White Highlands

The White Highlands is an area in the central uplands of Kenya. It was traditionally the homeland of indigenous Central Kenyan communities up to the colonial period, when it became the centre of European settlement in colonial Kenya, and between 1902 and 1961 was officially reserved for the exclusive use of Europeans by the colonial government.

Name

The first European explorers and administrators used the term Highlands to refer to the region no less than 5,000 feet (1,524 m) above sea level, which they believed was best suited climatically for the Europeans to inhabit.Morgan, W. T. W. "The 'White Highlands' of Kenya." The Geographical Journal 129, no. 2 (1963): 140-55. . During the process of settlement, the term came to be used for the areas not already settled by local African tribes. As ''The Crown Lands Ordinance'' of 1902 permitted land grants only to Europeans, the Highlands came to mean only the lands Europeans could own and manage.

History

Exploration

To many early explorers and administrators, the cool climate and absence of populations over large swathes of the Highlands made it a uniquely attractive area for European settlement in sub-tropical Africa. In 1893, the explorer Frederick Lugard, whilst lobbying for a railway in East Africa, noted that European settlement in the region was not feasible until the cooler Highlands were made accessible. This view was echoed by Sir Harry Johnston who, on completion of the Uganda Railway, noted of the Highlands:

Settlement

In 1902, Sir Charles Eliot, the British Commissioner of the Protectorate, encouraged settlement of the Highlands for farming. Eliot, a leading critic of building the railway, believed that the only way to recoup the money spent on its construction was by opening up the Highlands for farming.William Robert Ochieng', Robert M. Maxon, An Economic History of Kenya, East African Publishers, 1992, p.113 In his view, only European settlers and agriculture could develop the region and generate the necessary funds to support the colonial administration. Eliot's view was supported by pioneer settlers such as the 3rd Baron Delamere and Ewart Grogan, who believed that they had a civilising mission to transform the entire country into a modern industrialised "White Man's Country".

By 1903 there were about 100 European settlers in the Highlands.William Robert Ochieng', Robert M. Maxon, An Economic History of Kenya, East African Publishers, 1992, p.114 A large proportion of the settlers hailed from South Africa including 280 Boers from the Transvaal who settled in the Uasin Gishu plateau in 1908.

By 1914, there were around a thousand European settlers in the Highlands. In 1914, around twenty percent of the leases held in the region were held by 13 individuals or groups. The granting of leases to settlers for low prices resulted in rampant land speculation to the extent that by 1930 approximately sixty-five percent of land reserved for Europeans was not under any form of agriculturally productive activity.

Alienation

When European settlement began, the Highlands were primarily inhabited by nomadic pastoralists, and the absence of settled agrarian communities allowed British officials to describe the region as uninhabited.Sana Aiyar, Indians in Kenya, Harvard University Press, 6 Apr 2015, At the time, the African population was distributed between cultivating tribes and pastoralist people. The cultivating tribes were mainly in the high rainfall areas of Nyanza and the slopes at the foot of Mount Kenya such as the Aberdares, Elgeyo, and the hills of Ukambani.

The intervening areas consisted of extensive but sparsely-inhabited plains, at over 5,000 feet, where rainfall was more uncertain and pastoralists instead relied on the grazing of animals. European settlement was predominately in those extensive plains, traditionally inhabited by the Maasai tribe.

At the turn of the century, the Maasai had been decimated by a concurrence of natural disasters. Accompanying a smallpox epidemic were a severe drought and an invasion of locusts that consumed vegetation over large tracts of land, and rinderpest had killed large numbers of cattle resulting in starvation within the community.Whittlesey, Derwent. "Kenya, the Land and Mau Mau." Foreign Affairs 32, no. 1 (1953): 80-90.

The Maasai entered into treaties with British officials to surrender large amounts of land, and their reduced manpower meant they were unable to defend against rival tribes. Of the 12,000 square miles of European settled land, 7,000 consisted of former Masai grazing grounds abandoned under agreements between 1904 and 1913, and large parts of remaining areas, such as the Uasin Gishu plateau, were uninhabited.

British officials also alienated land from other tribes, which the Maasai had pushed to woodlands on the fringes of the Highlands. These tribes practised shifting cultivation, resulting in large areas of land lying fallow for a number of years. Similar disasters as afflicted the Maasai also caused havoc in those tribes, and between 1901 and 1902, a famine resulted in the Kikuyu losing between twenty and fifty percent of their population on their frontier with the Maasai.

Many survivors sought refuge in relatives elsewhere in their domain, but their leaving their land it made the frontier appear disused to European officials. Before the famine, the Kikuyu had been buying up parcels of land in the frontier for individual holdings.

As had happened in colonies in North America, when British officials later began paying the Kikuyu for that land, the British understood themselves to be acquiring the land freehold under colonial law. The Kikuyu, however, understood that the British were only renting the land, and that the Kikuyu could reclaim use of it in future, because a "freehold" transaction did not conform to local legal custom. The mutual misunderstanding was a contributing factor in the Mau Mau rebellion.

End of reservation

The reservation of the White Highlands for Europeans by administrative practice was ended by the ''Land Control Regulations'' in 1961.

Extent

Initially the region was not clearly defined, instead lying between two points on the railway track, namely Kiu and Fort Ternan, and later from Sultan Hamud to Kibigori. It was not until 1939 that the boundaries were defined in the 7th Schedule to ''The Crown Lands Ordinance'' under authority of the ''Kenya (Highlands) Order in Council, 1939''. The Order also established a Highlands Board with a majority elected by the Legislative Council to advise and make recommendations on the disposal of land in the region.

Today

Today, the region is at the heart of Kenya's economy. It is the country's best served region by road and rail and has many flourishing cities such as Nairobi, Nakuru, Eldoret, Kitale, Thika, Kericho and Nyeri.Joseph R. Oppong, Esther D. Oppong, Kenya, Infobase Publishing, 2009, p.35 Although covering only five percent of Kenya's total land area, it produces most of Kenya's agricultural exports, particularly tea, coffee, sisal and pyrethrum.

See also

* 1899 famine in central Kenya
* East Africa Protectorate
* Happy Valley set
*Kenya Colony
* White people in Kenya
* Hugh Cholmondeley, 3rd Baron Delamere

References

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Geography of Kenya
Kenya Colony
East Africa Protectorate
European diaspora in Kenya
Central Province (Kenya)
Geography of Rift Valley Province
*
Highlands
Oronyms

Settler colonialism in Africa