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Speaker 1: Hey y'all, Eve's here. Today's episode contains not just one,

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Speaker 1: but two nuggets of history. These are coming from the

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Speaker 1: T D I h C Vault, so you'll also here

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Speaker 1: to hosts. Consider it a double feature. Enjoy the show.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to this Day in History Class from how Stuff

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Speaker 1: Works dot com and from the desk of Stuff you

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Speaker 1: missed in History Class. It's the show where we explore

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Speaker 1: the past one day at a time with a quick

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Speaker 1: look at what happened today in history. Hello and welcome

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Speaker 1: to the podcast. I'm Tracy B. Wilson, and it's December three.

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Speaker 1: The trial of Kenya's cap and Gurias six began on

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Speaker 1: the state in nineteen fifty two. These were six political

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Speaker 1: activists who were arrested under the grounds that they were

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Speaker 1: members of the Mau Mau political movement against British colonial

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Speaker 1: rule in Kenya. Britain's colonial involvement in Kenya went back

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Speaker 1: to when that part of Africa became part of Britain's

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Speaker 1: East African Protectorate. This was during Europe's Scramble for Africa

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Speaker 1: and basically Europe divided up as much of Africa as

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Speaker 1: possible amongst themselves without asking any Africans about it. In

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Speaker 1: nineteen twenty Britain formally declared that Kenya was a Crown colony.

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Speaker 1: So all of this placed Kenya under a white minority government,

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Speaker 1: and that led to widespread poverty and racism and oppression

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Speaker 1: and resistance to colonial rules started almost immediately. The East

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Speaker 1: Africa Association formed in nineteen twenty one, the year after

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Speaker 1: Britain formally declared that Kenya was a Crown colony. A

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Speaker 1: man named Jomo Kenyatta, who was one of the Capa

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Speaker 1: and Curias six, was involved almost from the start of this.

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Speaker 1: He joined the East Africa Association in nineteen two. He

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Speaker 1: continued to work with a series of independence organizations as

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Speaker 1: they disbanded and reformed and started over with new groups

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Speaker 1: over the next several years. Sometimes these were because of

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Speaker 1: internal changes, sometimes it was because Britain had outlawed a

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Speaker 1: particular organization and they had to start over. He also

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Speaker 1: traveled through Europe and studied in England. A lot of

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Speaker 1: these first organizations were focused on some constitutional reforms, but

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Speaker 1: as time passed with seemingly no progress being made, many

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Speaker 1: younger and more radical members started to splinter off, and

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Speaker 1: the Mau Mau movement was formed in nineteen forty two.

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Speaker 1: It was formed when four Kenyan tribes came together and

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Speaker 1: took an oath to secretly fight against British rule. This

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Speaker 1: was a militant movement. It advocated violent resistance to the

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Speaker 1: British rule of Kenya, and their tactics included sabotage and assassination.

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Speaker 1: So by the nineteen fifties the British government had outlawed

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Speaker 1: the movement, but that didn't make the movement disappear, and

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifty two saw the Mau Mau Uprising that led

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Speaker 1: to a massive military engagement between the British Army and

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Speaker 1: members of the movement. The Mammoth faced devastating losses and

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Speaker 1: members were imprisoned during this time when they reported horrifying conditions,

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Speaker 1: including torture and abuse. In October of nineteen fifty two,

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Speaker 1: following that uprising, Kenyata and five other leaders were arrested

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Speaker 1: on the grounds that they had been directing this outlawed movement,

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Speaker 1: and hundreds of other people had been arrested as well.

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Speaker 1: At the time, Kenyatta was actually leading the Kenyan African Union.

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Speaker 1: They were all taken to Capa, Guria because it was

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Speaker 1: a very remote location that authorities thought would be secure

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Speaker 1: enough that the other members of the Memo movement couldn't

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Speaker 1: break them out. These six men were placed on trial

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Speaker 1: from December nineteen fifty two until April nineteen fifty three.

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Speaker 1: Although the British colonial government was approaching this as a

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Speaker 1: criminal matter, to a lot of the rest of the world,

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Speaker 1: it really looked like a political trial. They were all

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Speaker 1: found guilty. They were sentenced to seven years in prison

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Speaker 1: and with hard labor. Over the next decade, the British

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Speaker 1: colonial government gradually started shifting Kenya towards rule by its

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Speaker 1: African majority rather than having a white minority government. Kenyatta

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Speaker 1: was released from prison in nineteen sixty one, and then

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Speaker 1: he became one of the negotiators in a conference in

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Speaker 1: London in nineteen sixty two. That conference ultimately led to

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Speaker 1: Kenya's independence from Britain. A political party called the Kenya

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Speaker 1: African National Union won the first election, which had actually

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Speaker 1: taken place before independence, while Kenyatta was still in prison.

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Speaker 1: He had been elected the first party president, even though

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Speaker 1: he was still imprisoned at the time. Then, after Kenya

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Speaker 1: formally became independent on December twelfth, nineteen sixty three, Kenyatta

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Speaker 1: became its first Prime Minister and later became Kenya's first president.

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Speaker 1: In ten it was announced that Kenyan's who had been

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Speaker 1: tortured by colonial forces during the moment uprising would receive

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Speaker 1: payouts totaling twenty million hounds. Thanks to Christopher Hasiotis for

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Speaker 1: his research work on today's show, and to Casey Pigrim

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Speaker 1: and Chandler Mays for their audio work on this podcast.

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Speaker 1: You can subscribe to the Stay in History Class on

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Speaker 1: Apple podcast, Google podcast, the I Heart Radio app, and

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Speaker 1: wherever else you get your podcasts. Tune in tomorrow for

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Speaker 1: the birth of a poet. Hello again, I'm Eves and

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Speaker 1: you're listening to This Day in History Class, a show

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Speaker 1: where we drop history knowledge every single day. The day

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Speaker 1: was December three, eighteen fifty four. Gold Miners seeking reforms

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Speaker 1: in Ballarat, Victoria, Australia, rebelled against the colonial government. The

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Speaker 1: conflict led to the Battle of the Eureka Stockade, which

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Speaker 1: resulted in the death of at least twenty eight people.

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Speaker 1: The Victorian gold Rush began in Australia in eighteen fifty one.

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Speaker 1: It brought people seeking fortunes from all over Australia and

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Speaker 1: the world. As people flocked to the area and the

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Speaker 1: colonial government struggled to find the money to support them.

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Speaker 1: New South Wales Governor Charles Fitzroy and Victoria's Lieutenant Governor

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Speaker 1: Charles Latrobe imposed a license fee of thirty shillings a

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Speaker 1: month on miners. That was a hefty fee for miners,

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Speaker 1: especially when surface gold started to dwindle and gold production

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Speaker 1: per person was decreasing. Miners expressed their concerns to Latrobe,

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Speaker 1: but not much was done about the miners protests. Police

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Speaker 1: set out on license hunts to find miners who did

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Speaker 1: not pay their fees, and miners claimed that police were

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Speaker 1: exploiting them by extorting money, beating people up, taking bribes,

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Speaker 1: and locking people up without due process. Many people were

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Speaker 1: unhappy with the way the police handled crimes on the goldfields,

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Speaker 1: claiming police and government officials had to be bribed. Adding

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Speaker 1: insult to injury was the fact that miners could not

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Speaker 1: vote or own the land that they were working on.

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Speaker 1: In October of eighteen fifty four, a Scottish miner named

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Speaker 1: James Scobie was killed in a conflict at the Eureka

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Speaker 1: Hotel in Ballarat. J F. Bitley, the proprietor, was pegged

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Speaker 1: as the murderer. When Bentley was exonerated, miners felt it

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Speaker 1: was an injustice. A group of people gathered to protest

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Speaker 1: the decision, but a mob of miners ended up burning

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Speaker 1: down the hotel. The police arrested them. An organization called

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Speaker 1: the Ballarat Reform League formed in response to the government's

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Speaker 1: in action on people's demands. It organized a meeting in

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Speaker 1: Ballarat on November eleventh, eighteen fifty four. The League advocated

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Speaker 1: for negotiations on the Bentley decision as well as the

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Speaker 1: people arrested because of the fire, for abandonment of the

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Speaker 1: gold licensing system, for removal of the gold commissioners, and

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Speaker 1: for a better policing and justice system. But their grievances

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Speaker 1: were dismissed and more soldiers were sent to the goldfields

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Speaker 1: to back up the police and soldiers already present. Dissenting

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Speaker 1: miners held another mass meeting, elected Peter Lawler as their leader,

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Speaker 1: and flew the Eureka flag. They swore to fight together

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Speaker 1: to defend their rights and liberties, and they built a

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Speaker 1: stockade at Eureka, performing military drills to prepare for any conflict.

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Speaker 1: Robert Reid, commissioner of the Ballarat Goldfields, ordered the police

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Speaker 1: in army to destroy the stockade on December three. Before

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Speaker 1: dawn that day, troops stormed the stockade. Miners fell quickly

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Speaker 1: against the well armed force. At least twenty two diggers

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Speaker 1: and six soldiers died. Police detained around a hundred and

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Speaker 1: thirteen miners, and thirteen were eventually taken to Melbourne for trial.

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Speaker 1: All of the miners accused of treason were acquitted within months.

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Speaker 1: A Royal commission recommended removing the license fee and adding

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Speaker 1: an export duty and annual miners right. The number of

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Speaker 1: police on the gold fields was cut significantly and a

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Speaker 1: warden replaced the gold commissioners. Twelve new members were also

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Speaker 1: added to the Victorian Legislative Council, with four appointed by

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Speaker 1: the Queen and eight elected by diggers who had a

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Speaker 1: miner's right. I'm h Deact and hopefully you know a

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Speaker 1: little more about history today than you did yesterday. If

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Speaker 1: you'd like to follow us on social media, you can

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Speaker 1: do so at T D I h C Podcast on Instagram,

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Speaker 1: Twitter and Facebook, or if you would prefer to email us,

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Speaker 1: you can send us a message at this day at

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Speaker 1: I Heart media dot com. Thanks for listening. I hope

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Speaker 1: to see you here again tomorrow