Trace and Tell your Family's Empire Stories
Country Histories
India celebrates its Independence Day on 15 August, commemorating the end of British rule in 1947. The Raj, taken from the Hindi word for 'rule', had lasted for less than ninety years, but British influence on the subcontinent dates from the beginning of the seventeenth century.
Over the course of time this meeting of cultures has involved the movement of millions of people in both directions for a wide variety of reasons, from trade to military action, employment, education, and tourism.
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Studio portrait of Lord Curzon (1859-1925), Viceroy and Governor General of India, dressed in his robes for the Coronation Durbar at Delhi. India, circa 1902. Copyright Images of Empire.
The Governor-General was known as the 'Viceroy' of India in order to stress the feudal nature of the relationship between the British Monarch and the Indian 'Princes'. Queen Victoria was given the title 'Empress of India' in 1877.
The elite Indian Civil Service of around one thousand people ran the daily business of the Raj, and represented its authority for ordinary people. The Indian Civil Service and the higher rungs of many professions were largely confined to white British residents until the twentieth century.
