It had all been going so well. The Congress of Berlin had been a huge success, allowing Disraeli (and Salisbury) to bring back peace with honour. Things should have been flowing the Conservatives’ way.

But then there were a couple of bad military adventures, launched by over-powerful and out-of-control colonial administrators. Both ended up costing a lot of money and a lot of lives, for little gain. One, the Second Anglo-Afghan War, was even launched from India while a famine that eventually cost 8 million lives was raging and relief budgets were being cut to save money, although funds were being poured into waging war.

At the same time, the British economy was doing badly, with a recession and bad harvests.

That all added up to a rather bleaker picture for the Conservatives than their successes might have implied.

This episode also introduces three people we'll be hearing more about later, and who had significant moments in the 1870s (in one case, the moment was birth, a pretty significant event, without which it’s hard for anyone to make a name for themselves).

Illustration: Graveyard at Isandlwana, site of Britain's worst defeat in a colonial war since the American War of Independence. Photo from Zulu Kingdom Travel Guide.

Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an