", One journalist described hill station life as "ball after ball, each followed by a little backbiting." Encyclopædia Britannica. Once these troublesome or unloyal Burmese were forced out, the British replaced them with strangers they approved of. [11], From Infogalactic: the planetary knowledge core, Photograph of the arrival of British forces in Mandalay on 28 November 1885 at the end of the, Vegetable stall on the roadside at the Madras Lancer Lines, Mandalay, January 1886. Prominent among the political activists were Buddhist monks (hpongyi), such as U Ottama and U Seinda in the Arakan who subsequently led an armed rebellion against the British and later the nationalist government after independence, and U Wisara, the first martyr of the movement to die after a protracted hunger strike in prison. Membership was open to “all gentlemen interested in general society”, the club’s rules stated, but in practice that meant whites only. Most were built between 1820 and 1885. (One of the main thoroughfares in Yangon is named after U Wisara.) In his book Ornamentalism; How the British Saw Their Empire the historian David Cannadine said British empire had its roots in transplanting the British class system abroad not on racial pride and argues the whole thing was kind of as show. “‘Try the mutton,’” he was told. To the south was a safe shipping route for the empire; to the north, successive lines of “coolies”, elephants, and rifles defended against all comers. [6] In 1852, the Second Anglo-Burmese War was provoked by the British who sought the teak forests in Lower Burma as well as a port between Calcutta and Singapore. British rule in Burma British rule in Burma lasted from 1824 to 1948, from the successive three Anglo-Burmese wars through the creation of Burma as a Province of British India to the establishment of an independently administered colony, and finally independence. When the irresistible force was applied, the object in its path was too fragile to survive. (See George Orwell's novel Burmese Days for a fictional account of the British in Burma.) The British named the country Burma in honor of the Burmans, the dominant ethnic group. The economic nature of society also changed dramatically. [Source: Wikipedia +], The economic nature of society also changed dramatically. The name 'Burma' was subsequently rejected upon independence by the ruling junta in favour of 'Myanmar' due to the former's colonial implication. Most of the British residents In India-Burma were male. One missionary described a huge spider that made a home in his shoe. Large numbers of Indians were brought in to work as civil servants, and Chinese were encouraged to immigrate and stimulate trade. It [Source: George Webb, Royal Society for Asian Affairs, June 16, 1983 //\\], “Such wider motives of strategy or commerce apart, Theebaw's cruelties and follies were enough to make Burma an intolerable adjacent state for an outward looking Indian Empire rising to the zenith of its power and self-respect. Japan never succeeded in fully conquering all of the colony, however, and insurgent activity was pervasive, though not as much of an issue as it was in other former colonies. The country was very much shaken. The king was the chief executive, with the final say on all matters, but he could not make new laws and could only issue administrative edicts. During the colonial period when Burma was established as a British Colony, the number of Rohingya Muslims in the colony soared. They staged a strike in 1936 which was notable because it was during this strike that Thakin Nu and Aung San joined the movement. The annexed territories were designated the minor province (a Chief Commissionership), British Burma, of British India in 1862. +. A nationalist movement developed, and there were demonstrations, often led, in true Burmese fashion, by Buddhist monks. Britain made Burma a province of India in 1886 on the orders of the Secretary of State for India, Lord Randolph Churchill,with its capital at Rangoon, a move that ushered in a new period of economic growth. There was the first Anglo-Burmese War in 1824, and then the second in 1852. Lasting for two years, the Galon rebellion, named after the mythical bird Garuda – enemy of the Nagas i.e. Founded in 1871, their original watering hole appears lost in time. Burma is sometimes referred to as "the Scottish Colony", due to the heavy role played by Scotsmen in colonising and running the country, one of the most notable being Sir James Scott, and the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company. Aung San and Nu subsequently joined the Thakin movement progressing from student to national politics.[11]. Independent state, and later a British protectorate, located in the northwestern part of the island of Borneo. At the same time, the monarchy was given legitimacy by the Buddhist organisation, and the “church” gave the public the opportunity to understand national politics to a greater degree. They had become a conquering race and feared no one on earth.” //\\, “On the British side, there was at first no wish to tackle Burma, a profoundly mysterious country, alleged to have a huge population, certainly able to raise great armies. ], One British chronicler wrote: “What will our descendants think of us when they read that the British banished the King of Burma, annexed his country, and proceeded to govern it by officials of their own race? British rule in Burma lasted from 1824 to 1948, from the successive three Anglo-Burmese wars through the creation of Burma as a Province of British India to the establishment of an independently administered colony, and finally independence. +, Burma was grafted onto India despite the incompatibility of India and the Burmese heartland, which lacked a "Burma lobby" to explain it in Britain. The economic nature of society also changed drastically. Web. But sixty-years on the colonial legacy is not obvious. Another said, "There is theory that anyone who lives above 7,000 feet starts having delusions, illusions and hallucinations. Welcome to the CIA Web Site Central Intelligence Agency. Many Burmese were unhappy with the colonial status quo. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been authorized by the copyright owner. Among its exports, the country produced 75 percent of the world's teak from up-country forests. Missionaries that came to India-Burma endured numerous hardships and had little success converting the local population. [9], The British controlled their new province through direct rule, making many changes to the previous governmental structure. The British did not move in large numbers to the colony in Burma in the way they did to other colonies such as India. However. The Galon army rebels, like the Boxers of China, carried charms and tattoos to make themselves invulnerable to British bullets. Large Indian communities still remain in Yangon and Mandalay. Charles' George Orwell Links – Biographies, Essays, Novels, Reviews, Images. The peasant had grown factually poorer and unemployment had increased….The collapse of the Burmese social system led to a decay of the social conscience which, in the circumstances of poverty and unemployment caused a great increase in crime.”[10], The British did not move in large numbers to the colony in Burma in the way they did to other possessions such as India. There were never really that many Britons in Burma. The traditional Burmese economy was one of redistribution with the prices of the most important commodities set by the state and supply and demand mostly unimportant. It was agreed in the Burmah convention in 1886, that China would recognise Britain's occupation of Upper Burmah while Britain continued the Burmese payment of tribute every ten years to Beijing. The British became the wealthy and elite class. They were characterized by their English mother tongue, Christian religion, European lifestyle at home, Western clothes and employment in administration and service positions. Instead, the Indian moneylenders gave the mortgage loans out, but foreclosed them quickly as the rice prices and land costs soared. Efforts were also undertaken to increase the representation of Burmese in the civil service. The Burmese export economy was hit hard by the world depression in the 1930s. – an interview with Gen. Kyaw Zaw", https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-, http://media-2.web.britannica.com/eb-media/35/4035-004-4ECC016C.gif, http://www.netcharles.com/orwell/articles/col-burma.htm, http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/4729301/Cite, https://infogalactic.com/w/index.php?title=British_rule_in_Burma&oldid=3778267, Pages using duplicate arguments in template calls, Former country articles using status text with Colony or Exile, States and territories established in 1824, States and territories disestablished in 1948, Pages using infobox former country with unknown parameters, Pages using infobox country or infobox former country with the flag caption or type parameters, Articles with unsourced statements from September 2015, Articles with unsourced statements from April 2007, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, About Infogalactic: the planetary knowledge core. Its casual nature (“‘that jungle-fighting is the deuce and all. //\\, Before the British colonisation the ruling Konbaung Dynasty practised a tightly centralised form of government. And, finally, the crucial theme of race is approached as a respond to the question of how Burma became policed largely by foreign police and how the indigenous reacted to it. Here was one of the casualties of the nineteenth Century, knocked over by a momentum beyond its understanding. Burma became an official colony on January 1, 1886. There were three wars between the British oppressors and the Burmese. [11], The agreement left parts of the communist and conservative branches of the AFPFL dissatisfied, sending the Red Flag Communists led by Thakin Soe underground and the conservatives into opposition. British rule in Burma, 1824-1942. In other words, the Burmese see the British colonial regime’s separate administration of ‘frontier areas’ from the lowland (central Burma plain), and granting minority groups the right to secession under the 1947 Panglong agreement (and the 1947 constitution) as colonial plots and … Thus, in 1885, after three wars gaining various parts of the country, the British finally occupied all the area of present-day Myanmar, making the territory a Province of British India.[5]. Book: Great Hill Stations of Asia by Barbara Crossette (Harper Collins/ Westview, 1998). [Source: Myanmar Travel Information], Ben Macintyre wrote in The Times, “Like every country, Burma is a product of its history, in which Britain played a defining role, sometimes for better, mostly for worse. By some estimates more than 10,000 peasants were killed during it. Some people began to feel that the rate of change was not fast enough and the reforms not expansive enough. This excited the Chambers of Commerce and influenced the annexation. This massive move towards foreign trade hurt the Burmese economy initially because suddenly a large amount of their resources were being exported for Britain’s benefit, thereby taking with it the resources needed by the Burmese natives to continue living their lives as they had before colonisation. Washington D.C.: Counterpoint, 2002. Despite the efforts of his lawyer, Ba Maw, he was sentenced to death in March 1931 and was hanged at Tharrawaddy jail. [Hugh Tinker, The Union of Burma, Oxford University Press 1937, ch.XII. Despite this an independence movement emerged in … Armed only with swords and spears, Saya San's rebels were no match for British troops with machine guns. Classified and annotated links to more than 60,000 full text documents on Burma/Myanmar. The British made southern Burma into one of the world’s largest rice exporting regions and also exploited rubies and other products that they sold on the world market. Their actions, and the crime that began when the villagers were displaced by Indian workers, led to the British impression of their Burmese colony as a restless and violent place.[5]. Wikipedia +], With the arrival of the British, the Burmese economy became tied to global market forces and was forced to become a part of the colonial export economy. Intermarriage between Europeans and Burmese gave birth to an indigenous Eurasian community known as the Anglo-Burmese who would come to dominate the colonial society, hovering above the Burmese but below the British. In 1930 some of these dissatisfied students founded a new group called the Dobama Asiayone (We Burmans Association) whose members called themselves Thakin (an ironic name as thakin means "master" in the Burmese language – rather like the Indian 'sahib' — proclaiming that they were the true masters of the country entitled to the term usurped by the colonial masters). With this quickly growing economy, came industrialisation to a certain degree, with a railway being built throughout the valley of the Irawaddy, and hundreds of steamboats travelling along it. The British were victorious in this war, and as a result desired access to the teak, oil and rubies of northern Myanmar. 18 February 2010. "The Withdrawal of the Last British Residency from Upper Burma in 1879." The British ruled Burma as a part of India from 1919 until 1937. After Burma's defeat of the Kingdom of Arakan in 1784–1785, in 1823, Burmese forces again crossed the frontier and the British responded with a large seaborne expedition that took Rangoon without a fight in 1824. As Burma finally inches towards democracy, Britain's involvement in Burma's past offers a unique opportunity to help shape its future. The English didn't boil their water but insisted on wearing red flannel underwear even in the sweltering heat. +, Finally, in order to control the country on the village level, the British implemented a “strategic hamlet” strategy in which they burned villages and uprooted families who had supplied villages with their headmen, sending them to lower Burma. The second critical theme is to consider how the policing of colonial Burma might be assessed: how might success be determined. Missionaries were often expected to live out their lives abroad and they were discouraged from coming home even if they were fatally ill. "It is better that our missionaries should die on the field of battle," one missionary board warned, "than to return to camp in a wounded or disabled state. [Source: Myanmar Travel Information ~], On the night of December 22-2, 1930 the first outbreak of violence that became the Saya San rebellion occurred in the Tharrawaddy district; the revolt soon spread to other Irrawaddy delta districts. 1 March 2010. This arrangement lasted until 1937, when Burma began to be administered separately by the Burma Office under the Secretary of State for India and Burma. British Rule In Burma [Harvey, G. E.] on Amazon.com. Text Sources: New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Times of London, Lonely Planet Guides, The Irrawaddy, Myanmar Travel Information Compton’s Encyclopedia, The Guardian, National Geographic, Smithsonian magazine, The New Yorker, Time, Newsweek, Reuters, AP, AFP, Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic Monthly, The Economist, Global Viewpoint (Christian Science Monitor), Foreign Policy, burmalibrary.org, burmanet.org, Wikipedia, BBC, CNN, NBC News, Fox News and various books and other publications. Burma: The Curse of Independence. The main character is the narrator who experiences external and internal conflicts. While the Burmese economy grew all the power and wealth was in the hands of several British firms and the Burmese people did not reap the rewards. The peasant had grown factually poorer and unemployment had increased….The collapse of the Burmese social system led to a decay of the social conscience which, in the circumstances of poverty and unemployment caused a great increase in crime.” +, Immigrants and Infrastructure in Colonial Burma, According to Lonely Planet: The colonial era wrought great changes in Myanmar’s demographics and infrastructure. Most of the jobs also went to indentured Indian labourers, and whole villages became outlawed as they resorted to 'dacoity' (armed robbery). It was an extraordinary explosion of military effort. The Burmese resented both the British and the Indian migrants, and staged guerilla warfare against the British army of occupation. More ice please’”) gave him his first glimpse of the wars colonialism waged beyond its walls. Burma became an official colony on January 1, 1886. For those tasked with seeing Myanmar culture brought to bended knee by any means necessary, anything beyond seemed the end of the world. The Trouser People: A Story of Burma in the Shadow of the Empire. The Burmese under the British rule felt helpless, and reacted with a "racism that combined feelings of superiority and fear." The civil service was largely staffed by Anglo-Burmese and Indians, and Burmese were excluded almost entirely from military service, which was staffed primarily with Indians, Anglo-Burmese, Karens and other Burmese minority groups. The king was the chief executive with final say on all matters but he couldn’t make laws and could only issue administrative edicts. 'National Schools' sprang up across the country in protest against the colonial education system, and the strike came to be commemorated as 'National Day'. Method for treating and avoiding disease left a lot to be desired. Fifteen thousand European and Indian soldiers died, together with an unknown number of Burmese army and civilian casualties. The guerillas fought hard against the foreigners, but were often captured and punished harshly. [5], Conflict began between Myanmar and the British when the Konbaung Dynasty decided to expand into Arakan in the state of Assam, close to the British possessions in India. Progressive constitutional reform in the early 1920s led to a legislature with limited powers, a university and more autonomy for Burma within the administration of India. The hill station at Taunggyi was described in 1902 as “not merely for house-building but for racecourses, pol-grounds and public gardens.”, The atmosphere at the hill stations was both formal, strange and hedonistic. Web. Instead, it was Indian workers who migrated to the country once it was under British rule, and competed with the local Burmese for jobs, lowering the standard of living in the country. the British – emblazoned on the pennants the rebels carried, required thousands of British troops to suppress along with promises of further political reform. The annexed territories were designated the minor province (a Chief Commissionership), British Burma, of British India in 1862.[1]. [11], Dorman-Smith was replaced by Sir Hubert Rance as the new governor, and almost immediately after his appointment the Rangoon Police went on strike. British Rule In Burma The real reason for imposing direct administration was that it was the fashion of the age, and modern standards of efficiency were the only standards intelligible to the men who entered Upper Burma. When the British began their imperial take over of Burma, the colony was immediately thrown into a world of exportation in which they had not ever been exposed to before colonisation by the British. It "was nearly the size of the palm of my hand...olive brown and covered with a soft down.” The missionaries also had to put up with dust storms, torrential monsoons and 130°F heat that lasted for weeks at a time. A rising sense of nationalism combined with suffering lead to the Saya San rebellion, a peasant uprising which was brutally suppressed by the British. Under British rule, as a colony Burma was seen very much as a backwater. +, Movement Towards Burmese Independent Under British Colonial Rule. U Saw, a conservative pre-war Prime Minister of Burma, engineered the assassination of Aung San and several members of his cabinet including his eldest brother Ba Win, the father of today's National League for Democracy exile-government leader Dr Sein Win, while meeting in the Secretariat. Burma achieved independence from British rule on 4 January 1948. It was customary for unmarried British men to keep a local mistress-housekeeper who would raise their children. //\\, “Burma's tragedy, through every stage of British penetration from 1826 to 1948, was on the one hand to be self-centerd, traditionalist, conservative, desiring only to be left alone; and on the other hand to be so situated as to be exposed to external pressures which she was powerless to repulse. Historian Thant Myint-U writes: "At the beginning of the 20th century, Indians were arriving in Burma at the rate of no less than a quarter million per year. The colonial architecture of Rangoon, preserved because the developers were never allowed in and now in dire need of preservation, speaks of a flourishing metropolis. They came away from this experience with the belief that the Burmese situation could be improved through reform. Trade itself was not as important as self-sufficient agriculture, but the country’s position on major trade routes from India to China, meant that it did gain a fair amount of money from foreign trade passing through. Burma achieved independence from British rule on 4 January 1948. “‘I assure you the Club is the only place in Rangoon where you get mutton.’” But what stood out most was the morbid chatter about “battle, murder, and sudden death”. British rule in Burma, also known as British Burma, lasted from 1824 to 1948, from the Anglo-Burmese wars through the creation of Burma as a Province of British India to the establishment of an independently administered colony, and finally independence. Were opened up for cultivation by some estimates more than 10,000 peasants were killed it... Opportunity to help shape its future nineteenth Century, knocked over by a momentum beyond walls! In early 1887 of Surg many British companies grew wealthy trading in teak and.... 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