Holtom, Paul D.

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Salmon, Patrick and Tony Barrow (eds.): "Britain and the Baltic. Studies in Commercial, Political and Cultural Relations 1500–2000"

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NORDEUROPAforumZeitschrift für Politik,Wirtschaft und KulturISSN 1863639X1/200313. Jahrgang (6. der N.F.)Seiten 107-109Salmon, Patrick and Tony Barrow (eds.): Britain andthe Baltic. Studies in Commercial, Political andCultural Relations 1500–2000. Sunderland:University of Sunderland Press, 2003.This book is not only ambitious in the time period covered, but also in therange of themes that it seeks to address: war and trade, assimilation andidentities, and international security. Drawing upon papers presented at theconference Britain and the Baltic: East Coast Connections (1999), thisedited volume presents an eclectic mixture of case studies on: tradebetween East-coast British ports and Baltic ports (John D. Fudge;Jerzy Litwin; Adrian Osler; David Aldridge; Bill Purdue; Chris Evans,Åsa Eklund and Göran Rydén); the patronage networks of Scottishmerchants and ministers and the impact of small British commercial, militaryand diplomatic communities in the Swedish Empire and Prussian ports(Steve Murdoch; Leos Müller; Enn Küng; Martin Åberg); Swedishprivateering (Lars Ericson); British naval and war-time policies in the region(Andrew Lambert; Lutz Oberdörfer; Antonijs Zunda); links between Anglicanand Lutheran churches (Nicholas Hope); Poland’s NATO aspirations (KaareDahl Martinsen); accounts of British ambassadors on Denmark(Jørgen Sevaldsen); and a comparative study of post World War II cultureand society in Newcastle and Malmö (Natasha Vall).However, it is clear that the main theme in this volume is Britain’s ‘greatpower’ naval policy and marine trade in the Baltic Sea region, pleasantlyinterspersed with accounts of British, predominantly Scottish, communitieslocated in the region and their influence upon ‘local’ life in the cities in whichthey settled. In this regard, Steve Murdoch’s account of the sizeableScottish commercial, military and diplomatic communities in the SwedishEmpire of the early Seventeenth century and Martin Åberg’s study of the‘anglophiling’ influence of the comparatively small British middle-classcommunities in western Sweden move smoothly between individualbiographies and more general trends.The book makes one aware that British interests in the Baltic Sea wereinitially concentrated in its south-eastern corner, before moving northwardsin the Seventeenth century. The chapters documenting the period from1500–1650 suggest that British trading interests and communities wereclosely linked with the Prussian/Polish port of Danzig/Gdansk in the south-eastern corner of the region at this time. According to Jerzy Litwin, Gdanskremained “the principal Baltic port of destination for British ships until thesecond partition of Poland in 1793” (p. 59). Yet, when discussing the Memelcrisis of the 1920s, Lutz Oberförder states that “the region south of theBaltic Sea was not an area of traditional British interest or concern” (p. 50).Andrew Lambert neatly demonstrates the degree to which Britain’s navy‘ruled the Baltic waves’ in the period from 1890–1914, while Antonijs Zundaillustrates its post-WWI demise and the increasing influence that theemerging ‘superpowers’ had on British decisions regarding the question ofrecognising the Soviet Union’s annexation of the Baltic States in World WarII. Several contributions chart the rise and fall of Britain as a ‘Baltic Seapower’.zur StartseiteNORDEUROPAforum | Rezension | Paul D. HoltomIt seems strange to include a chapter on Poland and NATO in this collectionthat has little reference to war, trade or identity in either Britain or the Baltic.Kaare Dahl Martinsen’s chapter is an interesting account of Poland’sattempt to balance Euro-Atlantic aspirations and relations with its easternneighbours in the 1990s, but it seems out of place even in a collection ofarticles this diverse and wide-ranging.One of the most fascinating chapters, from a British or Danish perspectiveat least, is the contribution of Jørgen Sevaldsen. He provides an interestingcomparison of a book published in 1992 by the former British ambassadorto Denmark Sir James Mellon (1983–6), with An Account of Denmark as itwas in the Year 1692, written by a Seventeenth Century British ambassadorRobert Molesworth. The different receptions that the books received in theambassador’s home state and former posting are of interest, as Sevaldsensuggests, they give insights into the societies of both Britain and Denmark.In this regard, he argues that Mellon uses Denmark “as a warning exampleof the kind of society Britain could become if the process of ‘decline’continued and Britain lost its global influence. As ‘another Denmark’, Britainwould still be a civilised society, but an inward-looking and unglamorousone without a sense of mission in the world” (p. 332). In other words, Britainwould move to the ‘world periphery’, just as other former Baltic powershave.Of course, to describe Britain as a ‘Baltic power’ is not fashionable today.As David Kirby explains in the preface ‘Locating the Baltic’, the Baltic isoften confused with the Balkans in Britain, and “this low level of publicawareness may reflect the relatively un-newsworthy status of the Baltic,which in these times of strife and trouble is undoubtedly a good thing; but itmay also indicate how the Baltic has slipped out of the general ambit ofBritish public life in the course of the [twentieth] century” (p. xvii). Therefore,to say that this collection filled a gap would be an understatement. At thesame time, however, and despite the quality of several of the chapters, it isunlikely to reverse the trend that has seen the Baltic disappear from Britishpublic life, although that is not to say that attempts are not being made torevive interest and contacts between the Baltic and parts of Britain – withthe north-eastern corner of England at the fore.Paul D. HoltomNORDEUROPAforum | Rezension | Paul D. Holtom

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Salmon, Patrick and Tony Barrow (eds.): "Britain and the Baltic. Studies in Commercial, Political and Cultural Relations 1500–2000"

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