Sir George Arthur, Bart: 1784–1854
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Edition: First ed
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Chipped and worn with some minor damage
Pages: Good
Markings: Previous owner
Condition remarks: Small chip at bottom corner - otherwise fine.
Few figures of the British colonial era embodied the contradictions of empire as starkly as Sir George Arthur — soldier, administrator, and moral reformer — whose long career spanned some of the most turbulent corners of the nineteenth-century British world. A. G. L. Shaw's authoritative biography chronicles the life of this remarkable and often controversial man, from his early military service through his tenures as Superintendent of British Honduras, Lieutenant-Governor of Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania), Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada, and finally Governor of the Bombay Presidency, painting a vivid portrait of colonial governance at its most demanding and morally fraught. Shaw brings rigorous historical scholarship to bear on Arthur's complex legacy — a man at once deeply pious and unyielding in his exercise of authority, whose administration of Van Diemen's Land remains among the most scrutinised chapters in Australian penal history. Through meticulous archival research, Shaw illustrates how Arthur navigated the competing pressures of humanitarianism, imperial policy, and frontier violence, offering a nuanced reassessment that refuses easy judgement. Published by Melbourne University Press, this biography stands as an indispensable work for anyone seeking to understand the human machinery behind Britain's vast colonial enterprise — and the moral cost at which it operated.
Author: A. G. L. Shaw
Format: Hardback
Published: 1980, Melbourne University Press
Genre: Biography
Edition: First ed
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Chipped and worn with some minor damage
Pages: Good
Markings: Previous owner
Condition remarks: Small chip at bottom corner - otherwise fine.
Few figures of the British colonial era embodied the contradictions of empire as starkly as Sir George Arthur — soldier, administrator, and moral reformer — whose long career spanned some of the most turbulent corners of the nineteenth-century British world. A. G. L. Shaw's authoritative biography chronicles the life of this remarkable and often controversial man, from his early military service through his tenures as Superintendent of British Honduras, Lieutenant-Governor of Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania), Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada, and finally Governor of the Bombay Presidency, painting a vivid portrait of colonial governance at its most demanding and morally fraught. Shaw brings rigorous historical scholarship to bear on Arthur's complex legacy — a man at once deeply pious and unyielding in his exercise of authority, whose administration of Van Diemen's Land remains among the most scrutinised chapters in Australian penal history. Through meticulous archival research, Shaw illustrates how Arthur navigated the competing pressures of humanitarianism, imperial policy, and frontier violence, offering a nuanced reassessment that refuses easy judgement. Published by Melbourne University Press, this biography stands as an indispensable work for anyone seeking to understand the human machinery behind Britain's vast colonial enterprise — and the moral cost at which it operated.