INTRODUCTION
Steel engraving of Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, who founded a free port in Singapore for the East India Company in 1819.
This volume is concerned with the history during the period from 1800 until 1940 of the territory which has since 1963 been known as Malaysia. Political and economic transformation as the British established settlements, and later intervened in the administration of the Malay states, is the dominant theme. During this same period, the present-day states of Sarawak and Sabah were acquired, not by the British government but by British citizens. It was a period of remarkable economic development—of particular importance were tin mining and rubber estates—and also of social transformation, with the influx of thousands off foreign workers, many of whom settled in the country.