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Provides a history of the role of the British Consul, that has played an important part in world affairs. This book describes role of the appointment in serving with trading houses as the Muscovy, the Levant, and the East India Companies. It also presents how the Counsel had to face challenges such as the fallout of the package holiday revolution.
When Hong Kong fell to the Japanese on Christmas Day 1941 Macao was left as a tiny isolated enclave on the China Coast surrounded by Japanese-held territory. As a Portuguese colony, Macao was neutral, and John Reeves, the British Consul, could remain there and continue his work despite being surrounded in all directions by his country’s enemy. His main task was to provide relief to the 9,000 or more people who crossed the Pearl River from Hong Kong to take refuge in Macao and who had a claim for support from the British Consul. The core of this book is John Reeves’ memoir of those extraordinary years and of his tireless efforts to provide food, shelter and medical care for the refugees. He coped with these challenges as Macao’s own people faced starvation. Despite Macao’s neutrality, it was thoroughly infiltrated by Japanese agents and, marked for assassination, Reeves had to have armed guards as he went about his business. He also had to navigate the complexities of multiple intelligence agencies—British, Portuguese, Japanese, Chinese Nationalist—in a place that was described as the Casablanca of the Far East.
Relates the story of the politically motivated kidnapping of Charlie Fortnum, a minor British functionary in Argentina.
"The world's most powerful nation, and more than a dozen of the world's smallest, have been interacting for 200 years. Beginning with whaling in the 1700's, it has continued through many trades, investment, eduction, churches, media, diplomacy and strategic issues. As significant as the movement of Americans to the Pacific is that of 150,000 Pacific Islanders to the USA. This important book documents the growing interaction with the USA to the pinnacle of involvement in World War II. The importance of USA to the Pacific Islands remained high until the end of the 1980's but has declined since then on almost every dimension. While USA will remain significant for the Pacific Islands, its relative profile will continue to decline." -- Back cover.
In 1856, just months after Britain and Siam had finalized the historic Bowring trade treaty that would prevent the countries colonization, the violent death of a Siamese official at the new British consulate threatens to scuttle the deal and lead to war. The King and the Consul explores UK and Thai archives to reveal the twists, turns and tensions of this little-known episode that pitted Thailand's renowned King Mongkut, Rama IV, against the first British Consul, Charles Hillier. The crisis was resolved without war, but not without cost for the participants who suffered unintended tragic outcomes. By examining the background to this tragedy, the book reveals how history has often overlooked the importance of an issue that lay behind it the right of foreigners to own land in the country, and issue that continues to be a thorn in the side of Thailand's foreign relations to this day. "The tragic deaths in 1856 of the first British consul to Siam and a Siamese official had an unusual impact on Thailand's property law and Britain's diplomatic presence in the country. This intriguing book could only be written by someone with long residence in Bangkok, through knowledge of Thailand's property law, and enthusiasm for history. Simon Landy gives us a slice of legal and diplomatic history with close attention to its human dimensions. An unusual and lovely read" - Chris Baker
Recent events have once again focused international attention on the volatile politics of the Gulf region. This new book, by three former British ambassadors – all with long service in the region – demonstrates the importance of the Gulf for Britain from the days of Elizabeth I to the present. It tells the story, through the life and works of the British diplomats and consuls and the missions in which they worked, of Britain’s involvement, first for trade and later for strategic purposes, in the four key regional states of Iran, Iraq, Kuwait and Oman. With wit and insight, the book traces the origins of today’s problems from the Ottoman and Persian empires to the 1991 Gulf War and its aftermath. Those who know the region will find this a refreshing new slant on an old story, while those new to the subject will enjoy the mixture of politics and personalities ably described and analysed.
The book tells the story of how the British consular service in the Aegean, in the years of the British protectorate of the Ionian Islands (1815-1864) became an agency for the retrieval, excavation and collection of antiquities eventually destined for the British Museum. Exploring the historical, political and diplomatic circumstances that allowed the consular service to develop from a chartered company into a state run institution under the direction of the Foreign Office, it provides a unique perspective on the intersection of state policy, private ambition, and the collecting of antiquities. Drawing extensively on consular correspondence, the study sets out several challenges to current views. For those interested in the history of travel in the Levant, or more generally in the Grand Tour, the book presents an alternative point of view that challenges the travellers' descriptions of the region. The book also intersects with British diplomatic history, providing an insight into the consuls in both their official and private circumstances, and comparing their situation under the Levant Company with that of the Foreign Office run consular service. The complex political situation in the Aegean at the time of the take over of the service is examined along with the political and commercial roles of the consuls, their daily dealings with the Greeks and Ionians, and also with the Ottoman authorities. Through private correspondence, it shows how the consuls' reflected the belief that Greek, Egyptian, Babylonian, Roman and other antiquities would be better looked after in a British, French, German or American museum, than by the people, and in the countries, they were created for. In particular, the book illuminates the public/private nature of the consuls' role, the way they worked with, but independently of, government, and it reveals how Britain was able to acquire major pieces of sculpture from the nineteenth century Aegean.