Boer History1854 in South Africa: Clerk's Convention, Hoffman, Darling, and Grey
Clerk of the 19th of January, the Convention of the 23rd of February, and the Flag of the 11th of March — Sovereignty 1854
Sir George Russell Clerk was still at Bloemfontein. He had been named under the great seal on the 6th of April 1853 to take British rule off the Orange River Sovereignty, and he had reached the town on the 8th of August. Sir George Cathcart was still governor and high commissioner at the Cape. About 300 men still held the Queen's fort. The farms between the Orange and the Vaal were still a British sovereignty, proclaimed on the 3rd of February 1848. That is why the first business of 1854 was a notice, a convention, and a flag. [3] [4]
On the 19th of January Clerk published a notice inviting those prepared to form an independent government to meet in Bloemfontein on the 15th of February. The notice mattered because London had decided to leave, and because the farms could not be left without some body that would take the keys. On that day 2 hostile committees assembled. One, under Josias Philip Hoffman, opened talks with the special commissioner. The other was the remnant of the committee appointed by the delegates in September 1853, now reduced by the absence of Dr Fraser and by secession to 13 members, among them Commandant Wessels, J. van Rensburg, and J. Vergottini of the Winburg loyalists. They passed resolutions declaring themselves in permanent session, and that any dealings Clerk should have with any other body would be null and void. On the 16th of February he wrote to H. J. Halse as chairman, dissolving the committee for unauthorised proceedings. Those who still held out announced that they would nail the British ensign festooned with crape half-mast high and wait for parliament in England. A report of gold near Smithfield was used to beg delay until Fraser and Murray could be heard, and until the Cape parliament, shortly to meet, could speak of annexation. Clerk replied that a gold field would not alter the imperial resolve. A royal proclamation had been signed on the 30th of January abandoning and renouncing all dominion and sovereignty over the Orange River territory. [3] [3]
Claimants for Basuto robberies, who a twelvemonth before had received 2 shillings and 3 pence in the pound from cattle taken before and at Berea, were given 7 shillings and 9 pence more. No less than £33,744 was spent in that manner. Arrears of salary due to the civil servants were paid from imperial funds; £48,691 in all was drawn from the British treasury to meet the expenses of abandonment. The money mattered because resistance could not be bought off with a flag, and because the civil servants would not stay to hand over empty offices. On the 17th of February Clerk laid before the well-disposed assembly a draft of 10 articles. The first was agreed without change. The second named no alliance with any chiefs north of the Orange except the Griqua captain Adam Kok; the assembly wished to add that no treaties should thereafter be made, and Clerk added that her Majesty's government had no wish or intention to enter hereafter into any treaties injurious or prejudicial to the interests of the Orange River government. Asked about the old treaties with Moshesh, he wrote that war between two powers breaks all pre-existing treaties, and that the British government had no treaty with Moshesh. The ninth article of the original draft was embodied in the fifth. On the 23rd of February the convention was signed in the little building that later formed the vestibule of the museum at Bloemfontein, by Clerk and by delegates for Bloemfontein, Smithfield, Sannah's Poort, Winburg, and Harrismith — among them Hoffman, Jacobus Johannes Venter, Paul Michiel Bester, and Adriaan Hendrik Stander. The signature mattered because the farms between the Orange and the Vaal would now have to govern themselves, and because the Queen's fort would not be held for another winter. [3]
The first article guaranteed the future independence of the country and its government, and that its inhabitants should be free. The third provided for a modification of the treaty with Adam Kok and for the removal of restrictions preventing Griquas from selling their lands. The fourth forbade vexatious proceedings against those who had been loyal to her Majesty. The fifth provided for extradition of criminals and common access to courts. The sixth recognised certificates of marriage. The seventh prohibited slavery or trade in slaves. The eighth gave the new government the right to purchase ammunition in any British possession in South Africa, with a promise to recommend liberal import duties. The ninth provided for a British consul or agent near the colonial frontier. Clerk stationed John Burnet at Bloemfontein with that title. A few days later a memorandum gifted £3,000 to be distributed among persons who had suffered special hardship, provided for arbitration on disputed farms on the Basuto line, and presented the Queen's fort and certain public buildings to the new government. Adam Kok visited Bloemfontein while the negotiations were still open; he was understood to have consented to sales in the reserve, and afterwards denied it. On the 1st of March Mr Green reached Philippolis with proposals that farms might be sold through a British agent, that European purchasers should become subjects of the new government, that Kok should keep authority over his own people except on the farm of Fauresmith, and that £300 a year should continue from the imperial treasury during his lifetime. The Griqua council refused the first article; on the 7th of March the missionary at Philippolis wrote in Kok's name that the restriction on the inalienable territory was not a modification but a reversal of the existing treaty. The refusal mattered because article three of the convention could not be carried without Kok, and because farms in the reserve were already being asked for. [3] [3]
Before Clerk's departure Moshesh visited Bloemfontein and was received in a friendly manner by the members of the provisional government. At a public dinner he made a speech that would have been creditable to an educated and Christian ruler. He was on friendly terms with Moroko, who accompanied him, and he made liberal offers, though without effect, to Sikonyela. Clerk spoke to him of a British officer being stationed on the border as a channel of communication between the colonial government and the heads of the communities north of the Orange. Moshesh desired that he might be placed in the Lesuto, but did not press the matter. He inquired if the Warden line was still considered his boundary, and was requested by the commissioner not to speak of it — it was a dead horse that had long been buried, to raise it would be offensive. Thus the Basuto chief was led to believe that the line was not considered binding by the imperial government, while the farmers had every reason to believe that it was. The silence mattered because the Warden line was the only surveyed boundary the farms had, and because Moshesh would later treat it as gone. [3]
On the 11th of March the flag of England was hoisted for the last time over the Queen's fort, but only to be saluted. When it was lowered that of the new republic took its place, and Clerk, the troops, and the British officials were leaving Bloemfontein. Just as they set out a soldier dropped down dead, and they halted until the corpse was buried in the military cemetery on the hill behind the fort. The lowering mattered because British rule between the Orange and the Vaal, proclaimed in 1848, ended on that morning, and because the farms were now an independent government with no garrison behind them. [3] [4]
The Volksraad of the 28th of March, the Constitution of April, and Hoffman of May — Orange Free State 1854
British authority was withdrawn from the territory between the Orange and the Vaal in February. The European inhabitants were left to themselves, with liberty to form a government in any manner they might choose, but it could no longer claim supremacy over every man, white or black, living between the Vaal, the Orange, and the Kathlamba. The Basuto tribe was henceforth independent, not only in the reserve defined by Warden and Smith, but in the locations allotted to Sikonyela, Gert Taaibosch, and Carolus Baatje, which Moshesh had added by conquest, and in Molitsane's location, which formed part of the Lesuto with the Bataung chief's consent. Lepui and Moroko were to be independent within their reserves. Adam Kok's standing was practically what it had been before the Napier treaty. The claims of Nicholas Waterboer and Cornelis Kok could either be admitted or ignored. Most of Jan Bloem's Koranas had left the territory; those that remained had their location on the Vaal. The same was understood of Scheel Kobus son of Kausop, David Danser, Goliath Yzerbek, and the residents at Bethany, Beersheba, and Hebron. Clerk handed the provisional administration to a council of 7, of which Hoffman was president. About 15,000 Europeans resided between the Vaal and the Orange. In 1854 vast herds of springboks and other antelopes still grazed the great plain, and their dried flesh formed no inconsiderable portion of the food of the inhabitants. Beside the infant state Moshesh had, for every white man that could take the field, at least 12 well-armed warriors and an almost impregnable country. The numbers mattered because a republic of 15,000 could not dictate a line to Thaba Bosigo, and because the council of 7 had to call a volksraad before it had a constitution. [3] [3]
The provisional government called upon the people to elect representatives to meet and frame a constitution. On the 28th of March they came together in Bloemfontein, and the first sitting of the first volksraad of the Orange Free State took place. There were 2 representatives of the village of Bloemfontein, 1 of each of the villages of Sannah's Poort, Winburg, Harrismith, and Smithfield, and 23 of as many wards or fieldcornetcies into which the 5 districts were divided. On the 29th the provisional government handed over its authority. The debates lasted until the 18th of April, during which a constitution was framed. The country was declared a republic with the name of the Orange Free State. All adult males of European blood, after a residence of 6 months, were to have full burgher rights. The supreme and sole legislative authority was vested in a single chamber termed the volksraad. Each village and each fieldcornetcy was entitled to return 1 member for 4 years; at the end of 2 years half the first volksraad, selected by lot, were to retire. The volksraad was to meet in ordinary session at Bloemfontein on the first Monday in February of every year. 12 members were to constitute a quorum. A member must be fully 25, possess fixed property of £200, have been resident 12 months, and never have been punished for crime. The sitting mattered because the Sovereignty had been taken down on the 11th of March without a written constitution, and because the 29 members now had to say what kind of state they were. [3] [3]
The executive was entrusted to a president, elected by the burghers from a list submitted by the volksraad, for 5 years, capable of re-election. He could declare war and make peace, enter into treaties, and appoint officers when the volksraad was not in session, but all such acts required ratification. He could propose laws and had a voice in debates, but no vote and no veto. He was required to make a tour of inspection at least once a year. He was to be advised by an executive council of the landdrost of Bloemfontein, the government secretary, and 3 unofficial members chosen by the volksraad. Laws were to come in force 2 months after publication unless otherwise specified. In all cases without local enactments, Roman-Dutch law was the fundamental law of the state. Every healthy male between 16 and 60 was liable to military service, mounted and armed at his own expense. In time of war the commandants were to elect a general only for the period of the war; the president, commandants, and fieldcornets were then to form a krygsraad. In each district a landdrost was to be stationed for justice and revenue, assisted in important cases by heemraden; a circuit court of 3 landdrosts sitting together was to try serious criminal cases with a jury. The Dutch reformed church was to be supported by the state, but conscience was to be free. Liberty of the individual, freedom of the press, and security of property were guaranteed. The clauses mattered because a president without a veto still had to face Moshesh, and because every man from 16 to 60 was the army. [3]
The volksraad appointed an executive council and requested Hoffman to act as provisional president until its next session, to be held on the 4th of September, when the elected president would be installed. The election was to take place on the 15th of May. Four names were submitted: Hoffman of Smithfield; Captain Struben; Jacobus Nicolaas Boshof; and Andries du Toit, late commandant of Beaufort West. Landdrosts were named: Hector Lowen for Bloemfontein, J. H. Ford for Smithfield, Jurie Wessels for Winburg, and P. M. Bester for Harrismith. Clerk's gift of £3,000 for soothing bitter recollections was considered wholly inadequate; 16 members who were among the claimants immediately relinquished their shares. The moderate parties combined and elected Hoffman, a man of limited book education, crippled by an accident in Capetown when young, living on a farm at Jammerberg Drift given him by Moshesh, with whom he maintained that nothing but moral force was needed. The election mattered because Hoffman was Moshesh's neighbour and friend, and because the other 3 names were men from outside the farms. Jurie Wessels declined Winburg; Schnehage the clerk acted until the end of July, when he resigned. Joseph Millerd Orpen was then provisionally appointed by the president and confirmed on the 13th of September. At the same sitting Harrismith was united to Winburg, retaining a separate board of heemraden; Bester was appointed to Bloemfontein as successor to Lowen, who resigned, but Bester declined, and J. A. Smellekamp was selected to act until the volksraad should meet. In September the volksraad resolved that the president and executive council should constitute a supreme court of appeal. The claims of Nicholas Waterboer and Cornelis Kok to ground above the junction of the Orange and the Vaal came before the first session, and the members appointed a commission to inquire into the pretensions of the 2 captains. The volksraad then closed its first session. [3] [3]
Adam Kok of May, Hoffman at Thaba Bosigo in August, and Witsi of Harrismith — Orange Free State 1854
A matter demanding immediate attention was the attitude of Adam Kok. Upon publication of the convention he caused an advertisement to be inserted that, as to the third article, he had not approved or confirmed the measures for removing impediments to Griqua sales, either by word or letter. He next encouraged a party of indigent blacks from the Cape Colony to settle in his territory. On the 27th of May a notice was inserted in the Bloemfontein Gazette that all persons purchasing land in the Griqua reserve must make the necessary declarations before the landdrost of Fauresmith, when they could calculate thereafter upon protection by the state. The notice mattered because Kok had denied article three, and because European buyers would not take farms that the state would not defend. Kok, having written to Clerk and Cathcart for leave to purchase ammunition at Colesberg and finding the request unattended to, wrote on the 12th of July to ask if the terms of March were still open, as a greater number of his people than he had anticipated were desirous of selling. Clerk replied on the 3rd of August that it was then too late, as he was no longer in a position to negotiate. On the 28th of September Hoffman visited Philippolis and had no difficulty in making an arrangement: the sale of farms was agreed to, European purchasers were to be burghers of the Free State, Griquas within the old reserve were to remain Kok's subjects, and unoccupied ground therein was to remain the property of the Griqua government. The imperial authorities decided that the captain should receive the yearly allowance Smith had engaged to pay, as well as £100 a year as compensation for the conversion of leases into sales, and he drew it thereafter from the Cape treasury through the high commissioner as long as he lived. The September arrangement mattered because the convention's third article had stood on paper since February, and because Kok would now take money for the farms he had refused to sell in March. [3]
At the commencement of Hoffman's tenure the relationship with the Basuto was apparently satisfactory, for Moshesh was keeping his people in tolerable order. It was not long before difficulties cropped up. In the Winburg district parties under Molapo and other captains invaded ground purchased from Rantsane; in the Smithfield district cattle-lifting was renewed; in Harrismith the followers of Witsi in organised robber bands were preventing anything like security. The Bakolokwe had once formed part of the Baputi on the Limpopo, had placed themselves under Tshaka, and after Dingane's defeat by Panda's adherents had fled westward over the mountains to the locality ever since known as Witsi's Hoek. Orpen, whose opinion of Moshesh coincided with the president's, was employed as special commissioner. Moshesh, who claimed no control over Witsi, sent his brother Moperi with Orpen to advise the captain to give up the spoil. The mission was fruitless: Witsi neither restored the cattle nor would he allow the herds to be inspected. Hoffman then went upon the same errand himself, and met with a like rebuff. The rebuff mattered because Harrismith farms could not be held while Witsi kept the cattle, and because Moshesh's disclaimer left the Free State to deal with him alone. [3]
In August Hoffman visited Moshesh and held several conferences with him and his principal men. He was received at all the principal stations with salutes of musketry fired in his honour. Ammunition seemed plentiful, yet Moshesh asked for a present of gunpowder. The president promised him some, and upon returning to Bloemfontein sent him a keg containing 50 pounds. The keg mattered because it was a gift from a president who believed that nothing but moral force was needed, and because Moshesh asked for powder while his people were lifting cattle. It was arranged to bring further moral pressure to bear upon Witsi; if he should still remain obstinate the president was to send an armed force, and Moshesh promised neither to assist him nor to give him shelter. One of Witsi's brothers, against whom no charge was made, was received as a vassal by Moshesh, and a tract in the Lesuto was given him. Moshesh promised to call in his subjects who were trespassing on the ground purchased from Rantsane, which he admitted was rightly the property of the white people. Cattle-lifting between the Caledon and the Orange was not so easily settled: the Basuto there were mainly adherents of Poshuli, whose stronghold was Vechtkop, occupied for 9 years, and of Kuane, called by the Europeans Jan Letele, a grandson of Motlomi. Though fair promises were made, matters remained in confusion between the Caledon and the Orange. At the end of the year Orpen visited Thaba Bosigo again as special commissioner, but obtained nothing more than a renewal of the promises made to the president. [3] [3]
In November Moshesh, by the advice of the missionaries and with the concurrence of his councillors, issued an ordinance under which all spirituous liquor brought among his people was to be poured upon the ground, without compensation, drawn up in Dutch and Sesuto. Of late years Europeans had been introducing spirits into the Lesuto; the distillers' art had been unknown there, and a kind of weak beer of millet had formed a large proportion of the people's food. The ordinance was never thoroughly carried out, though it had some little effect in diminishing the quantity brought in. The ordinance mattered because spirits were a new trade on the Caledon, and because Moshesh chose to pour them out in the same months that cattle were being driven. Along the left bank of the lower Vaal a petty war was carried on between Goliath Yzerbek and David Danser. Warden had set apart a tract there for their joint use; Danser, representing that he had no cattle, was rapidly selling the whole reserve and converting the proceeds into brandy. In September the volksraad directed a commission to inquire into their claims, but before investigation Danser expelled his opponent and seized his cattle, compelling Goliath to take refuge among the farmers, until an officer of the Free State obliged him to give back the booty and permit Goliath to return. The quarrels caused the missionaries to remove from Pniel, and for several years that station was abandoned by the Berlin Society. [3]
The Gazette of the 16th of March, the Calcutta of the 26th of May, and Parliament of the 30th of June — Colony 1854
The old legislative council had concluded its last session on the 14th of October 1853, as the writs for the new upper chamber were about to be issued. John Montagu had died in London on the 14th of November of that year; Richard Southey acted as secretary to government until the 24th of May of this year, when Rawson W. Rawson arrived to fill the office. The constitution had taken force on the 1st of July 1853. What remained was to elect the men who would sit. The elections created great interest: in the western province 82,220 votes were recorded, and in the eastern 33,428. In the former there were 15 candidates, in the latter 10. The election of members for the legislative council was completed by the 14th of March; on the 16th the names of those who had received the greatest number of votes were published in the Gazette. For the west they were Howson Edward Rutherfoord, Francis William Reitz, Joseph Barry, Johan Hendrik Wicht, John Bardwell Ebden, Dirk Gysbert van Breda, Johannes de Wet, and Henry Thomas Vigne; for the east Sir Andries Stockenstrom, Robert Godlonton, George Wood, Henry Blaine, Willem Simon Gregorius Metelerkamp, William Fleming, and Gideon Daniel Joubert. Stockenstrom polled 6,315 in the east, Godlonton 4,534, Wood 4,427; in the west Rutherfoord received 8,894, Reitz 8,600, Wicht 8,184, Ebden 7,558, and Advocate de Wet 6,607. The poll mattered because the upper house was now chosen by the country, and because Stockenstrom, long disliked in high places, headed the east. [3] [4]
The elections for the house of assembly then took place. In 8 divisions there was no contest; in some of the others the competition was keen. Capetown returned Hercules Crosse Jarvis, James Abercrombie, Saul Solomon, and Francois Louis Charl Biccard; the Cape division J. M. Maynard and T. Watson; Stellenbosch Petrus Jacobus Bosman and Christoffel Josephus Brand; Caledon B. H. Darrell and C. A. Fairbridge; Swellendam John Barry and John Fairbairn; Beaufort West John Charles Molteno and James Christie; Clanwilliam Augustus Joseph Tancred and Johannes Hendricus Brand; Worcester E. B. Watermeyer and J. P. Wiggins; Albany Thomas Holden Bowker and William Cock; Albert J. P. Vorster and J. J. Meintjes; Colesberg J. G. Sieberhagen and J. P. F. von Maltitz; Cradock J. Collett and W. T. Gilfillan; Fort Beaufort C. L. Stretch and R. J. Painter; George H. W. Law and F. A. Swemmer; Graaff-Reinet J. F. Ziervogel and T. N. G. Muller; Grahamstown James Thackwray and Charles Pote; Malmesbury F. Duckitt and H. H. Loedolff; Port Elizabeth John Paterson and Henry Fancourt White; Uitenhage J. C. F. Krog and S. J. Hartman. John George Franklin, editor of the Frontier Times, was returned for both Somerset East and Victoria East; he kept Victoria East, which left a vacancy that Ralph Henry Arderne filled, taking the oath on the 24th of July. War with Russia had been proclaimed in London on the 28th of March, and Cathcart had been summoned to take a command in the army. On the 15th of April he gave up command of the forces and left Grahamstown on the 21st. Practically the whole of his governorship had been spent in the eastern province, as had been the case with Smith, Pottinger, and Maitland. On the 26th of May he left in the Indian mail steamer Calcutta, which put into Table Bay on her passage to Southampton, and arrived at Plymouth on the 3rd of July. Charles Henry Darling was acting as head of the administration. The departure mattered because the man who had closed the war was leaving before the first parliament sat, and because Darling, not Cathcart, would open it. [3] [4]
On the 19th of June Darling issued a proclamation summoning both houses to meet in Capetown on the 30th of June at 11 in the morning: the legislative council in the room where the disbanded council had sat, the assembly in the banqueting hall of the Masonic Lodge de Goede Hoop. On that day the members took the oaths. Deputations announced the meeting to Darling, seated with the executive council at government house: for the council, Ebden, Reitz, and Wicht; for the assembly, Fairbairn, Brand, and Cock. Rawson, in full Windsor uniform, and W. Field then brought in Mr Justice Musgrave to swear the council, in view of some 200 of the privileged public; Mr Justice Bell performed the same ceremony in the Goede Hoop lodge. As speaker the assembly elected C. J. Brand by 24 votes against 19 for Fairbairn. The legislative council assembled in the state room of government house, where the members of the assembly, having been sent for, also gathered. The acting governor, attended by the high officials, military and civil, entered the state room while a royal salute was being fired, and formally opened the session by a speech. 202 years after the foundation of the Cape Colony, its destiny was to a large extent in the hands of its own people. The country was not yet self-governing, for the principal officials were still appointed in England, and their salaries were secured by a reserved civil list, so that parliament had no authority over them; but henceforth no policy could be carried out against the wishes of those to whom it was home. The opening speech promised a military occupation of the annexed territory east of the Keiskama under a separate government still subordinate to Capetown, a lieutenant-governorship again in the east with 2 additional judges and a solicitor-general, Grahamstown as military headquarters, and the Queenstown settlement on military tenure. It was afterwards printed and issued in pamphlet form. Darling did not feel justified in introducing measures of importance, and little beyond framing rules of procedure was the outcome of the first session, which closed on the 26th of September. The sitting mattered because the letters patent of 1853 were now a parliament in a room, and because Brand, not Fairbairn, had the chair. [3] [4]
140,000, the Charlotte of September, and Grey of the 5th of December — Colony 1854
There were in this year about 140,000 Europeans and 210,000 coloured people within the colonial boundaries. The public revenue amounted to £261,724, of which customs yielded £122,184, transfer dues £44,118, auction dues £24,598, land rents £23,027, stamps and licences £24,802, postage £13,888. Special receipts of £18,413 included £12,297 from the sale of land. Expenditure ran to £287,704, the largest items roads, bridges, and buildings at £50,533, and the border department at £40,476; parliamentary expenses were £11,706. Sheep's wool was now not only the first article in importance, but exceeded in value all other products put together: the custom-house valuation for this year was £446,940, against £501,135 in the year before. Hides, skins, and horns stood at £50,977; wine at £40,280; copper ore at £25,056. Total exports were returned at £666,397. Imports for home consumption amounted to £1,470,030, greatly exceeding the exports. The vessels that entered the ports numbered 704 British and 122 foreign, with a total of 240,543 tons. A steam packet put into Table Bay regularly every month from England and from India under contract with the General Screw Steam Navigation Company, in ships of not less than 1,400 tons, engines of at least 233 horse power, averaging not less than 8 knots, touching at the Cape each way. The figures mattered because wool now outweighed every other export, and because the colony still bought more than it sold. [3]
The loss of the transport Charlotte, when over a hundred persons perished, was one of the saddest events of this year. She was a ship of 586 tons, bound from Cork to Calcutta with 5 officers, 163 soldiers, 16 women, and 26 children of the 27th regiment on board. Being in want of fresh water and provisions, she endeavoured to put into Table Bay, but was baffled by contrary winds, so continued on her passage, and on the 19th of September cast anchor in Algoa Bay. Arrangements were at once made for taking in supplies, and a number of casks of salt water used as ballast were emptied, so that the ship became very light. Her fore topsail, which needed repairs, was unbent and sent down. On the following day a gale set in; the Charlotte's cables parted, and she was unable to beat out of the bay. It was already dark when she struck on the ledge of rocks off Jetty-street at Port Elizabeth, and quickly went to pieces. Every possible exertion was made from the shore, but without success until the ship's poop, covered with nearly naked persons clinging desperately to it, drifted through the surf. Most of these were saved, among them 5 women and 2 of the military officers. The other 3 officers were on shore at the time. There perished 13 of the Charlotte's crew, 62 soldiers, 11 women, and all of the 26 children. The wreck mattered because a transport that had only wanted water was lost in a colonial bay, and because every child on board was drowned. [3]
On the 5th of December Sir George Grey arrived and took the oaths of office as governor and high commissioner. He had visited Capetown before, on his way to Australia to explore a previously unknown part of that country, and had afterwards been governor of South Australia and New Zealand. He had been in the army for a few years in early life, but had long since ceased to be a soldier, and was thus the first civilian that held the post of governor of the Cape Colony after the time of the earl of Caledon. When representative institutions were granted, it was considered proper that the line of military rulers should come to an end. To meet the wants of the eastern province a lieutenant-governor was appointed, to reside in Grahamstown and have command of all the troops in South Africa, most of which were then in the annexed territory east of the Keiskama and at outposts on the border. Lieutenant-general Sir James Jackson assumed duty on the 30th of December. All business connected with Albany, Fort Beaufort, Victoria East, Queenstown, Somerset East, Cradock, and Albert thereafter passed through his hands or his secretary's, but everything of importance still had to be referred to Capetown. Cathcart, having done what was required of him in the war and in the inauguration of the constitution, had been made a K.C.B. and had received the thanks of both Houses. On the 5th of November, while leading his brigade up Mount Inkerman, he was shot and fell from his horse dead. A tablet to his memory was later erected in St Paul's. Grey's oaths mattered because the Cape now had a civilian governor and a sitting parliament in the same month, and because Cathcart, who had opened the year in the east, was already in the ground at Inkerman. [3] [4]
Smellekamp of July, Hermanus Potgieter of Winter, and the Cavern of October — North of the Vaal 1854
North of the Vaal, for several years after the death of Andries Pretorius on the 23rd of July 1853, confusion and discord were rife. The government was so weak that to many it must have seemed a misnomer to call it a government at all. Practically it had no revenue except a trifling land tax paid when farmers felt so disposed. There was no police, and no president. The executive consisted of 3 commandants-general: M. W. Pretorius for Potchefstroom and Rustenburg, P. G. Potgieter for Zoutpansberg, and W. F. Joubert for Lydenburg. 2 farms on the Aapjes river at the base of Magalisberg, purchased by Pretorius from Prinsloo and Van der Walt for £600, were understood to be taken over for a village to be called Pretoria, but that resolution was not carried into effect in this calendar. The volksraad which met at Rustenburg in June, consisting chiefly of adherents of Pretorius, brought J. A. Smellekamp — a friend of the party under Potgieter's leadership — to trial on a charge of having slandered the reverend Dirk van der Hoff and the consistory of Potchefstroom, and fined him £37 10s. This was followed by his banishment, in pursuance of a sentence of the landdrost of Potchefstroom on the 11th of July. He retired to Bloemfontein, where he soon became a leading citizen. The trial mattered because the republic still had 3 generals and no president, and because a fine of £37 10s. was enough to drive a man across the Vaal. [3] [3]
Towards the close of the winter a hunting party headed by Fieldcornet Hermanus Potgieter visited the kraal of Makapan at the eastern extremity of the Waterberg, where the Nyl flows northward, with a view of trading for ivory. Laws of the volksraad prohibited barter of any kind under penalty of a fine of £37 10s. and confiscation, so the party was acting in violation of the law. Hermanus Potgieter was a man of violent temper and rough demeanour; whether offence was given cannot be positively stated, for the immediate actors perished before their evidence could be obtained. 13 men and 10 women and children composed the party. Their waggons were outspanned at the kraal, and, according to statements made afterwards by members of the clan, Potgieter went at the chief's invitation to look at ivory said to be on a neighbouring hill. He had hardly left when the Europeans at the waggons were attacked, and all — women and children included — were murdered. From information given by the blacks, Potgieter was flayed alive; his skin, prepared as that of a wild animal, was afterwards made into a kaross. There perished the entire families of Willem Prinsloo and Jan Olivier, in all 12 persons, M. A. Venter and his son W. Venter, H. Potgieter, and 8 other white men. Immediately afterwards Makapan's people were joined by 6 other clans, who commenced to pillage the country. The white inhabitants of southern Zoutpansberg had barely time to take shelter in lagers before their homes were in flames. The people of Rustenburg also retired to lagers, 1 in the village and another at the homestead of Paul Kruger, about 5 miles distant. The murders mattered because ivory barter was illegal, and because the farms of Zoutpansberg and Rustenburg went into lager in the same week. [3]
Commandant-general P. G. Potgieter took the field with 135 men and marched to the kraal at the place still called Makapan's Poort. The hostile clans had taken shelter in caverns. The mangled remains of the victims were discovered in various places. The people of Lydenburg could not move from their own district, but the burghers of Potchefstroom were called out. The church there was enclosed with an earthen bank, and Commandant-general Pretorius marched by way of Rustenburg, his force increasing as he advanced, so that he arrived with 400 men. South of the Vaal very little aid could be given, for it behoved everyone there to keep an eye on Moshesh; but a quantity of gunpowder was supplied, and a little later A. J. Erwee and a few others proceeded to Pretorius's assistance with 47 horses contributed by the people of Bloemfontein. W. Hartley, Dr Way, and 3 other Englishmen from Smithfield joined the burgher force. On the 25th of October, the day after the junction of the commandos, an attack was made upon a cavern some 610 metres in length by 120 to 150 metres in width. The gloom inside was so intense that the burghers could see nothing; from the recesses fire was opened, by which Jan Erasmus was killed and 2 others were wounded. It was then determined to blockade the place and wait the results of famine. The junction mattered because 135 men could not close a cavern, and because Bloemfontein could spare horses but not a commando. [3]
On the 6th of November the 2 commandants-general were standing close to each other in front of the cavern, when a musket ball struck P. G. Potgieter in the right shoulder and, passing through his neck, killed him instantly. Fieldcornet Kruger ran to the aid of his friend, and finding him dead, carried the body away. An attempt to smoke the enemy out failed. The mouth of the cavern was then partly blocked with brushwood and stones, and a strong guard was set over it. The remainder of the force was sent out under Kruger and other officers to scour the surrounding country. The inmates soon felt the want of water, and many tried to make their way out at night, but were shot down. The blockade lasted 25 days. Then a party of the besiegers entered and met with so little resistance that they took complete possession with only 4 men slightly wounded. Pretorius estimated that 900 persons had been killed outside the cavern, and more than double that number had perished of thirst within it. Makapan's clan was almost annihilated. Horse sickness, prevalent in that district during the summer, was making such havoc that the commando could not keep the field. On the 30th of November the camps were broken up, and the burghers returned to their farms. Upon P. G. Potgieter's death, Stephanus Schoeman was appointed commandant-general of Zoutpansberg. There were then north of the Vaal 3 commandants-general — Pretorius, Joubert, and Schoeman — each jealous of the power of the others. The 25 days mattered because thirst did what the first assault could not, and because Zoutpansberg now had a new general and still no president. [3]
That strife of words was as nothing when compared with the ecclesiastical discord. The country was convulsed with the question whether the church of the republic should be connected with the synod of the Cape Colony or not. Many burghers believed that their independence might be affected by it. They asserted that Sir Harry Smith had once said that if he could not conquer them with the sword, he would do it with the word, meaning the influence of colonial clergymen, and they wished therefore to be as little connected with any institution in the Cape Colony as possible. A visit of the reverend Messrs Neethling and Louw, 2 clergymen deputed by the Cape synod to visit the country and conduct services, was held by this party to be uncalled-for interference. There was only 1 clergyman to minister to the whole people, but there was a consistory in each district, and it was maintained by some that the elders of these could combine and constitute a synod if they chose. The quarrel mattered because Sand River had recognised independence in 1852, and because a Cape synod still looked, to many burghers, like a second government. [3]
Colenso of the 30th of January, the Natal Bank of April, and Utrecht of the 8th of September — Natal and the Frontier 1854
In Natal Benjamin Chilley Campbell Pine still sat. On the 30th of January the right reverend Dr John William Colenso arrived as the first bishop of the church of England, the see having been created by letters patent dated the 23rd of November 1853. The bishop devoted himself chiefly to missionary work. The name Sobantu — father of the people — was given to him by chance upon his first arrival. On the 1st of April the Natal Bank was established, with a capital of £20,000. Maritzburg and Durban remained the principal centres of European population; Pinetown, Verulam, Richmond, and Ladysmith had been founded in 1850. The press was active: the Natal Witness, first issued at Maritzburg in March 1846, and the Natal Mercury, first issued at Durban in 1852, were already in being, with the Natal Independent of January 1850 and the Natal Times of August 1851. On the 21st of April an ordinance was issued for establishing municipal government in towns containing over 1,000 inhabitants in the district of Natal. The boards were to consist of a mayor and 7 councillors. Under this ordinance Maritzburg and Durban were proclaimed municipalities on the 15th of May. On the 16th of May an ordinance was issued for establishing county councils, corresponding nearly to the divisional councils of the Cape Colony. On the 1st of June councils were proclaimed for the counties of Maritzburg, Durban, and Victoria, on the 19th of June for the county of Klip River, and on the 24th of June for the county of Umvoti. The ordinances mattered because Natal still had no representative government, and because Maritzburg and Durban now had mayors of their own. [3]
Theophilus Shepstone, secretary for native affairs since the 30th of July 1853, proposed that he should obtain from Faku a cession of the north-eastern portion of the high plateau between the Umzimkulu and the Umtata, then without other inhabitants than a few Bushmen, and induce some 50,000 or 60,000 of the blacks in Natal to move into it, himself accompanying them as their chief, recognised as an independent ruler, with a subsidy of £500 a year. The proposal found favour with Pine and the imperial authorities; Faku's consent was obtained without difficulty; and steps were in progress for carrying it out when Grey took the oaths at Capetown. The plan mattered because Natal could not govern the numbers already inside its borders, and because a new treaty state on the plateau would sit on the colony's eastern flank. On the 8th of September a deed of cession was signed by Panda to the farmers on the land under the Drakensberg that bordered Zululand and Natal. He accepted as an acknowledgment of the favour a present of 100 head of cattle. Immediately afterwards the Republic of Utrecht was established. Possession of that ground had been taken in 1848, with Panda's consent, by a party of farmers who had moved from the uplands between the Tugela and Buffalo rivers in order to be free of British rule. A consistory was formed there in this year, and the minister of Ladysmith acted as consulent and held services every 3 months. The deed mattered because a few hundred Europeans below the berg now had a paper from Panda, and because Utrecht was a republic of its own before the year closed. [3] [3]
In the annexed territory east of the Keiskama the few Europeans were under the high commissioner's direct government, but nothing definite had yet been decided upon as to the form of its administration or the settlement of the crown reserve. Letters patent of the 14th of December 1850 constituting the territory a separate dependency with a lieutenant-governor had never been promulgated, and were now regarded as obsolete. Cathcart proposed that the land north of the Amatola — the Bontebok flats — should be annexed to the Cape Colony, which was approved, and on the 7th of March letters patent were issued to that effect. In a letter to Colonel Maclean dated the 19th of January he stated his views concisely: military control, not colonisation, was the principle of policy which had induced him to advise the retention of the territory as a separate government, independent of the colony, instead of annexing it as a new colonial division or abandoning it altogether. Accordingly he had not allowed any Europeans to settle in it except a few camp followers at Keiskama Hoek, Izeli, and Dohne. The residents in King William's Town were allowed to remain, but they were only a few hundred. Captain Richard Taylor was stationed there as resident magistrate, with jurisdiction over Europeans only. Maclean remained chief commissioner at Fort Murray; Charles Brownlee resided at Dohne; neither was more than a diplomatic agent. Scattered about at different posts were 2,478 officers and soldiers, with 2,228 others to support them in case of need at stations in the colony. Grey, arriving in December, found matters in a very unsatisfactory state. The letter of the 19th of January mattered because Cathcart would not colonise the Amatola, and because 2,478 men still held a territory that had no lieutenant-governor and no settled form of government. [3] [4]