Priyamvada Gopal (The British empire’s hidden history is one of resistance, not pride, 28 July) could have been a bit more specific about the reaction in Britain to the suppression of the Morant Bay rebellion in Jamaica, as it identifies the racists and anti-racists among mid-Victorian intellectuals. The protests she refers to were organised mainly by the Jamaica Committee, who tried to get Edward Eyre, the governor of Jamaica, prosecuted for murder. The most eminent member was Charles Darwin, and it included his fellow scientists (and allies in the evolution debate) Thomas Huxley and Charles Lyell. The best-known other member was John Stuart Mill.

The racists led by the philosopher Thomas Carlyle organised the Governor Eyre Defence and Aid Committee, including John Ruskin, Charles Dickens, Charles Kingsley and Alfred Tennyson. I don’t think that is generally part of the reputation of these Victorian men of culture and supposed humanity.

John Wilson

London

• Priyamvada Gopal’s opinion piece is right. Some years ago, while researching the work of the Welsh pacifist Henry Richard, I concluded that 19th-century England had a good record of opposition to war and imperialism. Such men as Joseph Sturge, Richard Cobden, John Bright and Edward Miall staunchly opposed many of the wars and English meddling in foreign affairs. Yet the history we are taught is about war and empire.

Cobden, though not an out-and-out pacifist, was a free trader who believed in the pacifying influence of trade: “The greatest possible contact between peoples and the least possible contact between Governments [the better] … contact of peoples promotes peace, and the contact of Governments endangers peace”. Now we have Brexit.

Gwyn Griffiths

Pontypridd

• Priyamvada Gopal’s piece is a timely reminder that even at the height of Victorian imperialism there were always people in Britain who spoke out against it. Among others not mentioned in the article is Henry Hyndman of Britain’s first modern socialist organisation, the Social Democratic Federation; a lifelong advocate of home rule for both India and Ireland and of self-government throughout the empire.

Ian Bullock

Brighton

• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com

• Read more Guardian letters – click here to visit gu.com/letters