history of United Kingdom

Assorted References

• major treatment
  • 
    In United Kingdom: Ancient Britain

    Archaeologists working in Norfolk in the early 21st century discovered stone tools that suggest the presence of humans in Britain from about 800,000 to 1 million years ago. These startling discoveries underlined the extent to which archaeological research is responsible for any knowledge of…

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• 17th- and 18th-century aristocracy
  • 
    In history of Europe: Nobles and gentlemen

    In Britain, by contrast, only peers of the realm, whether entitled duke, marquess, earl, or baron, had corporate status: numbering under 200, they enjoyed few special privileges beyond membership of the House of Lords. The gentry, however, with assured social position, knighthoods, armorial bearings, and estates,…

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  • 
    In history of Europe: Nobles and gentlemen

    …trends were prominent, as in England, where there was a free intellectual life. New money, as lavished by the duke of Chandos, builder of the great house of Canons and patron of the composer George Frideric Handel, could be fruitful. Also important was the fusion of aristocratic style with ecclesiastical…

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• 19th-century Europe
  • 
    In history of Europe: The middle 19th century

    …existed to the west, in England and France, where liberals, only half satisfied by the compromises of 1830 and 1832, felt the push of new radical demands from the socialists, communists, and anarchists. Reinforcing these pressures was the unrest caused by industrialization—the workingman’s claims on society, expressed in strikes, trade…

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• age of European monarchy
  • 
    In history of Europe: Britain

    The Marquês de Pombal was inspired by what he had seen in London, and it was in Great Britain (as it became after the Act of Union with Scotland in 1707) that the entrepreneurial spirit was least restricted and most influential in government and…

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• balance-of-power theory
  • In balance of power

    …European balance of power, Great Britain played the role of the “balancer,” or “holder of the balance.” It was not permanently identified with the policies of any European nation, and it would throw its weight at one time on one side, at another time on another side, guided largely by…

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• Christian Socialism movement
  • In Christian Socialism

    …movement that took shape in England immediately after the failure of the Chartist agitation of 1848. Their general purpose was to vindicate for “the Kingdom of Christ” its “true authority over the realms of industry and trade,” and “for socialism its true character as the great Christian revolution of the…

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• dentistry
  • 
    In dentistry: Development of dentistry in Europe

    English dentistry did not advance as far as French dentistry in the 18th century. The guild that had united the barbers and surgeons was dissolved in 1745, with the surgeons going their own way. Some barbers continued their dental ministrations and were designated “tooth drawers.”…

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  • 
    In dentistry: Dentistry in 19th-century Europe

    In 1856 English dentist Sir John Tomes led the formation of the first dental organization in England, the Odontological Society. It was through the activity of this group that the Royal Dental Hospital of London was established in 1858. In opposition to the Odontological Society, a group…

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• devolution
  • In devolution

    …major political issue in the United Kingdom beginning in the early 1970s. Many people in Scotland and Wales began demanding greater control over their own affairs, a trend reflected in a rise in support for the Scottish National Party (SNP) and Plaid Cymru (Party of Wales). In 1979 the Labour…

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• dukes
  • In duke: The British Isles

    There were no English ducal titles (the duchies of Normandy and Aquitaine held by the English kings being, of course, French fiefs) until 1337, when Edward III erected the county of Cornwall into a duchy for his son Edward, the Black Prince.…

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• effect on Latin American independence
  • 
    In history of Latin America: The independence of Latin America

    …France, Spain pitted itself against England, the dominant sea power of the period, which used its naval forces to reduce and eventually cut communications between Spain and the Americas. Unable to preserve any sort of monopoly on trade, the Spanish crown was forced to loosen the restrictions on its colonies’…

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• enclosure
  • In enclosure

    In England the movement for enclosure began in the 12th century and proceeded rapidly in the period 1450–1640, when the purpose was mainly to increase the amount of full-time pasturage available to manorial lords. Much enclosure also occurred in the period from 1750 to 1860, when…

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• end of feudalism
  • 
    In history of Europe: The peasantry

    In England all but a few insignificant forms had gone, though feudal spirit lingered in deference to the squire. Enclosures were reducing the yeoman to the condition of a tenant farmer or, for most, a dependent, landless labourer. Although alodial tenures (absolute ownership) ensured freedom from…

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• Great Depression
  • 
    In Great Depression: Timing and severity

    Great Britain struggled with low growth and recession during most of the second half of the 1920s. The country did not slip into severe depression, however, until early 1930, and its peak-to-trough decline in industrial production was roughly one-third that of the United States. France…

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• historical scholarship
  • In diplomatics: Post-Renaissance scholarship

    …and Germany, historical scholarship in England long paid relatively little attention to legal, as opposed to literary, records. Although John Mitchell Kemble published his collection of Anglo-Saxon documents, the Codex Diplomaticus Aevi Saxonici (1839–48), an extensive study of Anglo-Saxon and Norman legal and administrative documents was delayed until the 20th…

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• legal profession
  • 
    In legal profession: England after the Conquest

    England after the Norman Conquest of 1066 also was influenced by Roman example, and the clerics who staffed the Norman and Plantagenet monarchies and who provided the earliest of their judges enabled the notion of a legal profession, and especially of litigious representation, to be…

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• police systems
  • 
    In police: Collective responsibility in early Anglo-Saxon times

    The earliest policing system in England, which predates the Norman Conquest in 1066, was community-based and implied collective responsibility. The Saxon frankpledge required all adult males to be responsible for the good conduct of each other and to band together for their community’s protection. To formalize that obligation, they were…

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  • 
    In police: The development of professional policing in England

    At the same time that the lieutenant general of police was trying to maintain public order in Paris, the reactive and inefficient urban policing system of England, in which nearly unpaid public constables had to rely on private, stipendiary thief-takers to maintain an appearance…

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  • 
    In police: Detective policing in England and the United States

    The investigation of crimes was not a central function of the early preventive police departments in England and the United States. Yet, despite the high hopes of reformers when they created police forces, the number of preventable crimes was limited.…

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• pornography
  • 
    In pornography

    … came to the throne in Great Britain in 1837, there were more than 50 pornographic shops on Holywell Street (known as “Booksellers’ Row”) in London. Pornography continued to flourish during the Victorian Age in Britain and in the United States despite—or perhaps because of—the taboos on sexual topics that were…

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• post-World War II economic recovery
  • 
    In history of Europe: Affluence and its underside

    In Britain, although there was no economic miracle, there were industrial success stories in chemicals, quality cars, nuclear energy, and aviation. It was a British airline that in 1952 inaugurated the world’s first purely jet airline service. By the end of the decade, Heathrow in London…

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• radio broadcasting history
  • 
    In radio: Great Britain

    When the first regular radio broadcasting began in London in 1922, the station was privately owned (by receiver manufacturers). It was supported by a tax on new receivers as well as by a continuing annual fee for receiver owners. The British Broadcasting Company,…

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• Rebecca Riots
  • 
    In Rebecca Riots

    …disturbances that occurred briefly in 1839 and with greater violence from 1842 to 1844 in southwestern Wales. The rioting was in protest against charges at the tollgates on the public roads, but the attacks were symptomatic of a much wider disaffection caused by agrarian distress, increased tithe charges, and the…

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• Revolutions of 1848
  • In Revolutions of 1848

    In the United Kingdom it amounted to little more than a Chartist demonstration and a republican agitation in Ireland. In Belgium, the Netherlands, and Denmark it manifested itself in peaceful reforms of existing institutions, but democratic insurrections broke out in the capitals of the three great monarchies,…

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• television history
  • 
    In television: Mechanical systems

    …by John Logie Baird in Britain (see the photograph) and Charles Francis Jenkins in the United States to build the world’s first successful televisions. The question of priority depends on one’s definition of television. In 1922 Jenkins sent a still picture by radio waves, but the first true television success,…

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• trade relations with China
  • 
    In China: Western challenge, 1839–60

    …cause of the first Sino-British clash in the 19th century, began in the late 18th century as the British attempted to counterbalance their unfavourable China trade with traffic in Indian opium. After monopolizing the opium trade in 1779, the East India Company’s government began to sell the drug at…

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• transatlantic slave trade
  • 
    In transatlantic slave trade: Origins of the transatlantic trade of enslaved people

    …and in the following century English and French merchants controlled about half of the transatlantic slave trade, taking a large percentage of their human cargo from the region of West Africa between the Sénégal and Niger rivers. In 1713 an agreement between Spain and Britain granted the British a monopoly…

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  • 
    In transatlantic slave trade: Banning the trade of enslaved people

    After Great Britain outlawed slavery throughout its empire in 1833, the British navy diligently opposed the trade of enslaved people in the Atlantic and used its ships to try to prevent slave-trading operations. Brazil outlawed the trade of enslaved people in 1850, but the smuggling of…

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Cold War

• 
  In Cold War: Origins of the Cold War

  …the United States and Great Britain on the one hand and the Soviet Union on the other began to unravel. By 1948 the Soviets had installed left-wing governments in the countries of eastern Europe that had been liberated by the Red Army. The Americans and the British feared the permanent…

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• 
  In 20th-century international relations: The economic battle with Communism

  Britain was exhausted and committed to the Labour government’s extensive welfare programs. In France, Charles de Gaulle’s postwar government quickly gave way to a Fourth Republic paralyzed by quarreling factions that included a large, disciplined Communist party. In Italy, too, Communists threatened to gain power…

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• 
  In 20th-century international relations: Great Britain and decolonization

  The Suez crisis of 1956, followed by Soviet space successes and rocket-rattling after 1957, dealt serious blows to the morale of western Europe. Given the potential of the war scares over Berlin to fracture NATO, the United States had to reassure its…

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• Berlin blockade and airlift
  • 
    In Berlin blockade

    …powers (the United States, the United Kingdom, and France) to abandon their post-World War II jurisdictions in West Berlin.

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• Truman Doctrine
  • In Truman Doctrine

    …followed World War II, Great Britain announced that it could no longer afford to aid those Mediterranean countries, which the West feared were in danger of falling under Soviet influence. Truman outlined what became known as the Truman Doctrine in a speech to a joint session of Congress on March…

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conflicts

• Afghanistan War
  • 
    In Afghanistan War: Iraq takes centre stage

    …killed in Afghanistan, while the British troops suffered some 300 deaths and the Canadians some 150. Both Britain and Canada stationed their troops in Afghanistan’s south, where fighting had been most intense. More than 20 other countries also lost troops during the war, though many—such as Germany and Italy—chose to…

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  • 
    In Afghanistan War: Prelude to the September 11 attacks

    and British invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001 was preceded by over two decades of war in Afghanistan (see Afghan War). On December 24, 1979, Soviet tanks rumbled across the Amu Darya River and into Afghanistan, ostensibly to restore stability following a coup that brought to…

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  • 
    In Afghanistan War: The September 11 attacks and the U.S.-British invasion

    The hijacking and crashing of four U.S. jetliners on September 11, 2001, brought instant attention to Afghanistan. The plot had been hatched by al-Qaeda, and some of the 19 hijackers had trained in Afghanistan. In the aftermath of the attacks, the administration of…

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• Alabama claims
  • 
    In Alabama claims

    …the United States against Great Britain, accumulated during and after the American Civil War (1861–65). The claims are significant in international law for furthering the use of arbitration to settle disputes peacefully and for delineating certain responsibilities of neutrals toward belligerents. The dispute centred on the Confederate cruiser Alabama, built…

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• Anglo-Afghan Wars
  • In Afrīdī

    British encounters with the Afrīdīs began during the first Anglo-Afghan War (1839–42), notably when General George Pollock fought against them during his march to Kabul. After the British annexation of the Punjab in 1849, various methods were tried to keep the Khyber Pass open, including…

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  • 
    In Anglo-Afghan Wars

    …1878–80; 1919) in which Great Britain, from its base in India, sought to extend its control over neighbouring Afghanistan and to oppose Russian influence there.

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• Argentina
  • 
    In Argentina: Independence

    …movement began in 1806–07, when British attacks on Buenos Aires were repelled in the two battles known as the Reconquista and the Defensa. Also important there, as elsewhere in Spanish America, were the ramifications of Napoleon I’s intervention in Spain, beginning in 1808, which plunged that country into a civil…

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• Austrian Succession War
  • In War of the Austrian Succession

    …her main foreign support from Britain, which feared that, if the French achieved hegemony in Europe, the British commercial and colonial empire would be untenable. Thus, the War of the Austrian Succession was, in part, one phase of the struggle between France and Britain that lasted from 1689 to 1815.

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• Battle of the Dunes
  • 
    In Battle of the Dunes

    …a victory of French and British forces led by Henri de La Tour d’Auvergne, vicomte de Turenne, over Spanish forces near Dunkirk (then just north of the French frontier in the Spanish Netherlands). The victory led to the surrender of Dunkirk by Spain and eventually to the conclusion of

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• Bering Sea Dispute
  • In Bering Sea Dispute

    …the one hand, and Great Britain and Canada, on the other, over the international status of the Bering Sea. In an attempt to control seal hunting off the Alaskan coast, the United States in 1881 claimed authority over all the Bering Sea waters. Britain refused to recognize this claim. In…

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• Bloody Sunday
  • In Bloody Sunday

    …which advocated violence against the United Kingdom to force it to withdraw from Northern Ireland. The incident remained a source of controversy for decades, with competing accounts of the events. In June 2010 the Saville Report, the final pronouncement of a government inquiry initiated by British Prime Minister Tony Blair…

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• Channel Islands
  • 
    In Channel Islands

    …source of long-standing dispute between England and France until 1953, when the International Court of Justice confirmed British sovereignty. In the late 20th century the dispute revived, as sovereignty of these islands determines allocation of rights to economic development (specifically, petroleum) of the continental shelf.

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• Crimean War
  • 
    In Crimean War

    … between the Russians and the British, French, and Ottoman Turkish, with support from January 1855 by the army of Sardinia-Piedmont. The war arose from the conflict of great powers in the Middle East and was more directly caused by Russian demands to exercise protection over the Orthodox subjects of the…

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  • 
    In Siege of Sevastopol

    …War (1853–56), in which 50,000 British and French troops (joined by 10,000 Piedmontese troops during 1855), commanded by Lord Raglan and Gen. François Canrobert, besieged and finally captured the main naval base of the Russian Black Sea fleet. Sevastopol’s defenses had been built by the military engineer Colonel Eduard Totleben,…

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• Danish-Swedish armed neutrality treaty
  • 
    In Denmark: Foreign policy

    …export of Norwegian timber to Great Britain. During wars in the middle of the century, Denmark-Norway had to bow to the British claim of ruling the waves. In 1780, during the American Revolution (1775–83), the Danish foreign minister Andreas Peter, greve (count) af Bernstorff, negotiated an armed neutrality treaty with…

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  • 
    In Denmark: The Napoleonic Wars and their aftermath

    …1800, was considered hostile by Great Britain. In 1801 British navy ships entered The Sound and destroyed much of the Danish fleet in a battle in the Copenhagen harbor. When the British fleet next proceeded to threaten the Swedish naval port of Karlskrona, Russia started negotiations with Britain. The result…

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• Easter Rising
  • 
    In Easter Rising

    …Rising, Irish republican insurrection against British government in Ireland, which began on Easter Monday, April 24, 1916, in Dublin. The insurrection was planned by Patrick Pearse, Tom Clarke, and several other leaders of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, which was a revolutionary society within the nationalist

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• Essex county
  • 
    In Essex

    …the Indians, the French, the British, and the Americans. At the fortifications in Crown Point, the British dislodged the French (August 4, 1759), who in turn were ousted by the Green Mountain Boys (May 11, 1775). Similarly, Fort Ticonderoga was held by the French (1755–59) and the British (1759–75) until…

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• Ethiopia
  • In Tewodros II

    …Tewodros to feel insulted by England. When he imprisoned several British missionaries and envoys, accusing them of plotting against him, Great Britain sent the Napier expedition (1867–68) to rescue the prisoners. Aided by rebellious nobles along the way, the British force attacked Tewodros’s forces at Magdela on April 10, 1868.…

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  • 
    In Ethiopia: Tewodros II (1855–68)

    In 1862 Tewodros offered Britain’s Queen Victoria an alliance to destroy Islam. The British ignored the scheme, and, when no response came, Tewodros imprisoned the British envoy and other Europeans. This diplomatic incident led to an Anglo-Indian military expedition in 1868. Sir Robert Napier, the commander, paid money and…

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• Falkland Islands
  • 
    In Falkland Islands War

    war fought between Argentina and Great Britain in 1982 over control of the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas) and associated island dependencies.

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  • 
    In Argentina: Galtieri and the Falklands War

    …Argentina increased pressure on the United Kingdom to relinquish the Falkland Islands. With popular support at home, Argentine troops landed on the Falklands and South Georgia island in early April, overcame the British Royal Marines stationed there, and raised the Argentine flag. For the next three weeks, while a British…

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  • 
    In 20th-century international relations: Marxism and the Cuban role

    The British government of Margaret Thatcher was taken by surprise but began at once to mobilize supplies, ships, and men to reconquer the islands some 8,000 miles from home. The United States was torn between loyalty to its NATO ally (and political friend of President Reagan)…

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  • 
    In naval warfare: The age of the guided missile

    …Falkland Islands War between the United Kingdom and Argentina in 1982 exhibited the tactical environment of sea-based forces fighting land-based forces in the guided-missile era. In this, the only extended naval campaign after World War II, were observed several modern influences on naval combat. First, submarines were formidable weapons, not…

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• Fashoda Incident
  • In Fashoda Incident

    …territorial disputes in Africa between Great Britain and France.

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• First Coalition
  • 
    In French Revolution: Counterrevolution, regicide, and the Reign of Terror

    Austria, Prussia, and Great Britain formed a coalition (later called the First Coalition), to which most of the rulers of Europe adhered. France lost Belgium and the Rhineland, and invading forces threatened Paris. These reverses, as those of 1792 had done, strengthened the extremists. The Girondin leaders were driven…

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• Iran-Iraq War
  • In law of war: Neutrals

    …states; for this reason, the United Kingdom declared its neutrality in the war between Iran and Iraq (1980–88), refusing to sell either side military equipment that would have significantly enhanced its capability to prolong the conflict.

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• Irish Republican Army
  • 
    In Irish Republican Army

    …a republic, the end of British rule in Northern Ireland, and the reunification of Ireland.

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• Jebel Akhdar War
  • In Jebel Akhdar War

    …Oman, who was aided by Britain. The rebels sought independence and control of the interior lands and any oil to be found therein.

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• King William’s War
  • In King William’s War

    …by William III of Great Britain and the League of Augsburg against France under Louis XIV. Canadian and New England colonists divided in support of their mother countries and, together with their respective Indian allies, assumed primary responsibility for their own defense. The British, led by Sir William Phips, captured…

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• Lundy’s Lane Battle
  • In Battle of Lundy’s Lane

    After defeating the British in the Battle of Chippewa on July 5, 1814, U.S. troops under General Jacob Brown established themselves at Queenston. On the night of July 24–25, a British force under General Phineas Riall moved forward to Lundy’s Lane. On the 25th he was reinforced by…

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• Libya
  • 
    In Libya: Intensification of international efforts: NATO air strikes, diplomacy, and ICC warrants

    …United States, France, and the United Kingdom. The handover came after several days of debate among NATO countries over the limits of international military intervention; several countries argued that the coalition’s aggressive targeting of pro-Qaddafi ground forces had exceeded the mandate set by the UN Security Council to protect civilians.

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• Malayan Emergency
  • In Malayan Emergency

    …the unification of several former British territories, including Sabah and Sarawak. The negotiations included special guarantees of rights for Malays (including the position of sultans) and the establishment of a colonial government. These developments angered the Communist Party of Malaya, an organization that was composed largely of Chinese members and…

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• Mexico
  • 
    In Mexico: French intervention

    …suspended all payments to Spain, Britain, and France. The three European powers prepared to send a punitive expedition to Mexico. The intervention was spearheaded by Spain, the forces of which landed at Veracruz on December 14, 1861, and were followed soon after by French and British contingents. When the allies…

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• Moroccan crises
  • In Moroccan crises

    …also agreed not to oppose Britain’s moves in Egypt in exchange for a free hand in Morocco. Germany, however, insisted upon an open-door policy in the area; and, in a dramatic show of imperial power, the emperor William II visited Tangier and, from his yacht on March 31, 1905, declared…

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• Paraguay
  • 
    In Paraguay: Paraguay’s conflicts with its neighbours

    …a complex diplomatic issue, but British war vessels captured and held for a time the flagship of the small Paraguayan navy. In most of those contretemps, López was forced to give in, and the consequent humiliation lent greater urgency to his desire to strengthen Paraguay’s defenses. By the time of…

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• Peninsular War
  • 
    In Peninsular War

    …to turn his attention toward Britain and toward Sweden and Portugal, the two powers that remained allied or friendly to Britain. Russia, it was decided, would deal with Sweden, while Napoleon, allied to Spain since 1796, summoned (July 19) the Portuguese “to close their ports to the British and declare…

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• Russia
  • 
    In Russia: Foreign policy

    …with France, Austria, and Great Britain.

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  • 
    In Russia: Foreign policy

    …interfere with the interests of Britain in other parts of China, made an alliance with Japan in January 1902. Negotiations between Russia and Japan continued, but they were insincere on both sides. On the night of January 26/27 (February 8/9, New Style), 1904, Japanese forces made a surprise attack on…

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  • 
    In Soviet Union: The Civil War and the creation of the U.S.S.R.

    …in varying measures supported by Great Britain with money and war matériel. The Allied intervention was initially inspired by the desire to reactivate the Eastern Front, but after the Armistice it lost its clear purpose, and it was continued on the insistence of Winston Churchill, who saw in Bolshevism a…

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• Second Persian Gulf War
  • 
    In Iraq: Post-9/11 tension and the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq

    …the United States and the United Kingdom argued that Iraq had resorted to its earlier practices, that it was willfully hindering inspection efforts, and that, given the large volume of material unaccounted for from previous inspections, it doubtless continued to conceal large quantities of proscribed weapons. Other countries, particularly France,…

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  • 
    In Iraq War

    …from the United States and Great Britain (with smaller contingents from several other countries) invaded Iraq and rapidly defeated Iraqi military and paramilitary forces. It was followed by a longer second phase in which a U.S.-led occupation of Iraq was opposed by an insurgency. After violence began to decline in…

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• Seven Years’ War
  • 
    In Seven Years’ War

    >Great Britain on the other. The war arose out of the attempt of the Austrian Habsburgs to win back the rich province of Silesia, which had been wrested from them by Frederick II (the Great) of Prussia during the War of the Austrian Succession (1740–48).…

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• Spanish Marriages Affair
  • In Affair of the Spanish Marriages

    …breakdown of friendly relations between England and France.

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• Suez Crisis
  • In aggression

    …in 1949, between Israel, Great Britain, France, and Egypt in 1956, and between Israel, Jordan, and Egypt in 1970. None of these states was at the time declared an aggressor. On the other hand, Japan was found to be an aggressor in Manchuria in 1933, Paraguay in the Chaco area…

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  • 
    In Suez Crisis

    Britain and France feared that Nasser might close the canal and cut off shipments of petroleum flowing from the Persian Gulf to western Europe. When diplomatic efforts to settle the crisis failed, Britain and France secretly prepared military action to regain control of the canal…

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  • 
    In 20th-century international relations: The Suez Crisis

    The British were understandably hostile to Nasser, as were the French, who were battling Islāmic nationalists in Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia.

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• Taliban
  • 
    In Afghanistan: U.S.-led invasion and toppling of the Taliban

    …attacks, the United States and Britain launched an intensive bombing campaign against the Taliban and provided significant logistical support to Northern Alliance forces in an attempt to force the regime to yield to its demands. Devastated by the U.S. bombardment, Taliban forces folded within days of a well-coordinated ground offensive…

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• Trafalgar
  • 
    In Battle of Trafalgar

    …the Napoleonic Wars, which established British naval supremacy for more than 100 years; it was fought west of Cape Trafalgar, Spain, between Cádiz and the Strait of Gibraltar. A fleet of 33 ships (18 French and 15 Spanish) under Admiral Pierre de Villeneuve fought a British fleet of 27 ships…

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• Trent Affair
  • In Trent Affair

    …nearly precipitated war between Great Britain and the United States. On Nov. 8, 1861, Captain Charles Wilkes, commanding the Union frigate San Jacinto, seized from the neutral British ship Trent two Confederate commissioners, James Murray Mason and John Slidell, who were seeking the support of England and France for the…

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• Venezuelan boundary dispute
  • 
    In Venezuela: The reigns of Guzmán Blanco and Crespo

    …serious diplomatic problem—a dispute with Great Britain over the boundary between eastern Venezuela and western British Guiana. This virtually uninhabited wilderness territory, in which gold was discovered in 1877, had been the object of alternating claims and counterclaims between Venezuela and Great Britain for more than half a century. Great…

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• Viceroyalty of Río de la Plata
  • 
    In Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata

    …addition, by the 1760s the British had made clear their intention to take the Falkland (Malvinas) Islands. Although Spain pressured the British out of temporary possession of the islands, the need for greater military control of the South Atlantic region had become apparent.

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culture

• blackface minstrelsy
  • In blackface minstrelsy

    …both the United States and Britain. Although blackface minstrelsy gradually disappeared from the professional theatres and became purely a vehicle for amateurs, its influence endured in later entertainment genres and media, including vaudeville theatre, radio and television programs, and the world-music and motion-picture industries of the 20th and 21st centuries.

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economic affairs

• Bank of England
  • 
    In bank: The origins of central banking

    2 million to the British government to fund its war against France, eventually became the world’s most powerful and influential financial institution. It was the first public bank to assume most of the characteristics of modern central banks, including acceptance, by the late 19th century, of an official role…

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• Bodø Affair
  • In Bodø Affair

    …a dual monarchy) and Great Britain. The affair arose over the illegal trading activities of an English company in the Norwegian port of Bodø, where Norwegian officials in 1818 seized a large cargo belonging to the company and arrested one of its owners, who later escaped. The Stockholm foreign ministry,…

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• Canton system
  • 
    In Canton system

    …Chinese and foreign merchants, especially British, in the South China trading city of Guangzhou (Canton) from the 17th to the 19th century. The major characteristics of the system developed between 1760 and 1842, when all foreign trade coming into China was confined to Canton and the foreign traders entering the…

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• Chinese Pidgin English
  • In Chinese Pidgin English

    …a trade language between the British and the Chinese, first in Canton, China, and later in other Chinese trade centres (e.g., Shanghai). Although some scholars speculate that Chinese Pidgin English may be based on an earlier Portuguese pidgin used in Macao from the late 16th century (as evidenced by certain…

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• Continental System
  • In Continental System

    … designed by Napoleon to paralyze Great Britain through the destruction of British commerce. The decrees of Berlin (November 21, 1806) and Milan (December 17, 1807) proclaimed a blockade: neutrals and French allies were not to trade with the British.

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• fiscal crisis
  • In fiscal crisis

    …by Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom and Ronald Reagan in the United States. Such thinking was given powerful credence by the fiscal crises and growing economic and political instability experienced in several major industrialized economies. This was most evident in the United Kingdom when, in September 1976, Chancellor of…

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• opium trade
  • 
    In opium trade

    …in which Western countries, mostly Great Britain, exported opium grown in India and sold it to China. The British used the profits from the sale of opium to purchase such Chinese luxury goods as porcelain, silk, and tea, which were in great demand in the West, while addiction to opium…

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• post-World War II
  • 
    In history of Europe: Planning the peace

    Britain received $3.75 billion, but only on condition that it make sterling freely convertible. As soon as it did, there was a run on the pound. The entire loan, it was reckoned, would have melted away in two and a half months if Britain had…

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• smuggling
  • In smuggling

    …spirits, and silks in 18th-century England, coffee in many European countries, and tobacco almost everywhere) or prohibitions on importation (narcotics) or on exportation (arms and currency).

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• South Sea Bubble
  • In South Sea Bubble

    …speculation mania that ruined many British investors in 1720. The bubble, or hoax, centred on the fortunes of the South Sea Company, founded in 1711 to trade (mainly in slaves) with Spanish America, on the assumption that the War of the Spanish Succession, then drawing to a close, would end…

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• Suez Canal Company’s holdings
  • 
    In Suez Canal: Finance

    …on the part of Great Britain, Lesseps was anxious for international participation and offered shares widely. Only the French responded, however, buying 52 percent of the shares; of the remainder, 44 percent was taken up by Saʾīd Pasha. The first board of directors included representatives of 14 countries.

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Industrial Revolution

• 
  In Industrial Revolution: The first Industrial Revolution

  …Revolution was largely confined to Britain. Aware of their head start, the British forbade the export of machinery, skilled workers, and manufacturing techniques. The British monopoly could not last forever, especially since some Britons saw profitable industrial opportunities abroad, while continental European businessmen sought to lure British know-how to their…

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• 
  In history of Europe: Economic effects

  …revolution took shape, led by Britain, which retained leadership in industrialization well past the middle of the 19th century. In 1840, British steam engines were generating 620,000 horsepower out of a European total of 860,000. Nevertheless, though delayed by the chaos of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars, many western…

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• 
  In modernization: The dual revolution

  …world, the Industrial Revolution in Great Britain laid down the economic pattern. It also brought revolutionary changes to society. The share of people employed in agriculture fell from 60 percent to about 25 percent, while the share of those employed in industry rose from less than 20 percent to nearly…

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• effect on 18th-century Europe
  • 
    In history of Europe: Innovation and development

    As those names suggest, Britain was the country that experienced the breakthrough to higher levels of production. The description “Industrial Revolution” is misleading if applied to the economy as a whole, but innovations in techniques and organization led to such growth in iron, woolens, and, above all, cotton textiles…

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• technological advances
  • 
    In history of Europe: The old industrial order

    …and John Kaye’s flying shuttle, British inventions set textile production on a dizzy path of growth. Abraham Darby’s process of coke smelting was perhaps the most important single improvement, since it liberated the iron founder from dependence on charcoal. The shortage of timber, a source of anxiety everywhere except in…

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international relations

• Arabia
  • 
    In history of Arabia: Omani expansion

    …the East India Company and British paramountcy in India began to affect Arabian politics and commerce most directly in the southern coastal region, while the interior was little concerned at first. Coastal Arabia now came fully into the world economy through commerce in coffee, slaves, pearls, and dates and the…

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• Australia
  • 
    In John Howard

    …its historic ties to the United Kingdom and become a republic with a president appointed by a two-thirds majority of Parliament. The referendum failed to carry, and Howard, who had opposed it, was vindicated.

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• Austria
  • 
    In Austria: New conflicts with the Turks and the Bourbons

    …with Spain, whereupon France, Great Britain, and Prussia formed a rival alliance. But soon after Russia was won over to the Habsburg cause, Prussia changed sides. As the outbreak of a European war seemed imminent, attempts were made at the Congress of Soissons to relax political tensions. Spain abruptly changed…

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  • 
    In Austria: Allied occupation

    , British, French, and Soviet). In September 1945 a conference of representatives of all states extended the authority of the Renner government to all parts of Austria.

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  • 
    In Austria: Seven Years’ War, 1756–63

    …enemies being France and Great Britain on the one hand and Prussia and Austria on the other, the reversal refers to Austria’s abandoning Great Britain as an ally in favour of France and Prussia’s abandoning France as an ally in favour of Great Britain. However, it may be argued that…

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  • 
    In Austria: Anschluss and World War II

    …the foreign ministers of Great Britain, the U.S.S.R., and the United States, a declaration was published that declared the Anschluss null and void and pledged the Allies to restore Austrian independence; it also reminded the Austrians that they had to make an effort to rid themselves of the German yoke.…

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• Austria-Hungary
  • 
    In Austria: International relations: the Balkan orientation

    Having Great Britain as an ally in his opposition to the Russian advance in southeastern Europe and Bismarck as an “honest broker,” Andrássy managed at the Congress of Berlin in July 1878 to force Russia to retreat from its excessive demands. Bulgaria was broken up again, Serbian…

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  • 
    In Austria: Foreign policy, 1878–1908

    …Mediterranean Agreements of 1887 joined Great Britain to the powers (Austria-Hungary and Italy) interested in blocking Russia from the Straits and enabled Kálnoky to abandon direct agreements with Russia. The Three Emperors’ League of 1881 was allowed to expire, and Austria-Hungary was thus left without any formal understanding with Russia.…

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• Bahrain
  • 
    In Bahrain: The British protectorate

    Several times during the 19th century, the British intervened to suppress war and piracy and to prevent the establishment of Egyptian, Persian, German, or Russian spheres of influence. The first Bahraini-British treaty was signed in 1820, although the country’s British-protected status dates from…

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• Belgium
  • 
    In Belgium: The Austrian Netherlands

    …Asia, but England and the United Provinces forced him after a few years to abandon the project. At the death of Charles VI in 1740, the southern Netherlands passed to his daughter Maria Theresa. The War of the Austrian Succession, however, resulted in a new French occupation in 1744. Austrian…

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• Brunei
  • 
    In Brunei: Growing significance and journey toward independence

    In 1979 the United Kingdom and Brunei signed a treaty whereby Brunei would become fully independent in 1984. Malaysia and Indonesia both gave assurances that they would recognize Brunei’s status, thereby allaying the sultan’s concern that the state might be incorporated by one of its larger neighbours.

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• Bulgaria
  • 
    In Bulgaria: Treaties of San Stefano and Berlin

    …was intolerable to Austria-Hungary and Britain, and they forced a revision of the Treaty of San Stefano a few months later at the Congress of Berlin.

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  • 
    In Bulgaria: Consolidation of power

    …to the new regime; Great Britain had already done so in February.

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• Colombo Plan
  • In Colombo Plan

    Australia, New Zealand, and Great Britain. The United States, Japan, and a number of Southeast Asian, East Asian, and Pacific countries joined later. The plan came into full operation in 1951. Its name was changed following the end of participation by several newly communist countries of Southeast Asia.

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• Diego Garcia
  • 
    In Diego Garcia

    …the United States and the United Kingdom. Development of this base for air and naval support in the late 1970s and ’80s evoked strong opposition from littoral states of the Indian Ocean area, who wished to preserve a nonmilitarized status in the region. Numerous air operations were launched from Diego…

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• European Union
  • 
    In 20th-century international relations: The world political economy

    ” Only Thatcher of the United Kingdom voiced doubts about merging Britain into a continental superstate. The alternative, however, would seem to leave Britain out in the cold, and so, despite Thatcher’s opposition, plans for European unity went ahead. (In 1990, members of Thatcher’s own party forced her resignation over…

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• Georgia
  • 
    In Georgia: National revival

    …occupation of Georgia by the British. The Georgians viewed Anton Ivanovich Denikin’s counterrevolutionary White Russians, who enjoyed British support, as more dangerous than the Bolsheviks. They refused to cooperate in the effort to restore the tsarist imperial order, and British forces evacuated Batʿumi in July 1920.

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• German reunification
  • 
    In 20th-century international relations: From skepticism to reality

    …pushing it too hard, while British Prime Minister Thatcher was openly skeptical. Gorbachev was expected to demand large concessions in return for his approval. Bush presumably had reassured him at Malta that events would not be allowed to get out of control. To underscore their intention to assert their rights…

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• Germany
  • 
    In Germany: Foreign policy, 1890–1914

    Moreover, Tirpitz’s plans alienated Britain. Germany already had the most powerful army in the world when it fastened on becoming a great naval power. The British found this threatening and negotiated an alliance with Japan in 1902 and another one with France in 1904. In 1907 Britain settled its…

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  • 
    In Germany: Allied occupation and the formation of the two Germanys, 1945–49

    purposes of occupation, the Americans, British, French, and Soviets divided Germany into four zones. The American, British, and French zones together made up the western two-thirds of Germany, while the Soviet zone comprised the eastern third. Berlin, the former capital, which was surrounded by the Soviet zone, was placed under…

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• Greece
  • 
    In Greece: Western encroachments

    …1815, the establishment of a British protectorate. Although governed like a colony, the Ionian Islands under British rule, in theory, constituted an independent state and an example of free Greek soil, adjacent to but not under the control of the Ottoman Empire.

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  • 
    In Greece: The Metaxas regime and World War II

    With the support of a British military mission, the guerrillas engaged in some spectacular acts of resistance, most notably the destruction in November 1942 of the Gorgopotamos viaduct, which carried the railway line from Thessaloníki to Athens, and in April 1944 the kidnapping and removal to Egypt of the German…

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• Hungary
  • 
    In Hungary: War and renewed defeat

    Great Britain threatened to declare war, and Teleki, blaming himself for the development of a situation that it had been his life’s aim to avoid, committed suicide on April 2. His successor, László Bárdossy, waited until Croatia had declared its independence (April 10) and then,…

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• Iceland
  • 
    In Iceland: Fishing limits

    …provoked strong protests from the United Kingdom and West Germany, and the British navy was repeatedly sent to the Icelandic fishing grounds to protect British trawlers. The struggle with Britain, commonly known as the “Cod Wars,” came to an end in 1976 when Britain recognized the 200-mile limit. Although all…

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• Iran
  • 
    In Iran: The Qājār dynasty (1796–1925)

    …trade were followed by a British mission from India in 1800, which ultimately opened the way for a drain of Persian bullion to India. This drain was made inevitable by the damage done to Iran’s productive capacity during Āghā Muḥammad Khan’s campaigns to conquer the country.

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• Iraq
  • 
    In Baghdad: Beginnings of modernization

    In 1798 a permanent British diplomatic residency was established there, and the British residents soon acquired a power and prestige second only to that of the governor.

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  • 
    In Iraq: The fall of the Mamluks and the consolidation of British interests

    Britain’s influence in Iraq had received a major boost in 1798 when Süleyman Paşa gave permission for a permanent British agent to be appointed in Baghdad. This increasing European penetration and the restoration of direct Ottoman rule, accompanied by military, administrative, and other…

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  • 
    In Iraq: British occupation and the mandatory regime

    Merging the three provinces of Mosul, Baghdad, and Basra into one political entity and creating a nation out of the diverse religious and ethnic elements inhabiting these lands were accomplished after World War I. Action undertaken by the British…

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• Ireland
  • 
    In Ireland: The 19th and early 20th centuries

    …Ireland, as part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, would have 100 members in the House of Commons, about one-fifth of the body’s total representation. The union of the churches of England and Ireland as the established denominations of their respective countries was also effected, and the…

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• Islamic world
  • 
    In Islamic world: The rise of British colonialism to the end of the Ottoman Empire

    By 1818 British hegemony over India was complete, and many other colonies and mandates followed between then and the aftermath of World War I. Not all Muslim territories were colonized, but nearly all experienced some kind of dependency, be it psychological, political, technological, cultural, or economic. Perhaps…

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  • 
    In Islamic world: Islamist movements from the 1960s

    …al-Aʿlā al-Mawdūdī (1903–79), founder in British India in 1941 of the Islamic Assembly, the first Islamic political party. The Islamic Assembly was reconfigured after the partition of Pakistan and India in 1947 in order to support the establishment of an Islamic state in Pakistan.

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• Israel and Palestine
  • 
    In Zionism

    …he found support in Great Britain. In 1903 the British government offered 6,000 square miles (15,500 square km) of uninhabited Uganda for settlement, but the Zionists held out for Palestine.

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• Italy
  • 
    In Italy: The war of 1859

    Britain, however, opposed the restoration of conservative governments in Modena and Tuscany, and Napoleon III, with his position at home strengthened by the acquisition of Savoy and Nice, reconsidered his position. As a result, Cavour’s policy prevailed, and he returned to office on January 21,…

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• Japan
  • 
    In Shimazu Hisamitsu

    …retinue, his followers attacked four Britons who rode past the procession without paying proper respect to Hisamitsu. One was killed and two others were wounded. Britain’s demand for a huge indemnity precipitated a major crisis. The shogun agreed to pay £100,000, but the Satsuma han refused to pay anything. The…

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  • 
    In Japan: The growth of the northern problem

    In 1808 the English warship Phaeton made an incursion on Nagasaki, and three years later the Russian naval lieutenant V.M. Golovnin landed on Kunashiri Island, where he was arrested by bakufu authorities. When these various incidents were resolved, peace continued for a time in the northern regions; the…

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  • 
    In Japan: Foreign relations

    The United States and Great Britain did what they could to assist the Chinese Nationalist cause. The Burma Road into southern China permitted the transport of minimal supplies to Nationalist forces. Constant Japanese efforts to close this route led to further tensions between Great Britain and Japan. Anti-Japanese feeling…

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• Jordan
  • 
    In Jordan: Transjordan, the Hashemite Kingdom, and the Palestine war

    …Palestine, was given to Great Britain, and the other, over Syria, went to France. This act effectively separated the area now occupied by Israel and Jordan from that of Syria. In November 1920 Abdullah, Faisal’s brother, arrived in Maʿān (then part of the Hejaz) with 2,000 armed supporters intent on…

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• Kashmir region
  • 
    In Kashmir: The region to 1947

    …this princely state helped the British safeguard their northern flank in their advance to the Indus and beyond during the latter part of the 19th century. The state thus formed part of a complex political buffer zone interposed by the British between their Indian empire and the empires of Russia…

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• Kruger telegram
  • In Kruger telegram

    …on the Transvaal from the British-controlled Cape Colony. The telegram was interpreted in the Transvaal as a sign of possible German support in the future. William’s intention was to demonstrate to the British that they were diplomatically isolated and should become friendly with Germany. This proved to be a diplomatic…

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• League of Nations
  • 
    In 20th-century international relations: The realist vision

    On the other hand, if Britain and the United States pursued their own interests without regard to French needs, then France would be forced to find solutions to its triple crisis through harsher treatment of Germany.

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  • 
    In 20th-century international relations: Poland and Soviet anxiety

    …refuse, their obstinacy might give London an excuse to leave them to their fate. Colonel Beck, however, had seen the fate of Schuschnigg and Hácha, and he would not submit to a Hitlerian kidnapping or to another Munich. When Hitler’s ultimatum expired, the German army staged a border incident and…

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• Libya
  • 
    In Libya: Independence

    …a volunteer Sanūsī force, the British foreign minister pledged in 1942 that the Sanūsīs would not again be subjected to Italian rule. During the discussions, which lasted four years, suggestions included an Italian trusteeship, a United Nations (UN) trusteeship, a Soviet mandate for Tripolitania, and various compromises. Finally, in November…

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• Madagascar
  • 
    In Madagascar: Formation of the kingdom (1810–61)

    … (1810–28), allied himself with the British governor of the nearby island of Mauritius, Sir Robert Farquhar. In order to prevent reoccupation of the east coast by the French, Farquhar supported Radama’s annexation of the area by supplying him with weapons and advisers and giving him the title “King of Madagascar.”…

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• Mozambique
  • 
    In Mozambique: Consolidation of Portuguese control

    …Portuguese claims—establishing Mozambique’s northern boundary—British claims to the region contradicted those of Portugal, leading to prolonged negotiations. However, the Portuguese crown was heavily in debt to British financiers, and the small country was no match for Britain’s military; in 1891 Portugal was forced to accept Britain’s definition of Mozambique’s…

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• Oman
  • In Saʿīd ibn Sulṭān: Rise to power

    …his reign he was under British pressure to end the slave trade. He told a captain of the Royal Navy that “to put down the slave trade with the Muslims, that is a stone too heavy for me to lift without some strong hand to help me.” By a treaty…

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  • 
    In Oman: Periodic civil unrest

    …Al-Sīb was negotiated by the British between the tribal leaders and Sultan Taymūr ibn Fayṣal, who reigned in 1913–32. By its terms, the sultan recognized the autonomy but not the sovereignty of the Omani interior.

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• Ottoman Empire
  • 
    In Ottoman Empire: Military defeats and the emergence of the Eastern Question, 1683–1792

    …in that stance by neutral Britain and the Netherlands, who sought to guard the commercial privileges that they had secured from the sultan through the Capitulations by preventing any country from gaining control of the entire Ottoman Empire and thereby becoming dominant in Europe. Russia and Austria fought the Ottomans…

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• Poland
  • 
    In Poland: The Second Republic

    Accepting British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s guarantee of March 1939 and turning it into a full-fledged alliance with Britain, Warsaw rejected German demands. On September 1, 1939, Hitler, having secured Soviet cooperation through the German-Soviet (Molotov-Ribbentrop) Nonaggression Pact a week earlier, launched an all-out attack against…

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• pre-World War I Europe
  • 
    In history of Europe: Prewar diplomacy

    …Germany’s rapid industrial surge, threatened Britain. France ran a massive empire, but its nationalistic yearnings were not fully satisfied and the humiliating loss of Alsace-Lorraine had not been avenged. Russia encountered a new opponent in the Far East in the rise of Japan. The Japanese, fearful of Russian expansion in…

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• Qatar
  • 
    In Qatar: Early history and British protectorate

    In 1916 Britain signed a treaty with Qatar’s leader that resembled earlier agreements with other Gulf states, giving Britain control over foreign policy in return for British protection.

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  • In flag of Qatar

    The Ottoman Empire, Iran, and Britain all had an interest in finding allies among the small Arab sheikhdoms in the Persian Gulf during the 19th century. A treaty signed in 1868 between Britain and one of those states, Qatar, may have been the occasion for the creation of the distinctive…

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• Romania
  • 
    In Romania: From democracy to dictatorship

    …they saw in France and Britain the chief guarantors of the postwar international order.

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• Saudi Arabia
  • 
    In Saudi Arabia: Ibn Saud and the third Saudi state

    … (1914–18) he was aided by British subsidies, but he managed by adroit diplomacy to be relatively quiescent, though surrounded by enemies. In 1919, however, he struck his first blow, against Hussein ibn Ali of the Hejaz, whose army was annihilated by the Ikhwān. In 1920 Ibn Saud’s son Faisal captured…

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• South Pacific Commission
  • In Secretariat of the Pacific Community

    New Zealand, the Netherlands, Great Britain, and the United States to advise them on economic, social, and health matters affecting the South Pacific island territories they administered. It is the oldest regional organization in the Pacific and is headquartered in Nouméa, New Caledonia. Guam and the Trust Territory of…

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• Spain
  • 
    In Spain: The War of the Spanish Succession

    To England, a Bourbon king in Spain would disrupt the balance of power in Europe in favour of French hegemony. Louis XIV conceived of Spain under a Bourbon king as a political and commercial appendage of France to be ruled by correspondence from Versailles. He wished…

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• sphere of influence
  • 
    In sphere of influence

    Thus, the agreement between Great Britain and Germany in May 1885, the first to make use of the term, provided for “a separation and definition of their respective spheres of influence in the territories on the Gulf of Guinea.” This agreement was followed by many of a similar nature, of…

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• Sweden
  • 
    In Sweden: Royalist reaction

    England, at the moment busy in Spain, could offer little help. Sweden thus became politically isolated, with enemies in the east, south, and west. The Swedish army defended Finland poorly, with that defense reaching its nadir when the strong fortress of Sveaborg near Helsingfors was…

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  • 
    In Sweden: Policy during World War I

    For Great Britain, the blockade was an important weapon, and Sweden’s demand to import freely favoured Germany exclusively. As a result, the Allies stopped a large percentage of Sweden’s trade. This, however, not only affected Sweden’s exports to Germany but also from 1916 caused a severe…

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• Syria
  • 
    In Syria: Egyptian domination

    After an ultimatum, a British, Ottoman, and Austrian force landed on the Syrian coast; the British encouraged a local insurrection, and the Egyptians were forced to withdraw from Syria, which reverted to the sultan’s government.

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  • 
    In Syria: Uprising and civil war

    >United Kingdom were opposed to military action. A motion in the British Parliament to authorize strikes in Syria failed on August 29, and a similar vote in the U.S. Congress was postponed. Meanwhile, diplomacy took centre stage, resulting in an agreement between Russia, Syria, and…

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  • 
    In Syrian Civil War: Civil war

    >United Kingdom were opposed to military action. A motion in the British Parliament to authorize strikes in Syria failed on August 29, and a similar vote in the U.S. Congress was postponed on September 10. Meanwhile, diplomacy took centre stage, resulting in an agreement between…

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• Thailand
  • 
    In Chulalongkorn

    …1909 Siam ceded to Great Britain the four Malay states of Kelantan, Trengganu, Kedah, and Perlis, and this brought some moderation of the system of extraterritoriality—which ended only two decades later. In relations with the West, Chulalongkorn even-handedly balanced the colonial powers against one another and consistently sought to have…

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  • 
    In Thailand: The early Chakri kings and a resurgent Siam

    When Britain declared war on the Burmese kingdom in 1824, Rama III feared that the British might also attack Siam. He subsequently agreed to sign the Burney Treaty (1826), which set conditions for the conduct of trade between the two countries.

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• Tibet
  • 
    In Tibet: Administration and culture under the Manchu

    …and the diplomatic visits from British India, which had been started in 1774. Tibet was now closed, and mutual ignorance enshrouded future exchanges with its British neighbours in India.

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• United Nations
  • 
    In United Nations: History and development

    United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union took the lead in designing the new organization and determining its decision-making structure and functions. Initially, the “Big Three” states and their respective leaders (Roosevelt, Churchill, and Soviet premier Joseph Stalin) were hindered by disagreements on issues that foreshadowed…

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• United States
  • 
    In United States: Imperial organization

    British policy toward the American colonies was inevitably affected by the domestic politics of England; since the politics of England in the 17th and 18th centuries were never wholly stable, it is not surprising that British colonial policy during those years never developed along clear…

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  • 
    In United States: Madison as president and the War of 1812

    …of pain and resentment against Great Britain and its people—still for many Americans a kind of paternal relationship. And, by freeing them of anxieties on this front, it also freed Americans to look to the West.

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  • 
    In United States: The road to war

    …allow belligerents (in reality only Great Britain and France, both on the Allied side) to purchase munitions on a cash-and-carry basis. With the fall of France to Germany in June 1940, Roosevelt, with heavy public support, threw the resources of the United States behind the British. He ordered the War…

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• Yemen
  • 
    In Yemen: Two Yemeni states

    …had the upper hand; the British finally accepted the inevitable and arranged the transfer of sovereignty to the NLF on November 30, 1967.

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occupation of

• Dominica
  • 
    In Dominica: The French and British colonial period

    The first colonists (1632) were French, but, with the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748), Great Britain and France agreed to treat the island as neutral ground and leave it to the Caribs. From that time until 1805, Dominica went back and forth between…

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• Jerusalem
  • 
    In Jerusalem: Modern Jerusalem

    In December 1917 British troops under Edmund Allenby entered Jerusalem after the retreat of Ottoman forces. This opened a new era that lasted until 1948, during which Jerusalem again became a capital, this time of a territory administered by the British under a mandate from the League of…

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• Malawi
  • In flag of Malawi

    …just prior to independence, the British territory of Nyasaland, renamed Malawi at independence, was granted a coat of arms, which replaced a flag badge of earlier British colonial origin. The new design showed a leopard and a lion with a shield between them. On the shield was portrayed a stylized…

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• Palestine
  • 
    In Palestine: World War I and after

    Palestinian Arabs, however, believed that Great Britain had promised them independence in the Ḥusayn-McMahon correspondence, an exchange of letters from July 1915 to March 1916 between Sir Henry McMahon, British high commissioner in Egypt, and Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī, then emir of Mecca, in which the British made certain commitments to…

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  • 
    In Palestine: Civil war in Palestine

    On May 14 the last British high commissioner, General Sir Alan Cunningham, left Palestine. On the same day the State of Israel was declared and within a few hours won de facto recognition from the United States and de jure recognition from the Soviet Union. Early on May 15 units…

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• South Sudan
  • 
    In South Sudan: Colonial administration

    jointly by Egypt and Great Britain, with a governor-general appointed by the khedive of Egypt but nominated by the British government. In reality, however, there was no equal partnership between Britain and Egypt in the Sudan, as the British dominated the condominium from the beginning. Their first order of…

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• Tangier
  • 
    In Tangier: History

    …it was transferred to the English crown as part of the dowry of Catherine of Braganza, wife of Charles II. The English put great hopes on this new possession, but, though a fine mole (breakwater) was built and a new fortification erected, the expense of maintaining the city against Moroccan…

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policy toward

• African slave trade
  • 
    In Southern Africa: Legitimate trade and the persistence of slavery

    …1807 they succeeded in persuading Britain to abolish the trade; British antislavery ships soon patrolled the western coast of Africa. Ivory became the most important export from west-central Africa, satisfying the growing demand in Europe. The western port of Benguela was the main outlet, and the Ovimbundu and Chokwe, renowned…

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• American Indian land
  • 
    In Native American: England

    England was the only imperial nation in which colonial companies were successful over the long term, in large part because ordinary citizens were eventually granted clear (and thus heritable) title to land. In contrast, other countries generally reserved legal title to overseas real estate to…

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• Irish Potato Famine
  • 
    In Great Famine: Great Famine relief efforts

    The British government’s efforts to relieve the famine were inadequate. Although Conservative Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel continued to allow the export of grain from Ireland to Great Britain, he did what he could to provide relief in 1845 and early 1846. He authorized the import…

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ships and shipping history

• 
  In ship: 17th-century developments

  …Century” was the 17th, and England’s overtaking of France as Europe’s seat of industry also occurred then. The English realized quickly that their merchant ships had to carry enough cannon and other firepower to defend their factories at Bombay and elsewhere and to ward off pirates and privateers on the…

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• 
  In ship: Early examples

  British inventors were active in this same period. Both Rumsey and Fitch ultimately sought to advance their steamboats by going to England, and Robert Fulton spent more than a decade in France and Britain promoting first his submarine and later his steamboat. In 1788 William…

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• 
  In ship: The Atlantic Ferry

  Steamship transportation was dominated by Britain in the latter half of the 19th century. The early efforts there had been subsidized by mail contracts such as that given to Cunard in 1840. Efforts by Americans to start a steamship line across the Atlantic were not notably successful. One exception was…

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• “Titanic” disaster
  • 
    In Titanic: British inquiry

    ” In May 1912 the British inquiry began. It was overseen by the British Board of Trade, the same agency that had been derided by U.S. investigators for the insufficient lifeboat requirements. The presiding judge was Sir John Charles Bigham, Lord Mersey. Little new…

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treaties and alliances

• Act of Union, 1707
  • In Act of Union

    …Scotland under the name of Great Britain.

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• Act of Union, 1801
  • In Act of Union

    … under the name of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

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• Anglo-Irish Agreement
  • 
    In Anglo-Irish Agreement

    British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Garret FitzGerald, the Irish taoiseach (prime minister), on November 15, 1985, at Hillsborough Castle in County Down, Northern Ireland, that gave the government of Ireland an official consultative role in the affairs of Northern

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• Algeciras Conference
  • In Algeciras Conference

    …Entente Cordiale, signed by Great Britain and France, had provided, among other things, for British support of French special interests in Morocco. France’s attempt to implement the agreement by presenting the Moroccan sultan with a program of economic and police “reforms” brought the indignant German emperor William II to Tangier…

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• Amiens Treaty
  • In Treaty of Amiens

    , by Britain, France, Spain, and the Batavian Republic (the Netherlands), achieving a peace in Europe for 14 months during the Napoleonic Wars. It ignored some questions that divided Britain and France, such as the fate of the Belgian provinces, Savoy, and Switzerland and

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• Ankara Treaty reaction
  • In Treaty of Ankara

    …differences between France and Great Britain, which continued to recognize the sultan’s government in Istanbul, and by releasing Turkish nationalist forces from the southeastern front for fighting on the western front against the Greeks.

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• Antarctic Treaty
  • In Antarctic Treaty

    Australia, Belgium, Britain, Chile, France, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa, the United States, and the Soviet Union. Later other nations acceded to the treaty.

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  • 
    In Antarctica: The Antarctic Treaty

    the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States), the treaty was enacted on June 23, 1961.

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• Berlin Congress
  • 
    In Congress of Berlin

    …satisfy the interests of Great Britain (by denying Russia the means to extend its naval power and by maintaining the Ottoman Empire as a European power) and to satisfy the interests of Austria-Hungary (by allowing it to occupy Bosnia and Herzegovina and thereby increase its influence in the Balkans). In…

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• Berlin West Africa Conference
  • In Berlin West Africa Conference

    …Free State, to which Great Britain, France, and Germany had already agreed in principle.

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• Campo Formio Treaty
  • In Treaty of Campo Formio

    …the original anti-French coalition, only Britain remained hostile to France after the conclusion of this treaty; Prussia had made peace in March 1795 after the effectuation of the Third Partition of Poland in January 1795.

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• Çanak Treaty
  • In Treaty of Çanak

    …the Ottoman Empire and Great Britain at Çanak (now Çanakkale, Tur.) that affirmed the principle that no warships of any power should enter the Straits of the Dardanelles and the Bosporus. The treaty anticipated the London Straits Convention of 1841, by which the other major powers committed themselves to this…

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• Central Treaty Organization
  • In Central Treaty Organization

    Iran, Pakistan, and the United Kingdom. Until March 1959 the organization was known as the Middle East Treaty Organization, included Iraq, and had its headquarters in Baghdad.

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• Dumbarton Oaks Conference
  • 
    In Dumbarton Oaks Conference

    …the United States, and the United Kingdom formulated proposals for a world organization that became the basis for the United Nations.

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• Entente Cordiale
  • In Entente Cordiale

    …matters, ended antagonisms between Great Britain and France and paved the way for their diplomatic cooperation against German pressures in the decade preceding World War I (1914–18). The agreement in no sense created an alliance and did not entangle Great Britain with a French commitment to Russia (1894).

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• Geneva Accords
  • In Geneva Accords

    United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, the Viet Minh (i.e., the North Vietnamese), and the State of Vietnam (i.e., the South Vietnamese). The 10 documents—none of which were treaties binding the participants—consisted of 3 military agreements, 6 unilateral declarations, and a Final Declaration…

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• Ghent Treaty
  • 
    In Treaty of Ghent

    …agreement in Belgium between Great Britain and the United States to end the War of 1812 on the general basis of the status quo antebellum (maintaining the prewar conditions). Because the military positions for each side were so well balanced, neither country could obtain desired concessions. No mention was made…

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• Hünkâr iskelesi Treaty
  • In Treaty of Hünkâr İskelesi

    …been rejected by Austria, Great Britain, and France, accepted Russian military aid early in 1833. In return he concluded, at the village of Hünkâr İskelesi, near Istanbul (Constantinople), an eight-year treaty that proclaimed peace and friendship between the two nations and a commitment to reach a mutual agreement on all…

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• Laibach Congress
  • In Congress of Laibach

    …of Modena and Tuscany, and British and French observers, the congress proclaimed its hostility to revolutionary regimes, agreed to abolish the Neapolitan constitution, and authorized the Austrian army to restore the absolutist monarchy. The British and French protested the decision, thereby encouraging unsuccessful resistance among the Neapolitans. A similar revolt…

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• Locarno, Pact of
  • 
    In Pact of Locarno

    France, Belgium, Great Britain, and Italy mutually guaranteed peace in western Europe. The treaties were initialed at Locarno, Switz., on October 16 and signed in London on December 1.

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• London Naval Conference
  • In London Naval Conference

    Hosted by Great Britain, it included representatives of the United States, France, Italy, and Japan. At the end of three months of meetings, general agreement had been secured on the regulation of submarine warfare and a five-year moratorium on the construction of capital ships. The limitation of aircraft…

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• Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Treaty
  • 
    In Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

    …1, 1968, signed by the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and 59 other states, under which the three major signatories, which possessed nuclear weapons, agreed not to assist other states in obtaining or producing them. The treaty became effective in March 1970 and was to remain so…

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• Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty
  • 
    In Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty

    …the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom that banned all tests of nuclear weapons except those conducted underground.

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• Paris Peace Conference
  • 
    In Paris Peace Conference

    …was attributable chiefly to the British prime minister, David Lloyd George, who chose to have his mandate confirmed by a general election before entering into negotiations.

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• Peace of Paris
  • 
    In Peace of Paris

    …signed by representatives of Great Britain on one side and the United States, France, and Spain on the other. Preliminary articles (often called the Preliminary Treaty of Paris) were signed at Paris between Britain and the United States on November 30, 1782. On September 3, 1783, three definitive treaties were…

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• Quadruple Alliance of 1718
  • In Quadruple Alliance

    … joined the Triple Alliance of Britain, the Dutch Republic (United Provinces), and France to prevent Spain from altering the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht (1713). Philip V of Spain, influenced by his wife, Elizabeth Farnese of Parma, and her adviser Giulio Alberoni, seized control of

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• Quadruple Alliance of 1813
  • In Quadruple Alliance

    …of the Napoleonic Wars, by Britain, Russia, Austria, and Prussia, for the purpose of defeating Napoleon, but conventionally dated from Nov. 20, 1815, when it was officially renewed to prevent recurrence of French aggression and to provide machinery to enforce the peace settlement concluded at the Congress of Vienna. The…

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• Quadruple Alliance of 1834
  • In Quadruple Alliance

    …on April 22, 1834, between Britain, France, and the more liberal claimants to the thrones of Spain and Portugal against the conservative claimants to those thrones. The alliance successfully supported Maria Cristiana, who was acting as regent for Isabella II in Spain and had allied herself with the liberals against…

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• Schönbrunn Treaty
  • In Treaty of Schönbrunn

    …diplomatic and trade relations with Britain. The treaty was followed by a short period of close ties between France and Austria.

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• Southeast Asia Treaty Organization
  • 
    In Southeast Asia Treaty Organization

    the Philippines, Thailand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The treaty came into force on February 19, 1955. Pakistan withdrew in 1968, and France suspended financial support in 1975. The organization held its final exercise on February 20, 1976, and formally ended on June 30, 1977.

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• Strangford Treaty
  • In Strangford Treaty

    …its Brazilian colony, and Great Britain, represented by its ambassador, Lord Strangford. The treaty provided for the importation of British manufactures into Brazil and the exportation of Brazilian agricultural produce to Great Britain; also, British naval vessels were allowed to be resupplied in Brazilian ports, British Protestants were given freedom…

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• Tilsit Treaties
  • In Treaties of Tilsit

    …System against British trade if Britain rejected Russian mediation in its conflict with France. Russia was given a free hand to conquer Finland from Sweden. Prussia was forced to join the Continental System and close its ports to British trade.

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• Treaty of Paris
  • In Treaty of Paris

    …signed by representatives of Great Britain and Hanover on one side and France and Spain on the other, with Portugal expressly understood to be included. It was signed in Paris on Feb. 10, 1763.

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• Versailles Treaty
  • 
    In history of Europe: The mood of Versailles

    Public opinion in France and Britain wished to impose harsh terms, especially on Germany. French military circles sought not only to recover Alsace and Lorraine and to occupy the Saar but also to detach the Rhineland from Germany. Members of the British Parliament lobbied to increase the reparations Germany was…

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• Vienna Congress
  • 
    In Congress of Vienna: Preliminaries

    Russia, and Great Britain, the four powers that were chiefly instrumental in the overthrow of Napoleon, had concluded a special alliance among themselves with the Treaty of Chaumont, on March 9, 1814, a month before Napoleon’s first abdication. The subsequent treaties of peace with France, signed on May…

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World War I

• 
  In 20th-century international relations: The era of the great powers

  …States and enforced by the British navy, sufficed to spare Latin America new European adventures, the only major exception—Napoleon III’s gambit in Mexico—occurring while the United States was preoccupied with civil war. When the United States purchased Alaska from the Russian tsar and Canada acquired dominion status, both in 1867,

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• 
  In 20th-century international relations: Germany’s final battles

  …on November 4 (excepting a British reservation about “freedom of the seas,” a French one about “removal of economic barriers and equality of trade conditions,” and a clause enjoining Germany to repair war damage). House and Wilson jubilantly concluded that the foundations of a liberal peace were in place: substitution…

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• 
  In World War I: The outbreak of war

  Thereupon, Great Britain, which had no concern with Serbia and no express obligation to fight either for Russia or for France but was expressly committed to defend Belgium, on August 4 declared war against Germany.

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• 
  In World War I: The Armistice

  In addition, the British were about to bomb Berlin on a scale hitherto unattempted in air warfare.

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• air warfare
  • 
    In military aircraft: Airships

    …blockaded in port by the Royal Navy, mounted a night bombing offensive—the first aerial strategic bombardment campaign in history.

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• German blockade
  • 
    In United States: Loans and supplies for the Allies

    Difficulties arose first with the British government, which at once used its vast fleet to establish a long-range blockade of Germany. The U.S. State Department sent several strong protests to London, particularly against British suppression of American exports of food and raw materials to Germany. Anglo-American blockade controversies were not…

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• navicert system
  • In visit and search

    The United States, however, protested on the ground that international law did not permit diversion of the vessel unless search at sea showed probable cause for capture. As a result, the British adopted the navicert system in 1916. The navicert issued by the belligerent’s representative in…

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• Sykes-Picot Agreement
  • 
    In Sykes-Picot Agreement

    …World War I between Great Britain and France, with the assent of imperial Russia, for the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire. The agreement led to the division of Turkish-held Syria, Iraq,

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World War II

• 
  In 20th-century international relations: Poland and Soviet anxiety

  The British and French parliaments, confident that their governments had turned every stone in search of peace, declared war on Germany on September 3.

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• 
  In 20th-century international relations: The final Allied agreements

  …was the refusal to order British and American armies to race the Soviets to Berlin. On March 7, 1945, General George Patton’s tanks broke through weak German lines and the 1st Army infantry captured intact a Rhine bridge at Remagen. Churchill pleaded for a rapid thrust in order to secure…

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• 
  In World War II: The outbreak of war

  In response, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany on September 3, at 11:00 am and at 5:00 pm, respectively. World War II had begun.

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• 
  In World War II: The German collapse, spring 1945

  , British, and French delegations. At midnight on May 8, 1945, the war in Europe was officially over.

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• Battle of Britain
  • 
    In World War II: The Battle of Britain

    …on Germany’s sole remaining enemy: Great Britain, which was protected from the formidable German Army by the waters of the English Channel. On July 16, 1940, Hitler issued a directive ordering the preparation and, if necessary, the execution of a plan for the invasion of Great Britain. But an amphibious…

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• Battle of the Atlantic
  • In Battle of the Atlantic

    Britain lost French naval support just when its own sea power had been hurt by losses incurred in the retreat from Norway and the evacuation from Dunkirk and stretched by Italian belligerency. Axis air power imperiled and eventually barred the direct route through the Mediterranean…

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• Casablanca Conference
  • 
    In Casablanca Conference

    Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and their respective military chiefs and aides, who planned future global military strategy for the western Allies. Though invited, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin declined to attend.

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• Czechoslovakia recognition
  • 
    In Czechoslovak history: World War II

    …1941 the Soviet Union and Britain jointly granted the Beneš government in exile full recognition; U.S. recognition arrived only in October 1942. Along with seeking recognition for his government, Beneš devoted his efforts to getting the Munich agreement annulled.

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• Deception Island claim
  • 
    In Deception Island

    Argentina, Chile, and the United Kingdom, each of which claims the island, all have operated stations there. Volcanic eruptions and earthquakes disturbed the island in 1967 and thereafter.

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• Dunkirk evacuation
  • 
    In Dunkirk evacuation

    … seaport of Dunkirk (Dunkerque) to England. Naval vessels and hundreds of civilian boats were used in the evacuation, which began on May 26. When it ended on June 4, about 198,000 British and 140,000 French and Belgian troops had been saved.

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• fascist movement
  • 
    In fascism: National fascisms

    The British Union of Fascists, led by Oswald Mosley, had some 50,000 members. In Belgium the Rexist Party, led by Léon Degrelle, won about 10 percent of the seats in the parliament in 1936. Russian fascist organizations were founded by exiles in

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• Hitler
  • 
    In Adolf Hitler: Dictator, 1933–39

    Britain was a possible ally, provided that it would abandon its traditional policy of maintaining the balance of power in Europe and limit itself to its interests overseas. In the west France remained the natural enemy of Germany and must, therefore, be cowed or subdued…

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• landing ship, tank development
  • 
    In landing ship, tank

    The British recognized the need for such ships after the debacle at Dunkirk in 1940, when they left behind tons of badly needed equipment because no vessels were available with the capability to bridge the gap between the sea and the land. Following the evacuation, Prime…

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• Munich Agreement
  • 
    In Munich Agreement

    …settlement reached by Germany, Great Britain, France, and Italy that permitted German annexation of the Sudetenland, in western Czechoslovakia.

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• North Africa campaigns
  • 
    In North Africa campaigns

    …1935 alliance that had pledged Britain, France, and Italy to jointly oppose German rearmament and expansion. In fact, just the opposite happened: fascist Italy turned its back to the democratic West and took to the road of alliance with Nazi Germany. On October 25, 1936, the Rome-Berlin Axis was proclaimed,…

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  • 
    In North Africa campaigns: Egypt and Libya (Autumn 1941–January 1943)

    The British undertook that offensive with more than twice as many tanks as their opponent. In addition, some one-third of Rommel’s tanks were poorly armed Italian ones. Rommel handled his tanks more skillfully than the British, however, and he made clever and effective use of concealed…

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  • 
    In North Africa campaigns: Planning a second front in Africa

    The Anglo-U.S. invasion of northwest Africa had its origins at the Arcadia Conference in Washington, D.C., in the winter of 1941–42 and at meetings in London the following July. Under pressure from Soviet leader Joseph Stalin to open a second front, the Western Allies debated how…

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• Oder-Neisse Line
  • In Oder–Neisse Line

    …the three major Allied powers—Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and the United States—moved back Poland’s eastern boundary with the Soviet Union to the west, placing it approximately along the Curzon Line. Because this settlement involved a substantial loss of territory for Poland, the Allies also agreed to compensate the reestablished…

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• operations research
  • 
    In operations research: History

    …discipline, however, in 1937 in Britain as a result of the initiative of A.P. Rowe, superintendent of the Bawdsey Research Station, who led British scientists to teach military leaders how to use the then newly developed radar to locate enemy aircraft. By 1939 the Royal Air Force formally commenced efforts…

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• Pacific War
  • 
    In Pacific War: Japan’s strategy in the Pacific and Southeast Asia

    …hypothetical enemies and China and Great Britain were included. Until 1941, however, the basic assumption was that Japan would be fighting only a single enemy, not two or three enemies simultaneously. In the event of war with the United States, the plan called for the Japanese Navy to destroy the…

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• Potsdam Conference
  • 
    In Potsdam Conference

    Truman, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (or Clement Attlee, who became prime minister during the conference), and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin.

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• Quebec Conference
  • 
    In Quebec Conference

    and British strategists about the coordination of the Italian campaign with Operation Overlord (the planned Normandy Invasion) were not resolved and had to be settled at meetings in Moscow, Tehrān, and Cairo later that year. Roosevelt and Churchill met again at Quebec the following year—the Octagon…

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• Russo-Finnish War
  • In Russo-Finnish War

    Unable to secure help from Britain and France, the exhausted Finns made peace (the Treaty of Moscow) on Soviet terms on March 12, 1940, agreeing to the cession of western Karelia and to the construction of a Soviet naval base on the Hanko Peninsula.

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• Tehrān Conference
  • 
    In Tehrān Conference

    Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin in Tehrān during World War II. The chief discussion centred on the opening of a “second front” in western Europe. Stalin agreed to an eastern offensive to coincide with the forthcoming Western Front, and he…

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• Tobruk
  • 
    In Tobruk

    The British captured the port from the Italians in January 1941, taking 25,000 prisoners in the process. The British were then forced by the Germans to withdraw to the east, leaving Tobruk an isolated British garrison that was periodically besieged by the Germans (March 1941–June 1942)…

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• Yalta Conference
  • 
    In Yalta Conference

    ” Britain and the United States supported a Polish government-in-exile in London, while the Soviets supported a communist-dominated Polish committee of national liberation in Lublin. Neither the Western Allies nor the Soviet Union would change its allegiance, so they could only agree that the Lublin

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