Racism, or Nationalism, represented in 19th century English Wills?
Upvote:1
While it is not to do with marriage, it is to do with nationalism, his Wikipedia article confirms that in 1877 Cecil Rhodes, the British colonial magnate (present-day Zimbabwe was formerly known after him as Rhodesia) wrote a will leaving much of his wealth
"for the establishment, promotion and development of a Secret Society, the true aim and object whereof shall be for the extension of British rule throughout the world...the ultimate recovery of the United States of America as an integral part of the British Empire, the inauguration of a system of Colonial representation in the Imperial Parliament which may tend to weld together the disjointed members of the Empire and, finally, the foundation of so great a Power as to render wars impossible, and promote the best interests of humanity."
He later decided that this was too ambitious and in his last will hoped to achieve the same ultimate end by leaving money to enable American, Commonwealth and German students with leadership potential to study in Britain at Oxford University, in the hope that this would encourage links between future leading men of those countries and those of Britain. ("Rhodes Scholars"). Again according to Wikipedia,: 'Eight former Rhodes scholars subsequently became heads of government or heads of state, including Wasim Sajjad (Pakistan), Bill Clinton (United States), Dom Mintoff (Malta), John Turner (Canada), Norman Manley (Jamaica) and three Australian prime ministers: Bob Hawke, Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull'. Dean Rusk, the US Secretary of State in the 1960s, was also a Rhodes Scholar.
Upvote:6
A little bit of both, but mostly "nationalism."
First of all, the will opposed a marriage of Charlotte to say a Frenchman or a German, (at least unless they happened to be British subjects like some Germans from Hannover). The idea then was that by marrying, a woman took on the nationality of her husband. So a foreign marriage would make her ineligible to inherit because she would, in effect, no longer be a British subject.*
On the other hand, people of British and some "colonial" blood were accepted as "British" (demonstrated by British subjects), if the British elements clearly predominated. In this case, the non-British elements could be no more than half, and ideally no more than a quarter. The British subject part protected a lot of people of "mixed" blood. The British did not adopt the American standard of "one drop" regarding non-British blood, and were less racist than the Americans.
British wills tended to be less explicit about things like skin color than say, American wills. ("Race" was not as everpresent an issue in British society as in American.) Clearly, testators wanted to keep their money out of the "wrong" hands, but they would use more "coded" language such as "British subject" in wills and other documents to accomplish this.
Put another way, the dividing line for Britishers was "British" and "non-British," whereas for many Americans, it was "white," or "non-white."
*Philosopher Samuel Johnson said that he would support his daughter as long as she remained single, but once she married, this support would cease so that her choice of a husband would basically be a choice of her standard of living.
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