Read complete books and articles on: Cecil Rhodes

Rhodes, Cecil John - sĕsˈĭl, rōdz, 1853–1902, British imperialist and business magnate.

Business Career

Rhodes, Cecil John - sĕsˈĭl, rōdz, 1853–1902, British imperialist and business magnate.

Business Career

The son of a Hertfordshire clergyman, he first went to South Africa in 1870, joining his oldest brother, Herbert, on a cotton plantation in Natal. In 1871 the brothers staked a claim in the newly opened Kimberley diamond fields, where Cecil was to make most of his fortune. He returned to England in 1873 and entered Oxford, but his studies were repeatedly interrupted by visits to South Africa and he did not receive his degree until 1881. His power in the diamond-mining industry developed until, in 1880, he formed the De Beers Mining Company, which was second only to that organized by Barney Barnato.

In 1888 he tricked Lobengula, the Ndebele (Matabele) ruler, into an agreement by which Rhodes secured mining concessions in Matabeleland and Mashonaland. He exploited these through the British South Africa Company (organized 1889), which soon established complete control of the territory. In 1888, Rhodes had also secured a monopoly of the Kimberley diamond production by the creation (with Barnato) of the De Beers Consolidated Mines, which reputedly had the largest capital in the world.

Rhodes left nearly all his fortune of £6 million to public service. One of his chief benefactions was the Rhodes Scholarships to Oxford, administered by the Rhodes Trust. More than 90 scholarships are now awarded each year to students from the (now former) British colonies, the United States, and Germany.

Political Career

A trip in 1875 through the rich territories of Transvaal and Bechuanaland apparently helped to inspire Rhodes with the dream of British rule over all southern Africa; later he spoke of British dominion "from the Cape to Cairo." In 1881, Rhodes entered the Parliament of Cape Colony, in which he held a seat for the remainder of his life. In Parliament he stressed the policy of containing the northward expansion of the Transvaal Republic, and in 1885, largely at his persuasion, Great Britain established a protectorate over Bechuanaland.

Rhodes became the prime minister, and virtual dictator, of Cape Colony in 1890. He was responsible for educational reforms and for restricting the franchise to literate persons (thereby reducing the African vote). His personal and business sympathies with the Uitlanders [Afrik.,=foreigners] in the Transvaal, who were mostly British and the victims of discrimination, brought him to conspire for the overthrow of the government of Paul Kruger. The result was the Jameson Raid (1895; see Jameson, Sir Leander Starr). Although Rhodes did not approve the timing of the raid, he was so clearly implicated that he was forced to resign as prime minister in 1896.

In 1897 a committee of the British House of Commons pronounced him guilty of grave breaches of duty as prime minister and as administrator of the British South Africa Company. Thereafter he devoted himself primarily to the development of the country that was called Rhodesia (since 1980, Zimbabwe) in his honor. In the South African War he commanded troops at Kimberley and was besieged there for a time. He died in South Africa and is buried in Zimbabwe.

Bibliography

See biographies by J. G. Lockhart and C. M. Woodhouse (1963), J. Marlowe (1974), and R. Rotberg (1988).

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9 of the Best Books and Articles on: Cecil Rhodes

as selected by Questia librarians

1.

Cecil Rhodes (1921) » Read Now
by Basil Williams. 358 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

...CECIL RHODES MAKERS OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY...2 Vols. Longmans, 12s. BUST OF CECIL JOHN RHODES BY J. M. SWAN IN THE MEMORIAL ON...CENTURY Edited by BASIL WILLIAMS CECIL...
2.

Cecil Rhodes: The Colossus of Southern Africa (1963) » Read Now
by J. G. Lockhart, C. M. Woodhouse. 525 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

...servant, Tony continued on back fly leaf CECIL RHODES The Colossus of Southern Africa CECIL RHODES The Colossus of Southern Africa...BIOGRAPHICAL Baker Herbert, Cecil...
3.

The Founder: Cecil Rhodes and the Pursuit of Power » Read Now
by Robert I. Rotberg, Miles F. Shore. 804 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

Cecil Rhodes was an imposing figure, tall, robust-looking, with a leonine head, a man so charismatic that one contemporary claimed that "belief in Rhodes was a substitute for religion." But he was certainly a man of contradictions. He was a dreamy idealist whose favorite book was The Meditations of...
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Cecil Rhodes was an imposing figure, tall, robust-looking, with a leonine head, a man so charismatic that one contemporary claimed that "belief in Rhodes was a substitute for religion." But he was certainly a man of contradictions. He was a dreamy idealist whose favorite book was The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius and a ruthless businessman whose guiding principle was "every man has his price." He supported invidious racial laws in South Africa, and invented and sponsored the world-renowned Rhodes Scholarships. Though his own education and intellectual talents were unprepossessing, he dominated the British Empire and became one of the leading figures in the English-speaking world, the confidant of Queen Victoria and Kaiser Wilhelm, and a man of vast wealth and world-wide influence. Based on seventeen years of research, this monumental volume offers the definitive biography of one of the most controversial figures of the nineteenth century. Rhodes was truly larger than life, and this book captures that life in fascinating detail. It offers an astute portrait of Rhodes' childhood and adolescence, informed by insights from modern psychology; it vividly depicts life on a nineteenth-century African cotton farm (Rhodes' first venture) and in mining camps around Kimberley and the Witwatersrand; it traces the surreptitious stock buyouts and mergers that allowed Rhodes to gain control over 90% of the world's diamond production by age thirty-five; it describes his campaigns against African populations that allowed him to establish Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia); and it discusses the poorly planned, disastrous raid on the Transvaal that destroyed Rhodes' reputation. A conqueror and colonial monarch, Cecil Rhodes presided arrogantly over the fate of southern Africa. But he also built lasting economic institutions, furthered transportation and communication links, improved agriculture, and fervently believed that he used his wealth and power to advance the best interests of the British Empire and Africa. This biography illuminates a complex and fascinating life, a life both evil and good.
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4.

Men of Wealth: The Story of Twelve Significant Fortunes from the Renaissance to the Present Day (1941) (Chap. VIII "Cecil Rhodes: Empire Builder") » Read Now
by John T. Flynn. 568 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library
5.

Empire: The British Imperial Experience from 1765 to the Present (Chap. 11 "Cecil Rhodes' Legacy: Fantasy Power and the Partition of Africa") » Read Now
by Denis Judd. 568 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library
6.

Africa and the Victorians: The Climax of Imperialism in the Dark Continent (Chap. VII "Rhodes' Counterpoise, 1887-1891") » Read Now
by Ronald Robinson, John Gallagher, Alice Denny. 491 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

...SAHARA 160 VII. RHODES COUNTERPOISE, 1887-1891...extensively: Lady Gwendolen Cecil , Life of Robert, Marquess...Arabi or Kruger, of Goldie or Rhodes, were worlds apart. Yet...
7.

The Tribe and Its Successors: An Account of African Traditional Life and European Settlement in Southern Rhodesia (Chap. Three "Cecil Rhodes") » Read Now
by William Rayner. 252 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library
8.

Divide and Rule: The Partition of Africa, 1880-1914 ("Rhodes and Rhodesia, 1890-1893" begins on p. 288 and "Rhodes vs. Kruger" begins on p. 300) » Read Now
by H. L. Wesseling, Arnold J. Pomerans. 446 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

The partition of Africa was one of the most spectacular episodes in modern history. For Europeans, Africa was still an unknown continent in 1880. Thirty years later almost all of it was under European control. This race for colonies went hand in hand with a host of thrilling exploits and dramatic...
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The partition of Africa was one of the most spectacular episodes in modern history. For Europeans, Africa was still an unknown continent in 1880. Thirty years later almost all of it was under European control. This race for colonies went hand in hand with a host of thrilling exploits and dramatic conflicts, of which Stanley's exploration of the Congo and Gordon's death in Khartoum are just two examples.
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9.

Africa and Some World Problems, including the Rhodes Memorial Lectures Delivered in Michaelmas Term, 1929 » Read Now
by General J. C. Smuts. 186 pgs.

Collections: History, Entire Library

...in South Africa, and that its author was Cecil Rhodes in his celebrated Glen Grey Act. Rhodess African policy embodied two main ideas: white...are mainly of African origin...