Agents of empire: the medical profession in the Cape Colony, 1880-1910.

British imperial control and the civilizing mission of the empire were imposed by a variety of means in the nineteenth century. The role of the missionary in this process has been well studied. By contrast, the contribution of the doctor has been curiously neglected. H. A. C. Cairns, in Prelude to imperialism for instance, has referred extensively to David Livingstone and to Robert Laws, one of the founders of the Livingstonia Mission in Nyasaland (Malawi). Livingstone, he contends, was "ultimately unclassifiable in terms of vocational criteria" and he never mentions that both were doctors. ' In the eyes ofhistorians, the imperial role ofthe medical profession has been much less visible than that ofthe missionaries, yet it could be argued that they contributed significant elements to empire.2 Except as missionaries, doctors were rarely pioneers in the imposition of imperial control. Their role came later, when a government infrastructure began to develop. In South Africa, medical men contributed as administrators and technocrats to the creation of the efficient, paternalist administrations so prized by the imperial pro-consuls ofthe Cromer school. In attempting to introduce sanitary concepts and to reform public health, doctors tended to reinforce and legitimize the values ofthe white ruling groups. Their influence was pervasive in a hybrid colony like that of the Cape, part colony ofwhite settlement, part colony of conquest. As they were often amongst the few educated men in small rural communities, and the only ones who were scientifically trained, they were the means by which sanitary concepts, so central to Victorian middle-class views of civilized society, were transmitted to the remoter corners of the colony.3 As "agents of empire" at the Cape, the medical profession played a complex role as healers, educators, and rulers. This article attempts to examine the impact of the developing medical profession on the Cape Colony from 1880, just after diamonds were discovered, until 1910, when the