COLONIAL OFFICE, GREAT BRITAIN

british government department responsible for administration of dependencies, including most of those in the middle east.

Until 1854 the colonies of the British Empire were managed by the secretary of state for war and the colonies. As colonial affairs grew in importance, a separate Colonial Office with its own secretary was established, which was responsible for administration of Britain's colonies and for the recruitment of colonial civil servants (who comprised the Colonial Service). The lines of Colonial Office authority often overlapped and conflicted with those of the India Office and the Foreign Office. The India Office administered British territories around the Persian Gulf (including the Trucial Coast emirates Bahrain, Qatar, and those that later formed the United Arab Emirates) and the Indian Ocean (including Muscat, part of present-day Oman). The Foreign Office oversaw certain areas of informal British rule, such as Egypt. At the end of World War I, Palestine and Mesopotamia came under British military administration and were therefore the responsibility of the War Office. When civil administrations were established in 1920, the Foreign Office took over responsibility for these territories, designated mandated territories by the League of Nations. Under Winston Churchill, colonial secretary in 1921 to 1922, the Colonial Office took over responsibility for the mandates. At the Cairo Conference in March 1921 Churchill established the basic structure of British overlordship of the Middle East for the next generation. The Colonial Office remained responsible for the administration of Iraq until 1932, for Transjordan until 1946, for Palestine until 1948, and for Aden and its hinter-land until 1967. After World War II the Colonial Office became the administrative organ for decolonization. In 1966 it merged with the Commonwealth Relations Office, which itself was later absorbed into the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

see also foreign office, great britain.

Bibliography

Beloff, Max. Imperial Sunset, Vol. 1: Britain's Liberal Empire, 1897–1921 ; Vol. 2: Dream of Commonwealth, 1921–1942. Basingstoke, U.K.: Macmillan, 1987.

Fromkin, David. A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East. New York: Avon Books, 1989.

Porter, Bernard. The Lion's Share: A Short History of British Imperialism, 1850–1995. London: Longman, 1996.

Bernard Wasserstein