Patrick N. Allitt quotes:

Author reports that a group of tortoises was given to the British by India's natives during the Seven Years War which ended in 1763. The last of those tortoises died in 2004 at the age of 255.

If you study a historical episode and feel good about it, it probably means that you haven't had it explained very well. Historical conflict is usually the struggle of different conceptions of what is good.