Boer History1844 in South Africa: Maitland, Natal Annexation, the Faku Treaty, and the Eastern Frontier
The Zenobia of March, Maitland’s Oaths, and Napier in the Maidstone — March–May 1844
Imperial practice now limited a colonial governor to 6 years unless special circumstances held. Sir George Thomas Napier had been governor of the Cape since the 22nd of January 1838. He was anxious to retire. On the 19th of December 1843 a commission issued to Lieutenant-general Sir Peregrine Maitland as his successor. Napier was the man who had named Advocate Henry Cloete commissioner for Natal in May 1843, after the fighting at Congella and the landing from the Conch. The chair still mattered because the Cape was the only British government in South Africa: Natal had no lieutenant-governor yet, and the eastern frontier still ran on the Stockenstrom treaties of 1836. [3] [4]
One account has the Zenobia in Table Bay on the 14th of March, with the oaths the same day; another has arrival on the 16th with wife, 3 sons, and 3 daughters, and the oaths on the 18th. The later date is the one used in the official list of governors. On the 1st of April Napier and his family embarked in the Maidstone and sailed for England. He left public life with the ship. The handover mattered because a new governor’s commission created the legislative council afresh: the same men were named again, so there was no break, but the body itself expired with each governor. [3] [4]
Maitland had entered the army in 1792, served in Flanders, been at Corunna and through the peninsula, and commanded a brigade at Waterloo, for which the commons thanked him. He had been commander-in-chief at Madras and had resigned rather than show respect to a custom the East India Company held necessary for native loyalty. He had been lieutenant-governor of Upper Canada and afterwards of Nova Scotia. When he arrived he was in the 67th year of his age. His second wife was a daughter of the duke of Richmond. Two sons, the reverend Brownlow Maitland and Captain Charles Lennox Maitland, acted as private and military secretaries. He found the public debt of the colony very nearly paid off, important public works in hand, and the revenue in excess of ordinary expenditure. The prospect was pleasant except on the eastern frontier, where cattle theft and the Stockenstrom paper still set farmer against chief. Honesty, patience, and a willingness to be guided by John Montagu and William Porter served him in ordinary administration. Those two men would not always be at his side when the Fish river ran hot. [3] [4]
The legislative council in 1844 consisted of the governor as president; Messrs. John Montagu, Harry Rivers, Pieter Gerhard Brink, William Porter, and William Field, official members; and Messrs. John Bardwell Ebden, Michiel van Breda, Henry Cloete, Hamilton Ross, and Advocate Henry Cloete, unofficial. Previously the council had met whenever the governor chose, upon a week’s notice. On the 15th of May a rule was adopted, and afterwards confirmed, that there should be a regular session every year commencing in April, of which 21 days’ notice was to be given in the Government Gazette. The governor could still call an urgent meeting. Eastern men wanted one of the 5 unofficial seats, and beyond that a government of their own nearly independent of Capetown. They did not get the seat this year. The session rule mattered because it turned the council from an occasional board into a body that had to sit in public on a fixed calendar, even if the eastern districts still had no voice at the table. [3] [4]
Cloete’s Farm Classes, Stanley’s Letters Patent of the 31st of May, and the Volksraad of September — January–December 1844
At the beginning of 1844 Advocate Henry Cloete registered all lands claimed by the inhabitants of Natal. Cloete was the Cape barrister whom Napier had sent as her Majesty’s commissioner after the Queen, in 1843, took Natal as a British colony. The volksraad had levied 18 shillings quitrent on farms supposed to be 3000 morgen and had issued what purported to be title without survey. Section XI of Napier’s proclamation of the 12th of May 1843 required 12 months’ bona fide occupation before the commissioner’s arrival. That year had included the arrival of the troops; many had abandoned places for Pietermaritzburg or some laager. Cloete’s tour ran from the 6th of January until the 2nd of February. Class A held 198 farms occupied according to the proclamation; titles could issue without further question. Class B held 173 occupied for only part of the time; the secretary of state later admitted those claims. Class C held 66 purchased but never occupied — “not entitled to favourable consideration.” Another 120 had volksraad deeds on payment of inspection and registration fees, without residence or cultivation; the secretary would not admit the claim, but would allow 5 pounds as compensation for sums paid to the volksraad. Lord Stanley thought 3000 morgen far too large and recommended 3000 acres, with quitrent 2 pounds 10 shillings instead of 18 shillings, unless the governor thought the cut would produce a renewed emigration. The governor did think so; the Class A farms were therefore left at 6000 acres. On payment of 50 pounds a deed was to issue covering survey and redemption of the burgher tax. The classification mattered because it decided who would keep a Natal farm under the Crown, and who would be paid 5 pounds and told to go. [4]
The old tender Fawn, under Lieutenant Joseph Nourse, had served as a floating fort in the inner harbour until June 1844, when she was sold as a hulk. Major Thomas Charlton Smith remained with 275 of the 27th, 12 Cape mounted riflemen, 24 artillerymen, and 20 engineers. The volksraad continued on sufferance. Smith could veto what he disliked almost at the point of the bayonet. Delay in Downing Street fed the hope that Natal might be abandoned as in 1839. That hope mattered because, without a lieutenant-governor or courts, the farmers still sat in a volksraad that had no legal standing, while Smith held the only force in the country. [3] [4]
Napier had hoped to use the American missionaries Dr. Adams and the reverend Aldin Grout to settle wandering people on unalienable plots of a few morgen, with churches and schools, each village under a missionary who was to have no civil power beyond personal influence. The appointments at 150 pounds a year were confirmed by the executive council on the 6th of April. Adams left without taking up the work. Grout tried a station on the Tongati and left in about a year. The American board had decided to withdraw; both men later resumed connection with it. The scheme mattered because it was an attempt to place the people who had fled Panda in 1843 on plots that no European could buy, without giving the missionary a magistrate’s power. [3] [4]
A letter from Johan Arnold Smellekamp said that he and the reverend Pieter Nicolaas Ham were still at Delagoa Bay. Gert Rudolph, J. Prinsloo, C. Coetzee, and one Bezuidenhout rode there. They left at the beginning of December and reached Lourenço Marques about the middle of that month. Smellekamp told them that the commercial community of Holland had sympathy, but that no recognition or assistance was to be hoped from the government of Holland: they must submit to British rule or move beyond the 25th degree of south latitude. Within about 24 hours they started back. Coetzee died of malaria; Prinsloo reached home and died of the same disease within a fortnight; Bezuidenhout recovered; Rudolph’s constitution held; all the horses died. A larger Winburg party of 50 with waggons took too north-easterly a line, met tsetse, and returned without reaching the bay. In 1844 Joachim Prinsloo, having reached Delagoa and spoken with Smellekamp, died of the fever on the return. Burger had crossed the Drakensberg. Servaas and Michiel van Breda got away overland to Delagoa; a rumour of pardon brought them back toward Natal; a message that the amnesty was refused turned them again; Michiel died in the forest fever; Servaas buried him and came on to Pietermaritzburg, where public feeling was strong enough that he was left unmolested. The small ride did more to settle minds than almost anything else could have done, because it closed the hope that Holland would recognise a republic at Natal. [4] [7]
While Natal chafed, a deputation from the Riet river in the Winburg district asked, on behalf of 265 who had signed, to be taken under British protection. Cloete regarded it as a triumph. The petitioners were in difficulties with Adam Kok; to accede would have been to declare the country British, against which the government had set its face. Nothing came of it. Shortly afterwards a missive dated Potchefstroom the 10th of April 1844, signed by J. D. van Coller as president and 23 others including A. H. Potgieter, declared that they did not consider themselves bound by Cloete’s treaty, made without their knowledge; that they were unwilling to enter into any negotiations with her Majesty; that they were free and independent; and that their burgher government extended to the fall of the Great River. The council of Potchefstroom and Winburg adopted the same resolution unanimously on that date: the emigrants were free, they would enter no negotiations, and their territory ran southward to the Orange. The paper mattered because the men west of the Drakensberg were telling Capetown that Cloete’s Natal submission did not bind them, and that they claimed to the Orange. [3] [4]
On the 25th of May Stanley announced to Maitland that the form of government of the new colony was decided. Natal was to be a dependency of the Cape, though separate for judicial, financial, and executive purposes. All communications with the secretary of state were to pass through the governor. There was to be a lieutenant-governor, aided by an executive council of not more than 5, which could recommend laws. On the 31st of May letters patent issued under the great seal: Natal was to be part of the Cape Colony; nevertheless no colonial law or magistrate was, by virtue of the annexation, to have force or jurisdiction there; the governor and council of the Cape, acting in the regular manner, were to have authority to make such laws as should be needed. A single judge was to hold courts alternately in Pietermaritzburg, Port Natal, and Weenen, with appeal to the supreme court in Capetown. Local government might take the forms most acceptable to the people: Pietermaritzburg might restore landdrost and heemraden; Port Natal might have a municipal organisation. The despatch must have reached Capetown in August. On the 12th of October the attorney-general communicated the matter to Major Smith, who did not think proper to acquaint the volksraad — hence the tone of later complaint. Cloete completed his Natal duties in April and reached Capetown in May. The total cost of his mission was 1623 pounds 18 shillings. Sixteen Pietermaritzburg names thanked him; Weenen and the republican party were absent from the paper. In October Smith received, in Natal, the sword of honour subscribed by admirers in the Cape Colony. The letters patent mattered because they made Natal a Cape dependency on paper, while still leaving Smith in command and the farmers without the civil government they had been promised. [3] [4] [7]
One account places the election of a new volksraad in August, as the old body had then been a full year in existence; the court-house meeting was on the 2nd of September. Retiring president Otto had to swear in the new members. With one exception they refused the oath of allegiance, on the ground that they did not consider themselves British subjects and had been no parties to Cloete’s treaty. Otto refused to admit them and declared, though illegally, that the old members should remain. The noise lasted the day. On the 3rd a letter from Smith was read: as there had been a refusal of the oath he could not recognise the volksraad, their conduct being at variance with the seventh article of the proclamation of the 12th of May 1843. The old volksraad continued. That afternoon a committee resolved that all who had entered Natal since the arrival of the British troops should have 14 days’ notice to return, and in default be driven back by force. Smith forbade the step, expressed willingness to prevent people from moving from place to place, and would not turn them out of the country. The resolution was modified to a warning, with refusal to be placed in Smith’s hands. One expedition of 15 crossed the Tugela chasing Zulus; a young man named van Coller followed a man into a glen, was assegaied, and died shortly afterwards; the man was shot in the act. In June the commercial community in Capetown addressed a memorial of 160 names praying that, in default of a proper civil government, the officer in command might exercise jurisdiction in civil cases: Natal had become a resort of persons who fled debts and punishment. They were told to confine themselves to cash and barter or await competent courts. On the 22nd of December William Cowie was appointed postmaster at Durban and Captain William Bell, previously master of the Conch, harbour master. The year closed with Natal still waiting for a lieutenant-governor. [3] [4] [7]
Mills and Van Staden, Jan Kock, and Oberholster at Philippolis — January–December 1844
Maitland found awaiting him a letter from Adam Kok soliciting military aid. Kok was the Griqua captain at Philippolis with whom Napier had signed a treaty in 1843, recognising Griqua authority north of the Orange and treating white emigrants there as British subjects. In January there was a quarrel between two white men, George Mills and Hermanus van Staden, not far from Philippolis. Shortly afterwards Mills died, as was reported from injuries received from Van Staden. Kok caused Van Staden to be arrested and sent to Colesberg for trial, and took possession of Mills’s property, ostensibly for the heirs. Diederikse, Mocke’s secretary, wrote from the Modder demanding that Van Staden be given up to the emigrant farmers’ courts. Kok’s reply — the missionary in his name — was that the request had been complied with in one sense, for as all emigrants from the colony were looked upon as British subjects they were amenable to the laws administered in the colony. Mocke’s party then threatened war. Kok obtained from the military store at Colesberg 200 pounds of powder and 400 pounds of lead. For a week or two there was considerable excitement; on Van Staden’s release the affair sank, with a warning to Kok not to repeat the provocation. The civil commissioner told him that the treaty did not involve sending troops, that he must continue to use the Cape of Good Hope Punishment Act, and that it was expedient to pursue a conciliatory line and not to enact laws so arbitrary as to invite resistance. Colonel Hare expressed disbelief in Kok’s statements: the farmers whose expulsion he contemplated had for the most part hired their lands from Kok or his people, and Kok was proposing, under pretence of disaffection, to dispossess them. The quarrel mattered because it tested whether Napier’s Griqua treaty meant British troops north of the Orange, or only the Punishment Act and a warning. [3] [4]
In May the executive council decided that it would be inexpedient for the colonial government to interfere in the settlement of the boundaries claimed by Moshesh under the Napier treaty, and that until Shaw’s statements and those of the French missionaries could be reconciled nothing could be done on the treaties. Early in the year a new leader of the anti-British party appeared on the Modder: Jan Kock, a farmer from the Hanover district, with rather more book education than the generality, genial and hospitable, and with too much confidence in his own ability. His aim was to bring all Europeans north of the Orange under the government at Potchefstroom. In April he attended a large meeting at Winburg when it was declared that all were free and independent. In the first week of June Michiel Oberholster convened a large meeting of farmers and Griquas at Philippolis to try to come to a common understanding. Gideon Joubert reported to the civil commissioner of Colesberg that dissensions among the emigrants prevented joint action. Oberholster’s party repudiated subjection to Adam Kok by the treaty, but they and the Griquas resolved that no one who disavowed allegiance to the British government should be permitted to reside in the territory. Kock declared that he would resist any such resolution; he had a strong body of adherents; the meeting dissolved. The June meeting mattered because it split the white emigrants north of the Orange into a loyalist camp around Oberholster and a Potchefstroom camp around Kock, with Kok in the middle holding a treaty Capetown would not enforce with troops. [3] [4]
During the year many efforts were made by Kock’s party to compel those who disagreed either to return to the Cape Colony or to fall in with their views. Oberholster’s adherents complained of incessant persecution. Maitland was wearied with communications showing that without a strong force north of the Orange the treaties could not be maintained. Kok wrote asking for soldiers to expel the emigrants. On the 24th of October Lukas van den Heever wrote on behalf of the parties under himself, Oberholster, and Jacobus Snyman — the last named being head of farmers in the valley of the lower Caledon — asking whether they could rely on protection. If the government did not assist them they would in the end be obliged against their will to submit to the council at Potchefstroom. The civil commissioner at Colesberg, Mr. Rawstorne, checkmated a circulating “proclamation” of independence with the assurance that the British government would never consent to an independent community. On the 13th of December Kock, in Potgieter’s name, wrote to Kok inviting a conference of peace and friendship. Kok replied through the reverend W. Y. Thompson that he did not feel at liberty to meet anyone officially who assumed authority over the subjects of the queen. A few days later Potgieter arrived at Philippolis and met Kok. He proposed that as farmers and Griquas were alike emigrants they should not interfere with each other, each party under its own government. Kok answered that he would abide by the Napier treaty and could only regard the white emigrants as British subjects. They came to no terms. The year north of the Orange therefore closed with Kok still holding a paper alliance, Oberholster still asking for protection, and Potgieter still claiming that his burgher government ran to the river. [3] [4]
De Lange of the 1st of July, the Maitland Treaties, Faku, and Kreli — January–December 1844
The Stockenstrom treaties of 1836 had treated the Xhosa captains as independent powers. Their object, as Napier once wrote, was to raise them in the scale of civilisation by appealing to their sense of justice for restitution of stolen property, rather than extorting it by force of arms. Napier found that the original treaties did nothing of the kind. He arranged modifications with the chiefs and hoped for a better result. He was disappointed. On the 4th of December 1843 he submitted to Stanley a scheme to pay tribute for release from plunder: salaries to the chiefs upon good conduct and the surrender of thieves, who upon conviction should be flogged in public, and institutions in Xhosa country at colonial cost for industry and religious instruction. Stanley replied on the 11th of March 1844, instructing Maitland to omit no safe and proper measure for increasing the security of the queen’s subjects on the frontier. D’Urban’s system might be better, but it would be necessary to go to war to revert to it, and that was not to be thought of. Infractions by the Xhosa absolved the queen’s government from strict adherence; Stanley claimed the right of insisting on modification. He approved Napier’s proposals but feared that education was too remote a means of escape. Diplomatic agents might change their duties to promoting the lawful claims of fellow colonists instead of acting as protectors of the Xhosa; in very urgent cases he sanctioned reprisals from the chiefs as a last resource; he left the matter to Maitland’s judgment, with a reminder that there were limits beyond which the military force of Great Britain could not be employed. At the quarterly meeting at Fort Beaufort on the 16th and 17th of January Maqomo and Botumane, who had been threatened with force if stolen cattle were not restored, were absent. Hare called out a company of the 7th Dragoon Guards; the cattle were forthcoming; not a shot was fired. Napier later told the commons that during the whole of his government not a single shot had been exchanged between the military and the Xhosa. He left a changed man: the Stockenstrom treaties, he said, shocked the sense of natural justice and were unsupported by sound policy. Stanley’s letter mattered because it told Maitland he might modify the paper, but not by going back to D’Urban’s province of Queen Adelaide, which would mean war. [3] [4]
On the 1st of July, before the governor had time to make new arrangements, a farmer, J. H. de Lange, lost a horse. Searching, he came on its spoor and that of a man driving it, then on the spoor of a large number of cattle. He collected other farmers. The trace ran to a deep wooded glen near the Fish, from which bellowing was heard. A watcher disappeared down the kloof; firing commenced. De Lange stood on a high crag and was hit; he died a few days afterwards. Seven men were believed to be in the party; one was killed; six escaped. One account names them of Sandile’s clan, pursued in Albany; another has the glen on the Fish and later blame shifting among Xoxo, Eno, and a councillor of Maqomo. The funeral drew a large number of Dutch farmers of the Fish and Koonap, who obtained leave for a public meeting at the farm of Gert Els. Even then public meetings were not allowed without the governor’s or lieutenant-governor’s permission. The killing mattered because it was the first death of a burgher on the spoor that Maitland had to answer, and because Hare used it to put troops into the ceded territory in breach of the treaty. [3] [4]
Hare decided upon military occupation of the ceded territory, contravention of the treaty though it was. The ceded territory was the land between the Fish and the Keiskama, taken after the war of 1819 and later left in Xhosa occupation under the Stockenstrom paper. Colonel Somerset with cavalry and infantry took post at Umdala, about half-way between Fort Beaufort and Block Drift, on the boundary of Maqomo and Botumane. Lieutenant-colonel Lindsay with part of the 1st battalion of the 91st, cavalry of the 7th Dragoon Guards, and a company of the Cape mounted riflemen, stationed in another part of Maqomo’s country. Lieutenant-colonel Johnstone with infantry and cavalry from Fort Peddie encamped at Breakfast Vlei in Eno’s country. Fifty infantry and fifty cavalry formed a post at Block Drift. Hare himself came to Fort Beaufort. Except in actual war, the display was perhaps the most extensive there had ever been in Xhosa country. Stretch was sent to summon the Gaika chiefs. Maqomo and Sandile appeared, apologetic. The demand was the apprehension of the murderers and a fine of 200 cattle for the widow. Maqomo laid the blame on Xoxo’s followers; it was afterwards said the expedition had been planned by one of Maqomo’s own councillors; three of the guilty were Eno’s people. On the 13th of August Eno and his son Stock signed an agreement to do their utmost to apprehend the men among their people, try them by their own law, and in case of conviction take them to Fort Peddie and execute them in presence of the British force; they promised two hostages and 50 head to the widow. Sandile came forward with a victim and claimed the reward; Maitland sent him a present of 50 pounds. Four men were sent to Grahamstown, tried before the circuit court, and found not guilty. On the 3rd of October a notice offered a reward — 50 pounds each for four still at large in one account, 200 pounds for the real murderers in another. They were not secured. Sandile, upon Hare’s demand, paid 50 head to the widow. Maitland approved the military movements but wished to discountenance the idea that a number of cattle could compensate a human life. The troops remained. [3] [4]
The meeting at Gert Els was held on the 12th of August. Between 60 and 70 farmers were present. De Lange the father was in the chair. It had been intended as an exclusively Dutch assembly; British voices blended in the cry. The chief speech was from J. M. Bowker, formerly agent at Fort Peddie, discharged by Hare for outspokenness against the Stockenstrom regime — the oration afterwards called the Springbok speech, when the attorney-general brought Bowker’s statement before the legislative council. “The day was when our plains were covered with tens of thousands of springboks; they are gone now, and who regrets it? Their place is occupied with tens of thousands of merino sheep.” The memorial went to Maitland. The meeting mattered because it put the Dutch farmers of the Fish and Koonap on the same paper as the English settlers, asking the new governor to tear up the Stockenstrom treaties. [4]
Maitland arrived somewhat unexpectedly in Algoa Bay on the 10th of September, with Montagu, Lord Mandeville, and the assistant surveyor-general. After three days over the roads from Port Elizabeth he was met on the Howison’s Poort road by Hare, the civil and military authorities, Somerset with the Cape mounted riflemen, Lieutenant-colonel Sir Harry Darrel with a troop of the 7th Dragoon Guards, and a large number of leading inhabitants on horseback. After four days in Grahamstown he left for Fort Peddie by Committees Drift and Breakfast Vlei. On Thursday the 19th of September, on the sward in front of the military hospital, he met Pato and Cobus of the Gqunukhwebe, Umkye for Umhala of the Ndlambe, who was ill, and Eno of the Amambala. The 27th kept a space. The governor sat at a table with a heap of silver. Theophilus Shepstone interpreted sentence by sentence. The first article was to repeal all existing treaties with these tribes — to abrogate the Stockenstrom treaties. Bonfires and tar barrels turned night into day in the colony. There were 25 articles, with slight modifications for all the tribes: former treaties annulled; peace and amity; the boundary of 1819 as agreed by Gaika recognised, the ceded territory part of the colony but still occupied except in case of hostility; troops and forts west of that line; agents as before; chiefs near the coast to prevent unlicensed landing; cattle or horses identified in Xhosa country, though not followed at the time, might be reclaimed with compensation for time and expense; if traced into a chief’s territory and not discoverable, the chief was bound to compensate, unless he delivered the thief; criminals to be delivered for trial in the colony. Article 18, an independent tribunal of appeal against agents or chiefs, later met opposition. Christians were not to be amenable to Xhosa law for refusing witchcraft, rain-making, and polygamy. Definite annual payments were to replace loose presents, contingent on fidelity. Cobus thanked; Umkye and Eno approved; each chief was given 10 pounds in silver in a large cotton handkerchief. Maitland then visited the site in Tola’s country already begun as a post for 400 men — a bank of earth enclosing military huts at the head of the Sheshegu, on the watershed between the Keiskama and the Fish, among Botumane’s people and a few miles from Sandile’s kraals — and named it Post Victoria. Outposts were recalled; some troops went back to Grahamstown, others to the new post. For a time the establishment seemed to answer: for the next 8 months hardly any cattle were stolen from the colony. 200 muskets were left with Shepstone for the Mfengu at Peddie. The Peddie meeting mattered because it tore up the Stockenstrom paper in public, put a post east of the Fish, and told the coast captains that stolen cattle could be reclaimed even without a hot spoor. [3] [4]
Travelling rapidly, on the 5th of October he was at Fort Beaufort, where Umtirara, Mapasa, and other Tembu captains waited, and Sandile, Makoma, and Botumane also. Terms with all of these were arranged; the documents were not drawn up until a later date. He tried to overawe the Rarabe captains by informing them that he was entering into treaties with Faku and Kreli, and would therefore have friends in their rear. The treaty with Kreli was signed by Maitland at Fort Beaufort on the 7th of October; Shepstone was then sent with it to Butterworth. Kreli was to protect missionaries, traders, travellers, and the post; deliver persons committing crimes in the colony; cause witnesses to appear; restore stolen cattle traced to his territory or make compensation; prevent unlicensed landing; keep peace with neighbours; respect the British agent. As long as he carried out the conditions the governor undertook to pay him yearly 50 pounds in money or useful articles. Kreli affixed his mark on the 4th of November in presence of Shepstone and William Macdowell Fynn. Another account has Shepstone dispatched to both Kreli and Faku on the 16th of October after Maitland had left Fort Beaufort on the 8th for Colesberg and the Orange. The Gaikas raised objections to articles 18 and 20; the legislative council later altered all the treaties in one particular. Sandile thanked for the soldiers who would strengthen his hands against stealing; Maqomo and Xoxo also thanked. [3] [4]
Faku was paramount chief of the Pondos, between Natal and the Xhosa. He was to have all the territory south of the Umzimkulu, though the Pondos could not have claimed with any show of right an inch north of the Umtentu. Stanley had not intended Natal to extend as far as the Umzimvubu; he left the south-western boundary to the governor, with the condition that it was not to embrace land occupied by any well-established tribe. Fodo lived on the southern bank of the Umzimkulu; that river was selected. On the 7th of October a treaty was prepared and signed by Maitland at Fort Beaufort; Shepstone and Fynn were sent to Faku; the reverend Thomas Jenkins explained the clauses. Faku agreed unhesitatingly. On the 23rd of November the marks of the chief and his son Ndamasi were affixed in presence of Shepstone, Fynn, Jenkins, and four leading Pondo councillors. Faku was acknowledged paramount over the whole country between the Umtata and Umzimkulu, from the Kathlamba to the sea, secured against claims of British subjects. He bound himself to be the faithful friend of the Cape Colony, to seize and deliver refugee criminals, facilitate evidence, make restitution for stolen cattle traced to his country, protect travellers, the post, traders, and missionaries, prevent unlicensed landing, avoid war so far as possible, submit disputes he could not settle to colonial mediation, and aid the colony with all his forces when called upon. A clause provided that the rights of petty chiefs and tribes within the territory should remain unaltered, and that they should be allowed to live as before the Zulu wars. Maitland knew there were other tribes within the bounds, frequently fighting the Pondos, over whom Faku exercised no jurisdiction. He hoped the treaty would restrain the Xhosa by the knowledge that they would have in their rear an enemy more powerful than themselves, keep a friendly neighbour on Natal’s south-western boundary, keep an open road, and prevent unlicensed cargo along the coast. In December trouble recommenced: three horses, a cow, and a calf stolen in Lower Albany and driven over the Fish; Pato and Shepstone surrounded a kraal with a large number of Mfengu; neither animals nor thieves were there; the cattle of the kraal were driven off under the old spoor law; shots were fired; Captain Bambrick came from Peddie with the 7th Dragoon Guards and Cape mounted riflemen; relatives pledged to capture the thieves. At Somerset East, Peacock and Joseph lost cattle; 87 head, valued at 261 pounds, got into Xhosa country, the thieves of Botumane and Xoxo. Friction arose between Somerset at Post Victoria and Stretch over jurisdiction. The Faku paper mattered because it gave the Pondo chief a claim from the Umtata to the Umzimkulu that other tribes inside those rivers did not accept, and because it was meant to put a British ally in the Xhosa rear. [3] [4]
Ichaboe, the Guano Notice of the 5th of November, and the Ten Thousand Pounds of June — 1844
At the beginning of Maitland’s government a considerable sum came into the treasury from an unexpected source. Guano had been found in bulk on Ichaboe, a rock less than a mile in circumference, highest point 30 feet, covered with penguins and other seabirds, the deposit from 40 feet at the northern end to 10 at the southern. Benjamin Wade, master of the barque Douglas, had taken possession of the islet for the queen on the 11th of November 1843. Shipping stages were erected. Before the close of 1844 300 vessels were lying at once in the channel between the islet and the mainland. During the busiest period, when some thousands of labourers were on shore, a frigate was sent from Simon’s Bay to support a committee of shipmasters and agents in enforcing order. The quantity that entered the English market from these islands during 1844 and the following season was about 300000 tons, sold at an average of 7 pounds a ton. Importers cleared about 2 pounds a ton, freight being 4 pounds and shipping and landing about 1 pound. The Cape’s benefit from the original mass was through the sale of provisions; after the rocks were cleared, Capetown merchants caused fresh deposits to be removed when the birds were not breeding. Search along the coast found deposits on Malagas Island at the entrance of Saldanha Bay, Dassen Island, and other rocks in colonial waters. The government claimed the guano, and on the 5th of November a notice issued that it could be removed on payment of 20 shillings for every registered ton of the vessel employed. Applicants were plentiful; a sum of about 50000 pounds was received by the treasury. The notice mattered because it turned a rush on rocks off Namaqualand into a cash receipt that paid for immigration and roads. [3]
The improvement in the finances enabled the government to apply money to European immigration. In June the council without a dissentient voice voted 10000 pounds for this purpose, with the understanding that a similar or larger sum should be so applied every succeeding year. The road board could not obtain as many labourers as it needed, though offering 2 shillings a day with lodging and rations superior to those supplied to British soldiers. Maitland’s minute of the 22nd of June made the prospective employer the importer: bounty on each individual introduced, in three classes. First class — farm overseers, master workmen — 15 pounds for a single man between 18 and 40, 22 pounds 10 shillings if married, 5 pounds for each of 3 children. Second class 12, 18, and 4 pounds. Third class 10, 15, and 3. Bounty orders in any one month were limited to 100 persons. The Immigration Board in Capetown was the secretary to government, the treasurer-general, the officer of health, and the collector of customs as immigration officer. Only 34 individuals came out under the first system; in a few months the imperial authorities altered it. The emigration commissioners contracted with Messrs. John Marshall & Co. of London and Southampton to select and convey agricultural labourers, mechanics, and domestic servants to Capetown and Port Elizabeth, at 10 pounds 8 shillings for each statute adult, a vessel every two months during the English autumn and winter. At Port Elizabeth Mr. Dunsterville counted 55 arrivals in 1841, 184 in 1842, 367 in 1843, and 231 in 1844. The vote mattered because the road board was short of hands at 2 shillings a day, and because the first bounty brought only 34 people before London changed the system. [3] [4]
Among the marks of progress in Maitland’s time the Colonial Bank opened in Capetown on the 1st of October with a capital of 100000 pounds. That, at least, was of this year; the Mutual life office of May 1845 and the later Port Elizabeth and Union banks belong to later dates. The bank mattered because it was the first joint-stock bank of that capital in Capetown, opened in the same year as the guano receipt and the immigration vote. [3]
Montagu’s Convict Code of the 1st of January, the Flats Road, and the Kowie Flood — 1844
On the 1st of January Montagu formulated a code of detailed regulations for the management and discipline of convicts: duties of superintendents and overseers specified, and provision for turning the men to labour on mountain passes distant from any township. Ordinance no. 8 of the 22nd of November 1843 had created the central road board — Montagu, Rivers, and Major C. C. Michell official; Ebden, F. S. Watermeyer, and J. Busk unofficial — with subordinate boards in the districts. Able-bodied convicts, except those sentenced to very short terms, were massed at two stations, one convenient from the east, the other from the west. The first works were a good road over Cradock’s pass and a hard road over the Cape flats, which necessitated planting the flats with mesembryanthemum to fix the sand. Early in 1844 two large parties from the eastern gaols arrived at the George mountain: one at the bottom, the other at the top, 5 miles distant. They built quarters, made a bridle path connecting the stations, and began the road. By the end of the year the southern party of 97 had advanced 1900 yards; the northern party of 92 had cleared away the loose rock. To convey 31 convicts from Graaff-Reinet cost 112 pounds 10 shillings; 23 from Uitenhage, 178 pounds 10 shillings. Montagu bridge, over the Salt river, began to be used for general traffic on the 1st of July. Exclusive of convict labour the flats road would cost about 50000 pounds, raised by rates, tolls, and special grants; the last sand section toward Klapmuts and the Stellenbosch branch were still in the future. The code mattered because it took convicts out of the district gaols and put them in gangs on the passes, which was how Montagu meant to open the colony without a large free labour market. [3] [4]
At the Kowie, William Cock had seen the river flow to the sea through a western opening on the 7th of February 1841. The schooner Ligonier, like the Sophia his own, was wrecked in February 1844. That year he availed himself of steam: the paddle-wheel Sir John St. Aubyn, of 150 to 200 tons, 90 feet, 26 feet beam, 40 horse-power, made Cape Town to the Kowie in three and a half days with 50 tons of cargo and 16 passengers, Cock among them; goods for Grahamstown were delivered 5 days after leaving Cape Town. The Kowie Navigation Company had been promoted with a capital of 6000 pounds in 500 shares; the British Settler and the Chanticleer had reached the river toward the end of 1843. Port Frances was not a port of entry: vessels had still to call at a free port, a customs officer travelling with imports, the Crown free from expense. The year was disastrous. Tremendous rains inland brought the Kowie down; stones and bush that had withstood the tides succumbed to the rush of fresh water; much of Cock’s work was ruined. In August the schooner Seaforth, crossing the bar, was blown onto the eastern beach; in November the British Settler went the same way. Cock did not waver in his belief in the river. The flood mattered because it wrecked the cut that was meant to give Grahamstown a port of its own, cheaper than the waggon from Algoa Bay. [4]
Richmond and Victoria West, St Patrick’s of the 21st of July, the St Mungo of the 20th of September, and the Tenth of April — 1844
At the beginning of 1844 the English episcopal church had congregations with clergymen in Capetown, Rondebosch, Wynberg, Simonstown, Port Elizabeth, Grahamstown, Bathurst, Fort Beaufort, and Sidbury. In 1844 the reverend G. V. Thorpe at Sidbury complained of being badly treated and clamoured for arrears of stipend, the grant having been vetoed and subscribers having fallen short; Napier impressed on Stanley the importance of a suitable grant. On the 21st of July, in Grahamstown, the first Roman Catholic place of worship in the colony destined to exist permanently was opened for public service. Building had been carried out chiefly by Catholic soldiers of the regiments there, on ground of 100 feet frontage granted in July 1838 at the back of the public offices, adjoining the Masonic lodge. Bishop Griffith of Capetown dedicated it to St Patrick in presence of Hare, the civil commissioner Martin West, the military and civil officials, and prominent citizens. On the 1st of August the reverend Pieter Kuypers Albertyn became first clergyman of the Zwartberg congregation, established by the synod in November 1842 on the farm Kweekvallei. St Patrick’s mattered because it was the first Roman Catholic church in the colony built to last, raised by the soldiers who garrisoned Grahamstown. [3] [4]
On the Cape flats a hamlet would take Maitland’s name; a church place on the farm Driefontein was refused it. Elders and deacons for a new congregation there had been chosen by the presbytery of Graaff-Reinet on the 11th of October 1843 and approved by the lieutenant-governor on the 2nd of November. A tract of between 8000 and 9000 morgen, part of Driefontein, was purchased. The first building allotments were sold on the 19th of April 1844. Early in January a consulent held services; the reverend Jan Frederik Berrangé became clergyman. For a few months he had no salary but the offerings of the people; on the 18th of June he was placed upon the clerical establishment of the colony. The consistory proposed to call the village Maitland; the governor would not consent. They requested Richmond, in honour of Lady Sarah Maitland’s father, and by notice in the Gazette on the 29th of November that name was substituted for Driefontein. In the same manner a congregation in the division of Beaufort West, for which the presbytery of Graaff-Reinet had appointed elders and deacons on the 11th of October 1843, was delayed because the governor had not previously given consent; they were not inducted until the 17th of April 1844. The farm Zeekoegat and part of Kapokfontein were acquired. By desire of the consistory these names were changed to Victoria West by government notice on the 25th of September. The first clergyman, the reverend Willem Adolf Krige, was appointed by the governor on the 1st of August and inducted on the 27th of October. At French Hoek the evangelist who had instructed coloured people since the mission of 1834 left in 1844; the people then determined to form a congregation distinct from the Paarl, with a clergyman who would also carry on mission work, and applied to the presbytery of the Cape. The people of Mossel Bay had their request to be formed into a distinct congregation before the presbytery of Swellendam in October, received with approval; a commission was appointed to define boundaries and appoint a consistory. The two villages mattered because they were church places first: the farm was bought, the allotments sold, and the name taken from the governor’s family only after he refused his own. [3]
Shipowners had raised by subscription 1738 pounds toward a lighthouse at Cape Agulhas. At five o’clock in the morning of the 20th of September the barque St. Mungo, from Calcutta bound to Newcastle, was wrecked at that place, and 10 of her crew were drowned. Correspondence with the secretary of state on sharing the cost of lights at Agulhas and Recife was already lengthening; the lanterns were not yet on the points. The wreck mattered because Agulhas was still dark, and because the 1738 pounds from shipowners had not yet bought a light. [3]
Suggested by the reverend J. Ayliff of Haslope Hill, and taken up by J. C. Chase, a committee early in the year resolved to honour the coming 10th of April as a day of thanksgiving. Grahamstown, Port Elizabeth, Bathurst, and Salem rose to it. A stone on the site of Graham’s Tree — the mimosa under which Colonel Graham and Andries Stockenstrom had decided the site of Grahamstown in 1812, blown down in August 1843 — was suggested and not carried out. In Grahamstown the holiday began at nine with a service in St George’s, a long sermon by the reverend W. Shaw. Inhabitants, including some hundreds of children, repaired to Somerset’s Oatlands estate; the bands of the 27th, 91st, and Cape Corps played. The evening dinner, some 300 at four tables with Somerset in the chair, was brought to a premature close by men still smarting under losses they attributed to former authorities. One diarist could not see that his family had much to rejoice at, his father murdered and the whole family robbed. The commemoration stood all the same as the first public remembering of the arrival of 1820, held in the year when a new immigration was commencing. [4]