Thursday Boer War Cartoon

In March 1900, Sir John Tenniel published this cartoon in Punch. He has a different target in this cartoon.

 

The cartoon has the title “Who said “Dead”?”. The cartoon shows a donkey running away for its life from a roaring lion emerging from a cave. The donkey has ‘Continental Press’ written on its back. By March 1900 the sieges of Kimberley and Ladysmith had been relieved and the British and Empire army under the new commander in chief, Lord Roberts, had begun to win some successes. The message of the cartoon seems pretty much to be that the British and Empire forces have now roused themselves to their warlike best, and proven to the world – well, to Europe at least – that the reports of the death of the Empire have been greatly exaggerated.

Portraying the European media as a donkey shows a certain contempt for them – they are donkeys, or asses, fools in other words. The European reactions to the circumstances of the Boer War were pretty much universally condemning of the British actions in provoking the war, and British Imperialism. There was just a little whiff of hypocrisy about this considering that some of the countries that were the strongest critics had also been willing and enthusiastic participants in the so-called ‘Scramble for Africa’ themselves.