Boer History1833 at the Cape of Good Hope: Cole’s Departure, Wade, the Slavery Act, and Trichardt
Stockenstrom Sails and Cole Hands Over — March–August 1833
Lieutenant-General Sir Galbraith Lowry Cole was in his fifth Cape year. He had taken the oaths on the 9th of September 1828, after a passage from Mauritius in HMS Tweed. The Cape still had no elected house. Internal law sat with a governor appointed by the crown and a council of advice. Two important changes sat in the personnel of that government this year. Ever since Cole and Commissioner-General Andries Stockenstrom had first come into contact in 1828 there had been a difference of opinion on the authority vested in each. Cole, as governor of the whole colony, held that all matters of law and order came within his attention, and that the subordinate officials were primarily responsible to him through the secretary to government. Stockenstrom maintained that, in virtue of the instructions issued on the creation of his office, he was virtually the governor of the eastern province, and that in all native affairs he was competent to act without reference to Capetown. Neither the governor nor the secretary to government could understand Viscount Goderich’s intentions in establishing the office. The civil commissioners of the east were not told that they were responsible to the commissioner-general. During the last year of his office Stockenstrom received no communication whatever on matters relating to the east, and discovered them in the papers lying upon the table of the council at government house. That is why a ship left in March: not because a new war had opened on the Fish, but because the eastern commissioner-general and the soldier-governor could not share one authority. [4]
He had spoken of resignation more than once; the governor had prevailed upon him to delay. In this year the resignation was accepted. Having sold off all his stock and effects at his farm in the east, he sailed for England on the 7th of March with aggrieved and acrimonious feelings and a thorough contempt for the whole system of colonial administration. It was his intention to settle in Sweden and to have nothing more to do with the Cape. The sailing mattered because the east lost the only officer who had claimed to govern it without Capetown, and because Cole was left to carry the frontier and the castle alone until a successor’s ship. [4]
Cole himself was desirous of returning to England for reasons concerning his family. In 1831 he had requested leave of absence, which Goderich granted; upon further consideration the governor expressed a wish to retire altogether, and the secretary of state gave him permission to transfer the duty to the senior military officer if a successor should not arrive by February of this year. Major-General Sir Benjamin D’Urban, then governor of Demerara, was appointed to take his place, but that officer was unable to proceed to the Cape at once. After waiting until the 10th of August, Cole with his family embarked in the merchant ship La Belle Alliance, then ready to sail for England, and Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Francis Wade became acting governor. Wade had for a time been in command of the 72nd Highlanders and had arrived in the colony in 1828, having come from Mauritius with Cole, with whose views on the politics of the Cape his own coincided. The interregnum that opened in August of this year would sit until D’Urban’s ship in January 1834. The embarkation mattered because the castle passed from a lieutenant-general who had asked to go home to a military secretary who had never been named governor, and because the frontier now answered to an acting hand. [3] [4]
Before May of this year the colony had in England a special agent — Mr. P. Courtenay — with a salary of 600 pounds a year. Messrs. George Baillie and Edward Barnard were then appointed agents-general for the colonies, and matters relating to South Africa were entrusted to the latter. Towards the salaries of these gentlemen the Cape was required to contribute 200 pounds a year. The new charter of 16 June 1832 had been acted upon as far as the reduction of the number of judges was concerned, by the removal of Mr. Justice Burton to the supreme court of New South Wales in November of that year; it was not otherwise observed until the 1st of March 1834. English remained the official language of the offices, and the courts sat as they had sat since the 1st of January 1828. The May change mattered because the Cape now paid 200 pounds toward an agent-general in London instead of 600 for a man of its own, and because the new charter still sat on paper except for the missing judge. [3]
Ordinance Ninety-Nine and the Northern Border — June 1833
Along the whole of the extensive northern border there was not a single soldier or a policeman, and there was no possibility of furnishing a defensive force of any kind. To meet the ordinary expenditure of the colony, paper money created as capital for the bank was being drawn upon year after year, so that there were no means of affording assistance to the farmers who were exposed to the depredations of Stuurman. There being no soldiers or police of any kind to protect the inhabitants against the dangerous hordes which dwelt along the Orange, the farmers had to be called out on commando when any demonstration against them was necessary. But as these burghers had, in so many cases, refused to leave their homes to go on this duty, it became necessary to bring force to bear upon them. They maintained, and perhaps rightly, that as they paid taxes in common with their fellow colonists, they had an equal claim to protection from the government without rendering their personal services. That is why a numbered ordinance issued in June: not because a regiment could be posted on the Orange, but because the treasury could not buy one, and the commando was the only force the border still had. [3] [4]
Under these circumstances, on the 6th of June of this year an ordinance — No. 99 — was issued by the governor in council to amend the commando law. A proclamation of Lord Macartney had empowered landdrosts and other magistrates to call out burghers for military service, but without defining penalties for disobedience; that proclamation had been the commando law until this June. Ordinance 99 gave to civil commissioners, justices of the peace, commandants, provisional commandants, fieldcornets, and provisional fieldcornets power to call out burghers in cases of necessity. The second section, which in England was regarded as a cruel injustice not to the Boers but to the tribes beyond the Orange, enacted that it should be lawful for any of those officers, at all times of actual or threatened invasion, or for the protection of the colonists or their property, or when they should otherwise deem it absolutely necessary, to summon the inhabitants of their district or ward, or such of them as they in their discretion should see fit, to appear at such time and place as they should require for the purpose of acting on commando. If any person so summoned should refuse to come without just cause, or should not obey the orders of the fieldcornet or other superior officer, or should withdraw before permission, he should be liable to a fine of not less than 5 pounds and not exceeding 20 pounds sterling on the first conviction, and on every subsequent conviction to a like fine and imprisonment for any period not exceeding 3 months. In the case of fieldcornets the fines were 10 pounds and 30 pounds. The June text mattered because Macartney’s old proclamation had had no teeth, and because a fieldcornet on the Orange could now fine a man 5 pounds for staying at home. [3] [4]
The ordinance met with strenuous opposition from Dr. Philip and from the party in England that supported him. The Commercial Advertiser, which was the organ of that party in Capetown, endeavoured to make it appear that the new law empowered a provisional fieldcornet to levy war upon the native tribes, and the ability with which that newspaper was conducted gave great weight to its views. It was at this time advocating a system of dealing with the tribes beyond the colony exactly as if they were civilised European powers, and laid it down as a principle that the governor should meet chiefs like Maqoma upon a footing of the most perfect equality. In England pressure was brought upon the secretary of state to advise the king to disallow the ordinance. Mr. E. G. Stanley had succeeded Goderich at the colonial office, and he referred the matter to Cole for explanation. On his arrival in London Cole received a despatch asking for a full report of the circumstances which had induced him to confirm such extraordinary powers in the frontier magistracy. Stanley held out no hope of such measures meeting with his approval, as from the statements which had been advanced on the subject of commandos they appeared to be a system of military execution upon the natives. The opposition mattered because the ordinance’s enemies sat in Capetown and in Downing Street at once, and because Stanley already treated the commando as a crime. [3] [4]
In his reply, dated the 15th of November of this year, Cole showed that, in view of the conditions of the colony with respect to the means of protecting the peaceable inhabitants, the commando system was the only one possible and ought not to be abolished until some better means of defence and protection of life and property could be devised. It might suit the views of some writers, he continued, to hold up the local government and the colonists to the detestation of mankind; but those who had had the opportunity of taking a dispassionate view of the subject would judge differently. The atrocities imputed against the colonists were now of rare occurrence, and seldom failed to bring down punishment on their heads when the guilty individuals could be traced; and such was their dread of the criminal laws that many were afraid to defend their persons and property in even a lawful manner. The secretary of state, however, was unconvinced. A few days after the receipt of Cole’s answer he wrote to D’Urban that the king had been pleased to disallow Ordinance 99, and that it was to be of no effect after the 1st of August 1834. The November letter mattered because Cole, now a private man in London, was still defending the only force the northern farms had, and because Stanley had already decided the ordinance would not live into D’Urban’s second Cape winter. [3] [4]
The Slavery Act and Letters Patent — June–October 1833
Great was the disappointment in this year when the king’s speech was read, and no reference was made to any proposed measure for the abolition of slavery. Mr. T. F. Buxton, who had given himself up entirely to the cause, gave notice of his intention to bring the matter before parliament on the ensuing 19th of March, but he withdrew on the government itself promising that a safe and satisfactory measure would be introduced. As there were indications of the question being shelved again, and fearing the influence of the West Indian party, Buxton appealed for support to the now enormously powerful Anti-Slavery Society, and expressed his intention of bringing the matter before the house on the 23rd of April. At this juncture a great and unexpected impetus was given to the movement. A Mr. Whitely, a plantation bookkeeper, had just arrived from the West Indies. Introduced by Mr. Pringle he called on Buxton one morning and gave him a blood-curdling account of some of the cruelties he himself had witnessed shortly before his departure from Jamaica. Having assured himself of Whitely’s bona fides, his stories were taken down and published in pamphlet form. The effect was prodigious. Within about a fortnight, 200000 copies were scattered over the country. Public meetings denouncing slavery were held everywhere, and petitions with over 1500000 signatures from all quarters poured into the house of commons. One from the females of Great Britain contained over 187000 signatures, and was so bulky that it took Buxton, with 3 assistants, to carry it into, and leave it on the table of, the house. The pamphlet mattered at the Cape because the same session that read Whitely would price every slave from Table Bay to the Fish, and because Pringle, who had lived here, was the man who opened Buxton’s door. [4]
On the 12th of June resolutions were adopted by both houses that immediate measures should be taken for the abolition of slavery, upon which the government brought in a bill that rapidly passed through the requisite stages. Through Buxton’s devotion the bill — an act for the abolition of slavery throughout the British colonies, for promoting the industry of the manumitted slaves, and for compensating the persons hitherto entitled to the services of such slaves — passed the house of commons on the 7th of August and received the royal assent on the 28th of the same month. The chief points gained were that slavery was to be abolished, that there was to be a term of years of apprenticeship intermediate between the state of slavery and that of freedom, and that a sum of 20000000 pounds sterling was to be set aside for compensating the owners. It provided that after a certain date — in the Cape Colony the 1st of December 1834 — slavery was absolutely to cease. All slaves over 6 years of age were then to become apprentices to their former masters, either for 4 or 6 years, but if for 6 years they were not to be required to work more than 45 hours a week. Special magistrates were to be appointed, who were to have exclusive jurisdiction in cases between the apprentices and their employers, except in matters under control of the supreme and circuit courts. The share of each of the 19 slave colonies of Great Britain was to be determined by the value of its slaves, based upon the average prices during the 8 years preceding the 31st of December 1830. The August signature mattered because no slave at the Cape was freed this year, and because the date that would free them was already written: 1 December 1834. [3] [4]
These great ends attained, it was to have been expected that the most ardent abolitionist would have been satisfied. Such, however, was not the case. There were some who would have been contented with a gradual extinction of slavery as advocated by the Cape colonists, but by far the greater number argued that neither law nor custom could give one man the right to possess another, and refused to allow that the slave owners had any right to compensation. Buxton was in favour of the compensation and voted for it. He thus again drew upon himself the wrath of many of his followers. The next step, which was taken without delay, was, in accordance with the 45th section of the act, the appointment of a committee in London for the purpose of apportioning the 20000000 to the 19 slave-owning British colonies. On the 20th of September Stanley could tell the officer appointed as the new governor that this had been done, and that a similar committee was to be formed in Capetown, which should collect and investigate the respective claims of the Cape slave owners. Returns were to be called for, showing the numbers of slaves in the various classes, such as tradesmen, domestic servants, and labourers. The value of a slave in each class was to be determined by the average price which had been paid for each for the 8 years immediately preceding the 31st of December 1830. The first meeting of that Cape committee was not for this year. The September notice mattered because D’Urban was told, before he sailed, that Capetown would have to value its own slaves, and because the 20000000 would be split by an eight-year average, not by what a Cape owner thought his man was worth. [4]
In a despatch to the secretary of state dated the 6th of December of this year, Cole affirmed that the inhabitants in general could not with justice be accused of brutal or inhuman treatment of their slaves, that there was not then and never had been at the Cape an attachment to slavery, that the existence of it had been a matter of necessity not of choice, and that until the last few years there had been no disinclination on the part of the colonists to emancipation on fair and equitable principles. On the contrary, more than one plan for the gradual extinction of slavery had emanated from the proprietors themselves. The torture inflicted upon the slaveholders by successive orders in council had been so acute that it was felt as a relief when an emancipation act was finally passed. There was a general impression that the money voted by the imperial parliament would suffice to meet the whole, or nearly the whole, value of the slaves. Most people supposed that a vagrant act would be passed before the day of final emancipation, and in that belief they were disposed to accept the new condition of things without demur. Wade was therefore able to report very favourably upon the reception which the emancipation act met. The December despatch mattered because Cole, writing as a private man, still spoke for the Cape owners, and because the act did not yet free a slave, sit a special magistrate, or pay a pound of the 20000000. [3] [7]
The memorial Cole had forwarded to Goderich on the 6th of January 1832 still sat without a house of assembly. In the course of this year the ministry resolved to make the government of the Cape a little less despotic than it was, by the creation of two distinct councils to take the place of the council of advice. Earl Grey was still premier, but Stanley had succeeded Goderich at the colonial office. On the 23rd of October letters patent were issued at Westminster creating a legislative council for the Cape Colony. It was to consist of not less than 10 nor more than 12 members, exclusive of the governor. The military officer next in rank to the governor, the secretary to government, the treasurer-general, the auditor-general, and the attorney-general were to have seats by virtue of their offices. The other members were to be selected by the governor from the most respectable inhabitants, and were to hold office during residence and good behaviour, unless disallowed by the secretary of state within 2 years of their nomination. The governor and 6 members were to form a quorum. Meetings could only be summoned by the governor, and in them he was to preside unless his absence should be unavoidable. The governor was to have a vote the same as other members, and also a casting vote when the council was equally divided. Draft ordinances were to be published in the Gazette at least 3 weeks before being submitted for discussion. An executive council was at the same time created, consisting of the military officer next in rank to the governor, the secretary to government, the treasurer-general, and the attorney-general. The governor was to take the advice of this council in questions of administration, but he was not bound by it. Neither council sat in this year. The October patents mattered because the Cape still had no elected house, and because two councils on paper, with 5 official seats and a quorum of 6, were the ministry’s answer to the January memorial of 1832. [3]
Stuurman, Jacob Swart, and Forty-Four Hours — September 1833
The leader of the later robber band on the Orange was a Khoikhoi man named Stuurman, who had in earlier years been connected with one of the Griqua settlements. His followers were chiefly Koranas and Griquas, but among them were several fugitive slaves and desperadoes of mixed blood. He was perfectly indifferent as to whom he robbed, for he attacked indiscriminately the Batlapin in the north, the farmers of the colony in the south, and the Griquas under the captain Andries Waterboer in the east, whichever at any time seemed most likely to furnish spoil. His custom was to send out parties of 50 to 70 men, well mounted and armed, who appeared suddenly where they were not expected, and slaughtered all who attempted to prevent their driving away the cattle. In one year there were more than 30 reports from the civil commissioner of Graaff-Reinet detailing their atrocities. In August 1832 a strong party had made a sudden raid into the Nieuwveld, murdered three colonists named Faber, Van der Merwe, and Steenkamp, as also Van der Merwe’s wife, near Slangfontein, and a commando under the civil commissioner Van Ryneveld had returned unsuccessful after 6 weeks. That August raid is why the Hantam was watching the river this September: the same band was still uncaught, and there was still no soldier on the northern line. [3] [4]
In September of this year a band of about 70 of the robbers made a swoop upon the farm of Jacob Swart at the Hantam, murdered 3 men and 1 woman, wounded 4 others, and carried off 8 children with the flocks and herds. A party of 45 white men and halfbreeds was got together by Commandant J. N. Redelinghuys, and by riding for 44 hours as hard as horses could carry them, they overtook Stuurman’s gang while yet a long way from the river. An engagement followed, in which a colonist — Mr. J. J. Louw — lost his life; but 6 of the robbers were killed. The others then fled, leaving 7 of the children, the whole of the cattle, 2 of their horses, and 3 muskets behind. What became of the other child could not be ascertained, and it was supposed that it must have died or been left on the road to perish. The men and the horses of the commando being alike exhausted, it was impossible to continue the pursuit. Presents were later made: a handsome double-barrelled gun each to the commandant and to the fieldcornet W. P. Burgers, gunpowder or remission of taxes to the others who had taken part, and to Louw’s widow 1000 rixdollars and all taxes remitted for the rest of her life. The ride mattered because 44 hours on horseback was the only answer the Hantam had, and because one child of the 8 never came back. [3] [4]
In his despatch to Stanley dated the 10th of December of this year, Wade, now acting governor, wrote of these Bastards and Koranas who invaded the colony in bands of from 50 to 70 well-armed and mounted men each, coming suddenly on the isolated habitations of the farmers, massacring perhaps the whole family, and too frequently escaping to their fastnesses with impunity, carrying away the flocks and herds of their slaughtered victims. There were upwards of 30 reports from the civil commissioner of Graaff-Reinet during the last year, detailing their atrocities. In one of those excursions, in the month of August, they had penetrated in considerable numbers into the Nieuwveld in the centre of the Beaufort district, murdered two whole families in the neighbourhood of Slangfontein, and escaped with their booty before the alarm could possibly be communicated to the widely separated inhabitants. A commando had subsequently been despatched under the personal direction of the civil commissioner, but after a most harassing campaign of 6 weeks the commando had been obliged to return without having effected its object. At the Great Falls the Orange was very wide; large islands — Schauskop and Blauskop among them — though bushy, were capable of pasturing a considerable number of cattle, and the lands along the banks were covered with dense bush traversable only by the few paths which the outlaws had cut. The December despatch mattered because Wade was telling Stanley why Ordinance 99 had been issued, and because the islands at the falls were still a refuge no soldier could reach. [4]
About three years after Colesberg had asked for a remedy against drunkenness and disorder, Mr. van Ryneveld still sat without a stipendiary magistrate there. A farmer who resided on the bank of the Great River near the Stormberg Spruit appeared before him in August of this year to complain. The other side of the river was occupied by Koranas, Bastards, and San, and that part of the country was very unsafe in consequence of the illicit traffic in liquor with these people. As his house was near the chief drift he could see clearly what went on on the other side. On the 16th, 17th, and 18th of August great disturbances prevailed; he heard continued reports of guns; standing on the bank at Syfer Fontein he saw a waggon outspanned and a great number of people surrounding it, some lying down while others danced round in drunken frenzy and fired off guns. This lasted 3 days. A brisk trade went on; it was usual to give 2 small flasks of brandy for a cow and 2 and a half for a fat one. Thinking his life in danger he came to Graaff-Reinet to report all this. Cole had regretted that he had no power to station there a stipendiary magistrate without reference to the secretary of state, but he was willing to appoint as justice of the peace any individual who was sufficiently respectable to be entrusted with that office. The August complaint mattered because the northern drift still had no magistrate, and because 2 flasks of brandy still bought a cow in sight of the colony. [4]
Maqoma, Tyali, Philipton, and the Kat River — 1833
The enthusiasm and ardour with which the greater number of the first Kat River settlers had devoted themselves to agriculture had left little to be desired by their well-wishers. The waters of the Kat were distributed to the arable lands by a system of small canals or furrows, the total length of which, in this year, amounted to about 24 miles. In some places rocks were excavated to a depth of 6 feet, while in others aqueducts were constructed by hollowing out trees and supporting these on trestle work. The value of all this labour was estimated at 3500 pounds. In this way 640 allotments of 6 acres each were rendered productive, and from them, in this year, 6000 bushels of wheat were reaped. The construction of houses of the regulation pattern was neglected; the people seemed to prefer the hut, and that slovenly and badly built. The returns of this year showed 250 horses, 2444 cattle, and 4096 sheep and goats, although the legitimate or authorised population had increased to 2114. The furrows mattered because the Kat settlement had been planted in 1829 on ground taken from Maqoma, and because 6000 bushels this year were the proof that the canals worked even when the cottages did not. [4]
As the greater number of those who had formed the nucleus of the settlement were Bethelsdorp people, the reverend James Read had stationed himself at Philipton, the location of Andries Stoffles, in May 1830. Cole was not conspicuously disposed to countenance the London society’s agents in the new settlement: in spite of Read having commenced his work, the reverend W. R. Thomson, who was anxious to leave the Chumie, had been sent there in July 1831 at a cost to the government of 200 pounds per annum, and further, in July of this year, a sum of 100 pounds towards the erection of his church was sanctioned. Read received no assistance from the public treasury but was maintained almost entirely by his society. Both Sunday schools and day schools were soon in full operation. Captain Duncan Campbell, instructed to make a tour of inspection and to report to government on the state and progress of the settlement, dated a report the 31st of May of this year. He found 47 different locations, which he described separately. The changes were rung on every condition of existence from prosperity to the most abject poverty: Christian Grace’s party had a water-course of 700 yards completed the first year, and a second on a higher level nearly finished, with an orchard in bearing; Rooy Bergman’s party, established 3 years, had a water-course of 700 yards, unsuccessful crops notwithstanding, and appeared ill-clothed and squalid, the huts of the most wretched description. Wade, who visited the settlement in this year, said that he was assured upon the spot that there were cases where the last sheep of an industrious man had been eaten by the visitors and the owner compelled to seek service again with the Boers. Campbell’s May report mattered because the Kat was not one village but 47 locations, and because the same furrow that watered an orchard left another party squalid. [4]
The results of the Kat River experiment up to the end of this year were not such as to give unmixed satisfaction. Too many of the idlest and worst class of vagrants had crept into the settlement and were hindering the honest occupation of the more worthy. They could not be arrested for vagrancy or compelled to work, as Ordinance 50 had secured to them the privileges of idleness and beggary. Being willing to fraternise with any who lived the same irregular lives as themselves, they were soon joined by many Xhosa who crept back by stealth, and thus introduced an element of real danger. A small military post, known as Eland’s Post, had been established at the chief pass over the mountains with a view to keeping the Xhosa out of the settlement. The officer in command was Captain A. B. Armstrong of the Cape mounted rifles, who, however, could exercise no civil authority. In December of this year Wade appointed him to be a justice of the peace for Albany and Somerset at an additional 100 pounds per annum, to continue to reside at Eland’s Post and to have the general superintendence of the Kat River settlement. The December appointment mattered because Cole had left the Kat without a magistrate of its own, and because Armstrong’s extra 100 pounds was Wade’s attempt to put a civil hand on a settlement that Ordinance 50 would not let him police as vagrants. [4]
Although Tyali had been permitted to occupy lands at the Mancazana on sufferance, he had always played a double part. Continued threats of expulsion had been held over him but they had had little or no effect. Depredations resumed on a very extensive scale in this year. Cole then resolved to expel Tyali from the valley of the Mankazana, and in September a military force was sent to drive him out. He did not resist. As soon as the troops showed themselves, Tyali with all his followers and cattle moved immediately in the direction of the Chumie and was gone. He retired quietly to the land along the Gaga, from its source to its junction with the Tyumie. There he gave as much trouble as in his former home. In clearing the ceded territory of Tyali it was discovered that Maqoma had completely re-established himself in it, occupying the country a little to the north of Fort Willshire. In 1832 Lieutenant-Colonel Somerset, who had always been indulgent towards Maqoma, had allowed him with a few followers to cross the boundary for the purpose of grazing their numerous cattle, as the grass in their own country was scanty and insufficient. He did not return. His people followed him little by little until the whole tribe was again in the forbidden land. Fieldcornets testified to his good conduct as instanced by his restoration of cattle in cases where it was certain that the theft had been committed by any of his people; but his people, situated so near to Tyali’s, joined them in their forays, and thus it became necessary to expel all and Maqoma with them. This embittered him intensely. Somerset was in Europe on leave, and Lieutenant-Colonel England was acting commandant of the frontier. The September expulsion mattered because Tyali left without a shot, and because Maqoma, who had been let west of the Tyumie to graze, was now to be driven with him. [3] [4]
When Wade became acting governor he caused a strict inquiry to be made into matters in the ceded territory. Under these circumstances he practically defined a new boundary. The wording of the notice in the Gazette issued after Lord Charles Somerset’s arrangement with Ngqika in 1819 was somewhat obscure, and the Gaga was not named in it. Another branch of the Tyumie a little higher up — the Kurukuru — better answered the description there given. In November of this year Captain Robert Scott Aitchison, of the Cape mounted rifles, was directed to remove Tyali beyond the Kurukuru, and Maqoma and Botumane beyond the Tyumie. They did not attempt to resist, but retired quietly with all their movable property. Their women were afterwards permitted to cross over and tend the gardens until the millet and pumpkins were ripe, and could be taken away. Early in October Mr. Read held an anniversary service and tea meeting at Philipton. Among those invited was Maqoma, although Read was fully aware of the strict orders of government against allowing any Xhosa, and especially Maqoma, into the settlement. Maqoma with 20 followers, all mounted, appeared at Eland’s Post in order to obtain permission and a pass. The officer in command refused. In defiance of this the chief, by a circuitous path, made his way to Philipton and arrived there on the afternoon of the 6th of October. On the 7th a service was held in the Philipton church when Maqoma is said to have given an eloquent address. After the service the missionaries and Maqoma repaired to Read’s house to take tea. While they were doing so, a sergeant and 6 privates of the Cape mounted rifles were seen to ride hurriedly down the slope of one of the adjacent hills. The officer commanding the post had heard of the chief’s action and had sent these men to arrest him. In August Hermanus’s nest of thieves at the Blinkwater had become so dangerous that it was necessary to clear them out. This was effected by Colonel England in August of this year. Hermanus was persuaded to take land in Albany. During the latter part of this year there was a quiet ferment beyond the Keiskama which boded no good to the colony. Tyali and Maqoma were chafing under their exclusion from the ceded territory; Eno had reproved Tyali for his tame submission to the troops, and was disposed to assist him to regain the Mancazana. Traders noticed an increasingly hostile attitude; there was a tendency to rob with violence the waggons and shanties which answered for shops. The November removal mattered because Wade had redrawn the 1819 line at the Kurukuru, and because Maqoma left the ceded ground embittered, after tea at Philipton that the post had tried to stop. [3] [4] [4]
Morija, Thaba Ntshu, and Trichardt’s First Waggons — June–December 1833
On Dr. Philip’s recommendation, missionaries of the Paris evangelical society turned their attention to Moshesh’s country. In June of this year the reverend Thomas Arbousset, with Casalis and Gosselin, reached Thaba Bosigo, and were warmly welcomed by Moshesh, who gave them permission to settle wherever they chose. They selected a fertile and well-watered valley about 25 miles from Thaba Bosigo, and there established a station which they named Morija. The valley when they first visited it was uninhabited, but Moshesh sent some members of his own family, among whom were his sons Letsie and Molapo, with a large party of people, to reside close to the white men and be instructed by them. Arbousset, Casalis, and Gosselin found the strip of country about 30 or 40 miles in width along the north-western side of the Caledon, from about latitude 29° to 29° 30′, thinly inhabited by Basuto. On the opposite or south-eastern side of the river, a similar belt, extending to the Maluti, was much more thickly peopled, though its inhabitants were few compared with the number reached at a later date. Game of many kinds was abundant. Along the head waters of the Caledon the Batlokua were living, between whom and the Basuto of Moshesh there was a bitter feeling of enmity. The June arrival mattered because Moshesh wanted teachers within a day’s ride of Thaba Bosigo, and because Morija put a French station on the Caledon before any Cape officer sat there. [3] [4]
At nearly the same time the reverend Mr. Pellissier, finding that the services of three missionaries were not needed at Motito, was looking for a suitable site farther south. Philip transferred the so-called Bushman school just below the confluence of the Caledon and the Orange to Pellissier, who named the place Bethulie, and induced a fugitive Batlapin clan from the neighbourhood of Kuruman, under the chief Lepui, to settle there. These were afterwards joined by some refugee Barolong. Bethulie was not peopled by Basuto, nor was a claim to its ground ever made by Moshesh, but from this date there was a close connection between it and the stations of the French society in the Lesuto. The naming mattered because a Paris station now sat at the Caledon’s mouth as well as at Morija, and because Lepui’s people were Batlapin from Kuruman, not Moshesh’s subjects. [3]
A few months later the population of the country along the western bank of the Caledon opposite Thaba Bosigo was largely increased by the arrival of several bands of refugees under the leadership of Wesleyan missionaries. The clan under Moroko, Sifunelo’s son, had remained at Platberg on the southern bank of the Vaal until the close of this year, when the reverend James Archbell, John Edwards, and Thomas Jenkins led them to Thaba Ntshu, a mountain west of the Caledon and distant from Thaba Bosigo about 50 or 60 miles. Just at this time Gontse and Tawane with a few followers, fleeing southward from Moselekatse, joined Moroko and moved onwards with him. They were accompanied also by small parties of Koranas, Griquas, and halfbreeds who had no settled home. At Thaba Ntshu the strangers found a petty chief named Moseme governing a few people, but he informed them that he was subordinate to Moshesh, and had no power to give them permission to settle. Two of the French clergymen immediately proceeded to ascertain particulars, and having learned the object of the strangers, communicated it to Moshesh. The fact that Europeans were the leaders of the immigrants sufficed to dispel the fears of the Basuto, and Moshesh, glad to get friendly settlers on his border, cordially consented to their location on the vacant land west of the Caledon. A document purporting to be an absolute sale to the Wesleyan missionary society of a tract of ground about Thaba Ntshu, several hundred square miles in extent, was drawn up on the 7th of December of this year, and was signed by Moshesh and Moseme on the one part, and Messrs. Archbell, Edwards, and Jenkins on the other. The price paid is said therein to have been 7 young oxen, 1 heifer, 2 sheep, and 1 goat. There was no competent interpreter present, and Moshesh did not regard the transaction in the light of a sale. Of the Barolong chiefs then at Thaba Ntshu, Gontse was the highest in rank, but so thoroughly impoverished was he that his name hardly appeared; Tawane had energy enough to turn his followers into a band of robbers; Moroko alone, owing partly to his clan having fled before the great disasters and partly to the guidance of the missionaries, was a man of power and influence. In this same December the remnant under Barend Barends was settled by Wesleyan missionaries at Lishuane near the Caledon. The December paper mattered because 7 oxen bought a Wesleyan title Moshesh did not think he had sold, and because Moroko now sat 50 miles west of Thaba Bosigo as a neighbour Moshesh had invited. [3] [3] [4]
The emigration of white inhabitants of the eastern frontier districts to the countries beyond the Orange began in this year. A very large proportion of the burghers of Graaff-Reinet and the adjacent districts were then already convinced that the cause of all their sufferings and difficulties was the existence of the British government in the country. The years which had passed since 1815, and the events which had followed Slachtersnek, had strengthened their conviction that it was their duty to seek for their children a refuge from what they regarded as the oppressor’s flag. Carel Johannes Trichard was the leader of the first party. His farm was in the fieldcornetcy of Bruintjes Hoogte, in the district of Somerset. In December of this year he and his wife and daughter; his son Carel, with wife and two children; and his younger sons, Louis, Pieter, and Jeremia, started for the Orange. With them travelled five other frontier families from the districts of Somerset, Albany, and Uitenhage, namely J. Albrecht, Hendrik Botha, J. Pretorius, G. Scheepers, and H. Strydom, with their wives and children. Besides these different households there was also a youth named Daniel Pfeiffer. Proceeding northwards through the present districts of Cradock and Colesberg, they were, before they came to the river, still inside the colony’s paper. The Trichards and Van Rensburgs, with their followers, started from Somerset and Albany and left for the Orange. In the two following years the movement was not continued on the same scale. The December start mattered because the first waggons left Bruintjes Hoogte a full year before the Cape slave date of 1 December 1834, and because the men who drove them were eastern graziers, not Stellenbosch slaveholders. [7]
Among any 100 white inhabitants of the country in Albany or Somerset, barely a single one could be found who had owned slaves. That number of 100 sat in the combined parties of the Trichards and Hans van Rensburg, typical eastern frontiersmen, who left the colony in this year — that is, before the date of emancipation. They did not take any slaves with them, nor had they sold any before starting for the north. They possessed none. The wine- and corn-growing districts of the Cape and Stellenbosch had held some 20160 out of the 36000 slaves, and yet their inhabitants took practically no part in the northward movement. From the other western districts of Worcester, George, and Swellendam, where there had been over 10000 slaves, only some 200 of the inhabitants would leave for the north in the years of the emigration. The eastern frontier colonists were cattle graziers and sheep farmers; their herdsmen and waggon drivers were free people, Khoikhoi and Xhosa. The count mattered because the first 100 souls on the road to the Orange owned no slave among them, and because the districts that held 20160 slaves stayed at home. [7]
Port Frances, Piketberg, and Grahamstown — 1833
In this year the destruction of Port Frances was practically completed by the withdrawal of the schoolmaster’s salary and the closing of the school, the dismissal of the postmaster, and the cancelling of the post contract from Port Frances to Bathurst and Grahamstown. The harbour-master’s office had been abolished in 1831; in the next year instructions had been received from the secretary of state for the entire abolition of the customs department, and Mr. Henry Nourse had bought both houses on the 5th of November 1832 — the custom house with nearly 4 morgen for 215 pounds, the harbour-master’s house with nearly 3 morgen for 36 pounds. What this year added was not a new pile in the Kowie but a school without a salary and a post without a contract. At Bathurst the drostdy house, like the government buildings at Port Frances, was consigned to the scrap heap. It was bought by Mr. T. J. Biddulph in September of this year, together with 11 acres of land, for 255 pounds. The closings mattered because Port Frances had been meant as Albany’s harbour, and because the school and the post were the last public offices the Kowie still had. [4]
In Grahamstown the question of what was to be done with the drostdy house still sat. It had been proposed that the resident magistrate’s, civil commissioner’s, and other public offices should be housed there, as well as accommodation provided for the visiting circuit court. This met with the indignation and unanimous opposition of the inhabitants, who argued that the drostdy house, being practically outside the town, was so far from the chief commercial centre and market place as to be most inconvenient for the satisfactory expedition of business. A public meeting was held in August of this year to protest against this, and a petition was sent to Cole asking him to reconsider the question. His excellency in reply said that whether the public offices should be removed or not to the drostdy house must be decided upon the broad principle of public expedience, and that he himself had no doubt that in every public point of view it was desirable to make the proposed change, and that were he not under the necessity of obtaining, in the first place, the sanction of the secretary of state for the expenditure, he would authorise the measure forthwith. The approval of the home government was not a contract in this year. The August meeting mattered because Grahamstown would not have its courts walked out of town, and because Cole, already packing for La Belle Alliance, still wanted the drostdy used and could not spend the money without Stanley. [4]
On the 1st of April 1832 the people of that part of the country about Piketberg had sent a petition to the presbytery of the Cape asking that they might be formed into a congregation separate from Tulbagh and Clanwilliam. On the 18th of August of that year a meeting had been held on the farm of Mr. J. Basson, when a committee was appointed to carry out the design. In this year the committee was superseded by properly appointed elders and deacons, who commenced their duties about the 17th of October. In the records the exact date is not given. A village named after the mountain, and a grant of Grootfontein, were not for this year. At Uitenhage the members, in April of this year, were asked to raise 25000 rixdollars — 1875 pounds — in shares of 100 rixdollars, or 7 pounds 10 shillings, toward replacing the small Dutch reformed church built in 1810 by a larger edifice. This seems to have been done, and new plans were called for; operations again commenced were not for this year. The school under Mr. Rose Innes had been the best in the eastern province; the hours had been from eight till one and then from two till six — 9 hours a day for small children in a South African climate. Cradock, on the eastern bank of the Great Fish, had not made any great strides; it was still an outpost of Somerset East, and as that place was a sub-drostdy of Grahamstown, Cradock was in reality a sub-sub-drostdy of Grahamstown. The October seating mattered because Piketberg now had elders of its own, and because Uitenhage had 25000 rixdollars on paper for a church that was not yet built. [3] [4]