Physical Deterioration
While the difficulty and length of the Boer War no doubt had an effect on perceptions of the deterioration of the British people, the Inter-Departmental Committee on Physical Deterioration’s 1904 Report brought these fears to the forefront of British public discourse during the decade until WWI. During the Boer War, many were perplexed at the notion that the British army, which for so long had displayed its dominance in creating an Empire that stretched around the world, could be held off by the Boers, a group of farmers without the technological or military superiority. However, as this was the case, rumors began circulating suggesting British recruits for the military were not meeting standards, and were failing to pass the physical tests at an alarmingly unprecedented rate. When the war finally ended, Parliament authorized a committee to research these claims, and see what could be concluded from the findings. Two years later with the release of the 1904 Report, both Parliament and the British public had their answer, and the citizens of the Empire were not confident with the findings. The Report had several significant findings. First, and perhaps most stunning, was the evidence that “thirty-seven percent of applicants examined were rejected as unfit…[and] if the number of men too obviously unfit even to be considered was added, the total would be close to” 60% of all applicants to the British military being rejected as physically unfit (Hynes, 22). Further, the pure magnitude of those rejected, 23,745 out of the 84,402 inspected, shocked the British populace that such a large number could be considered physically unfit (Inter-Departmental Committee on Physical Deterioration, 142). As the dominance of the British Empire had embedded a sense of racial superiority in the discourse of British imperialism, such findings at the turn of the 20th century were shocking and unsettling for most British citizens. Seeking causes for such terrible physical preparedness, the Report cited the awful living and working conditions many of the urban working class faced every day (Inter-Departmental Committee on Physical Deterioration, 83). As the Report noted, children of the working poor were born into a pitiful existence, being malnourished from birth, and grew into underfed men who worked in dangerous conditions. The Report warned of the potential for disaster in future wars, pointing to the potential of an underfed and physically unprepared military force that would primarily be made up of working class men. The result of the Report was an instant outcry , as suddenly Britain’s difficulties in the Boer War made sense. As the Report discussed, the British public had ample evidence of the suggested physical deterioration of their nation. Further, as lamented by Rudyard Kipling, British use of troops from the colonies was more indictment of the physical preparedness of Britons. Without a doubt, the fears of many observers were confirmed when the Report indicated clearly that many throughout Britain were not physically fit. Coupled with concurrent ideas of eugenics popular at the time, and tied in with previous notions of British racial superiority contributing to the building of the Empire, the Report and the apparent decline of the imperial structure supplied the discourse of the British race’s physical degeneration more fuel.
While seemingly inconsequential, a series of rugby tours in the first decade of the twentieth century added significantly to fears of British deterioration and decline. These tours saw rugby teams from various British colonies, notably the New Zealand All Blacks in 1905, the South African Springboks in 1912, and an Australian team in 1908, come to Britain, challenging British rugby teams. In all three tours, the colonial teams left having “beat nearly all the teams they played, and displayed vigorous and innovative styles of play previously unseen in Britain” (Nauright, 121). Although rugby is just a sport, and tours such as this had occurred since the 1880s, these three tours produced a different reaction among the British public, a response that must be understood in the context of the Boer War and the Inter-Departmental Committee on Physical Deterioration’s 1904 Report. As rugby was seen as “the best trial of the relative vigor and virility of any two or more opposing countries,” Britain’s colonies domination of the mother nation was shocking and contributed further proof for many in the public who believed the British were deteriorating (Nauright, 122). However, the colonial rugby tour defeats compounded the worry of Britons by the suggestion of who was deteriorating. As the 1904 Report on physical deterioration stressed the destructive environmental effects of urban cities and factories where the working class lived and worked, the rugby tours suggested decline among the elite. As rugby was a sport of the elite who had the time and resources to devote to the game, the very fact of Britain’s defeat to the colonial teams seemed to indicate that decline was not isolated to the working poor. Further, as the elite still lived in the supposedly nurturing British countryside, yet seemed to suffer physical deterioration as well, the British public became fearful of an unstoppable decline of the Briton, regardless of class, work, or home. Thus, while dread about the possibility of deterioration had been present, now there seemed to be significant panic, as “losses at rugby affected the relative manhood of the power elite in Britain and shifted concerns about physical decline from the working class to the groups who produced future leaders of the British race” (Nauright, 122).
The result of the more influential 1904 Report and the highly publicized colonial rugby tour defeats was a significant panic in the British public over the apparent deterioration of their nation’s men. Further compounding such fears was the apparent evidence suggesting decline both among Britain’s working class, who would be the rank and file of the wars of the future, as well as the British elite, who would lead the armies of the future as officers and generals. While these events seem small and inconsequential, they had far-reaching consequences, both for the immediate years afterwards, and for the growing threat of war. Most immediately, the growing British fear of physical deterioration among their populace led to policy changes in the British government, as well as notable private initiatives designed at reclaiming British physical superiority that many citizens believed was the reason for the Empire’s success and dominance.