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Cole, Galbraith Lowry British army officer and colonial administrator. Cole served as Governor of Mauritius from 1823 to 1828 and then the Cape Colony from 1828 to 1833.
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Colston, Edward English slave trader, merchant, philanthropist, and politician. Colston was a Member of the Royal African Company from 1680 to 1692 as well as Deputy Governor from 1689 to 1690. He was also Member of Parliament for Bristol from 1710 to 1713.
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Constantine, Emperor Fourth-century CE Roman Emperor, who was declared emperor in York on the death of his father. During his reign, Christianity started to become the dominant religion in the Roman Empire; Constantine's role and motives in this process is debated. Since the eighteenth century, Constantine's legacy was viewed with suspicion; the historian Edward Gibbon blamed him personally for the superstition and corruption that, in Gibbon's view, led to the decline and fall of the Roman Empire.
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Cook, James British colonial explorer, cartographer and naval officer in the eighteenth century. Cook is most well know for his three voyages (1768-1771; 1772-1775; 1776-1779) in the Pacific Ocean, which set off British colonial expansion into the region. During his first voyage, Cook's first encounter with the Māori people in New Zealand ended in the deaths of nine Māori. In 1779, during his third and final voyage, Cook was killed trying to take Kalaniʻōpuʻu hostage, who was the ruling chief (aliʻi nui) of the island of Hawaii at the time. The legacy of Cook's expeditions, and in particular its consequences for the indigenous people of the Pacific Ocean, has been highly contested in the present. In 2019, for instance, the British government expressed its regret for the killing of Māori people during Cook's first voyage, although it stopped short of a full apology. In 2024, a statue of Cook in Melbourne, Australia was sawn off in protest over the Australia Day public holiday, with the words "THE COLONY WILL FALL" graffitied on the plinth underneath.
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Coram, Thomas English sea captain and philanthropist who created the Foundling Hospital in London. Coram founded a shipyard in Massachusetts in 1694, and was later appointed as a trustee of the Georgia Colony in 1732.
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Cotton, Stapleton, 1st Viscount Combermere British Army officer, politician, colonial administrator and slave-owner. Cotton came from a family with extensive involvement in British slave-ownership in the Leeward Islands in the Caribbean. Sir William Stapleton (?-1686) was Governor of the Leeward Islands from 1671 to 1686 and acquired a number of estates in Antigua, St Kitts, Nevis, and Montserrat. Stapleton Cotton (1773-1865), Baron Combermere (from 1814) and Viscount Combermere (from 1827) inherited the family interest and became the co-owner of two enslaved labour-estates in St Kitts and Nevis in the 1820s. Upon abolition, Cotton received £3,739 in compensation for 227 enslaved people on his estate in St Kitts, and £3,465 for 193 enslaved people on his estates in Nevis. In 1862, Cotton transferred his Caribbean estates to his son Wellington Henry (1818-91), 2nd Viscount Combermere, with the family interest in the region lasting into the early twentieth century. In addition to his involvement in slave-ownership, Cotton also served in various capacities as a military officer and colonial administrator in the Caribbean, Ireland, and India. From 1817 to 1820, Cotton served as Governor of Barbados, before later becoming Commander-in-Chief in Ireland from 1822 to 1825 and India from 1825 to 1830.
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Crompton, Samuel British inventor in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries who invented the spinning mule.
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Cromwell, Oliver English military and political leader in the seventeenth century. A pivotal figure in British history, and one whose historical reputation has long been the source of debate, Cromwell's colonial legacy is symbolised by the war in Ireland (1649-1653) and the capture of Jamaica from the Spanish in 1655. Jamaica became one of Britain's wealthiest colonies through the use of enslaved African labour, with the British occupying the island for the next three centuries.
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Curzon, George, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston Viceroy and Governor-General of India (1899-1905).
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Darwin, Charles English naturalist, geologist, biologist and the founder of the theories of evolutionary biology and natural selection.
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de Boigne, Benoît Colonial general who fought in India in the late eighteenth century and made a fortune from colonial land holdings there. His first marriage was to an Indian woman variously identified as 'Halime Banu', 'Nur Begam', or "Hélene Bennett". They had two children, a daughter named 'Banu' or 'Anna (1789–1804) and a son named 'Ali Bakhsh' or 'Charles Alexander' (1792-1853). Benoît de Boigne's colonial fortune enabled him to become a major philanthropist in his home town of Chambéry in Savoie. His brother Claude Pierre Joseph Leborgne de Boigne (1762-1832) was a colonial administrator in Santo Domingo.
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de Crussol, Jacques French colonial explorer in late nineteenth century Africa.
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de Lamoricière, Louis Juchault French military general and colonial administrator. de Lamoricière was Governor- General of Algeria from 1845 to 1847.
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de Vimeur, Jean-Baptiste Donatien, comte de Rochambeau French commander-in-chief during the American Revolutionary War.
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Deproge, Ernest Avocat comme son grand-père Louis Fabien, condamné au début du XIXe siècle en même temps que Cyrille Bissette pour avoir réclamé des droits pour les libres de couleur, il est élu député de la Martinique de 1882 à 1898. Il fonde le Parti Radical Socialiste Martiniquais et dirige de 1886 à 1893 un journal, La Petite France, où il défend l’assimilation, demandant le développement de l’instruction et l’application de la conscription. Battu aux élections de 1898, il se retire de la politique et mène une carrière administrative impériale, à la Réunion puis en France.
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Dinham, John British businessman and philanthropist in Exeter. Dinham made his wealth as a tea-merchant based in London.
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Disraeli, Benjamin Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1868; 1874-1880)
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Dobson, Benjamin Alfred English textile machinery manufacturer and mayor of Bolton.
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Douglass, Frederick American abolitionist, suffragist, writer, and statesman. Born into slavery, Douglass became one of the most important abolitionists and civil rights leaders of the nineteenth century. He made a number of visits to the British Isles during his life, visiting England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. The website 'Frederick Douglass in Britain and Ireland' maps where Douglass and other transatlantic abolitionists gave speeches.
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Doyle, Arthur Conan British writer and physician in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Doyle is most well known as the author of the Sherlock Holmes stories, but he was also involved in, and wrote about, the British Empire and imperial politics. Doyle served as a volunteer physician in Bloemfontein between March and June 1900 during the Second Boer War (1899-1902), and wrote about the war in The Great Boer War (1900) and The War in South Africa: Its Cause and Conduct (1902). In 1909, he wrote The Crime of the Congo in support of E.D. Morel and Roger Casement's campaign for the reform of the Congo Free State. Doyle's fictional works also touch on imperial themes. The famous character of Dr. Watson, for instance, was written as a veteran of the Second Anglo-Afghan War (1878-1880), while the science fiction novel The Lost World (1912) depicts an imaginary expedition to South America.
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Drake, Francis English sailor, privateer and slave-trader in the sixteenth century.
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Duguay-Trouin, René French naval officer and slave trader in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
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Dundas, Henry, 1st Viscount Melville Eighteenth-century Scottish politician who played key roles in shaping domestic and international policy. Dundas was instrumental in slowing down the full abolition of slavery through amendments introduced to Parliamentary legislation. He was the President of the Board of Control, or the Parliamentary Committee that supervised the affairs of the British East India Company, especially its political and military activities in India.
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Dundas, Robert, 2nd Viscount Melville British politician in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Dundas was President of the Board of Control (1807-1809; 1809-1812), Chief Secretary for Ireland (1809), and First Lord of the Admiralty (1812-1827; 1828-1830).
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Earle, William British soldier (1833-1885) who fought in the Crimean War and East Africa. Earle came from a Liverpool family with deep ties to slave-ownership and slave-trading. Earle married Mary Codrington, who also came from a family closely involved in British slavery.
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Edward VI King of England (1547-1553)
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Edward VII King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India from 1901 to 1910
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Edward, the Black Prince Eldest son and heir apparent of King Edward III of England. Although Edward obviously predates the British Empire, his nickname "The Black Prince" (an appellation whose origins are uncertain) raises interesting questions about the meanings of blackness in fourteenth century Europe, or indeed how ideas of blackness have been reconfigured in the present. His equestrian statue in Leeds was also dedicated as a tribute to Edward VII, who was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 1901 until 1910.
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Edwards, Henry British Liberal politician and linseed merchant in the nineteenth century. His life showcases the inevitable imperial connections of the British elite of the Victorian period. He participated in the Crimean war; was present in the coronation of Russian Czars; was among the first to sail through the Suez canal, whose financing and later debt-servicing landed Egypt into a semi-colonial state; he also rode the newly Northern Pacific Railway, which served as a powerful tool of settler expansionism and disrupted Native American Communities. In Parliament, however, Edwards's interventions were principally around local concerns.
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Elder, Isabella Scottish philanthropist in the nineteenth century, whose wealth largely derived from imperial shipbuilding. Her husband was the shipbuilder John Elder (1824-1869), whose firm was was actively involved in supporting Britain's naval empire and imperial commerce. Some of the company's clients included the African Mail Company and the African Steamship Company. Isabella briefly took over management of the company upon John's death in 1869, before selling the company to her brother John Francis Ure (1820-1883), J. L. K. Jamieson (1826-1883) and William Pearce (1833-1888).
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Elder, John Scottish shipbuilder in the nineteenth century. In 1852, John Elder joined the firm of Randolph, Elliott, & Co., which was initially involved in building ship engines before expanding to constructing actual ships from the 1860s. Elder became the sole partner in the company from 1868 and renamed the firm John Elder & Co the following year. His wife Isabella Elder (1828-1905) then briefly took over management of the company upon John's death in 1869. The Elders' shipbuilding firm was actively involved in supporting Britain's naval empire and imperial commerce throughout the nineteenth century. Some of the company's clients included the African Mail Company and the African Steamship Company, the latter of which was absorbed into Elder, Dempster and Co. in 1891.
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Eliott, George Augustus British army officer in the eighteenth century. Eliott served as Governor of Londonderry (1774-1775) and Governor of Gibraltar (1777-1790).
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Elizabeth II Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 1952 to 2022.
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Fagon, Alfred Black British poet, playwright and actor in the twentieth century.
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Fawcett, Millicent English suffragist and writer in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. During the Second Boer War, Fawcett headed the Fawcett Commission, alongside Anne Knox, Jane Waterston, Ella Scarlet, Katherine Brereton and Lucy Deane, which was sent by the government on a four-month tour in the summer of 1901 to investigate the conditions of British concentration camps in South Africa, in response to a prior independent investigation carried out by Emily Hobhouse which had been highly critical of the camps.
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Foch, Ferdinand French general, Marshal of France, and Supreme Allied Commander from 1918 until 1920.
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Forster, William Edward Chief Secretary for Ireland (1880-1882).
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Forwood, Arthur Bower English merchant, shipowner, and politician. Forwood was Member of Parliament for Ormskirk (1885-1898) and Mayor of the Borough of Liverpool (1877-1878). Working with his brother William Bower Forwood (1840-1928), Forwood made much of his wealth from blockade running during the American Civil War (1861-1865) in support of the Confederate States of America , which was fighting to preserve the institution of slavery in the United States.
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Fox, Charles James British Whig politician and statesman in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Fox was Foreign Secretary in 1782, 1783 and 1806. His nephew was the politician and absentee Jamaican slave-owner Henry Vassall-Fox, 3rd Baron Holland (1773-1840).
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Franklin, John British naval officer, explorer and colonial administrator. Franklin was Lieutenant-Governor of Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania) from 1839 to 1843. Franklin's lost expedition to the Canadian Arctic in 1845 resulted in considerable efforts to try to locate the remains of their two ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, and their crews. In 1854, the Scottish explorer John Rae (1813-1893) collected testimony in from the Inuit people about the fate of the expedition, which included suggestions that some crew members had been forced to resort to cannibalism to survive. The testimony provided by the Inuits was met with considerable racist outcry from sections of Victorian society, including Charles Dickens (1812-1870), which effectively tarnished Rae's reputation.
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Frederick, Prince of Wales Eldest son and heir apparent of King George II.
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Frere, Henry Bartle British colonial administrator. Frere served as Commissioner of Sind (1851-1859), Governor of Bombay (1862-1867), and High Commissioner for Southern Africa (1877-1880).
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Gainsborough, Thomas English portrait and landscape painter. Gainsborough painted a number of figures with connections to transatlantic slavery and colonialism during the eighteenth century. These include, for example, the absentee slave-owner and MP Charles Tudway (c. 1765) as well as The Byam Family (c.1762–66) and The Baillie Family (c. 1784). In 1768, Gainsborough painted a portrait of Ignatius Sancho, who was a Black British writer, composer, and abolitionist. Gainsborough also painted portraits of Robert Clive, credited with turning the British East India Company into an imperial state in India, and his son, Edward Clive.
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Galliéni Saint-Cyrien, d’origine italienne et assez modeste, il incarne l’officier républicain sorti du rang grâce aux guerres coloniales. De sa première affectation à La Réunion (1872-1875) au poste de Gouverneur général de Madagascar (1896-1905), sa carrière est impériale : Sénégal (1877-1881), la Martinique (1883-1886), Soudan français, actuels Mali et Burkina Faso (1886-1888) et Tonkin (1892-1896). Il écrit beaucoup théorisant la doctrine de la « pacification », mélange brutal de guerre de conquête et de mise en place du pouvoir colonial, et celle de la « politique des races ». Il termine sa carrière en métropole au Conseil supérieur de la Guerre. En 1914, il reprend du service comme gouverneur de Paris et s’illustre lors de la bataille de la Marne. Il est Ministre de la Guerre d’octobre 1915 à mars 1916.
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Gallieni, Joseph Simon Saint-Cyrien, of Italian origin and rather modest, he embodied the republican officer who rose from the ranks thanks to the colonial wars. From his first posting to La Réunion (1872-1875) to the post of Governor General of Madagascar (1896-1905), his career was imperial: Senegal (1877-1881), Martinique (1883-1886), French Sudan (now Mali and Burkina Faso) (1886-1888) and Tonkin (1892-1896). He wrote extensively theorising the doctrine of "pacification", a brutal mix of war of conquest and the establishment of colonial power, and that of "race politics". He ended his career in France at the Conseil Supérieur de la Guerre. In 1914, he returned to service as Governor of Paris, and distinguished himself at the Battle of the Marne. He was Minister of War from October 1915 to March 1916.
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Gandhi, Mahatma Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and nonviolence leader who led India's successful independence campaign from the British Empire in the twentieth century.
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Gascoyne-Cecil, Robert, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1885-1886; 1886-1892; 1895-1902).
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Geffrye, Robert English merchant and slave trader in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Geffrye was a petitioner to the East India Company (1654), a Charter Member (1672) and Assistant (1691-2) of the Royal African Company, and Lord Mayor of London (1685-1686).
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George I King of Great Britain and Ireland (1714-27) and Elector of Hanover (1698-1727). George I was governor of the South Sea Company, which was involved in the transatlantic slave-trade through the Asiento contract, and held a substantial amount of shares in the company.
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George II King of Great Britain and Ireland (1727-60). Like his father, George I, George II was also a governor and shareholder of the South Sea Company, which was involved in the transatlantic slave-trade through the Asiento contract.