When you think of Victorian Britain, images of tea, silk, and industrial progress usually come to mind. But behind the polite empire laid a dark secret: the British Empire was running one of the largest state-sponsored narcotics operations in history all to fund its obsession with tea.
In this episode of Murder Mayhem UK, host Sam H Arnold pulls back the curtain on the Opium Wars. Discover how the British government pushed tons of illegal opium into China, crashed an economy, and forced an imperial dynasty to its knees at gunpoint. From high-seas smuggling and destroyed summer palaces to the birth of modern Hong Kong, this is the story of how tea, silver, and drugs reshaped global power forever.
In this episode, we cover:
The British tea crisis and why silver was flowing out of London.
How Queen Victoria briefly became the owner of £55 billion in illicit opium.
Lin Zexu’s heroic (and fatal) attempt to stamp out addiction in Canton.
The unequal Treaties of Nanking and Beijing that changed the map of Asia.
How the trauma of Western aggression shaped China into the global superpower it is today.
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For more deep dives into history's darkest chapters, check out our extra stories over on the Murder Mayhem UK Substack.
Stay safe, and stay curious.
