Sir Bartle Frere and the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879
Damian O’Connor examines the motives of the man who started the conflict.
The film Zulu has made the Anglo-Zulu war of 1879 perhaps the most well-known colonial campaign of the Victorian era. The war is also known to students because the British defeat at Isandhlwana contributed to the downfall of Disraeli’s ministry in 1880. To explain how the conflict started, historians have traditionally concentrated on theories of capitalist exploitation and missionary imperialism, but these are now being challenged by revisionist historians.
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