Palace, where he discovered a trench had already been dug, encircling the building, and several armed guards put in place. Alexander III knew that his father had survived several assassination attempts, the threats of which lingered throughout his reign. Indeed, the policies the new tsar pursued and the way he lived his life were governed by fear. Although physically strong, he was no match for an organized group of assassins. To protect himself and his family he was forced to assume a near isolated existence, away from the social whirl of the Imperial court; and moreover to introduce a set of domestic and foreign policies which would keep his enemies at a distance.

Tsar Alexander III of Russia in the 1880s.

St Petersburg itself symbolized revolutionary spirit: a contemporary English observer remarked how the city reeked of dynamite. Following Alexander II’s assassination in March 1881, Alexander III took his family and fled to their country residence, Gatchina, some thirty-five miles to the south.  Here he chose to live more like a prisoner than an Emperor. He dismissed the opulent rooms and instead moved into converted servant quarters that were low ceilinged and cramped. He surrounded himself with Victorian bric-a-brac to further the sense of claustrophobia. Rumors abounded abroad about the new tsar’s confinement.  He listened to the advice of his former tutor: the reactionary and influential Konstantin Pobedonostsev, who warned him to “look under all the furniture at night and lock the doors not only in the bedroom, but in all the adjacent rooms, right up to the outside door.” He further advised to “check every evening, before going to bed, that the sentries are still there – their throats can so easily be cut.” Alexander kept a revolver beneath his pillow and allegedly fatally shot an aide-de-camp who surprised him as well as a guard who reached behind his back for a cigarette. Rumors abounded abroad about the new tsar’s confinement. To counter these claims, he and his family took frequent public walks in a nearby park but the image of freedom was an illusion: the park was reached via an underground tunnel from the Palace and a fear of large crowds forced Alexander to delay his coronation for over fourteen months.

Enemies everywhere

It was this sense of mistrust that governed his foreign policy. Often referred to as ‘Alexander, the peace-maker,’ it was more paranoia that forced his decisions. Although he ratified the Three Emperors League with Germany and Austria-Hungary, which his father had initiated in 1881, he failed to further extend the alliance in 1887 when he became suspicious that Austria was acting against Russian interests in Bulgaria. Instead he signed a Russo-German neutrality pact, but again refused to extend this in 1890, when the ascension of Kaiser Wilhelm pushed Alexander into the hands of the French. Alexander was suspicious of the ambitious German ruler and in 1892 signed a military pact with France to counterbalance German aggression in Europe. But ultimately the Tsar believed he had only two natural allies – his army and his navy.

Alexander III acknowledged that a threat also existed from within. His domestic policy was governed by his desire to maximize the security of his dynasty. He followed the doctrine of his grandfather, Tsar Nicholas I, with ‘orthodoxy, autocracy and nationality.’ Only by having one religion, one people and one leader could he maintain peace within Russia and eliminate threats from the Radicals and Reactionaries. He pursued a policy of Russification, promoting the Slavic elements within the Empire and removing Prussian ones. All aspects of life were affected from Alexander sporting a Slav-like beard to persecuting other religions. Russian art, music and architecture were promoted. School curriculums were altered to reflect the glories of Russia and universities were instructed on what to teach.

Blaming the Jews…

Perhaps his most controversial policy was the persecution of the Jews. Pobedonostsev’s formula for the Jewish was:  ‘one-third was to emigrate, one-third was to die, and one-third to disappear (or be converted).’ Strict quotas were introduced on the number of Jews admitted to higher education and Jews were banned altogether from many professions. Their settlement was restricted to nominated areas and towns closed to them. In 1891, almost twenty thousand Jewish inhabitants were evicted from Moscow. Although the pogroms - which were a feature of Tsarist Russia from 1881 - were not government led, they were welcomed by it. The Jews were a useful scapegoat and a focus for hatred: diverting attention away from revolutionary activity. The emancipation of the serfs in 1861 had forced many uneducated peasants into the cities where they came across the wealthier Jews who they resented. This hatred grew as an international agricultural depression was blamed on the Jews who largely controlled the trade and merchant houses.

But the tsar could not divert all hatred from him. The social revolutionaries needed to be suppressed and Alexander achieved this through censorship [the country’s main literary journal Notes of the Fatherland was closed in 1884 for its supposed support of Populist political ideas], the promotion of police powers and consequent clampdown on civil liberties. In 1881 the Law on Exceptional Measures, - in effect martial law - was introduced; meetings of any kind could be banned, and the police were given extensive powers of search and arrest, while liberal judges and officials were dismissed from office. Perhaps most importantly, a new security division of the police was founded - known as the Okhrana. Not only were they responsible directly for the protection of the Tsar and his family but also for tracking down political opponents and radicals. This they achieved through subversion and infiltration. They were successful and effective: by 1894, over 5,400 people had been exiled to Siberia or sentenced to hard labor. The long hands of the Okhrana operated not only from the major cities within Russia but those European hotbeds of revolutionary behavior such as Paris and London.

Alexander III kept his enemies at a distance and flexed his muscles on the international and domestic scene. Even so, his desire to appear powerful and fearless infiltrated every aspect of his life, and ironically was to contribute to his death. At six feet four and with a large stature (his nieces and nephews referred to him as ‘Uncle Fatty’) Alexander III was an imposing physical character. He kept his children amused with feats of strength such as ripping whole decks of cards in half and bending fireside pokers into bizarre shapes. But his most significant display of strength came following a train derailment near Borki in 1888, on one of the few occasions he had travelled beyond the confines of the royal palaces. As bodies lay amongst the tangled mess he reportedly supported the roof of the dining car in which he and his family were travelling, allowing them all to escape. He suffered a trauma to his back and damage to his kidney, heralding the onset of kidney disease that contributed to his death six years later. An alleged tendency towards alcoholism brought about by the stresses of confinement worsened his health. Although Tsar Alexander III escaped the fate of his father and son, he remained imprisoned by the fears his role as ruler of an unruly Russia invoked and ultimately died an untimely death at the age of 49.

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The Scientist who World War I wrote out of history

Karl Ferdinand Braun is the unsung hero of wireless telegraphy. He made many great discoveries, but due to World War I, he was forgotten. Here, Kevin K. O’Neill tells us his story.

Many people have memories of the early history of radio development summed up in a single word: Marconi. This is not undeserved as Marconi and the companies he founded were instrumental in the development of wireless telegraphy and radio. The transition from the wired telegraph to wireless telegraphy came at a time of turmoil in Europe and was in part driven by different country’s desire for improved communication.

At the outbreak of WWI, verbal radio was still in its infancy and crossing any significant distance in wireless communications was achieved by the "dots and dahs" of Morse Code, whose cultural legacy remains with us in the form of SOS as a distress signal, chosen for its simple three "dots", three "dahs", three "dots" pattern. One of the fathers of this technology remains unsung in much of the world due to Germany's loss of WWI. Despite numerous technical contributions, this man, Karl Ferdinand Braun, remains largely unknown to many English-speaking people.

Most of us in today's world have viewed images on a Cathode Ray Tube, commonly known among English speakers as a CRT.  Before the advent of semiconductor flat panel display technology, every TV and computer sported a CRT as its most prominent feature, but how many know who invented it?  It was Karl Ferdinand Braun.

Braun in 1909.

Success at learning

The youngest boy of seven children, Braun was born in June of 1850 at Fulda, a town northeast of Frankfurt still enclosed in its medieval walls. Despite his father's job as a mid level civil servant, Braun was raised in extreme poverty due to the billeting of Bavarian soldiers in his home. A time of unrest in Germany, Fulda was forced to house many soldiers forcing its inhabitants into sheds and barns, while the poor ate rodents to survive.  Despite these inauspicious beginnings, Braun did attend to school.  Hardly a prodigy, the fact that he had difficulty with mathematics outside of theory was often laughed at later in his life.  Despite this, Braun wrote a book on crystallography when he was 15. Reviewed favorably by several professors it went unpublished due to his age. However Braun was undeterred, publishing several papers on aspects of chemistry before he turned 17.

Braun enrolled in experimental physics, mathematics, and chemistry at the college in Marburg just before his 18th year. Due to his physics professor's musical inclinations his studies were focused on acoustics, which while good at, Braun was not inclined to pursue.  Even so, it is likely that his understanding of the concept of resonance would later play a role in his inspired electrical innovations. Dissatisfied with the scope of his studies at Marburg - with its mere 355 students and unimaginative professors - Braun cleared financial hurdles and went on to the University of Berlin, an undisputed leader in science, after his second semester at Marburg.

In Berlin, an elite physics laboratory existed with only 3 of 265 science students allowed access. Braun, after a single interview with the professor in charge, was allowed use of the lab in complete privacy and at no expense, an honor almost unheard of. Morally and financially compelled to return to Marburg after two semesters to please his father, Braun's next break came when offered a paid internship as a laboratory assistant and lecturer at what was to later become a section of the Technical University of Berlin. This allowed him to stay in Berlin under the tutelage of a Professor Quincke who promoted the spirit of German scientific education, something that was to eventually propagate through much of the academic world. This pairing reaped great benefits for mankind.

Braun's first dissertation earned him the beginnings of a reputation. His acumen for the mechanics of experimentation became evident to all those involved. His contributions to scientific knowledge are too numerous to even outline here, but his discovery of the "diode" effect should be mentioned. This discovery effectively makes him the great grandfather of every semiconductor ever manufactured. Braun was the teacher that every student hopes to get and if they do, they remember him for life.  Braun taught at numerous German universities and his talent for amusing anecdotes once had Kaiser Wilhelm II repeatedly slap his leg and laugh during a lecture.

A history of invention

In the latter half of the 19th century, electricity was working its way into industry and society.  Batteries, generators, lights, telegraphs, and other assorted technologies were being implemented while barely being understood. Braun was asked by early German electricity producers for help with various aspects of energy propagation. With characteristic energy, he tackled the problem by refining ideas published by Roentgen, the discoverer of X-Rays. Braun's solution to probing the inner workings of electrical circuits was the creation of the Cathode Ray Tube.  A long glass tube with the air pumped out and two metal plates with a phosphor coated "screen" of cardboard. Braun was the first to control the horizontal and the vertical by waving magnets around the tube to deflect the electron beam, or cathode ray, which was a discovery in itself. 

Braun, a kindred soul to Tesla and never a businessman by nature, altruistically published his findings with expediency, despite being aware of the enormous fiscal value of his invention. He honed his marvelous tube into what is known today as an oscilloscope, a fundamentally unchanged tool of electronics that is indispensable to any electronic engineer or technician. It was Braun's oscilloscope that first showed the German electricity producers that the electricity they were creating operated at a frequency of 50 "hertz" or cycles per second - a frequency unchanged in Europe to this day. To say the German industrialists involved were pleased with Braun's "Scope" is a huge understatement. Braun contributed many other items to the electric industry and his brother, a successful merchant, founded a company to reap some gain from Braun's inventive mind. The most pervasive legacy of this company remains with us in the form of the Braun electric razor. His tube, known in America as the CRT, is still called "Braunsche Rohre" (Braun's Tube) in German speaking countries and "Buraun-kan" in Japan.

At the tail end of the 19th century "wireless" communication was in its infancy, and utilizing "Spark Gap Transmitters" and releasing barely manipulated EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) assaults into the atmosphere, Braun hoped that someone could pick them up at distances measured in single to double digit miles. If one of these transmitters were "sparked up" today in a modern city, it is likely that all the iPads, iPods, and cell phones in the immediate area would suffer a premature death, all their semiconductor junctions fried at the hands of raw electromagnetic energy.

World War I and change

Ferdinand Braun helped change all that. Braun and Marconi were jointly awarded a Nobel Prize in 1909 for "contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy." Marconi even admitted to Braun himself that he "borrowed" several of Braun's patents. It was during his work on wireless telegraphy that Braun invented the first diode, without which there would be no modern electronics as we know it. It was also here that Braun's early work with acoustic resonance came into play as he improved the wireless technology including inventing the phased array antenna.

During the Russo-Japanese war of the early 20th century and before the outbreak of WWI, the combat efficacy of wireless communications was proven by the Japanese sinking of the Russian flagship Petropavlovsk. Baited out of Port Arthur with small ships, torpedo boats were called in as reinforcements by wireless. At the outbreak of WWI, Braun's workplace, then at Strasbourg, was shut down and the city filled with troops. Braun's family was scattered by various circumstances. When the tide of war ebbed Braun returned to Strasbourg to find his university's station locked behind closed doors, being used by the military as one point of the first known radio triangulation efforts to track ships at sea.  The British ships were tracked and the U-boats success at finding prey may have been due to this effort.

Prior to the war, with Marconi's efforts tied up, the only world wide network of communications was set up by Telefunken. Many pieces of this network were destroyed in the early days of the war in an effort to isolate Germany. The Sayville station, outside New York and the last of the offshore Telefunken stations to remain operational, had recently been upgraded and was able to receive reports from Germany.  It came under assault for patent infringements in efforts to shut it down, with Marconi himself scheduled to testify. Braun decided to travel to New York to help counter the British efforts to shut it down. Diagnosed and treated for cancer ten years earlier though, the disease was rearing its head again making Braun aware that this trip might be the last effort of his life. Risking winter travel and the Atlantic blockade (his own son had been caught at sea returning from America and imprisoned), Braun left for New York without much hope of seeing his homeland or family again.  Departing from Bergen, the captain went far out of the normal sea routes, passing just south of Iceland to deliver his "cargo," for, besides Braun and his three companions, the ship was carrying a new transmitter and antenna setup for the Sayville station. Shortly after Braun's arrival in New York he had a pleasant surprise when his son, released from internment by the British, was allowed to return to America.

In part due to Braun's presence, the lawsuit against Sayville went in Telefunken's subsidiary's favor. However Sayville was taken over by the US Navy when America declared war on Germany.

His job done, Braun petitioned the British government for safe passage to Germany but they were non-committal. Braun remained in America under the watchful eyes of British intelligence, and coming to the realization that the British did not want him back in Germany, Braun resigned himself to life in the Catskill Mountains of New York until the war ended. Many American scientific groups, pleased to have a Nobel Prize winner nearby, treated him to feasts and event invitations, easing his isolation.  He continued to write articles on physics, one of his last being "Physics for Women," a practical aid to housewives everywhere. In 1918 Braun slipped and fell. He broke his hip, went into a sickbed, and never arose. He passed away shortly thereafter.

Scientist, teacher, innovator, and patriot to his country, Braun was a remarkable and admirable man written out of history by the winners of WWI. The next time you view the iconic 1960s TV show The Outer Limits’ introduction, with its elemental display of oscilloscope functionality, take a moment to reflect upon a 20th century without the Cathode Ray Tube.  Braun was the first to control the horizontal and vertical, bringing much of physics in to crystal clarity. Life would not be the same without his wonderful "Braunsche Rohre" and other miraculous inventions.

This article is by Kevin K. O’Neill.

You can read another article by Kevin, related to ghosts and science in the 19th century, here.