>> From the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. ^M00:00:03 ^M00:00:22 >> Mary-Jane Deeb: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you all so very much for coming. It's a very special occasion today, and we have a very exciting program ahead of us. So I am delighted that we're able to be now here. And I would like before I start to recognize the [inaudible], who is here with us and who has been one of our speakers many -- a few years ago. And I hope he will come again. And Princess Masente [phonetic], and Princess Zeble [phonetic], who are both here as well, who have joined us for this presentation, a presentation which is very special on the imperial exile of Emperor Haile Selassie. And this program is part of the programs that we have when we invite speakers, scholars to tell us about the history of the countries that we are responsible for here at the Library of Congress. Ethiopia is one of the very special countries for this division. We have a specialist just for Ethiopia, and he, Fantahun Tiruneh, has collected materials, and built a recollection at the Library of Congress, which is one of the top collections in the world. And we often have many scholars, researchers from all over the world who come to consult these collections. And so this division -- I always make a little commercial for our division, because our division is the African Middle East Division. It is responsible for 78 countries around the world. And our collections are in the vernacular. They are housed, preserved in our stacks, which are closed stacks, and which we use to serve our patrons and our researchers as they come. These countries that we're responsible for, or whose collections we're responsible for, come from the whole continent of Africa, north and Sub-Saharan. They come from the Middle East, including the Arab world, Turkey and Iran. They include the Hebraic world, which is very broad because those connections come from all over the world. They also include central Asia and the caucuses. And our work here is to serve our patrons and our researchers, not only by recommending collections by pulling the books off the shelves, by letting them know what treasures we have, but also by having displays, exhibits, programs, conferences, briefings, especially one-on-one briefings. We receive visitors from all over the world who come to use our materials. We work with different universities, government agencies and others. And I'm leaving the best for last, we invite scholars, and we invite authors and writers to come and tell us about their research, about their work, about the collections they have used, and about the stories from the countries that we're responsible for. It is they who make those collections come alive, through their own experiences, through their photographs, through the works that they have done, and through their own passion for the countries they have written about. And so we have a case in point today. We have Keith Bowers, a BBC writer and author, who has written an exceptional book, "Imperial Exile: Emperor Haile Selassie in Britain," 1936-1940. The book will be available for purchase later on. And now I want to introduce our own, Fantahun Tiruneh, the specialist for Ethiopia and Eritrea, who is a librarian, a scholar, and who has singlehandedly built an Ethiopian collection at the Library to be one of the best in the United States and in the world. So Fantahun will introduce the speaker. Thank you. ^M00:05:34 [ Applause ] ^M00:05:38 >> Fentahun Tiruneh: Thank you, Mary-Jane. Ladies and gentlemen, I once again welcome you to our beautiful reading room for this tremendous event. And personally I'm very, very happy for today's event, because it has drawn a lot of scholars that I have met for so many years. And some of my teachers, such as Dr. Mulugeta [phonetic], are here. And very good friends that I have lost for some time have shown up today. And I especially recognize Princess Masente, Princess Zeble, and Dr. -- Prince Emias [phonetic], for making themselves available today for this event. And I am very grateful to David Reta [phonetic], who has made the important connection between me and Keith Bowers, our guest today. Before I go into introducing today's guest, I'd like to make an announcement that this event is being videotaped, and later broadcast on the Library's webcast and other media. There will be a formal question and answer period after the lecture, in which the audience is encouraged to ask questions and offer comments. Please be advised that your voice and image may be recorded and later broadcasted as part of this event. By participating in the question and answer period, you are consenting to the Library's possible reproduction and transmission of your remarks. With that said, I would also like to inform you that the book signing will take place in this very room right after Mr. Bowers' presentation. I now will introduce our guest. Mr. Keith Bowers is a former BBC executive producer, a writer, an international broadcast correspondent. At the BBC Mr. Bowers ran two international television documentary series, assignments and correspondent, and at one stage was in charge of all the BBC's international current affairs outputs on television, domestic, radio, and world service. He worked for 20 years for the BBC. For nine months in 2014, he was based in Washington, DC, working as an executive producer for Al Jazeera. He has also taught journalism to students at a number of universities around the world, including [inaudible] University, City University in London, and New York University. Mr. Bowers has worked extensively in Ethiopia over the past 15 years. He has taught in the School of Journalism and Communication at [inaudible] University, and I'm glad to announce that Avi Fort [phonetic], my best -- my good friend, was the dean when Mr. Bowers was a lecturer at the university, and has worked with young documentary makers as part of the Ethiopian Field Initiative. He is the author of two books, his first book, "Viewing History," which is an eyewitness account of key movements of change, and "Imperial Exile," of course the one that we are discussing today. Mr. Keith Bowers is based in the United Kingdom as a broadcast consultant, and now lives in the city of Bath. Please welcome Keith Bowers. ^M00:09:39 [ Applause ] ^M00:09:44 >> Keith Bowers: [Speaks Foreign Language]. [Laughter] Welcome to everybody. ^M00:09:51 [ Speaks Foreign Language ] ^M00:09:58 So it's a great pleasure and honor to be here in this wonderful, marvelous, inspiring building. When I was in Washington in 2014, I came here and was inspired to study and learn, just by the walls and the books. It's a fantastic place to be. It's great also to have friends, and colleagues, and members of the emperor's family as well, and especially to Princess Zeble, who helped me in the writing of this book. We had two interview sessions at Annandale, and we also met on Kings Road in Chelsea. So we're meeting again in a different place. And it's a pleasure to meet Prince Emias as well. We communicated by e-mail, and the princess, his mother too, it's great to meet you. And Abby Ford and David Greta, and I have some friends I worked with, Josh and Cody, when I was here, and thank you so much for coming. It's rather appropriate, I think, that we're talking about His Imperial Majesty, the emperor and his exile period in the United States. But the story I'm telling happened in Britain primarily. But there were many links between the emperor and the United States. As you know, he met President Roosevelt in 1944 at Bitter Late on a destroyer, and was the first African leader to have a tickertape reception on Broadway, where more than a million people turned up to welcome him. And, of course, there were links with the Americans with the Foundation of Ethiopian Airlines, which is now one of the most successful airlines in Africa, that was instigated with American help. So there are many links. And I learned yesterday, excitedly, that the emperor also visited the Library of Congress. And lurking somewhere in these ogost [phonetic] buildings is actually a hand-drawn map by his Imperial majesty, 1921, a map of Ethiopia and it's in store here somewhere, so yes. But that's not the subject of the lecture today. That's a different lecture, the relationship between America and Ethiopia. Today we're going to be talking about His Imperial Majesty's exile time in Bath. And the way I'm going to do this is look at why did he end up in Britain in the first place, what happened to him while he was there in the 1930s, and then how did he come to leave? It's a big story. And, of course, the emperor was in power for many, many years, so we're not touching on a lot of the aspects of his reign. We're just focusing on the exile experience. Why was I interested in this? Well, I think first of all, the exile experience is a universal human condition. Throughout history, people have been refugees forced from their countries. And today, as we know, this is a very commonplace thing. So I was very excited to look at this through the eyes of one person, what was it like to be in exile? Of course, as we know the background to this, the emperor came to Britain in 1936 after Italy had invaded Ethiopia a few months before. So this was a time of war and international aggression, all issues of collective security and peace, and having to protect the weak from the strong, and the powerful, all of these are relevant. But most of all, I wanted to write this story because it's a fascinating story. It's a mingling of two cultures, two countries at an incredible time in world history, the 1930s. And I think thank you to the Library of Congress for inviting me and I think, as Fenta said, I live in Bath myself, which is why I wanted to write this book, because that's where the emperor lived for most of his time in Britain. And Bath itself is a fascinating historical city. Anyway, now we're going to have a few slides. I hope I can operate them. You know the old joke about President Ford that could he walked down the streets and chew gum down at the same time, I'm now going to test whether I can speak and operate this at the same time. [Inaudible], we'll see what happens. So the picture you have in front of you here is one of my favorites. I don't know whether you've ever seen this one before; probably taken around the 1930s of the emperor on a hunting party with two of his sons. And the wonderful train, the [inaudible], on the French-built railway line from Djibouti to Addis Ababa, which incidentally, the route has been built -- a new railway has been built by the Chinese. So there will be a super-duper fast link between Djibouti and Addis Ababa fairly soon. This one, though, was this wonderful narrow gauge train. And we're going to be mentioning a little bit about the train later on. So for those of you not familiar with the history of Ethiopia, think of a map, top-right, Horn of Africa, next to Sudan, Kenya, Djibouti, Somalia, that's where Ethiopia is, in the 1930s, a very different place to what it is now. And the emperor came to power in his coronation in 1930. But before that, he'd been in power for 14 years as crown prince and prince regent. So he was not inexperienced in domestic and international affairs; far from it. But in 1930 around the time of this photograph, he had a massive coronation in Addis Ababa. Guests came all over the world, he was announced on the world stage, he was on the front cover of Time Magazine. Ethiopia had announced itself to the world, and people were beginning to take interest. So this is a backdrop to the early '30s. Within a few years, of course, he finds himself manning an antiaircraft gun in the north of Ethiopia. The Italians invaded in 1985; why, Mussolini wanted a colony, a fascist flag waving exercise. He wanted to show his power, and so he just invaded. The Italians, of course, were also smarting very much after they were defeated at the Battle of Adwa in 1896, the first African army to beat a European one. And the Italians were still very sore about that. And the Empress Father, of course, fought in that battle in 1896. In 1935, 1936, it was a bit of a difficult battle. The Ethiopian army was out-gunned, out-maneuvered, had worst equipment. And so soon, the emperor had to retreat to Addis Ababa, and in a historic occasion statement decision, he left Addis Ababa for the coast to escape his country, and to appeal to the League of Nations, which Ethiopia had joined in 1923, quite an internationalist move. The Italians had supported this move after the initial reluctance. UK government, of course, opposed it. We'll see this as something of a theme. I have to apologize for my government in the 1930s, but there we go. And so he had a council of ministers, and they decided, "Yes; let's promote the case of Ethiopia at the League of Nations." The emperor goes there in person and he can be a figure head of the opposition to the Italian occupation, and he could speak up for Ethiopia. So he decided to leave, going against thousands of years of Ethiopian history where kings and rulers either died in battle, or on some occasions, even committed suicide rather than be captured. So this was a modern decision, you might say. It's an extraordinary story we don't have time to go into today of how the emperor and his family left Addis Ababa on a train like we saw, worried about Italian bombers maybe attacking them. And they went to the Port of Djibouti where a British ship ended up had been arranged to pick them up. Now, the catching of the ship, which goes -- to those of you who are "Star Trek" fans, the name of this boat was "HMS Enterprise." And believe it or not, there was a captain's log. Captain Morgan kept a log, which I have read in the queue national archives in the UK, an extraordinary diary of this event, of picking up -- he was told to expect 12 guests, 12 visitors. When he arrived and when he saw the [inaudible] side at Djibouti, he found 150 people, more than 100 cases of [inaudible] dollars, that was the currency they used in those days, the European currency, two lions, a dog, a Cadillac, a Buick, and a lots of people running around, saying they needed to escape. So after much negotiating and discussion, it was agreed he would take 50 people. The lions didn't make it onboard, the dog did, the cases of [inaudible], they made it onboard as well. ^M00:20:17 ^M00:20:20 And an extraordinary journey as the boat went up through the Red Sea, people on the shore would follow the ship by motorbike, other boats came after it, and he eventually landed in Haifa in what is now known as Israel, and went to Jerusalem. While he was on that ship, according to the captain's log, there was much discussion between British naval authorities and the emperor as to where he should go. It seems pretty clear he'd had some injuries in the war in the North with some poisoned gas injuries, and he was -- he was thought at one stage to go for treatment in Germany. The empress wanted to go to Jerusalem to join the Ethiopian community there. But there were discussions about the emperor coming to Britain. Now, the British government was like many governments, torn between showing interest and doing the right thing, and being open to what should happen. The big issue was they didn't want to upset the Italian government. They thought Mussolini might go towards Hitler, which of course, he eventually did. But they didn't want that to happen. But equally they knew that Ethiopia had suffered injustice, had been invaded, and the public opinion in Britain was keen that the Ethiopians were supported. So they tried to have it both ways. They said he could come, but he could only come under certain conditions, only bring a small party of diplomats, and that he couldn't engage in political activity; and that he couldn't be given an official welcome. So this is the captain's log, by the way. It does exist, five pages of sheer historical amazement. Here is the emperor. See, I'm already failing; I haven't been able to chew gum and walk down the street. Here he is in Jerusalem, these wonderful photos. And here he is in Gibraltar on the way to the UK. He was given British naval protection until Gibraltar, and then the government said, "No; you can't arrive on British shores on a British ship." So he had to transfer to a civilian passenger liner. Such are the [inaudible] international diplomacy. Here he is arriving. I'm sure some of you here know some of these other figures in these photographs. Some of you here will know a lot more about this history than I do. So apologies for my -- if I make any mistakes here. So but here he is at Southampton, arriving on the wonderful Orient Line. So that's why he ended up in Britain, to get away from the Italians, to use it as a base to speak to the League of Nations in Switzerland. And of course, Britain then was a major world power, and it was a good base to have to manage to do some sort of politic [inaudible], but I would say under the counter, as it were. ^M00:23:17 ^M00:23:22 The emperor gets to London. Here is the reception from the British people; big crowd. This is Princess Gate near Harrods in [inaudible] Bridge, very convenient for shopping, but just opposite Hyde Park. It's actually just up the road from here is where the current Ethiopian Embassy is as well. And keeping the American connection going, JFK lived somewhere on this street when he was a student. So look at the reception here. This is -- oh from the top, but you can see the balcony where the Royal Family were. And it caused major attention. This was big news in Britain and around the world, the Italian invasion. And, of course, as we saw, it actually -- some people argue was the start of the Second World War. You can make that case. So it was a big international news, and he was big news in the UK. ^M00:24:18 ^M00:24:23 Here it is, I love this photo of the old London taxi being greeted by what's his face, Anthony Eden, the British foreign secretary at the time, Lord Avon. Note the bowler hat has already sort of assimilated some of sort of British culture. And if I was doing another book, I would do the hat wear, the headgear of His Imperial Majesty, because seeing what he wears at different times of his life and during this exile period, it tells you a lot. Anyway, here he is. Here is Anthony Eden. Anthony Eden was fairly pro-Ethiopia. The prime minister at that time, Baldwin, was more ambivalent, and his predecessor -- one of his successors, [inaudible] Chamberlain was less inclined towards Ethiopia. Suddenly Baldwin himself was embarrassed about -- he wanted to welcome the emperor, but he didn't want to be seen to be welcoming him. And the emperor was taken on a tour of the House of Westminster, the parliament on the banks of the Thames. He went in there to the tea room. Lo and behold, the [inaudible] Baldwin is at the end of the room. And when he sees the emperor, he dives under a table to avoid seeing him. [Laughter] So actually it's British diplomacy; we're very good at it. And they also changed the route of his motorcade so he couldn't be received by a lot of cheering supporters. So there was the ambivalence that he survived in for the next four years in actual fact. But the people were very, very supportive, and the people of Bath especially. Of course, its base in Europe was to go to the League of Nations in Geneva in June, 1936. Some people say this was the best speech he ever gave. Some the Italian journalists before it started tried to drown him out with whistles. Mussolini had put them up to this. They didn't want him to have a platform. They said, "Well, we are now the rulers of Ethiopia. Why is he there?" But anyway, eventually, they were thrown out. A Romanian delegate, [inaudible], got up and said -- forgive my French here, "[Speaks Foreign Language]," "Let's get rid of these savages." And they were duly thrown out. [Inaudible], though, his government thought they embarrassed them, and he was sent into exile after this, apparently. Amazing times, the 1930s. So anyway, he made a speech and everybody nodded their head accentually and said, "Yes; Italian aggression very bad." But within a week, the League of Nations had actually lifted sanctions against Italy, and so his speech fell on deaf ears essentially. So suddenly it was dawning on the emperor that he might be out of his country for some time; indeed, maybe he might never get back. Because that's what we have to do, we have to suspend our knowledge of what happened in rest of the 20th century. This story -- we have to see through the emperor's eyes. He had no idea when he would get back. And of course, he did. But it could have been different. The areas where some of his aides and advisors, [inaudible]. He goes back to the UK, and people like making statues of him. This is by Hilda Seligman, who he stayed with in Wimbledon. She was a sculptress. It's now in Cannizaro Park, and when I took this photo about a year ago, it was restored a few years ago, but it needs probably restoring again. The emperor, believe it or not, entered into British cultural life. I looked through many reports about his time there. He was a favorite for a costume at many fancy dress parties that Britain had, [inaudible] of Britain. People would go dressed as Emperor Haile Selassie. He was in the fashion pages for his capes and shawls. And there's a wonderful -- at the same time in 1936, this is by Epstein, the American British sculptor; wonderful. And another here I like here by a Serbian sculptor. So he was still famous, and people were still following what he was up to. ^M00:29:10 ^M00:29:14 This is Bath Abbey. Why did he go to Bath? Well, it seems he went, first of all, just for a rest. He'd been at war, he'd been to Europe, under a lot of stress and strain. Someone recommended that he go to Bath in the west of Britain, 100 miles west of London, a spa city, a Roman city. And the irony of that, turning up in an Italian city, having fled from the Italians. Also, a famous city for its 18th century architecture; people come from all over the world to see it. This would have been the view from the train. He went on the train built by the wonderful British engineer, Isambard Kingdom Brunel. The line is still going today strong. On this site in 973 AD, the first king of all England was crowned king. So quite an auspicious place. This is not my house, [laughter], neither is it the emperor's house. This is the wonderful royal present, Palladian architecture, balanced proportion harmony, [inaudible]. You'll see it there. [Inaudible]. So the wonderful Marlboro buildings, His Imperial Majesty took his dog for a walk near here. He was being spotted here definitely. So these wonderful buildings; one of the few bridges in the world, Pulteney Bridge that has working shops on it. When he first came to Bath, the emperor, in August 1936, this would have been the route to the hotel. He stayed in a hotel, first of all, for a month. He wasn't going to settle there, he just came for some leave, and some rest and recuperation. And you see these elegant -- this is the canal, but it's not the Manchester Ship Canal. This is a sort of elegant [inaudible] canal, very close to the hotel where he stayed. ^M00:31:19 ^M00:31:24 The Bath Spa Hotel where the emperor, his three eldest children, one or two advisors stayed for the month they were in Bath. This was state-in-the-art in those days. It had 100 rooms, 60 with hot and cold running water, an orchestra, a ballroom, and several acres of grounds. And the emperor made quite a stir there. So that his daughter, Princess Sahai [phonetic] one day at the ballroom, she was invited to dance by a young English gentleman; she was 16 or 17 at the time. One of the emperor's advisors, Dr. Bian [phonetic], who eventually ended up living in America, was worried about this and said to her, "Princess, I think it's maybe time for bed." And she was with a British lady, and the British lady said, "Oh, come on, it's fine. I'll look after her. It's no problem." Dr. Bian went off to see the emperor said, "Your daughter's dancing with this young English gentleman. And apparently the emperor just laughed, fine he wasn't that worried about it. [Laughter] And in May when I had the British version of the book, we had an event to celebrate 80th anniversary of His Imperial Majesty's arrival in Bath. And we dug out this iconic photograph with the then mayor of Bath. A day after he arrived, August the 5th or 6th, the mayor of Bath, James Carpenter, they stood on the steps of the Bath Spa Hotel. I have a friend who used to be in the army and he said, "What is the emperor carrying? I'm going to read that." And he's been studying it in microscopes, but he hasn't been yet able to discover what it is. I think it's probably a postcard. So 80 years later, we had a wonderful event; over 100 people came. The high sheriff of Somerset, the local NP, the local head of the council, some people who were in Bath alive at the time the emperor was there, and we recreated this photograph. This is Prince Michael, one of the emperor's grandsons, and this is the great niece of the mayor of Bath. So we recreated this history. So it's living history, as indeed we are today. Princess Zeble was actually -- not at this time, she came to Bath a year after this. She was in Jerusalem at the time, and then came a little bit later. But we are -- you know, we have in the audience, someone who lived through this exile period. ^M00:33:57 ^M00:34:02 He was very well-received everywhere he went in Bath at this time. These are not Nazi salutes, I think people are -- it's just the greeting that people had. [Laughter] So he went to the royal bath for some treatment. And I've seen in the book, he had Tivoli [phonetic] treatment, whatever that is. I haven't been able to discover what that is, but -- and behind him in the beret is Princess Sahai. And he was offered the chance to escape in secret and said, "No; I'll come out in the front." And so he was well-received. People were pleased to see him. And he went on a tour of Bath. Of course, being the lion of Judah, he liked lions. And actually the city of Bath likes lions. It's on the coat of arms. There are many -- more than 500 statues of lions in Bath itself. This is one of them at the Royal Victoria Park. And this may be one of the reasons why the emperor maybe felt at home in Bath. It's quite a royal, elegant, regal city. The people give him a good reception. He was beginning to realize he may not go back soon to Ethiopia. He was running out of hard cash. His advisor said, "You can't afford to keep living in all these expensive hotels and traveling around. You need to make a base." So he maybe thought about maybe going to Switzerland and settling there, but the Swiss said they didn't want them there; they were neutral, and next door to Italy. And so he decided to stay in Britain. London was a possibility, but maybe too close to the government. So Bath became suddenly a real possibility, because of its royal heritage, pleasant place, only two hours on the train from London so you could still get to London. Property was cheaper there, of course. And it was a convivial place to be, maybe. And so this is empress with him here. By October 1936, they bought a house and they bring some of the rest of the family. This is the house, Fairfield House, actually an Italianate villa, another irony, built around 1850, two acres of grounds, some big bedrooms, but not a palace; I mean, just a big family house. ^M00:36:23 ^M00:36:27 They are the royal couple. We think this is the outbuildings of Fairfield house in Bath, and probably taken in 1937, 1938. Some of you will know some of these people. I'm sorry to say Princess Zeble -- the photographer was very bad, so she's at the bottom with half her head cut off. Apologies. They wouldn't have known all these years later that -- and some of these will be known to you in the family. So they were there together as a family. And, of course, during the summer, the weather's not bad and so, you know, you can play some tennis and table tennis and Prince [inaudible] would go around on his bike. ^M00:37:08 ^M00:37:12 This is an old photo I dug out. Sorry for the quality. This is Princess Ida, another grandchild, going to school in Penzance in the southwest tip of Britain. So some of the grandchildren came. They had to be looked after, and educated, and everything else. Why I've been able to find some of these photographs is that in Britain, we have the lottery scheme, and they put money into cultural projects. And they -- in 2012, they put money into developing regional newspaper archive from the year, I think, 1750. Between 1750 and 1949, many regional newspapers have been put online, and they're searchable; incredible. So you put in "Emperor Haile Selassie," and all of these entries come up from the Dundee Evening [inaudible] and the Nottingham Evening Post, which we would have never been able to -- I wouldn't have even known they were there. But we found all sorts of things, all sorts of photographs, even the fact that he tried kippers, if you know what kippers are, sort of herring, smoky fish; even tried some of those apparently, so we're told. Because many diary items were written about the emperor and his family. He was still new. Some people wanted to know what he was up to. And in 1936, still had some cash, so here is a [inaudible]. In the car is Prince [inaudible]. I think he's too young to drive it in the moment, but there's the man from Bath Garages. The emperor, of course, as you probably know, he loved gadgets, and planes, and clocks, and watches, and cars, [makes sounds]. Now, in the grounds of the garden, of course, the Orthodox faith very important. There was no church -- Orthodox Church in Britain. What there was, was a greenhouse, and at the time, the emperor wrote to the church in Ethiopia -- church in Jerusalem, and arranged for a tabot [phonetic] or a concentration stone to become over to the greenhouse. So they made this into their church. It no longer stands today, but that was the couple of priests there, and there were services regularly to pray for the country. Of course, while the emperor is there, he's obviously aware of what is going on in Ethiopia, and a lot of the news is very bad. This is actually on the steps of Addis Ababa University, the palace -- it used to be the palace where the emperor set off from for his exile. This is the Italian viceroy Graziani. I taught -- this is a campus, and I taught on this campus. Here in beginning of 1937, he's distributing arms to the poor. But there's a plot to kill him. Two people throw a bomb, he's injured a couple of people are killed, the Italian army and the Blackshirts go berserk. They mow down hundreds of beggars, and women, and children, and then go on the rampage for basically four days killing maybe as many as 19,000 people over four days. And so some terrible times. This, of course, comes to the Fairfield house, the news, the Gloucester Evening Paper, which is close-by to Bath. They had an appointment with him, but they said His Imperial Majesty had to cancel the appointment because of the distressing news. And it was said later in a later interview he gave a few years later, this was the only time his servants apparently saw him break down in front of them. So terrible news. You're there on the other side of the world powerless, you can't do anything about it; some people have accused you of running away. And then there was a whole series of news of people he knew who had been killed and murdered. And this is a service in London a few weeks later with the foreign minister and [inaudible], his cousin, and the London representative for Ethiopia. Now, of course, some British people helped him. Here's another bit of living history. This is a tapestry based on a photograph taken by a young boy called "Richard Pankhurst." For those of you who know Ethiopia and for those in the library and studies business, Richard Pankhurst is the founder of the Institute of Ethiopian Studies. His mother was Sylvia Pankhurst of the famous Pankhurst suffragette family. And she took to the emperor and his cause. Even though she was opposed to the idea of royalty and the monarchy, she wanted to support him because of what the Italian government had done, and she was speaking out for freedom. So she went to visit the emperor at Fairfield House. This is his friend in the background. And so an angle like this is taken by an eight-year-old boy, Richard, who is still alive. So I talked to Richard about this, he took this photograph, and she was one of many British people who rallied to the cause and supported Ethiopia. And see if you can spot Princess Zeble on here. This is at the wedding of Richard Pankhurst and Rita, his wife in the middle there. They still have this house in Addis Ababa to this day. ^M00:42:41 ^M00:42:46 This is [inaudible] next to the emperor, who -- again, they're there in Central London. And David Greta, thanks to him for facilitating my visit here. This is his father, [inaudible] Greta, with the emperor. So this is Sidak [phonetic], the foreign minister's son, one of his sons who was also in Bath. So there's a whole range of characters who themselves were in exile, and had to suffer being away from your own country, losing, you know, identity, not knowing what was going to happen next. So you can see this is basically a map I put together of where the emperor went during his stay in Britain. He didn't just say in Bath. He did go -- you see these points in the southwest. He opened many faiths and festivals you see on the south coast. He went to various places to have a look around. The tip of Wales at the bottom, he went to a holiday home, some people in Bath lent him that. And then you'll see he went to Manchester, Liverpool where his son went to university, and right up into Scotland. Many biographies of the emperor and -- both in American English basically just say the emperor was in exile for four to five years. He did the speech at the League of Nations. He went to Bath, and it was cold and miserable. And then he turned up in Sudan in 1940. So I've tried to fill in these missing years. He didn't just stay in Bath -- he was cold and miserable some of the time in the winter, but I can testify that during the summer, it's pretty nice. So he did get around a bit, he did -- you know, and he spoke at various rallies. He did one in Cambridge, north of London, 600 students wearing pink carnations drummed their feet as he came in to speak to them. So people were taken with this cause. The didn't like fascism, popular opinion, and the emperor was an embodiment of opposition to it. But of course -- but now we're talking about 1938. It's beginning is dawn on His Imperial Majesty maybe he's not going to get back. Bad news is coming from home. The British government has changed, the Foreign Secretary Eden is replaced by Lord Halifax, who's much more hard-lined, much more pro-Italy. And Halifax basically says, "Look, we've got to recognize Italy's occupation. That's the reality. That war is over, we've got to move on. King Emmanuel III -- Victor Emmanuel III, he is the rightful ruler of Ethiopia now." And he suggested a meeting of League of Nations to discuss this. The emperor went this time to make another appearance. He was exhausted, he had been ill, and he wasn't able to complete his speech this time. Lorenzo Taezaz had to finish it for him. And it was clear the writing was on the wall that many countries in Europe were going to recognize Italy's occupation. And this was clear that it was very depressing news. Here he is on the west pier of Brighton. Note now he's wearing Western gear, the hats and the overcoat. This is another bit of headgear, [inaudible] White. And the [inaudible] White newspaper reports that the emperor's coming here, and he has been depressed, so this is openly said in the press. So it shows how quite disturbing it was, really. This I found in the National Archive. By the end of 1938, the British government did indeed act on their promise of recognizing Italy's occupation of Ethiopia. That meant the British government did not see the emperor anymore as head of state. He was now the ex-head of state. ^M00:46:54 ^M00:46:59 So they slapped him with an income tax return. [Laughter] I love it. Yes; that's -- [laughs] I don't, but -- then the emperor wrote to the king 1939 saying, "Look, I'm still here. Don't forget me." As war was coming in Europe, 1939, he goes to a Bible college in Wales, just before the world breaks out. He gets some money from the British government eventually. Churchill becomes prime minister. Mussolini declares war on Britain. I'm going to finish in a second. Mussolini declares war on Britain. Churchill eventually sends the emperor back. And here he is in Sudan, entering -- I know this date, this is January the 20th, that's my birthday, just in case you don't know; 1941, the Dinder River, he crosses the Dinder River. There was some more British government maneuvering while deciding when to go into Sudan, but he goes into territory here. And now he's back in Addis Ababa in 1941, five years to the day after he left. So it's time for questions, is it? ^M00:48:19 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:48:20 Pardon? ^M00:48:21 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:48:22 Yes. So far so good. You're still following? [Laughter] So here he is with George Steer, a wonderful British South African journalist who wrote a lot about the emperor. The story and relations with Britain and Bath were not over. In the mid '50s, he came back to Bath to be made free man of the city. We have this quaint thing in Britain where you have these things -- where you can be recognized to be a free man of the city. In London, it means you can drive cattle across the Thames on a bridge. And if you're caught for any dismeanor, you can be hanged with a silken cord instead of a rope. [Laughter] So it's quite good being a free man. Anyway, so he was a free man of Bath; this time big state reception, huge turnout. He gave these elephant tusks to the city. Unfortunately, they were stolen a couple years later. Fairfield House is still -- he gave to the people of Bath in 1958. It's still being use as a community center. And of course, he didn't forget the people of Bath. This is Fairfield Palace in Debre Zeyit, which he named after the house in Bath. ^M00:49:35 ^M00:49:39 And this is a picture I found not long before his death at Fairfield House. Of course, those of you who know the history, 40 years on, things were very different. And eventually, after being murdered by the dirge in 1975, after the dirge had deposed, and a few years later, the emperor's buried in Holy Trinity Cathedral, which he'd completed as a monument to his victory over the Italians. So in terms of my story, his time in exile, in some ways you could say it's fitting that he is laid to rest at this place, which symbolizes one of his defining moments of his life. Plus in the lead at the top, there is a photograph of the League of Nation's speech and debate. So this exile period, this time of fighting the Italians, was very, very important in his life, I submit, and is therefore worthy of just thinking more than he went to Geneva and Bath where he was cold for four years. So that's what I tried to do, ladies and gentlemen. So please, if you've got any questions, please do. ^M00:50:49 [ Applause ] ^M00:50:54 [ Background Talking ] ^M00:50:58 I hope it's not too difficult. You know, that's -- [laughs] ^M00:51:00 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:51:14 Ah, well -- ^M00:51:15 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:51:20 Yes; well, I mean, there are some missing holes in the story, but basically I've seen some of the Cabinet papers for the discussions they had when Mussolini declared war and the time running up to that. And they analyzed would the emperor gain support from the patriots and from the people back home? What -- how should we support him? By this time, you're right, Eden was back in the Cabinet by this time. And I don't know the answer to that, because I haven't seen anything that said specifically. The Emperor said that he had been promised modern weapons, and that he would be supported very quickly to go back. In the end, he ended up nine months waiting. And it was only sort of facilitated where Eden himself would had been promoted again the Cabinet went to Khartoum, and basically pushed the deal that led to the invasion. So there were still factions in the British government. There was still opposition in Africa among the British diplomats. Some of them didn't want the emperor to come back. And, of course, as we saw -- I mean, this is not the subject of today, but more British sort of government to-ing and fro-ing, they really having in their own eyes liberated -- or helped to liberate Addis Ababa. They wanted to carry on and run the place. And the emperor had to fight them not literally -- ^M00:52:46 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:52:58 Yes, they did. ^M00:52:59 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:53:01 Yes; it was British self-interest. Churchill wanted to send him to cause trouble for Mussolini. He saw this was a way of doing it. Yes; so this was a feature for the next two years. And this in fact led really why the Ethiopian policy went much more towards the United States in subsequent years. ^M00:53:18 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:53:20 Yes. >> My question is basically the same, you know, whether there had been any negotiation regarding the ultimate invasion while he was still [inaudible]? >> Keith Bowers: Well, I mean, in the end, it was done quite quickly, but he thought they weren't -- maybe weren't going to send him. He did say to Sylvia Pankhurst at one stage, "What are they doing? Why are they delaying? Why won't they send me?" And later, Sylvia Pankhurst said -- she wrote an article saying, "I have to protect the emperor from his protectors now." Yes. ^M00:53:56 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:54:10 Sorry; missed some of that. Is that -- ^M00:54:12 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:54:34 Yes; it was to appease Mussolini. ^M00:54:35 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:54:38 Well, you could argue that. ^M00:54:39 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:54:42 Yes; you could make that case. You could make that case. >> Okay, thank you. >> Keith Bowers: There was a tremendous amount of appeasing, of course. Yes; and I think that the actual decision to recognize Italy's occupation, that was a betrayal, definitely, when they said, "Well, you know, let's move on." But it was different times. They were frightened of war in Europe, and it was a frightening war, as we saw. So no wonder they were -- you have to try and understand it from their point of new. I'm not justifying it, but I'm saying they were trying to make political calculations. And in the end, even though public opinion was very pro Haile Selassie at the beginning, they began more and more to be worried about Europe, and Africa then seemed far away. So British public opinion wasn't -- in some ways, the emperor was becoming a little bit forgotten. And maybe if Mussolini hadn't have come back into the war, he would never would have come back to Ethiopia. >> During his life, did the British government ever make a formal apology to Selassie [laughter] [inaudible]? ^M00:55:45 [ Background Talking ] ^M00:55:50 >> Keith Bowers: No. [Laughter] I mean, there were factions -- as we said, there were factions in the government. They felt they were pursuing the right policy. And they would also point out and say, "Well, didn't we supply troops and actually get rid of the Italians in the end?" But no, we're not talking about principle here, we're talking about can do politics, yes, that's -- ^M00:56:19 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:56:49 Not very much. No, not very much, no. Later, they did. Of course, you know, the current queen was quite close to His Imperial Majesty and visited Ethiopia. And when he came back in 1954, he stayed at Buckingham Palace, which was rather contrast to how he turned up in 1936. But no I think even in 1924 when he came on a grand European tour, the then king was a little bit sniffy about receiving him or not. There was quite a lot of racism -- let's not cut a -- beat around the bush, there was quite a lot of racism in the Foreign Office and in sort of establishment circles, not just towards Ethiopia, but towards, you know, anybody who was not from Europe, I'm ashamed to say, so -- ^M00:57:38 [ Inaudible Comment ] ^M00:57:47 No. I mean, he wrote to the king there in 1939. I've seen, again, at the archives in queue the diplomats have a big debate about how should we reply to this letter, because the King didn't reply; you know, the Foreign Office mandarins. And some factions said, "Well, we can't -- you know, who does he think he is? We can't let him think he can get back his power on French and British bayonets." That is what someone said. So they did eventually try and help him with his funding, because they didn't want the embarrassment of the emperor going bankrupt. That was one of the features. I haven't really gone into it. They were short of ready cash to pay for the household bills and everything. They did find a benefactor who gave, I think it was 2,500 pounds a year, which is not a bad sum in those days. There was then a squabble within the British establishment as to whether that should be subject to tax. The mysterious benefactor, Sir William Collier, then collapsed and died of a heart attack on a train. And there was another [inaudible] over whether his legacy to the emperor was then subject to more death tax. I mean, it was quite extraordinary, really, the -- he was spied on by the tax authorities. And so I would say no, I think we have to understand he preoccupation wars with the rise of Nazism. You know, people quite understandably, in some ways, were not frequently straight, you know, and the policy of appeasement, as we know, turned out to be an utter failure. So no, I don't think it's -- I think the story of his exile really you could say I think the British people come out of it pretty well in favoring Ethiopia and justice, international justice. British government was sort of comme ci, comme ca, I think we could probably say. >> I think we have to end it here. And please give an applause. >> Keith Bowers: Yes. ^M00:59:46 [ Applause ] ^M00:59:50 >> This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress. Visit us at loc.gov. ^E00:59:56