Military Officers, Tropical Medicine, and Racial Thought in the Formation of the West India Regiments, 1793–1802

Bibliographic Data

ID9089669
AuthorsMichael Joseph (0000-0002-8117-5739, corresponding author)
Year2017
Volume72
Issue2
Pages243-243
Publication date2017-04-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-5045 • E-ISSN: 1468-4373
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/jhmas/jrw051
PMID27794541
OpenAlexW4246874728
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited24

The article examines the establishment and growth of the West India Regiments, British army corps manned by slaves of African descent and commanded by European officers, between 1793 and 1802. Focusing on the medical history of British military operations in the West Indies, the article demonstrates that the rationale behind the regiments was medical, but that the impetus for them came from senior military commanders rather than from the medical practitioners whose writings are usually privileged in the historiography. The senior officers who commanded the West Indian expeditions in the French Revolutionary Wars mobilized their own particular brand of medical theory, explicitly based on their own experience of the region's epidemiological environment, in support of the policy. This willingness to adopt and adapt medical ideas heavily influenced both military policy regarding the regiments, and commanders' relationships with their medical men

Ancient history · Archaeology · Ethnology · Geography · Military medicine · Traditional medicine · Colonial History and Postcolonial Studies · Colonialism, slavery, and trade · Historical Economic and Social Studies · History · Medicine

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