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Imperial Reckoning : The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya
Imperial Reckoning The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya Author:Caroline Elkins “An extraordinary act of historical recovery.”—The New Yorker — As part of the Allied forces, thousands of Kenyans fought alongside the British in World War II. But just a few years after the defeat of Hitler, the British colonial government detained nearly the entire population of Kenya... more »217;s largest ethnic minority, the Kikuyu—some one and a half million people.
The compelling story of the system of prisons and work camps where thousands met their deaths was the victim of a determined effort by the British to destroy all official records of their attempts to stop the Mau Mau uprising. Caroline Elkins spent a decade in London, Nairobi, and the Kenyan countryside interviewing hundreds of survivors of the camps and the British and African loyalists who detained them.
The result is an unforgettable account of the unraveling of the British colonial empire in Kenya—a pivotal moment in twentieth- century history with chilling parallels to America’s own imperial project.
“Elkins has bravely done justice to history.” —The Nation
“A vivid portrait of daily life behind the wire.” —The Economist
“An important and excruciating record. It will shock even those who think they have assumed the worst about Europe’s era of control in Africa.” —The New York Times Book Review