Somali clans readily accepted British protection as Egypt withdrew

Evidence

In these circumstances it was reluctantly decided that direct British action was needed to ensure the safety of the trade-routes and to safeguard the Aden garrison’s meat supplies. A British mission led by Admiral Hewitt was dispatched to Abyssinia in 1884 to secure King John’s co-operation in the evacuation of the Egyptians from Harar. And after an Italian ironclad had visited Berbera and staged a somewhat equivocal incident at Zeila, Major Hunter was authorized to make the necessary arrangements with the local Somali clans for a British occupation. Tired of the Egyptian rule, and perhaps already sensing the expansionist moves of Abyssinia and of other foreign powers which they were soon to experience so much more forcibly, the Somali clans seem to have readily consented to British protection. By the end of the year formal treaties, replacing the earlier Anglo-Somali trade agreements, had been signed with the ‘Ise, Gadabursi, Habar Garhajis, Habar Awal, and Habar Tol Ja’lo clans. — I.M. Lewis, I. M. Lewis, A Modern History of the Somali_ Nation…, 154

Categorization

• XREF: This is the founding moment of the British Somaliland Protectorate, the beginning of Lewis’s narrative arc of colonial partition. — connects to: Somali chiefs read protection treaties as ordinary clan alliances, not as surrenders of sovereignty.; Somali chiefs read the protection treaties as clan contractual alliances — I.M. Lewis, I. M. Lewis, A Modern History of the Somali_ Nation…, 155

Related

• British protectorate treaties covered specific northern Somali clans but not the Dulbahante. (similarity 0.85)
• Somali chiefs read protection treaties as ordinary clan alliances, not as surrenders of sovereignty. (similarity 0.84)
• British protectorate treaties covered select northern clans and not the Dulbahante (similarity 0.83)
• Britain’s Somaliland protectorate treaties excluded the Dulbahante clan. (similarity 0.83)
• Britain’s 1897 withdrawal of protection exposed Somali clansmen to Ethiopian occupation (similarity 0.82)
• Somali chiefs read the protection treaties as clan contractual alliances (similarity 0.82)
• Britain in 1897 nearly abandoned its Somaliland protectorate (similarity 0.81)
• Britain’s 1897 withdrawal knowingly doomed the Somali clans’ independence. (similarity 0.81)
• British-protected Somali only learned of the 1897 treaty when the 1934 boundary commission arrived (similarity 0.80)
• Menelik’s 1891 circular asserted Ethiopian sovereignty over Somali clans (similarity 0.80)
• Britain’s nominal treaty stipulation masked its earlier unilateral record in Somaliland. (similarity 0.80)
• Italy acquired its Somali protectorates through private treaties with clan sultans (similarity 0.80)
• Somali clan maneuvering between rival empires weakened the Somali position (similarity 0.80)
• Britain withdrew to the coast in 1910, arming allied clans and abandoning the Dulbahante (similarity 0.79)
• British imperial strategy traded Somali protectorate treaties for trade access to Aden (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Somali chiefs read the protection treaties as clan contractual alliances #expands (0.60) — I.M. Lewis, I. M. Lewis, A Modern History of the Somali_ Nation…, 155