Sir George Goldie and the making of Nigeria
Date
1960
Authors
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Publisher
London: Oxford University Press
Abstract
• Early years • Trade and politics on the Niger river • Towards political power • Berlin and the charterLakes • Administration and the liverpool opposition • German opposition—and a setback • Major macdonald investigates • Giving away mountains and rivers and lakes • The revenge of the brassmen • The burdens of empire • The war against nupe and ilorin • Crisis • Decline and fall • Years of retirement
Description
This biography of Sir George Goldie brings to life the motives and driving energies of one of the most remarkable, and hitherto most mysterious, of the ‘Empire-builders’ of late-Victorian times. The great part played by Goldie in the creation of Nigeria as a British colony is not often fully recognized or appreciated. It was he who determined its political frontiers and the basic pattern of its administration.
Through the Royal Niger Company, which he founded and personally directed, he built a private empire on the Niger that became the prototype for other chartered companies in Africa. Before he died, Goldie destroyed all his papers and refused to give out any information that would allow his biography to be written. In 1952, however, the British government opened the records of its correspondence with Goldie, and with the aid of these papers and several collections of private letters, the author has been able to examine, stage by stage, the way in which Goldie obtained a commanding position from which he often dictated the West African policies of British prime ministers and foreign secretaries.
Keywords
Sir George Goldie-politics