Disabled Empire: Race, Rehabilitation, and the Politics Of

DISABLED EMPIRE: RACE, REHABILITATION, AND THE POLITICS OF HEALING NON-WHITE COLONIAL SOLDIERS, 1914-1940 by HILARY R. BUXTON A dissertation submitted to the School of Graduate Studies Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey In partial fulfillment of the requirements For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Program in History Written under the direction of Seth Koven And approved by _________________________________ _________________________________ _________________________________ _________________________________ _________________________________ New Brunswick, New Jersey May, 2018 © 2018 Hilary R. Buxton ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Disabled Empire: Race, Rehabilitation, and the Politics of Healing Non-white Colonial Soldiers, 1914-1940 By Hilary R. Buxton Dissertation Director: Seth Koven The First World War and its aftermath gave birth to the trauma industry – an intellectual, political, and institutional response to the widespread experiences of disability and “shell shock” among veterans. “Disabled Empire” follows several million non-white colonial subjects from across the British Empire who fought in the War, and their experience of grievous injury, debility, and trauma. Through a comparative analysis of South Asian and West Indian servicemen, it explains how race shaped the character and goals of bodily and psychological treatments that the British wartime and post-war state offered its non-white veterans. It also analyzes the impact non-white veterans had on how white British psychologists, orthopaedists, hospital staff, policy makers and administrators understood trauma. It reveals how colonial subjects’ service in WWI destabilized long-standing ideologies about masculinity and racial difference, even as it produced an uneven system of care. Throughout the Great War, British officials struggled to resolve the paradox of enacting the Empire’s mission to restore the health of crucial manpower reserves of non- white soldiers, while reinforcing colonial gendered and racial hierarchies. Imperial constructions of race, from the fearless South Asian ‘martial races’ to the ii hypersexualized black masculinity of West Indians, shaped the kind of wartime service Indian and Afro-Caribbean soldiers were allowed to perform and the treatment of their psychological and physical injuries. Whether in the form of ethnic-specific diets and rations, the provision of impractical prosthetics, or discounting trauma through racialized stigmas, colonial soldiers navigated a health system whose technologies, diagnostics, and treatments denied them the same quality and level of care as their white counterparts. Yet White British Tommies’, Indian Sepoys’, and West Indian labour corps workers’ concurrent experiences of disease, disability, and trauma disrupted ideologies about colonial difference. Drawing on archives from the United Kingdom, Jamaica, and India, the thesis’s transcolonial framework demonstrates how racial ideologies simultaneously played into and were subverted by the process of offering healthcare to non-white colonial subjects. It demonstrates the war’s lasting effects on the policies and practices of healthcare and welfare throughout the Empire. iii Acknowledgments This study exists thanks to a mountain of support from a bevy of advisors, contributors, and friends. The National Science Foundation, the Coordinating Council for Women Historians, the Mellon Foundation, the Rutgers School of Graduate Studies, and the Department of History at Rutgers University all provided generous aid essential to finishing this work. I owe more to Seth Koven’s academic tutelage, infectious enthusiasm, and enduring dedication than I can possibly account for. Whether in his office or from a boat on a Keralan river, he has always made himself and his brilliant critique available to me whenever I most needed it. I would be nowhere without the long years spent discussing and digesting innumerable histories, debates, and questions with him. From my first semester with her, Julie Livingston astounded me with her zealous instruction and intellectual gusto. She always asked the questions and drove straight to the heart of issues that I simply couldn’t see, and this project would be all the poorer without her. Temma Kaplan provided shrewd guidance and unreserved support over seven years, and never let me forget my subjects, or let their perspective get lost amidst all the politics and ideas. I am obliged also to Julie Stephens for joining this endeavor providing new and exciting angles for me to think from. A deep thank you too to Matt Houlbrook for his enlightening and enriching feedback and enthusiastic readings across the Atlantic. Carla Yanni, Jochen Hellbeck, Projit Mukharji, Judith Surkis, and Deborah Cohen all offered enthusiastic and deeply appreciated advice throughout the course of this project. The Rutgers British Studies Center, Center for Historical Analysis, and the Center for Cultural iv Analysis’s Medical Humanities Seminar made Rutgers an invaluable forum for exchange and debate. This project would not be possible without the archives and librarians who contributed to and enriched it, from the United Kingdom to India and Jamaica. I have never envisioned myself as a military historian. Nonetheless, the archival journeys that this project has enabled me to go on have brought me into contact with a world of postcolonial militaries, many of which are still working out their relationship with their colonial predecessors. In Pune, India, I spent time and shared meals with the differently abled students of the Queen Mary Technical Institute, injured in service with the Indian National Army. At the QMTI, they trained for a new profession in hospitality, engineering, or computer science, on the same grounds that the Institute had re-educated disabled servicemen on since its move from Bombay to Pune in 1922. I watched them take their exams, read their reflective writing to others during the daily flag raising ceremony, and listened to them as they recounted their journey from their often-distant home provinces, to the rehabilitation center next door to the QMTI, where many were able to bring their wives and children to live near them as they recovered. Sunil Panicker, once a student at the Institute and now one of its teachers, was especially generous with his time and insights, and shared with me his own research into the school’s history. In Kingston, Jamaica, Corporal Harrison of the Jamaica Defense Force gave me a comprehensive tour through their small military history museum and library, describing the ordeals and service of soldiers past and his time in the present JDF. The collection, housed in a small hangar on the grounds of the JDF’s base, sat on the same ground that v arriving Jamaican recruits would have camped and done training exercises on as they awaited deployment. When, at times, I found the voices of their First World War predecessors unreachable, my discussions with these men and their perspectives helped give life to a history I could otherwise only read about in periodic glimpses. They are historians in their own right, and the following thesis would be dramatically different – and all the poorer – for the lack of their insights. My amazing fellow graduate students at Rutgers provided both comradeship and invaluable feedback, particularly David Reid, Julia Bowes, Kaisha Esty-Cambell, Amy Zanoni, Courtney Doucette, Alyssa Klots, AJ Blandford, Raechel Lutz, Dara Walker, Miya Carey, Lytton McDonnell, and Tom Cossentino. Reading groups and exchanges with Dale Booth, Kate Imy, and Chris Bischof helped me refine my understanding of the boundaries and possibilities of British gender history. Outside Rutgers, Andrew Seaton and Lila Chambers brought me into new conversations about British history, and offered enthusiastic diversion from them. A special call of thanks must go to Clare Kim, classmate since age 11, writing partner since 21, and generous reader for the duration of our respective doctoral degrees. I have the deepest gratitude for the friends and family who met me across the globe and let me sleep on their couches and spare beds while thumbing through the archives, particularly Imogen, Carrie, Nick, Cassie, the Laurences, and especially the wonderful Julian and Hildegard Hyde. My family’s support and love, and especially that of Maddy, Vid, Claire, and Tim, have powered me through the longest stretches of research and writing. vi The biggest thank you of all goes to my parents, Charlotte and Alfred, who – perhaps unwisely – never hesitated in encouraging me to pursue whatever career I wanted, and helped me to get there step by step. This dissertation is dedicated to Alex Hyde, whose reading eyes, listening ears, and travelling feet have shaped this project since before it began. He has moved continents several times, and read every chapter more than he would like to remember. For his patience, encouragement, and love, I will be forever grateful. vii Table of Contents Abstract………………..………………….…..…………………..………….……………ii Acknowledgments ………………..………………….…..…………………..…………. iv Table of Contents………………..………………….…..…………………..……………vii Introduction……………………..……………………..……………………..……………1 Chapter One Muscles: Raced Labor and the Mobilization of Non-white Colonial Servicemen………31 Chapter Two Stomachs: Food, Nutrition, and Multiracial Rationing………………………………....101 Chapter Three Nerves: Non-white Trauma and Military Psychiatry…………………………………...148 Chapter Four Bones: Rehabilitation, Re-education, and Re-Membering

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