Histories of the Hanged

"David Anderson’s Histories of the Hanged is a very good detailed historical overview of the Mau Mau uprising. It’s a military history as well as a social history of the conflict. Its name comes from the fact that central to it is his writing about the kangaroo courts that were set up in Kenya, which were possibly no less valid than the military tribunals going on in America. “The courts functioned to standards that would in no way have been tolerated in Britain at the same time.” These were courts that were set up, and tried and convicted and hanged about 1,500 people. The courts functioned to standards that would in no way have been tolerated in Britain at the same time. It’s also a book that has a kind of anger to it, but it is I suppose more measured in its claims. I’ve encountered people at readings of The Broken Word who have this sort of competitive attitude to British moral degradation: ‘We may have behaved badly but the Africans behaved much worse,’ is the kind of argument you face, which seems odd and pointless. It doesn’t make a difference to how we consider the British people behaved during that conflict to know that the Mau Mau committed multiple atrocities. There seems to be an expectation that you say, oh well, yes that’s fine – which is clearly not a reasonable response."