Boer History1706 at the Cape of Good Hope: Tas Arrested, Forced Certificates, Deportations, Stellenbosch Defiance, and the Seventeen’s Verdict
Homeward Fleet, Forced Certificate, and Two Hundred and Forty Names — February 1706
With the arrival of the homeward bound fleet on the 4th of February 1706 it came to the knowledge of governor Wilhem Adriaan van der Stel that a document accusing him of malpractices had been sent to Batavia in the previous year. He immediately concluded that similar charges would be forwarded to the Netherlands, and that a memorial embodying them must already be in existence; but he could not learn where it was, or who were parties to it. The danger of his position drove him to acts of extreme folly as well as of tyranny. [3]
He caused a certificate to be drawn up in which he was credited with the highest virtues and the utmost satisfaction was expressed with his administration. The burgher residents of the peninsula were invited to the Castle and requested to sign. The landdrost of Stellenbosch, Johannes Starrenburg, who had held office since July 1705, was directed to proceed with an armed party from house to house in the country and obtain signatures there also. By these means two hundred and forty names in all were obtained, including those of a few Asiatics and free blacks. Many, however, refused to affix their signatures, even under the landdrost’s threats that they would be marked men if they did not. [3]
The certificate campaign sat against the background of official farming that had already crowded the small produce market. At Vergelegen the governor’s freehold estate at Hottentots Holland—enlarged after commissioner Wouter Valckenier’s grant of four hundred morgen in February 1700—stood a commodious dwelling, mill, tannery, wine and grain stores, slave lodge, and extensive outbuildings. Nearly half a million vines, or fully one fourth of the colony’s total by 1706, were planted there, with groves, orchards, and cornlands to match, and beyond the mountains six or eight hundred large cattle and eight or ten thousand sheep. Secunde Samuel Elsevier farmed Elsenburg near Klapmuts; the Rev. Petrus Kalden held Zandvliet; Frans van der Stel farmed at Hottentots Holland; and the retired governor’s Constantia still produced. Burghers who had signed Adam Tas’s thirty-eight-paragraph memorial late in 1705 now faced a governor trying to answer that case with paper loyalty before the return fleet could carry their charges home. [3] [4]
Arrest of Adam Tas — 28 February 1706
The governor suspected that Adam Tas, burgher of Stellenbosch and native of Amsterdam, was the writer of the memorial. Starrenburg was directed to have him arrested. Early in the morning of Sunday the 28th of February 1706 his house was surrounded by an armed party; he was seized and sent as a prisoner to the Castle; his premises were searched; and his writing desk was carried away. Bail was immediately offered for his appearance before a court of justice, and refused. He was committed to prison, where he was kept nearly fourteen months. [3]
There could be no truce after this between the governor and his opponents. If a burgher could be treated in that manner upon mere suspicion of having drawn up a memorial to the high authorities, no man’s liberty would be safe. In the desk was found the draft from which the memorial to the directors had been copied. It was unsigned, but a list of names and various letters with it indicated several who had taken part in the compilation. The completed memorial was at the time in the house of a burgher in Table Valley, where it was intended to be kept until it could be sent away with the return fleet. [3]
The governor thus became acquainted with the nature and terms of the charges against him. Some of the accusations were so overdrawn that he felt confident the directors upon reading them would acquit him of all, and in that belief he did not hesitate to request that a competent and impartial person might be sent out with the first opportunity to examine matters. The true counts that remained—Company servants and slaves used at his farm, Company materials for building, cattle taken by violence on bartering journeys, wine bought cheap and sold dear to strangers, retail wine monopoly arranged for a favoured buyer, land grants alleged to require bribes—still made a formidable indictment once the memorial’s path to Amsterdam was secured. [3]
Placaat of 4 March and the Deportations — March 1706
On the 4th of March a number of ships’ officers were invited to assist in the deliberations of the council of policy, and the retired and acting burgher councillors were summoned to give evidence. These answered a few questions put to them by the governor in a manner favourable to him. The broad council then consented to the issue of a placaat in which all persons were forbidden to take part in any conspiracy or to sign any malicious or slanderous document against the authorities of the country, under pain of severe punishment. The ringleaders in such acts were threatened with death or corporal chastisement. The fiscal and the landdrost were authorised to seize persons suspected of such offences and commit them to prison. This placaat was on the following Sunday affixed to the door of the Stellenbosch church. [3]
Within the next few days the governor caused the burghers Wessel Pretorius and Jacob van der Heiden to be arrested and committed to prison, Jan Rotterdam to be sent to Batavia, and Pieter van der Byl, Henning Huising, Ferdinandus Appel, and Jan van Meerland to be put on board a ship bound to Amsterdam. The burghers deported were informed that they must answer before the supreme authorities at the places of their destination to charges of sedition and conspiracy that would be forwarded by the Cape council, and that if they had any complaints they might make them there also. [3]
By these high-handed proceedings the governor hoped to terrify his opponents into signing the certificate in his favour and denying the truth of the charges made against him. Not one of those confined on board the ships in the bay faltered for a moment. Their wives petitioned that the prisoners might be brought to trial at once before a proper court of justice, and when it was hinted that if they would induce their husbands to do what was desired, release would follow, these women indignantly refused. The arrest and committal of Nicholas van der Westhuizen, Christiaan Wijnands (Wynoch), Hans Jacob Konterman, and Nicholas Meyboom followed shortly. [3]
Postlooper’s Return, Grain Export, and Thin Wool — March–1706
The galiot Postlooper, which had sailed for Natal on the 20th of November 1705 under master Theunis van der Schelling to inspect forests and the coast, dropped anchor again in Table Bay on the 8th of March 1706. She had reached Natal on the 29th of December, found the bar so silted that she could cross only at high water, and noted fewer cattle than sixteen years before, though wood remained in considerable quantities. When crossing the bar outward the vessel lurched; the tiller struck the skipper in the chest and hurt him so badly that he became unfit for duty. There was no one on board who could take his place, so the galiot returned without further exploration. Two of the crew had run away, attracted by the life of the Englishman Vaughan Goodwin found living there with two wives and several children. [3]
In the same season grain recovery became measurable. From 1698 to 1705 the seasons had been very unfavourable and no wheat could be exported; in 1705 the long drought broke and crops were very good, though heavy rain damaged the wheat at harvest. There was nevertheless a surplus, and in 1706 exportation was resumed and fourteen hundred muids were sent to Batavia. From 1706 to 1711, both years included, the average export would later stand rather over four thousand muids a year at a little less than twelve shillings a muid at the magazines—but the first restored shipment of the calendar year was the fourteen hundred muids of 1706. [3]
Wool remained thin. In 1700 the government had sent home two hundred and eighty-five pounds of Company wool; in 1703 one small bale; in 1704 a very small quantity; in 1705 none at all; in 1706 one hundred and fourteen pounds. The governor collected wool-bearing sheep on a farm of his own, wrote to Europe for rams and ewes of good breed and to Java for Persian sheep, and was about to give the industry a fair private trial when recall closed the experiment. Silk culture with white mulberry had already failed when imported worms died; partridges and pheasants placed on Robben Island to breed were the more successful minor trial of the same administration. [3]
Bogaert, the April Fleet, and the Chase to Robben Island — April 1706
In the meantime the memorial had been committed to the care of Abraham Bogaert, a physician in the return fleet who was refreshing himself on shore and who had a very warm sympathy with the burghers. On the 4th of April the fleet sailed, and when at sea and all fear of search was over Bogaert delivered the document to Henning Huising. [3]
The anchors of the ships were being raised and the topsails being sheeted home when the governor must have reflected that he was making a great mistake in sending four of the burghers to Europe. In great haste he embarked in a galiot and followed the fleet as far as Robben Island. In the official records it is stated that he did this to show respect to the admiral, but no such method of showing respect was practised here before or since, and his opponents were probably right when they asserted that his object was to overtake the ship in which the burghers were, and release them. He did not succeed. [3]
Of the four burghers sent to Europe, one, Jan van Meerland, would die on the passage home. The others, on arriving at Amsterdam, presented to the directors the memorial which Tas had drawn up. The charges made by the authorities at the Cape had already been received, as had the governor’s denial of some of the statements made by the burghers and explanation of others. In a matter of this kind it was necessary to act with promptitude as well as with justice: the Company had numerous and powerful enemies always watching for an opportunity to arraign it before the States General, and a charge of oppression of free Netherlanders in one of its colonies would be a formidable weapon. A commission of investigation was therefore appointed without delay. [3]
Further Arrests, Recantations, and Those Who Remained — Mid-1706
Within a week or two of the April sailing further arrests were made, when the burghers Jacob de Savoye, Pierre Meyer, Jacob Louw, Jacob Cloete, and one or two others were placed in detention. The health of some of the prisoners broke down under the rigorous treatment to which they were subjected: one— Van der Heiden—was confined for twenty-seven days in a foul dungeon, with a black criminal as his companion. Most of these then, to obtain their liberty, disowned the truth of the assertions in the memorial and expressed contrition for having signed it. They excused themselves afterwards for so doing by arguing that it could not affect the charges against the officials, as these would be brought before the directors by those then on their way to Europe. And so after an imprisonment varying from a few days to a few weeks, all were released except Adam Tas and Jacob Louw. [3]
For a short time matters were quiet, but on the governor coming to learn the names of some more of his opponents, Willem van Zyl, Francois du Toit, Guillaume du Toit, Hercules du Pré, Cornelis van Niekerk, Martin van Staden, Jacobus van Brakel, Jan Elberts, and Nicholas Elberts were cited to appear before the court of justice. These came to a resolution not to obey the summons before the decision of the directors should be known, and so they failed to attend. They were cited by placaat, but in vain. [3]
The military outposts, excepting those at Waveren, Klapmuts, Groen Vlei, and Saldanha Bay, at which twenty-four men in all were stationed, had been broken up before the August sentences, so the burghers felt freer to act. Country hostility to Starrenburg and the Castle thus had fewer posts to watch and a thinner chain of soldiers inland of the peninsula—facts that would matter when armed farmers rode into Stellenbosch in September. [3]
Contumacy Sentences — August 1706
In consequence, on the 9th of August, by a majority of the court of justice sitting with closed doors, each of the contumacious burghers was sentenced for contumacy to be banished to Mauritius for five years and to pay a fine of £11 18s. 4d., half for the landdrost as prosecutor and half for the court. They were at the same time declared incapable of ever holding any political or military office in the colony. This sentence was made public on the 23rd of August, and it tended to increase the hostility to the government. [3]
The Mauritius banishments were paper terror as much as immediate transport. The sentenced men did not meekly embark; within weeks some would appear openly in Stellenbosch and jeer at a landdrost who dared not arrest them without reliable subordinates. Exile to the island dependency, fines shared with the prosecutor, and civil disability for life were the court’s answer to refusal to appear—issued behind closed doors while the memorial and the deported burghers were already on the European track. [3]
Armed Defiance at Stellenbosch — 18 September 1706
In the early morning of the 18th of September the farmers of Waveren, Riebeek’s Kasteel, and Drakenstein rode armed into the village of Stellenbosch, and at beat of drum drew up near the landdrost’s office. Starrenburg went out to them and requested the drummer to be still; but that individual, who was a Frenchman, kept on beating, only observing that he did not understand Dutch. Some persons, to show their contempt for the landdrost, began to dance round the drum. Others inquired why there was to be no fair this year, such as there had always been since 1686. Starrenburg replied that the Indian authorities had prohibited it; but they would not believe him, and laid the blame upon the Cape government. [3]
Yet it was correct that the Indian authorities were solely responsible in this matter. With a view to save expense, on the 29th of November 1705 they had instructed the council of policy not to contribute longer toward the prizes of the Stellenbosch fair or to furnish wine and ale at the Company’s cost. There was thus no kermis or fair in 1706 and later. The September crowd heard that as Castle evasion; the order itself was Batavia’s economy. [3]
After this the women expressed their views. The wives of Pieter van der Byl and Wessel Pretorius, speaking for all, informed the landdrost that they had no intention of submitting to his tyranny, but were resolved to maintain their rights. The spirit of the women of the country districts was thoroughly roused, and their opposition was as formidable as that of their husbands. Starrenburg himself wrote to the governor on that day that the women were as dangerous as the men and were not quiet. He was obliged to return to his house in humiliation. The burghers remained in the village the whole day, setting him at defiance, but otherwise preserving perfect order. [3]
A few days later two of the persons sentenced to banishment appeared in Stellenbosch without any support and jeered at the landdrost, who dared not attempt to arrest them, as he could not even depend upon his subordinates. All respect for the government was gone in the country magistracy’s own village. [3]
Failed Night March to the Kuilen and Flight to Twenty-four Rivers — Late September 1706
It was now arranged between the governor and the landdrost that during the night of the 28th of September, after the closing of the Castle gate, a party of soldiers should march secretly to the Kuilen. At two o’clock in the morning of the 29th the landdrost was to meet them there, and was then before daylight to arrest those believed to be the leaders of the defiant party. But a constable at the Kuilen who sympathised with the burghers managed to detain the party for a time, and when they at length left to try and seize Cornelis van Niekerk in his bed, the alarm had been given. [3]
Daylight broke; no one had been captured; and there was nothing left for the landdrost and the soldiers but to retire to the village of Stellenbosch. No one there would give any information or sell a particle of food to the troops, and the landdrost was obliged to kill his own goats for their use until provisions could be sent from the Cape. Starrenburg having now soldiers at his back, the burghers sentenced to exile fled to Twenty-four Rivers, where they concealed themselves. The landdrost did his best to capture them. During this time the governor dismissed the heemraden and other officers who had been elected in the legitimate manner, and arbitrarily appointed creatures of his own to the vacant places. [3]
The calendar year closed with Tas and Louw still in confinement, contumacy sentences outstanding, country officers replaced by gubernatorial nominees, and the memorial already before a directors’ commission in the Fatherland. Arrests of Hercules du Pré and Jacobus van Brakel at Twenty-four Rivers would succeed only on the 4th of February 1707; the letter of the Assembly of Seventeen dated the 30th of October 1706 would reach Table Bay only with the Kattendyk on the 16th of April 1707. Those deliveries belong to the next year; the decisions and the written case that produced them were already complete before 1706 ended. [3]
Assembly of Seventeen Condemns the Governor — 30 October 1706
The commission of investigation sent in a report condemning the governor and those who acted with him. In consequence the letter dated the 30th of October 1706—later delivered by the skipper of the Kattendyk in presence of witnesses—was written. It announced that governor Wilhem Adriaan van der Stel, secunde Samuel Elsevier, clergyman Petrus Kalden, and landdrost Johannes Starrenburg were removed from office and ordered to proceed to Europe with the first opportunity. The governor’s brother, Frans van der Stel, was to betake himself to some place outside of the Company’s possessions. [3]
The burghers were acquitted of conspiracy; the three sent to Europe were restored to their homes at the Company’s expense; and orders were given that if any were in prison in the colony they should be immediately released. It was announced that Louis van Assenburgh, previously an officer in the army of the German Emperor, had been appointed governor, and Johan Cornelis d’Ableing, recently commander at Palembang, secunde. In case neither should arrive at an early date, the administration was to be assumed by the independent fiscal Johan Blesius and the other members of the council of policy acting as a commission. [3]
The same body of decisions fixed the long-term rules that would shape farming after the crisis. In giving directions concerning Vergelegen, the directors stated that as its grant by commissioner Valckenier had never been reported to them, they resumed possession of the ground. The large dwelling house, adapted for ostentation and not for a farmer’s use, must be broken down; the late governor could sell the material. The other buildings and improvements could be fairly valued and paid, or broken down; the ground must then be divided into four farms and each sold separately by auction. Emphatic instructions followed that for the future no servant of the Company, from the highest to the lowest, was to own or lease land in the colony, or to trade directly or indirectly in corn, wine, or cattle. Those who had landed property could sell it within a reasonable period or face confiscation. The burghers were not to be molested in their right to dispose of their cattle or the produce of their ground in any way that suited them, and were to be governed in accordance with law and justice. [3] [4]
On their part, the colonists claimed exactly the same rights as if they were still living in the Fatherland. They held that any restrictions to which the early burghers had agreed were of a temporary nature and affected only those who consented to them. In their opinion they had forfeited nothing by removal to a dependency, and the violence displayed toward Adam Tas and his associates was as outrageous as if it had taken place in the city of Amsterdam. They asserted undoubted right to personal liberty, exemption from arrest unless under reasonable suspicion of crime, admission to bail, speedy trial before a proper court, and freedom to sell to any one—burgher or foreigner—except under special circumstances when restriction was needed for the good of the community, whatever their land produced after the tithes had been paid and the Company’s needs supplied. These claims were not challenged by the directors or even the partisans of the late governor, but were accepted as unquestioned. The directors were fully aware that a colony of free Netherlanders was to be ruled in a different manner from a dependency inhabited by Asiatics. [3]
Close of 1706 at the Cape
By the end of 1706 the open conflict that had been assembling in memorials and private Batavia charges through 1705 had run its Cape course. The homeward fleet of 4 February had exposed the Batavia list; Starrenburg’s house-to-house certificate had gathered two hundred and forty names and failed to silence the rest; Adam Tas had been seized on 28 February and held without bail; the 4 March placaat had criminalised memorial politics; Pretorius, Van der Heiden, Rotterdam, Van der Byl, Huising, Appel, and Van Meerland had been imprisoned or deported; Bogaert had put Tas’s memorial into Huising’s hands at sea after the 4 April sailing; the governor’s galiot chase had stopped at Robben Island; further arrests had forced recantations while Tas and Louw remained; contumacy sentences of 9 and 23 August had named Mauritius exile and lifelong disability; armed farmers of Waveren, Riebeek’s Kasteel, and Drakenstein had defied Starrenburg at Stellenbosch on 18 September over drum, fair, and women’s rights speech; the night march to the Kuilen on 28–29 September had failed and the sentenced men had hidden at Twenty-four Rivers while heemraden were replaced by nominees. The Postlooper was back from Natal by 8 March; fourteen hundred muids of wheat went to Batavia; one hundred and fourteen pounds of wool were all Europe received. In Amsterdam the commission had condemned the administration, and the Assembly of Seventeen’s letter of the 30th of October had removed Van der Stel, Elsevier, Kalden, and Starrenburg, acquitted the burghers, named Van Assenburgh and d’Ableing, resumed Vergelegen for division into four farms, and barred Company servants from farming or produce trade. Those were the calendar facts of a year that turned written grievance into arrest, deportation, village defiance, and a directors’ verdict already sealed before the next homeward season could deliver it to Table Bay. [3]