A fascinating piece from The
Chronicle:
“The British had
sought to quell the Mau Mau uprising by instituting a policy of mass detention.
This system — "Britain’s gulag," as Elkins called it — had affected far
more people than previously understood. She calculated that the Mau Mau camps
held not 80,000 detainees, as the official figures had it, but between 160,000
and 320,000. She also came to understand that colonial authorities had herded
Kikuyu women and children into some 800 enclosed villages dispersed across the
countryside. These heavily patrolled villages — cordoned off by barbed wire,
spiked trenches, and watchtowers — amounted to another form of detention. In
camps, villages, and other outposts, the Kikuyu suffered forced labor, disease,
starvation, torture, rape, and murder....
The British government, defeated repeatedly in court, moved to settle the Mau Mau case. On June 6, 2013, Foreign Secretary William Hague read a statement in Parliament announcing an unprecedented agreement to compensate 5,228 Kenyans who were tortured and abused during the insurrection. Each would receive about $4,000. "The British government recognizes that Kenyans were subject to torture and other forms of ill-treatment at the hands of the colonial administration," Hague said. Britain "sincerely regrets that these abuses took place." The settlement, in Anderson’s view, marked a "profound" rewriting of history. It was the first time Britain had admitted carrying out torture anywhere in its former empire.”
The British government, defeated repeatedly in court, moved to settle the Mau Mau case. On June 6, 2013, Foreign Secretary William Hague read a statement in Parliament announcing an unprecedented agreement to compensate 5,228 Kenyans who were tortured and abused during the insurrection. Each would receive about $4,000. "The British government recognizes that Kenyans were subject to torture and other forms of ill-treatment at the hands of the colonial administration," Hague said. Britain "sincerely regrets that these abuses took place." The settlement, in Anderson’s view, marked a "profound" rewriting of history. It was the first time Britain had admitted carrying out torture anywhere in its former empire.”