ABSTRACT
As the 17th century opened, the British overseas empire consisted mainly of several struggling settlements on the eastern edge of North America and a few trading posts on the Indian subcontinent. Over time, while those territories grew, Britain acquired islands in the Caribbean that it used for highly profitable sugar plantations, and established posts in Africa to facilitate its participation in the slave trade. Colonies were added in Australasia and lost in the American Revolution. After Britain abolished slavery in the empire in 1833, it set out to fight the slave trade that remained; ironically, this entailed enlarging its claims in Africa (Huzzey 2012). By the close of the 19th century, Britain possessed the empire on which “the sun never set,” encompassing nearly a quarter of the world’s land area and population.
