WHETHER the word “colony” can be applied to the state of Scotland is debatable. What isn’t in doubt is that we were once colonialists ourselves.
I got to thinking about this when doing some research into the author, ballad collector, parliamentary reporter and journalist Allan Cunningham, the anniversary of whose death falls on Monday. In addition to poetry, he wrote three novels and a comprehensive six-volume work on the lives of eminent British painters and sculptors.
It was Walter Scott who arranged the cadetships for Cunningham’s sons, largely because Cunningham could not afford to purchase commissons in the regular army for them. However, if they went with the East India Company, they would not require money behind them – indeed, they would be paid to do so. The endless cycle of violence in the Middle East which is being played out once again with such horrendous consequences for innocent people in Israel and Gaza has its roots in just such a process and in selfish, inconsistent policies from a variety of external players including the UK which held the mandate for Palestine from 1923 to 1948 – a mandate which was enforced at times with violence as well as often resisted – by Arab and Jew – with equally unacceptable brutality.