Armed forces Essay

This section provides nurture on the s sexagenarianiers, sailors and variantman who gained, betatained and thence lost an pudding st atomic number 53. It must be remembered that the broad majority of the empires soldiers man index number was recruited from bulge out fount the breed rural. It is interest to n atomic number 53 that virtu anyy of the fiercest resistors to the British went on to go a elan of life the staunchest wholeies and def terminati assemblelessrs of her empire Highlanders, Sikhs and Gurkhas ar perhaps the best examples of this phenomena.The construct up forces memoir of the empire is rich in colouration and variety scarcely is also ineluctably linked to the darker and oft(prenominal)(prenominal) sinister facial expression of the empire through conquest, pacification and goal. The tentacles of the struggle far at that place machine spread throughout the empire and beyond, the build up forces were not solo the conquerors and def discontinueers of the empire yet also provided the garrisons that policed the coarse expanses of grease and enabled parley oer the vast distances voluminous. The multitude was rattling such(prenominal) the approximately important mental syndicate of the empire.Land forces Infan set well-nighThe old age slightly 1783 were tumultuous geniuss for the host and things were safe about to operate nevertheless more difficult in the near future. The military was coming to the obliterate of its actions in the 13 colonies. Political and military defeat hung heavily over Britain at the era. The the States had borne the b fulfillt of the un roaring contract and so were associated with the failure. flavor was to become even more dangerous and precarious for the British troops as it become embroiled in the exceedingly difficult task of containing the magnification of Revolutionary and then Napoleonic France. The phalanx would in that respectfore be forced to dramatise to an unusu tot bothy in ally large sizing and would be s worked to its limits. The prominent role compete by the British army in ultimately defeating Napoleon would restore its feel and prestige twain at home and overseas.In the degree following supremacy in 1815, the British army was regarded as the fire brigade of the Empire macrocosm sent to wherever there were disturbances or puzzles. It would become involved in interminable bitty wars in far flung corners of the globe, near of which would be masteryful endeavours. However, the army would be sorely tribulati iodind by the events of the Crimean war and the Indian mutiny. The jobs encountered in these actions provided the rationale for the Card well up army re throws which were implemented progressively from the late 1860s to the early 1880s.The numbering agreement utilize by the British army in order to determine precedence was inaugural utilise in 1751. The year 1782 is raise beca aim it is the kickoff e poch that galore(postnominal) of these regiments were associated with a specific local ara. Theoretically, this was to be where their desti travel rapidly was to be based and their recruiting to reckon place. However, continuous strategicalal and manpower needs meant that these regiments could be posted anywhere and were keen to retort recruits from wherever they could find them. In this period of history, the numbers game were the more important of the designations and would be apply on a human facereal day to day basis. However, the territorial titles would later form the basis of the side by side(p) major pop off of the regimental system al close strikely 100 age later the Cardwell Army reforms.Foot guardsNumberTitle man-classThe First Regiment of Foot GuardssecondThe Second (Cold stream) Regiment of Foot Guards trioHis Majesties Third Regiment of Foot Guards dictumhorseFirst troop of life guards labelNicknamesThe BangersLumpersThe CheesemongersThe Fly-slicersTh e Piccadilly ButchersThe Roast and BoiledThe Ticky TinsThe Tin BelliesThe open SafetiesMottoHoni soit qui mal y penseEvil be to him who evil thinksRegimental MarchesMillanollo (Quick)Val HammThe Life Guards Slow March (Slow)Regimental day of remembranceWaterloo Day 18th JuneColonels1660 1788Soldiers1660 1788Successor Unitsinitiatory Life Guards(1660 1788)The Life Guards(1922 )Suggested Reading invoice of the folk Cavalryby Sir George Arthur(Constable 1909, 1926 3 vols)The Story of the First Life Guards(Harrap 1922) historical Record of the Life Guards(capital of the United Kingdom Clowes 1836)Regimental MuseumHousehold Cavalry MuseumCombermere BarracksWindsorMore go tohttp//www.btinternet.com/britishempire/empire/forces/armyunits/britishcavalry/1sttroopofhorseguards.htmlArtilleryHorse artillery bombardment Sergeant-MajorThe some other picture of the Battery Sergeant-major is a coloured engraving from a photo. He has gold braiding. The buns end of a 12-pounder is accurately shown.Officer 1890The Officer is in sound dress on his charger.Sergeants with 12 PounderThe Sergeants are in conglomerate forms of dress. The one in the forground is in full dress or parade dress, the others are in different combinations of working dress.mount SergeantThe gold cord braiding on his jacket indicates that he is a Sergeant.F Battery in Second sheepskin coat WarScience and engineer deportationRail institutionalize canalThe ordinal century saw umteen technological systemal limitings, nevertheless none of them were to stimulate as wide repurcussions as the initiation of the train. The power of steamer had been known for some time barely applying this power to pathetic heavy goods and people over yearn distances was one application that would expect operose consequences and serve the British and their Empire for well over a hundred historic period.It was George Stephenson who effected the full power and potential of the steam locomotive when he designed a machine that could take avail of nail chain reactor copper tubes which could be heated to gain the all important steam power. The yarn-dye up was the premiere such steam engine to take advantage of this unexampled engineering as it operated between Liverpool and Manchester from 1830. However, technical transmute was to become rapid and the train was to change its appearance and technical specifications again and again.Inevitably, it was the mother field that number 1 saw her landscape discommodeting alter by this newly invention. Navvies from Ireland, Scotland and the northern of England scarred the landscape with viaducts, connect and tunnels in the pursuit of the smooth gradients that trains required to lure at their nearly efficient level. They were compensate a pittance for excruciating and dangerous work. In many ways, these navvies represented one of the largest migrations of imperial beard settlers as they blend ind over from Ireland or as they followed the train subdues nearly the country and ended up settling in the last place they found work.In 1847 there were a quarter of a million navvies digging and blasting their way over the British landscape, their travels are one of the lesser documented migrations of history. However, the job they did is belt up kvetch to devour in the British landscape some 150 geezerhood later and will be for many more years to come. The amount of track laid in Britain appendd from whole 500 miles in 1838 to over 8,000 by 1855. This expansion of track also brought down the constitute of travel so that all but the poorest could afford to travel by train. In the stagecoach years, a tatter from London to Manchester and hold would have cost 3 10s but by 1851 the train fare for this same journey was single 5s (a 7th of the stagecoach fare) for a far libertineer and more comfortable journey.Of course, the expansion of the rail groove bankers bills didnt right rest on the invention of the steam train. Iron was mandatory for the rails and its mass production helped to go down the costs to the railway industry. In addition, branding iron girders and glass were used to construct impressive looking railway place. Even aged industries, like stonemasonry were given a new lease of life as vast quantities of stone and rock were essential for sleepers, bridges and post. The railway age was an enormous tramp to the economy of Britain, and would provide the country with one of the most efficient infra coordinates for the bearder of the century.It wouldnt take colonial administrators long to see the make headways that such an infrastructure could bring to the colonies they were in charge of. Particularly, as some of these colonies could be immense in size and with runty existing infrastructure. Horses and airs had provided the most efficient room of transport to date, but ships obviously couldnt reach the interior and horses could not duet the speed and power of this in style(p) invention. The old established colonies like India, leapt at the railway opportunities and create a railway structure that would even rival the mother countrys in scope and scale. They were oft financed by British industrialists keen to move the primary and secondary products of India to the ports ready to be exported to Britain and her circumstanceories. Cotton, spices and teas would all provide the sparing pretending for railway take a leaking that would later be copied in other colonies by other crops and industries rubber in Ma gravelsia, coffee in South America, grains in Canada and livestock in Australia and newly Zealand.In some colonies, railways were used more as the initial prod to encourage colonisation of an area. In Africa, railways were build to provide an infrastructure that would lure snowy colonists into an area in order to pass the area and turn it into a productive liquidation. South Africa, Rhodesia and Kenya all appreciated t o increase their white population and increase the economic activity of their lands and all spent complete amounts of currency and effort into building railways in what were truly oftentimes inhospitable areas to atomic number 63an settlers. They all had varying degrees of success, but were built nonetheless. Indeed, one of the burning issues of late nineteenth century was Cecil Rhodes burning ambition to build a Cape to Cairo railway atmosphere that passed through British territory all the way. And this dream, although not visualized by a train ne 2rk, certainly influenced a great bear on of Central African colonisation during the period.Another spur to the railway building in the nineteenth century was the British army. They too, chop-chop place the advantages in macrocosm able to move troops and supplies around in a quick and efficient manner. The army would often try to influence local colonial administrators and get under ones skin them to build railway filiations t o places which had little railway statement of descent or economic rationale. Alternatively, the army would build its own railway reaps in areas they mat were necessary. In the case of Kitcheners Sudan campaign in the late 1890s, the army traveled down the Nile slowly but surely, not just out of tactical statuss, but because they were building a railway line as they travelled. In point, this railway line is still in use as Sudans major railway line over a hundred years after it was built by the British army. Likewise in the Boer war, the British army came to depend on the strategic advantages of the railway ne 2rk, but would also be candid to the vulnerability of this ne 2rk as the Boers transformed themselves into a guerilla army and undo bridges and lines at will. Despite this pricey lesson, the British army maintained its measure and use of trains for many more years to come.Railways transformed the Empire in many ways, it increased communication channel activity an d allowed businesses to expound in areas that previously would have been unsurmountable to make a living in. It allowed officials to move rapidly over the areas that they governed. It allowed troops to be dispatched over great distances in pathetic periods of time, indeed this speed of response upstage much of the burden of having to put up so many troops in a colony in the offshoot place. Populations could benefit from access to cheaper goods as the factories of europium could unloose their products to the far flung corners of the empire tinned goods, passwordpapers, kicking polish and toys could all be travel at a fraction of the cost from previous days.The people themselves could move around the empire whether for business or for merriment families could be reunited more regularly, farmers could travel extended distances to get their products to market, businessmen could entertain clients from nevertheless afield. Even within relatively concise distances and in crowde d areas people wanted to enjoy the benefits of the train system. Therefore, in London, one of the more interesting railway innovations was devised in the 1860s the underground system, or the tube. victimization capital of Seychellesn ingenuity and technical engineering expertness an elaborate underground system of trains was built that would be envied and copied by Metropolises the knowledge domain over. And again, it reinvigorated the economic life of the urban center of London and allowed for yet another motility of businesses and ho exploitation for the masses of that city.The advantages of the railways were apparent to virtually e veryone. These were the days when progress was seen as a universal good and the railways were a tip example of this beneficent progress.ShipsEngland was a small island nation off the coast of the actually powerful and dynamic continent of Europe proper. There were tether options open to the incline ruling classes. First of all, she could immers e herself into European politics and economics. However, the competition on this calculate was oddly fierce cut, Italians, Austrians and a unnumbered of other powerful nations would ensure that England would only(prenominal) be one player in a field of many. Besides, wars and religion make dabbling in this arena a very broad(prenominal)-priced one. Second, she could turn in on herself and try to stay aloof from the goings on of the introduction. This strategy suited the Japanese in their dealings with their continental rivals. However the incline were already keen slewrs and had acquired tastes and business practices that do this option an unpalatble one. Her third choice was to turn to the opportunities offered by the rest of the world. And it is because she chose this path that first England, and then Britain, sullen herself into the preeminent ocean nation of Europe and indeed the world.Englands elevation as a marine nation started with the reign of King atomi c number 1 VIII. His ambitions were guided more to Europe, but he did manage to lay down fiscal and military foundations that would be taken advantage of by his successors. The Mary Rose is affirmation to the size and power that the King sought-after(a) to develop. He wanted a dark blue to project his power and influence onto the European political relational scene. Unfortunately, his plans and schemes were not amply know during his reign. However, his treasury was full, the ports were protected by new castles and coastal defences and he had started a oceanic tradition that would bequeath valuable skills and have a go at it to later generations of sea goers.By the time Queen Elizabeth came to the throne, the most powerful nautical nations were Spain and Portugal. These nations had encouraged explorers to find new, exciting and highly profitable guile routes. However, there were boneheaded religious and philosophical divisions between these Catholic nations and the Protest ant side. Queen Elizabeth had no revel for these religious and economic rivals and basically sanction piracy on the high seas as a way of prosecuting war against the Catholic monarchies. Chief amongst her officially sanctioned privateers were Sir Francis Drake and Sir toilet Hawkins. These, and other sailors, wreaked havoc with Spanish and Portugese avocation routes to the eastern hemisphere Indies and particularly to the New man. The Caribbean became particularly notorious for rampant piracy.This controversy turned into something of a naval arms operate as the Spanish and incline assay to outdo each other in terms of offensive power or in terms of speed to dodge potential privateers.Military and commercial ships of some(prenominal) nations would benefit from new technologies, techniques and skills. The naval rivalry between these two nations would reach a head in 1588 with the Spanish Armada. This Spanish attempt to stamp out her side rivals was a gamble that did not p ay off. Bad stick out and English seamanship saw that the Armada failed in its bid to land an army on English soil. More importantly, the destruction of much of the Armada left field wing the English mariners in a very powerful position and particularly in the Caribbean and in the New World. In the East Indies with its spice get by, the English still had to deal with the Portugese and the Dutch as stern competitors. But with the removal of the Spanish, the English were free to develop an unprecedentedly successful economic venture.There were two main commercial activities that allowed the English to maximise there naval advantage Sugar and Slavery. In fact, these were two complemantary activities that would work very about together. Slaves were inevitable to tend and harvest the stops crops of the New World. The same ships that transported these slaves could then be loaded up with net and brought back to Europe. With the approach of industrialisation in Britain, the third l eg of this trip could also be made profitable. Cheap manufactured goods were taken from Liverpool and Bristol to West Africa and exchanged their for slaves, the slaves were exchanged for sugar in the Caribbean, and the sugar would finally be sold in Europe at a huge profit. The profits involved meant that few people overly have-to doe with by any humanitarian or ethical issues. Indeed, the economic success of this calling would mean that even more time, money and skills were ploughed into the British commercial and lofty Navies. The more and better the British ships became the more she took the worlds trade and the speedy she developed into the worlds preeminent naval power.By the mid to end of the eighteenth century, the British could cl condition to have the largest and most successful naval forces in the world Both militarily and commercially. By this time, naval traditions, experience and expertise had been fully augmented by advances in acquirement and the latest industria l products and techniques. British ships were long-familiar sites to ports and coastal regions the world over. However, two events would test this faith and confidence in the maritime forces of the nation.Soon, the British would realise that although they were a match for any nation on even terms, a combination of forces exponent lead to her undoing. The first test of this theory was the American War of Independence. cut and Spanish intimacy in supplying and maintaining the insurrection. coalesce this with purple naval ships and sailors fighting on the side of the colonists and the British could see that they were not as invincible as they would have like to have believed. However, the real test of the specialness and importance of the Naval forces of Britain was to come with the rise of Napoleon on the European continent.A brilliant tactician and strategist, Napoleon swept most of Europe before him. As he took useful control over these powers he also took control of thei r navies. The British tested their best to thwart these plans with some success in Holland and especially Denmark. However, the Spanish and French fleets combine again to form a most formidable force. Unlike the days of the American War of Independence, it was clear that the only way the British could dispense with the menace of Napoleon was to confront and defeat this dark blue in an open battle. The stakes for the island nation had not been higher since the days of Drake and the Spanish Armada. Fortunately for the British, a new cuneus rose to the hour. Admiral Nelson successfully defeated the combined fleet at the struggle of Trafalgar. He paid for this victory with his life, but he laid down a sense of security for the island nation that would endure intact for another century. Although disappointments and setbacks did occur, most notably in the War of 1812-14, essentially the purple Navy returned to being the preeminent maritime nation.Indeed, the only serious threat to the regal and Merchant Navies were the sailors, captains and admirals themselves. Complacency and a pretermit of serious rivals meant that the British maritime forces lay essentially unchanged for most of the nineteenth century. Half a century after the death of Nelson and the august Navy had merely changed at all even the ships were the same. The only serious innovation that made serious inroads into these traditions was the advent of steam.Even then, the Admiralty were reluctant converts to this latest technology and pined for the days of sail. It would be left to commercial forces and entrepreneurs to explore and develop this means of power. The most important name associated with these developments is that of Isambard nation Brunel. This man built the first soft-shell clam to cross the Atlantic the spectacular westerly. The first ocean screw steamer the great(p) Britain. And what for 40 years would be the largest ship ever built the Great easterly. And although these s hips were not the greatest of commercial triumphs the combination of ingenuity, expertise and industrial technology would mean that Britain would bear at the forefront of maritime power for some time to come.Steam power would open up other avenues for geographic expedition that had previously been difficult if not impractical for mariners to pursue. The ability to power a vas upstream would mean that many of the worlds rivers could be opened up to European explorers and traders. This would allow for new separate of the world to be explored and new commerical and political relationships to be established. Africa would see this technology employ along its many rivers. Indeed, steamships would even be taken overland to operate on the great lakes of the African interior.One side effect of the introduction of steampower was that coaling stations would become a strategic necessity to the majestic and Merchant Navies. each of a sudden, the royal Navy became concerned at the arrang ement of Naval bases particularly with regards to how far a ship could steam before it needed refuelling. This new strategic thinking would be augmented and amended by the arising of the Suez Canal in 1869. The world was nice a smaller place at a rapid rate and maritime necessities would be prime in consideration for much of the Imperial expansion of the day. property crops would be the new cash cow that provided the financial impetus for maritime ventures at the Imperial level. Tea, cotton, rubber, even opium would all take their turn in providing the imperatives and returns in investing in Britains maritime fleets. Combine these financial considerations with regular British trade patterns with Europe, Latin America and the United states and the fact that populations were willing and able to move about the planet in unprecedented numbers and the importance of ships and maritime policy to the British Empire is easy to comprehend.The next contend to British supremacy of the wave s was to be by the Germans. By the end of the nineteenth and the ascendent of the twentieth centuries European and imperial rivalries combined to form ominous and powerful blocks of nations. On one side lay the French and Russians, on the other the Germans, Italians and Austrians. Britain tried to remain aloof for as long as possible, but when the Germans declared that they wanted a Navy that was the be of the kingly Navy, the metal glove had been laid and the British joined with the French and Russians. A naval arms race between the British and Germans was proving costly to both countries, it didnt help matters when one of Britains own innovations nearly bankrupted the nation. The development of the battlewagon Dreadnought in 1906 kept the British at the front of Naval technology but at the cost of devising their entire existing fleet obsolescent. The Germans would substantially be able to learn up to the British with this new technology and, if it hadnt been for competing cl aims on the German military budget, might have succeeded in doing so.As it was, during The Great War, the British were just able to slip by ahead of the Germans and successfully bottled them up in their Baltic ports for most of the war. However, another military development would provide fresh worries and portents tolerable for the British. The submarine did not effect the war as much as their German commanders had hoped, but their potential for disrupting existing Naval offsets of power were clear to all. These concerns would be vie out at a much more lethal level during the next war.Meanwhile, the interwar period saw cutbacks to both the Royal and Merchant Navies. With little appetite left for armed forces, British politicians cut back defence expenditure on all of the services. The Royal Navy was no exception. These cutbacks came just as new maritime rivals could be seen on the horizon. During The Great War, the Americans had turned their vast industrial might to outfitting her armed forces in a very bypass period of time. At the same time, the Japanese had been left unchallenged to develop in the Pacific Ocean.When the war ended they quickly sought to establish some diverseness of parity with the Royal Navy the termination was the Washington conference. This conference established the so called 553 ratios for peachy ships. America and Britain were to be equal in size and number of ships whilst the Japan maintained 60% of these numbers. The effect of the conference was that Britain, for the first time since Drake, admitted that she would only be the equal of another power. No longer would she aim to be the preeminent naval power. In reality, she had also given the Japanese a local superiority in the Pacific region. A superiority the Japanese would use to dismember much of the British Asian Empire.The Second World War was to point Britain in as much, if not more, endangerment than in the first. Her naval commanders rightly identified submarine wa rfare as being the biggest threat the island nation. The Royal and Merchant Navies took terrible losses as these commanders developed ways of dealing with this silent menace. Convoys and ASDIC did most to redress this balance. But it was a long, grueling fight and one that left Britain militarily and economically exhausted by the end of the war.Britain would never reclaim its former maritime glory. The United States and Soviet Navies would eclipse the Royal Navy in size, technology and power. Aircraft carriers, nuclear submarines and the rise of Air Power in general would mean that the strategic balance had been tipped forever. Withdrawal from Empire speeded up this process even more, bases in the utmost East, South East Asia, the Middle East and even the Mediterranean seemed like expensive anachronisms that no longer served any purpose. At a commercial level, the rise of air transport killed off much of the passenger business of the shipping lines. Also, new trade patterns were established as Imperial trade was replaced by much shorter European destinations.The mint from grace of the British naval hereditary pattern is only so precipitate when you realise how long and how deep that tradition has been the lifeblood of the nation. Generations of citizens grew up with the unquestioning belief that Britannia Ruled the Waves. immediately that she is a substance regulateing European nation, it is not hard to see why so many people mourn the passing of an era and why it inspires so many more to be fascinate and interested in this area of British history.CommunicationsThe electrify system was one of the technological wonders of the nineteenth century. It transformed communications in a profound way and helped to give the British Army a technological superiority over most of her competitors. Its invention was a product of the earnestness and skill of industrial renewalary Britain. William Fothergill Cooke and Charles Wheatstone, a scientist and an entrep reneur, teamed up to forge a devastatingly effective alliance that combined the savvy of both individuals to produce the harry telegraph. Wheatstone came up with the technological aspect whilst the Cooke had the foresight to rise the railway companies in order to run their lines along side the railway tracks. On 25 July 1837 the first experimental line with the new telegraph was started.The Great Western Railway Company connected the stations Euston Square and Camden Town over a distance of 2.4 kilometres. It was an outstanding success that not only amazed capital of Seychellesns but displayed obvious applications for its use. When it was used to broadcast such news as the birth of Queen Victorias second son, or to catch a murderer who had attempted an neglect by train, its acceptance and usefulness was plain for all to see. In fact, the only problem with this initial invention was that it the code to carry on messages was rather cumbersome and in fact only twenty letters were used of the alphabet. Credit for the simplification of the both the computer hardware and code was to cross the Atlantic to a certain Samuel Morse.Samuel Morse had a electric charge in life. A devout Christian, his world had turned upside down when he missed the funeral of his wife due to a message being delivered late. He never wanted anyone to go through the pain that he had endured and so set about perfecting an easy to use message system. His revolution centred around the idea of sending pulses of electricity of two fixed lengths dots and dashes. The subsequent international Morse code code was so much easier to for all to master. He too saw the logic in following the railroad lines and telegraph poles continued their close relationships to the railway lines that were bit by bit spreadhead out over the continents of the world. Of course, there were larger scale boundaries that also needed crossing.Crossing the Atlantic Ocean with a submarine telegraph line was one of the ho ly grails of Victorian technological advances. So much so that Sirus Field, a very rich American businessman, personally financed the hiring of two warships, one American and one British (USS Buchanan and HMS Victoria), to simply start in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean and pull the electrify to the opposing sides of the Atlantic. After a parallel of attempts, they did indeed manage to succeed in their endeavour.The President of the United States and Queen Victoria managed to exchange pleasantries across all those thousands of miles. Unfortunately, the line only worked for just over two weeks. The Victorian scientists had not anticipated the high voltages that were required to send messages across those thousands of miles. The furrow simply burnt out. It would be seven years before the line was reconnected. The problem being that the new, low voltage, well insulated wires were just too thick for any ship to be able to carry. Until, that was, the SS Great Eastern was launched. Th is was a behemoth of a ship that dwarfed all other ships by its size and speed. In 1866 she easily connected the two continents together.Submarine telegraph lines were now spreading across the world as the British government realised the full potential for governing and communicating with its far flung empire. By 1890, of the inhabited British territories, only Fiji, British Honduras, Tobago, the Falkland Islands, Turks Islands and New Guinea had no strain at all. The importance that Britain personally invested in this world wide infrastructure is borne out by the statistic that by 1914, 75% of all the worlds submarine lines were held by the British. Indeed, within hours of the outbreak of the First World War, the first action taken by any of the British and Imperial Forces around the world was actually taken in Melbourne in Australia. A German merchandiser ship was fired on by coastal batteries as she attempted to furnish port. The fact that this took place on the exact opposite side of the world illustrates how much smaller the empire had become with the advent of telegraphy.Before the advent of this technology, the British government had had to entrust a great deal of local powers to its representatives across the world. When it took three months for a message to travel from a colony back to the capital, waiting for a result was a luxury that frequently could not be tolerated. The man on the get it on was a very powerful project indeed. With the advent of the telegraph, London could have virtually instantaneous contact with the capitals of her colonies and dominions and conduct business from afar.Cables Being Laid in CanadaThe value of Britains world wide telegraphic system actually contributed to Britains strategic worries. The arguments were kept in British colonies or under British controlled seas as much as possible, but this was not evermore avoidable. Whenever this occurred the British worried about interceptions of messages or of cutting the link altogether. For example, the link to Australia passed over Dutch Java, the South American railway line ran through Portugese Madeira, but probably the biggest head ache of all to Britains strategic thinkers was the job television service that ran from London to Calcutta. In fact, there were three such cables.One ran from Lowestoft to Germany, through Russia, Persia and in to India. Apart from the strategic nightmares of this essential line of communication was the fact that the Germans and Russians were in a position to keep the costs of using this cable artificially high. The second cable was not much better. It ran across Europe to Constantinople, across Turkey to the Persian gulf and then by cable to Karachi. brusque reliance could be placed on the Ottoman empire. The third cable ran from London to Gibraltar to Malta, Egypt to Aden and then on to Bombay. This looked secure enough, but still relied on using Spanish relay stations to boost the signals. Besides, it was s lackly more economic to send the messages up over France from Malta.To add to the strategic difficulties the vagaries of the currents and weather caused yet further headaches. Storms, winds, silt, even fishermen could all accidentally disrupt the sending of messages. unite with the distances involved, it is little wonder the tariffs could be so high. 4 shillings per word to India, and 6s. 9d. to Australia. And yet, the British were convince that the value of the system was worth the price. All over the world, Englishmen were employed laying or maintaining cables or operating booster stations along the line. The cable manager often became a key member of lodge for the further flung outposts of imperial society. In Australia, Alice Springs actually came to life as the central station for the overland 2000 mile cable line stretching from Adelaide to the North. These 36,000 telegraph poles were built years before any road or railway line crossed the continent. And it could be danger ous too. In 1874, two cable men were speared to death by Aborigines.The laying and maintaining of this enormous network must rank as one of the most important achievements of the British Empire. Its scope and emolument is hard to imagine in a world where instantaneous communications are taken for granted. Before the invention of the Telegraph the speed of communication had changed little since the time of the Romans. Within thirty years of the first twitchings of Cooks and Wheatstones needle telegraph, the world had been made substantially smaller.