Boer History1808 at the Cape of Good Hope: Mamre, the Louis Rising, and the Discount Bank
Prize Ship on Jutten Island — January 1808
Du Pré Alexander, second earl of Caledon, sat as civilian governor when 1808 opened. He took the oaths on the 22nd of May 1807, aged 29, under the form used when Lord Macartney governed: no council, heads of departments sent from England, and the salaries of 1797. The parliament of Great Britain had abolished the slave trade in British ships and by British subjects from the 1st of May 1807. What hung on January was not another landing. It was how that statute would meet a cargo already contracted for, and a governor who could make the law sit without a council to share the blame. [3]
When the Act was communicated to the Cape, Alexander Tennant had received only 383 of the 500 slaves David Baird had given him leave to import, but he had contracted with a Portuguese sea-captain for another cargo. Toward the close of 1807 that vessel arrived in Table Bay with 220 slaves. Caledon allowed 117 to be landed — the last openly sold in the colony — and refused the remainder. With his concurrence Tennant directed the vessel to proceed with the balance to South America. The open market was closing. The leftover hull was still on the water. [3] [4]
On the passage she was taken by H.M.S. Harrier and sent back with a prize crew, on the ground that the owner of the slaves was a British subject. Her arrival in January 1808 caused a good deal of perplexity. The ship needed repair, so the slaves were placed on Robben Island until some decision could be come to. In a south-east gale she parted her cable, was driven to sea, and was wrecked on Jutten Island. Caledon then made up his mind. The negroes could not be left where they were, could not be sold as slaves in the colony, and could not be exported. Tennant had to content himself with having them apprenticed to him for 7 years. The wreck forced the first full application of a closed trade: labour without a sale. [3]
From the 1st of March no slave could be landed in any British colony. The Cape was made the receptacle for negroes rescued in the southern seas: such British vessels as were detected with slaves on board, and such slave ships of nations at war with England as were captured by British cruisers, were sent to Table Bay to be condemned by a court of admiralty. The negroes were placed under the collector of customs and, with the governor’s concurrence, apprenticed by him. An Order in Council of the 16th of March 1808 committed them first to that officer’s guardianship and then, under restrictions, indentured them for a period not exceeding 14 years to persons who wished to employ them. Those who took them were supposed to feed and clothe them, instruct them in the rudiments of the Christian religion, and train them so that at the end of the term they could provide for themselves. There was soon a great demand: for 14 years they were to all intents and purposes slaves, acquired not at the high prices of the slave market but on a promise to abide by the regulations. [3] [4]
In July 1807 Caledon had proposed to sell the government slaves and convert the lodge into public offices — 189 men, 73 women, and 23 children, some old and infirm, costing more than they returned, while the public offices still sat in the castle where the military staff needed room. The secretary of state would not put the inmates up to public auction; respectable people, especially military officers, might select slaves at £30 each with the governor’s permission. That reduction had barely begun when January put a prize hull on Jutten and March put prize negroes under the customs house. Suspecting that slaves were being smuggled, Caledon in 1808 instituted a Board of Inquiry. Every slave holder had to appear and explain how he became possessed of each slave, on pain of 500 rixdollars. The proclamation was dated the 29th of April. The board sat every day for 6 weeks. The year opened not with a new conquest but with the first full season of a trade the statute had closed, and with a paper inquiry into every title in the colony. [3] [4]
Tulbagh Enlarged — 1 February 1808
Caledon held a government without a council. He could make what laws he chose, responsible to the secretary of state; of his own will he could fix prices for produce required for the army and assess the quantity each farmer was compelled to deliver; the patronage of the civil service, except heads of departments sent from England, was in his hands; with the lieutenant-governor he formed a court of appeal in civil cases of over £200; and he sat as judge in criminal appeals with one or two assessors. That was the Macartney form, restored because London wanted a civilian of rank, not a soldier, in the chair until peace. The districts, in his view, were too large for proper supervision. He increased the number of magistrates. The cut of 1 February was the first of those enlargements: not a new conquest, but a map drawn so that one landdrost’s horse could reach the farms. [3]
On the 1st of February 1808 a portion of the district of Stellenbosch was cut off and added to Tulbagh. The new boundary was declared to be the Berg river from its mouth to the junction of the Koopmans river, the Koopmans river to its source, the mountain range to Baviaans’ Kloof, and a line crossing the Bosjesveld in a north-easterly direction through Gorees Hoogte to the Zwartebergen. The cut took Stellenbosch’s northern and north-eastern grazing into a drostdy that had been named for a Dutch governor and now sat under a British earl. Farmers who had ridden to Stellenbosch for petty justice and the opgaaf now rode to Tulbagh, or to a deputy still closer. [3]
The opstal of the farm Jan-Dissel’s-Vlei was purchased from S. van Reenen for 6000 rixdollars, and a deputy landdrost was stationed there to collect revenue and exercise jurisdiction in petty cases, subject to directions from the landdrost of the district. Daniel Johannes van Ryneveld received the appointment. He held it until the 1st of January 1810, when Jan Hendrik Fischer succeeded him. The post was not a new drostdy. It was a deputy’s house on a bought opstal, meant to bring petty justice and the revenue closer to farms that Stellenbosch could no longer reach. [3]
What hung on the February cut was the reach of government, not a change of flag. From the mouth of the Berg to the Zwartebergen the map of the old Stellenbosch drostdy lost a slice, and a van Ryneveld sat at Jan-Dissel’s-Vlei to hear petty cases under Tulbagh. Later years would make a Cape-district landdrost and heemraden, a deputy fiscal at Simonstown, and a new district east of the Gaurits; those are not this year’s work. In 1808 the western cut was enough: the farms had walked inland farther than one landdrost’s horse, and Caledon used the power a council would have shared. [3]
Mamre — March 1808
The Moravian institution at Genadendal had proved of the greatest utility to the Khoikhoi there. The missionaries, working quietly and avoiding interference with political questions, were esteemed alike by the government, passing strangers, and the colonists; the results of their labours were visible not only on their own grounds but in the appearance and conduct of the people under their care who went out to work among the farmers. The only objection to their system was made by missionaries of other denominations, who thought the Moravians kept their pupils under tutelage to such an extent that they could not exercise the social and political rights of men — the feature most admired by observers who held that people emerging from a pastoral life required constant guidance. Caledon was so impressed that he urged them to form another station. He wanted in the west what, in his view, the London society had failed to be in the east: a quiet station whose people went out to work. [3]
In the large tract called Groenekloof there had been from the early days of the settlement a location reserved for the remnant of the Khoikhoi clans that under the names of Cochoquas, Goringhaiquas and Gorachouquas were found in possession of the whole Cape district when white men first settled in South Africa. Smallpox and brandy had nearly exterminated those people, but a few remained, with whose blood that of Europeans and of negro slaves had been mixed. When Groenekloof was set apart as pasture for the butcher who contracted to supply the government with meat, it was stipulated that he should not deprive the Khoikhoi of land they required for their own use. After the first outbreak of smallpox the government reserved a special tract. It was not surveyed, nor was a title-deed issued, but white people were prevented from encroaching upon it, and it was as well defined as the ordinary loan farms. In 1804 a burgher whose sheep the Khoikhoi had stolen tried to drive them from Louwskloof; Jan Willem Janssens and the council protected them. The reserve adjoined the government farm Kleine Post, which had a good dwelling-house and some outbuildings. [3]
In December 1807 Caledon invited the Moravians to establish a mission there and offered them the Kleine Post property. The offer was accepted, and in March 1808 the mission commenced. The new station was named Mamre. The house stood ready on an unsurveyed reserve the Company had fenced from white encroachment. The biblical name marked the second Moravian post the earl had asked for. What hung on the March opening was a western station of the kind Caledon trusted: quiet labour, no politics, and people who went out to the farms. [3]
The London society’s station of Bethelsdorp was not regarded with favour. Outside the missionary circle an opinion was unanimously held that no good was being done there, that the Khoikhoi were encouraged in idleness, and that the place was a retreat for bad characters. Richard Collins of the 83rd, directed to inspect and report, recommended that the London missionaries should not be permitted to teach Khoikhoi but be confined to the San on the northern border under respectable farmers, and that the people at Bethelsdorp should choose a Moravian station or service with colonists. The judges of the high court, the military officers at Fort Frederick, and the landdrost of Uitenhage concurred. Caledon had thought of more fertile ground near Plettenberg’s Bay. In 1807 he authorised the landdrost of Swellendam, with George Rex, to confer with Johannes Theodorus Vanderkemp. They met at Rex’s house on the 13th of May 1808. Jackhal’s Kraal was first offered, then two places on the Keurboom’s River; none met with approval. Faure and Rex reported that nothing could be proposed satisfactory to Vanderkemp. The governor declared a resolution to remove two-thirds of the Khoikhoi and to prohibit Xhosa from settling at Bethelsdorp; he did not carry it into effect. [3] [4]
The land was not large enough for the population which nominally belonged to it, and the poor supply of water permitted agriculture only on the smallest scale. It was a matter of surprise that the numerous cattle of the place found sufficient food in the scanty pasturage of the barren surroundings. From Bethelsdorp on the 30th of August 1808 missionary Read wrote a letter that later years would still be answering. While Mamre opened on a reserve in the west, Cungwa invaded the Longkloof and built a kraal west of the Gamtoos, and in October a sub-tribe under Habana, a nephew of Ndlambe, settled on the Gamka river near the later village of Prince Albert. The east kept its Institution on ground too small, too dry, and too close to moving kraals for the castle’s comfort. The west got Mamre. [3] [4]
Collins in the North-West — 1808
A great many complaints having been received concerning depredations by San along the northern border, early in 1808 Caledon sent Major Collins to inspect the country and, if possible, to devise some remedy. Collins was of the 83rd, the regiment that had landed with Baird in 1806. The commission mattered because the northern farms sat beyond easy reach of a drostdy, and because the same officer would later be asked to report on Bethelsdorp and the eastern chiefs. The major ascertained that the complaints were not exaggerated; the suggestions he made could not be carried out. At that period these people seem to have been migrating from more distant parts and congregating in the Bamboes and Stormberg mountains. Their ravages, which increased in frequency toward the end of 1808, seemed actuated more by wanton mischief than by a desire to possess other people’s property. Cattle and sheep were now and again found killed or maimed without any apparent intention of using the carcases as food. [3] [4]
Early in 1808 landdrost Anders Stockenstrom sent out a commando under the field-commandant Van Wyk to dislodge the San, “observing all possible humanity.” The commando shortly returned without having fired a single shot, having driven the enemy to a distance. Little time elapsed before they were as troublesome as ever. The landdrost therefore decided to go himself and in a kindly spirit to treat with them for peace. In July 1808 he collected the available force from his district — about 50 men, provided with beads, tobacco and dagga, and accompanied by three friendly San. He had hoped for a contingent from Uitenhage; that district having its own troubles, only 5 men insufficiently equipped arrived at the rendezvous on the Fish river. Uitenhage’s drostdy house, begun under the Batavians, was by January still little more than half finished. Labour, not powder, was that district’s shortage. [4]
On arrival at the mountains the commando divided. Stockenstrom with about 25 men took the southern side of the Stormberg range; the other half, under two experienced burghers named Van der Walt, took the northern side. The journey was extremely unpleasant: much suffering from cold, much rain previously, rivers difficult to cross, waggons impeded. Very few San were seen, though they were known to be hiding in the inaccessible parts. The friendly San were sent in search of them and many were found, but no promises or offers of presents could induce them to come forth. Stockenstrom’s party pushed on as far as the Tsomo river, probably near later Xalanga. In those parts one kraal composed of Thembu and San was discovered; they at first fled, then summoned courage to meet the commando. He told them that if they came openly and asked, they would be provided with as much as possible, but that if they did not abandon theft they would have themselves to blame if they were pursued and shot. The Van der Walts, approaching the only kraal they came upon, met a volley of poisoned arrows; several San were shot. The parties met, and the commando was disbanded. The year on the northern border spent powder on almost no shot in Van Wyk’s ride, beads on people who would not come down, and arrows on one kraal the Van der Walts reached. [4] [4]
In 1808 Collins commenced the duties he had been commissioned to perform by journeying through the north-western parts and investigating the relations between San and white inhabitants. From his own observations he accomplished little. Horse-sickness was prevalent, and drought prevented him from going far enough inland to meet any large number of San. From the scattered farmers he collected many complaints of losses of cattle and of murders of Khoikhoi herds. Returning to Capetown and remaining a short time, he commenced an eastern tour by going first to Graaff Reinet. On the way he met, at the farm of Samuel De Beer in the Kweek Valley, a youth, Andries Stockenstrom, son of the landdrost, bound for Graaff Reinet as a clerk. Collins became impressed with his abilities and invited him to accompany the expedition as Dutch interpreter and secretary. The offer was accepted. The ride that would take that party north of Graaff Reinet on the 23rd of January 1809 belongs to the year that followed. 1808 closed on the north-west, the horse-sickness, the Kweek Valley meeting, and a commissioner who had seen that the complaints were not exaggerated. [4] [4]
Bank of Discount — August 1808
In August 1808 the loan bank was made also a bank of discount. Discount meant the bank could now buy a merchant’s bill before it fell due, and so put paper into trade as well as into loans on land. The colony’s circulating medium was still cartoon money: rix-dollar, skilling and stiver, not bank-notes of dignity but “goed voor” pieces, the earlier ones bearing the words Goed voor … Kaapsche Rijksdaalders. The paper was not very durable. Some pieces, the rix-dollar notes, were inconveniently large, about 5.75 inches long and 3.5 wide; in everyday use they became folded, torn, defaced and dirty. All this necessitated frequent reprinting and complete destruction of that which was worn out. A closed slave market and a paper rixdollar were the same government’s two instruments: one labour, one credit. [3] [4]
When a renewal was needed, the receiver-general and a member of the high court of justice were appointed by the governor to examine conjointly all the worn-out and defaced paper that had found its way back to the treasury. The secretary of the court then applied at the colonial secretary’s office for the box containing the dies or metal stamps and for a quantity of cartoon — stout paper cut to size, with a coloured design on one side. In the presence of the fiscal and two members of the court the pieces had their face value stamped upon them. The dies were replaced in the box, fastened and sealed with the seal of the governor and that of the court, and returned to the colonial secretary’s office. All the pieces of each denomination were signed by three high officials, different officials for different denominations. The finished money was handed to the receiver-general, who exchanged it for a further quantity of damaged notes. [4] [4]
Destruction took place in the courtyard of the castle. When a sufficient quantity had accumulated, the fiscal, the deputy commissary-general, two members of the court of justice and two members of the burgher senate met at a date appointed by the governor at the revenue office, then within the castle. The notes, carefully examined, were burnt in the yard just outside the office. If the examining and burning could not be finished in one day, the officials met again at intervals. These renewals took place in 1806 twice, 1807 once, and 1808 twice. On the 10th of November 1808 2500 pieces were stamped and signed — Goed voor Vyf Rijksdaalders — five-rixdollar notes of the cartoon the castle still burnt when they came back torn. The signatures on that issue included P. J. Truter, A. V. Bergh, and G. E. Overbeek. [4] [4]
Discount was not a new mint. It was the loan bank’s second function in a year when the slave market’s open import had closed and prize negroes were already in demand as fourteen-year labour. Later issues would raise the bank’s capital and swell the paper in circulation; those later stamps are not this page. What hung on August was credit in a colony whose rixdollar still passed, when later tenders were taken, between two shillings and twopence and two shillings and sixpence, and whose castle yard burnt the worn notes twice in the year. [3] [4]
Cowan and Donovan — October 1808
In October 1808 an expedition was fitted out by order of Caledon to explore the country between Lithako and the Portuguese province of Mozambique. Lithako was a Tswana town north of the colony, already known to missionaries; Mozambique was a Portuguese coast the Cape had never been asked to find by land. The party consisted of Dr Cowan, assistant surgeon of the 83rd, and Lieutenant Donovan with 20 Khoikhoi of the Cape regiment. They had as guides a white man named Kruger and a man of mixed descent, both of whom had for many years been wandering among the Tswana and Korana. The missionary Anderson accompanied the expedition as far as the Bangwaketsi, whom Cowan described as so far civilised that the wealthy inhabitants were possessed of slaves and servants. The 83rd gave the surgeon; the Cape regiment gave the escort; Kruger and his companion gave the road as far as men who had lived among the Tswana could give it. [3]
Cowan’s letter was dated the 24th of December, from latitude 24° 30′ S., longitude 28° E. — the latter probably incorrect. From that place Anderson turned back and brought to the colony the last authentic tidings of the expedition. Nothing certain is known of the fate of the explorers. Reports received from individuals of the southern Tswana tribes in later years differed greatly and cannot be relied upon; it has been supposed that they perished of fever when not very far from Mozambique. The year that closed on the 24th of December had only Anderson’s letter and a blank north of the Bangwaketsi. [3]
Caledon’s government, which could not yet name a peace with France, named an expedition toward a Portuguese coast. Twenty Khoikhoi of the Cape regiment walked north with a surgeon of the 83rd and a lieutenant, past Lithako, toward a shore the refreshment station had never been asked to find by land. Anderson came back. Cowan and Donovan did not write again in this year. What hung on the October fitting-out was a northern blank: the last authentic word this year can carry is the letter of the 24th of December. [3]
Louis’s Rising — 24–27 October 1808
For nearly three years after the surrender of Janssens the utmost tranquillity prevailed throughout the western part of the colony, but in October 1808 a slight disturbance took place. In Capetown there was living a slave named Louis, a native of the island of Mauritius. His wife was a free woman, and he paid his owner a fixed sum monthly and worked about town, a custom not uncommon. The old law that people of half European blood should be free at 25 had fallen into disuse, and Louis was so light in colour that he was able to pass for a white man. In his house a young Irish labourer named James Hooper lodged. Between them a wild plan was concocted for setting at liberty the whole slave population: to induce a large number of blacks in the country to join them, then to make themselves masters of Capetown and proclaim a general emancipation. The closed trade of 1807 had stopped new cargoes; it had not freed those already held. That is why a Mauritian slave who could pass as white, and an Irish lodger who said there were no slaves in his country, could still find an audience on the Zwartland farms. [3]
Two Irishmen had arrived in Capetown that year: Hooper, of no particular calling, and Michael Kelly, a sailor. Hooper explained to Louis, and to two others, Abraham born at the Cape and Adonis, that there were no slaves in his country and that there ought to be none here. The plot was to approach first those at a distance from Capetown, collect a sufficient number, march on the town, and demand a general emancipation; if refused, to seize the prison and magazine and obtain freedom by fighting. In the event of success Louis was to become governor and “Chief of the Blacks,” Hooper to have a high position under him. The scheme was mad. It was also the first general rising of slaves in the colony, and that is why a cocked hat on a Zwartland stoep still mattered in December. [4]
Early in October Hooper and Abraham rode on horseback to the farm of Pieter Louw at the Zwartland, where Hooper represented himself as a traveller and the black as his servant. They stayed overnight, and Abraham persuaded the slaves, who were numerous, to join. After their return to Capetown, Kelly became their associate. On the 24th of October 1808 Hooper hired from Hendrick Matfield a tent-waggon with 8 horses, saying they were required for a military officer going to Rietvlei on duty. Thus equipped, the five ringleaders — Hooper, Kelly, Louis, Abraham and Adonis — set out for Louw’s farm. When they were within a short distance of the house, Louis decked himself in a blue coat with red collar and cuffs, gold epaulets, a large sword with gold knob, and a cocked hat with ostrich feathers. Hooper and Kelly also put on uniforms, less gaudy than Louis’s. Adorned in this manner they went to Louw’s house. Louw was not at home. To Mrs Louw, Louis was introduced as captain of a Spanish man-of-war, Hooper and Kelly as his aides-de-camp, Abraham and Adonis as their black attendants. She received them with due deference and showed them all the hospitality her establishment could afford. The two attendants waited upon their masters in correct form at the evening meal. [3] [4]
Sometime after all had retired, Hooper and Kelly stole to the bedside of the sleeping Louis, took away all his finery, escaped by a window, and commenced a journey toward Saldanha Bay, where they hoped to get on board some ship. Louis was left to get on with the scheme as best he could. He did not desist. Next morning he called Louw’s slaves together and told them to take Louw’s horses and waggon and follow him. In spite of Mrs Louw’s protests this was done, and the party, 13 in number, moved on to the neighbouring farm of Willem Basson. There they were reinforced by Basson’s slaves. The house was looted of guns, ammunition and provisions; the waggon and horses were taken. Louis represented himself as having been sent by the fiscal to take all Christians as prisoners to Capetown and to liberate all slaves. They bound Basson’s son and put him in the waggon; the attempt to bind the farmer’s wife failed, she escaped. The farmer himself was away. The fiscal was the colony’s public prosecutor. An order in his name was the one lie that could bind white men without a shot. [3] [4]
In this manner 34 different farms at Zwartland, Koeberg and Tygerberg were visited in three days. From each the white men, after being bound, were removed, and all the horses, carts, waggons, guns and ammunition were taken away. Provisions and brandy were freely appropriated, but not a drop of blood was shed during the whole of the rash proceedings. In some places the slaves refused to join. The number of insurgents increased until they amounted to 326. On the 27th of October the different parties into which the band had divided turned toward Capetown, then garrisoned by nearly 5000 soldiers. That evening a farmer arrived in Capetown with the news. The governor at once sent out a strong body of cavalry and infantry, and within a few hours 326 slaves were made prisoners without the slightest resistance — without a single shot being fired. Five of the leaders escaped at the time but were apprehended shortly afterwards. Hooper and Kelly were pursued and soon in the hands of the authorities. [3] [4]
A brief examination by the fiscal showed that far the greater number really believed they had been acting under his orders, in consequence of which all but 51 were sent back to their masters with a caution to be more careful in future. The white men confined in waggons were released, and the plundered property was restored. The 51 were brought to trial before the high court of justice, and on the 7th of December sentence was pronounced. 16 were condemned to be hanged and their bodies afterwards exposed in various places, 1 was acquitted, and the remaining 34 were condemned to various kinds of punishment. The sentences were mitigated by the governor, so that Louis, Hooper, Abraham, and two slaves who had taken a leading part were hanged and afterwards exposed in chains. Kelly seems to have been sent to England. Adonis was sent to Robben Island. 17 suffered punishments ranging from being flogged to imprisonment with hard labour in chains for life; the others, after witnessing the executions, were sent back to their masters. What hung on the three October days was not a new government. It was how a Macartney governor without a council would treat a rising that had shed no blood, and how five bodies in chains would answer a cocked hat that had bound 34 farms without a shot. [3] [4]