Boer History1867 in South Africa: Wodehouse, Brand, Makwai, and the Diamond
Wodehouse, the Epidemic of July, and Van Niekerk’s Pebble — Colony 1867
Sir Philip Wodehouse still governed the Cape Colony and still held Her Majesty’s high commission in South Africa. He had arrived at Capetown on the 15th of January 1862, succeeding Sir George Grey. The Table Bay dock voted in the session of 1861 was still unfinished inside John Coode’s plan. The Port Elizabeth light still showed from the 1st of June 1861; the Roman rock light from the 16th of September 1861. Ichaboe, with Holland’s Bird and the other west-coast islets, still stood on the colonial roll from the 16th of July 1866. The census of 1865 had counted 200000 in the Colony. A drought of several years had depressed agriculture and trade. The castle year mattered because the same high commissioner who had pointed the Warden line at Aliwal North on the 28th of October 1864 now watched John Henry Brand try to occupy the land Moshesh had marked at Thaba Bosigo on the 3rd of April 1866, and because a governor who still sat at Capetown would, before the year closed, buy the first recognised diamond and write again to London for the Basuto. [3]
From July an epidemic ran through the Colony. In the seven months from that month there were about 5000 cases, and within 36 weeks 1493 deaths were counted, the count running into January 1868. The outbreak did not look like ordinary measles. Motito, which the French missionaries had held from their older work north of the Orange, was in this year transferred to the London society and became an outstation of Kuruman. The epidemic mattered because a colony already thinned by drought now counted deaths in the towns while the high commissioner still had to write to Brand and to the secretary of state, and because Motito’s transfer closed a French station and put the London society on that ground from Kuruman. [3] [4]
In this year a farmer named Schalk van Niekerk, who resided in the district of Hopetown, called at a neighbour’s house and saw one of the children playing with a remarkably brilliant pebble. Small stones of different colours were familiar in the bed of the Orange along the whole of its upper course, but this one reflected the light in a different and more beautiful way than the pebbles ordinarily met with. The mistress of the house, on hearing Van Niekerk express his admiration of the stone, made him a present of it. Some little time after this, a trader named O’Reilly was in Van Niekerk’s company, when the glittering pebble was shown to him as a curiosity. He instantly suspected it to be a diamond, and, after obtaining possession of it, sent it first to Grahamstown to Dr Atherstone, and afterwards to Capetown to M. Herite, the French consul, to be tested. These gentlemen pronounced it to be a diamond. The gem weighed 21 carats, and was sold to the governor, Sir Philip Wodehouse, for 500 pounds. Van Niekerk’s pebble mattered because a Hopetown child’s plaything, tested at Grahamstown and Capetown, became the first recognised diamond of the interior, and because the high commissioner who bought it for 500 pounds was the same man writing to London about Moshesh. [3]
Search was immediately commenced by several persons in the Hopetown district, and shortly a second diamond was found. Then a third was picked up on the bank of the Vaal river, and attention was drawn to that quarter. Belief in mines so close at hand was not yet widespread. What the Colony had at the year’s close was still only a pebble sold for 500 pounds, a second stone, and a third on the Vaal. The three stones mattered because Hopetown and the Vaal bank were now named as diamond ground, even while drought and sickness still lay on the gardens and the towns. [3]
Albania of January, Arnot of the 21st, and Marais of the 14th of March — Waterboer 1867
The tract east of the Vaal enclosed by the Vetberg line, the line from Ramah towards David’s Graf, and the Orange river had recently acquired the name of Albania, and was partly occupied by white people under a plan of settlement devised by Mr Arnot. Nicholas Waterboer held Griquatown. His own people were too few and too feeble to make use of Albania. In January circulars were issued in Waterboer’s name in and about Grahamstown, offering farms of 3000 morgen in extent on lease for 21 years, at rentals varying from 5 pounds to 25 pounds a year, according to the quality of the land. The leases were to be renewable on the same terms for as long a period as the occupants or their heirs or successors might choose. A council of lessees was practically to form a government, though public documents were to run in Waterboer’s name. A portion of the rents was to be at the disposal of the council for public purposes. This plan of settlement was intended to give Waterboer a revenue until the occupiers of the farms might choose to repudiate him. Some 10 or a dozen Englishmen accepted the terms offered, and took up their abode in Albania. The January circulars mattered because a Griqua captain who could not occupy Albania now leased it in 3000-morgen farms from Grahamstown, and because a council of English lessees would govern in his name. [3]
When issuing his circulars, however, Arnot attached a map in which Waterboer’s territory was made to comprise not only the districts of Griquatown and Albania, which really belonged to him, but the district of Campbell, west of the Vaal and adjoining Griquatown, and portions of the districts of Boshof and Jacobsdal, east of the Vaal and included in the Orange Free State from the day it came into existence. That eastern ground had formed part of the European section of the Sovereignty from 1848 to 1854, and had been transferred in 1854 by Sir George Clerk to the provisional government which established the Free State. Many of the farms there were held under British titles. This was brought to the notice of the government at Bloemfontein, and on the 14th of March an advertisement was inserted in the newspapers by the state secretary — Mr J. C. Nielen Marais — warning all persons against having anything to do with the scheme. Arnot’s map mattered because it drew Free State districts of Boshof and Jacobsdal, and Campbell west of the Vaal, into a Griqua claim, and because Marais’s notice of the 14th of March was Bloemfontein’s public answer. [3]
Sir Philip Wodehouse had been requested in 1864 to arbitrate on Campbell, and had consented, but Waterboer, acting by Arnot’s advice, declined to sign the deed of submission after it had been drawn up by the attorney-general of the Cape Colony, because Arnot wished to include the land east of the Vaal. On the 21st of January Arnot brought the Campbell matter on again by offering to submit his client’s claim to the arbitration of Wodehouse, provided the land east of the Vaal and north of the Vetberg line should be included in the dispute. The Free State Government rejected this offer, as they would not admit that there was any valid ground of contention concerning territory transferred by Clerk and held under British titles. On the 20th of June the volksraad resolved that if Waterboer would not consent within four months to refer the question of the ownership of the Campbell district, without reference to any other territory, to the arbitration and decision of Sir Philip Wodehouse, the president should send a commission to inspect the ground preparatory to further action being taken. But the difficulties which followed with the Basuto, and which necessitated a call of the burghers to arms within a month after the adoption of this resolution, absorbed the attention of the Free State Government, and this matter was allowed to stand over. The 20th of June mattered because Bloemfontein would arbitrate Campbell alone, not Boshof and Jacobsdal, and because a Basuto call to arms within a month left Arnot’s map on the table. [3]
Farms of the 15th of January, Moshesh of the 18th of March, and Fick and Pansegrouw of the 12th — Orange Free State 1867
John Henry Brand still sat at Bloemfontein. The treaty of Thaba Bosigo of the 3rd of April 1866 had ceded a belt of Basuto ground to the Orange Free State. Moshesh had set his mark to that treaty. Three rows of farms adjoining the new boundary had been offered by the volksraad to occupiers under military tenure. From the list of applicants who sent in their names the most suitable were selected, but several delays occurred, and it was not until the 15th of January that this ground was actually given out. Before this time a large part of the remaining land had been sold by public auction, and it was intended that the purchasers should take possession of it on the same date. Nine months had now elapsed since the cessation of hostilities, and during that period a great many Basuto squatters had gone in and made gardens. Due notice of the allotment of the farms was given to Moshesh, who was requested to withdraw his subjects in accordance with the second clause of the treaty of Thaba Bosigo. Instead of doing this he sent strong parties of warriors into the district. The 15th of January mattered because Brand’s new farms were the first occupation of Thaba Bosigo’s cession, and because Moshesh answered an allotment notice with warriors, not a withdrawal. [3]
The bishop of the English Church in the Free State purchased one of the farms with a view of establishing a mission, and then went to see Moshesh, who told him candidly that he would not allow it. A widow who had received a grant of ground went to the great chief to ask if it would be safe to occupy it, when he told her it would not be. On the 18th of March the old chief wrote distinctly to the high commissioner that he did not mean to give up the territory. Great quantities of grain were stored on Thaba Bosigo, the Kieme, Tandjesberg, and Makwai’s mountain, all of which were strongly fortified and garrisoned. It was evident to the Europeans that as soon as they were settled a raid would be made upon them, so they hastily retired. The 18th of March mattered because Moshesh told Wodehouse in writing what he had already told a bishop and a widow: the ceded belt was not going to be given up, and the grain that would feed a second war was already in the mountains. [3]
Brand then called out an armed burgher force to expel the Basuto from the ceded territory, but gave notice to Moshesh that he need be under no apprehension of an attack, for there was no intention of sending the commandoes beyond the boundary. The burgher forces were formed into two divisions, under Chief-Commandants J. I. J. Fick and J. G. Pansegrouw, the first of whom was to conduct operations north of the Caledon, and the last between the Caledon and the Orange. On the 12th of March the two commandoes entered the ceded territory. The crops were at the time almost fit for gathering, and it was an object of the utmost importance with the Basuto to preserve the grain. What remained of the crop of 1866 was now stored in a few mountain fastnesses, and upon the crop of this year the mass of the people were depending. During the winter of 1866 some sections of the tribe had suffered greatly from hunger, though other sections were able to store large quantities of food, and others had been kept alive by the charity of Sir Philip Wodehouse, for whom some of the French missionaries acted as almoners. The 12th of March mattered because Fick and Pansegrouw entered to clear gardens, not to storm Thaba Bosigo, and because the crop in the fields was the store on which Moshesh’s people would live once the 1866 grain in the mountains was gone. [3]
The commando under Fick commenced operations in the neighbourhood of Viervoet by destroying some of the cornfields, and a little later Pansegrouw’s division began to do the same. In several places parties of burghers met with resistance, but no pitched battle took place. A few sconces in the mountains were taken by storm, and on one of these occasions two Bushmen who had fired poisoned arrows upon the burghers, and who were made prisoners, were afterwards shot by some miscreant in cold blood. Thereupon several members of the commando demanded an investigation and the punishment of the assassin, but the general feeling of exasperation against the Bushmen was so strong that the evidence obtainable merely served to prove that the officers had given no orders for the perpetration of the crime. The one object of the Basuto chiefs was to save the crops in the ceded territory. To gain that, their plan was not to take the field, but to profess the most abject submission, and to entreat to be taken over as subjects and given ground on which to live. On the 8th of May the volksraad met, and on the 10th in mistaken pity yielded. The suppliants were informed that they could make arrangements to gather the crops with the purchasers of the ground, and a few days later they were received as subjects, and the commandoes were withdrawn. The 10th of May mattered because a volksraad that had sent Fick and Pansegrouw in to cut maize now took the same people as subjects so that the grain could be stored, and because the commandoes left the ceded belt with the harvest still in Basuto hands. [3]
Letsie of the 22nd of May, Moperi of the 1st of June, and Krynauw of the 12th of July — Orange Free State 1867
Letsie was the first to be taken over. The great difficulty in his case before had been the Natal debt, and to get over this he informed the volksraad that the Natal Government had consented to give him credit for 7 years. When making this statement he knew that the falsehood must be detected in a few weeks, but in those few weeks he could complete the storing of his corn. He was not required to move. The district in which he had always lived was assigned to him as a location, and he was thus left with nothing but a nominal line between his people and the other Basuto. The regulations provided for Molapo’s clan were made applicable to him. There were special clauses in the document which he signed when he became a Free State subject, making him responsible for any share of the Natal debt which should be claimed from him. With Letsie were received a great number of petty chiefs, who professed to be his vassals, the most important of whom were Poshuli and Makwai. The last named was then residing on a strongly fortified mountain, but Letsie engaged that he should remove from it within a month. The arrangements for the establishment of this new native reserve were completed on the 22nd of May. The only guarantee of good faith which the government of the Free State demanded was that Letsie should send one of his sons and one of his councillors to Bloemfontein, to remain there as hostages, and this he undertook to comply with, apparently most cordially. But the hostages sent were in reality men of no rank, and when the object of their chief had been attained, one night they quietly decamped from Bloemfontein. The 22nd of May mattered because Letsie’s reserve left him on his own ground with only a paper line, and because a 7-year Natal credit that was not true bought the weeks in which the corn went into the mountain. [3]
On the 1st of June Moperi was received in the same manner. A tract of land in Witsi’s Hoek was selected as a location for him, with the object of separating his clan from the other Basuto. He was informed that he must move as soon as his crops were harvested, with which intimation he expressed himself satisfied. With regard to Molitsane, the volksraad empowered the president to purchase a block of farms in the district of Kroonstad, and to locate the Bataung there, so as to remove this restless clan into open ground, where it would have less power to do mischief. On learning that these clans had been received as subjects of the Free State, the high commissioner at once informed the president that in his opinion the Republic had also accepted their liabilities. He observed farther that these large acquisitions of territory and population tended to produce such important changes in the political position of the several powers in this part of Africa as would fully warrant a claim on the part of the British Government, should necessity arise, of a right to reconsider the bearings of the convention entered into with the Orange Free State on the 23rd of February 1854. In May the matter of a strong police force was discussed again. In February 1865 the volksraad had voted 20000 pounds for that purpose, but the war had so reduced the revenue that the plan could not be carried out. The majority of the members now saw no means of increasing the revenue, and the project was abandoned. The 1st of June mattered because Moperi’s location at Witsi’s Hoek was meant to peel him from Moshesh, and because Wodehouse treated the new subjects as a reason to reopen the Bloemfontein convention of 1854. [3]
The crops were harvested and stored in caverns in the mountains, and then the tone of the late suppliants underwent a sudden change. Moshesh denied all knowledge of the cession of land by the treaty of Thaba Bosigo, and publicly announced that he would not allow Europeans to settle on it. The Basuto there were instructed not to move and were informed that if they were attacked help would be sent to them. Masupha with an armed band commenced to plunder far and near. Letsie refused to receive the commandant appointed to reside with him, or to remove Makwai as he had promised. All disguise was cast aside, and Moshesh’s tribe was seen to be in perfect readiness for war. In the middle of June an English itinerant trader named Bush was plundered of all his goods and then murdered by order of a grandson of Molitsane, close to Mekuatling, and consequently on Free State soil. Bush was one of the renegades who had assisted Moshesh during the recent war, but he had since returned to civilised habits, and the Bataung looked upon him now as a traitor to them. The murderer fled to Moshesh. The president wrote on the 26th of June demanding his extradition under the sixth clause of the treaty, and received an answer, dated the 9th of July, which was to all intents and purposes a declaration of war. In the English language, bearing the signature and seal of Moshesh and purporting to have been written by Nehemiah, the old chief asserted that he had ceded no territory, that the district in which Bush was murdered was still part of the Lesuto, and that white men had no right to live there without his permission. “Let the Boers know,” he added, “that they must remain where they are, in the Free State; there is no other way to keep up peace.” The letter of the 9th of July mattered because Moshesh now denied Thaba Bosigo in writing after the corn was in, and because a trader murdered near Mekuatling was answered with a claim that the ceded belt was still Lesuto. [3]
Before this letter was received, on the 12th of July tidings reached Bloemfontein that a band of about 200 Bataung under the sons of Molitsane had appeared on the farm of a young man named Jacobus Krynauw, in the ceded territory, and had murdered the owner of the place in cold blood. A farmer named Abraham van der Walt, with his wife and three children, happened to be on a visit at Krynauw’s at the time. Van der Walt was very severely wounded, but he managed to kill two of his assailants and disabled several others. He actually drove the whole band off, and with his family escaped to Thaba Ntshu, where Moroko did all that he could for him, and as soon as possible sent him to Bloemfontein. It was now clear to everyone that another struggle was unavoidable. On the 16th of July the president called the burghers to arms to clear the ceded territory and compel Moshesh to observe the treaty of Thaba Bosigo. Martial law was proclaimed throughout the state from the 19th, and during its continuance the civil courts were to be closed. The volksraad was summoned to meet in extraordinary session on the 8th of August. Krynauw’s murder mattered because a farm in the ceded belt was now a killing ground, and because Brand’s call of the 16th of July was the second war for the same treaty. [3]
Of all the chiefs subject to Moshesh, the only one whose conduct was not openly hostile was Moperi. He had not yet moved to Witsi’s Hoek. On the 9th of August the volksraad gave him 24 hours’ notice that if he did not leave with his clan before the expiration of that time, the agreement with him would be cancelled. He had been to inspect the ground, and had been agreeably surprised to find that the location offered him was larger, and in every respect better, than the one he was required to vacate. He therefore moved, as required, and took no part in the events that followed. A commandant was appointed to live with him, and this officer had no reason to complain of his subsequent conduct. The burghers responded to the president’s call with a sense of duty equal to that displayed in 1865. From all the districts the farmers came marching under their respective commandants, and on the 5th of August two strong brigades entered the disturbed territory. The northern brigade was under Chief-Commandant G. J. Joubert, the southern under Chief-Commandant J. G. Pansegrouw. On the 15th of August the volksraad authorised a loan of 50000 pounds from the Bloemfontein Bank, at 8 per cent. per annum interest, to defray the cost of equipping the forces in the field. In October the erven of Wepener, close to Jammerberg Drift on the Caledon, were allotted. August mattered because Moperi moved when given 24 hours, two brigades entered on the 5th, and a village named for Louw Wepener was laid out on the ceded Caledon while the loan of 50000 pounds paid for the field. [3]
Makwai of the 25th of September, Buchanan of February, and Buckingham of the 9th of December — 1867
The tactics adopted by the Basuto on this occasion were to avoid encountering the burghers in the open field, to pretend to hold the hills, but to run away as soon as pressed, and really to defend, to the best of their ability, the strongly fortified mountains on which their corn was stored. The Free State forces were thus employed for the first six weeks in marching about, securing a few cattle here and there, and driving their opponents from ranges of hills, only to find the same places occupied by the same people a few days later. On the 25th of September, however, Makwai’s mountain, one of the great natural fortresses of the country, was taken by Chief-Commandant Pansegrouw’s division. A camp had been formed in its neighbourhood, from which during the night of the 24th three parties set out. The first consisted of 60 European volunteers and 100 Fingos under Commandant Ward, and marched to the east end of the mountain. The second, consisting of 200 burghers under Commandant Jooste, marched to the north side. And the third, 200 burghers under the chief-commandant himself, marched to the south side. The night of the 24th mattered because Pansegrouw split the assault three ways against a grain fortress, and because Ward’s east column was the feint that would draw the garrison. [3]
Under the darkness of night Ward’s party crept unmolested up the steep slope, and at daybreak found itself on an extensive tableland with enormous masses of broken rock forming the background. The garrison was taken by surprise, the first intimation of the attack which they received being a volley of bullets. Some cattle were discovered here, and the Fingos at once commenced driving them down. This gave the Basuto an opportunity to rally, and they came on in such force that the volunteers were obliged to fall back, and, after a brief stand, to retire from the mountain. While the attention of the Basuto was directed to this quarter, Commandant Jooste’s men were scaling the northern side. They reached without accident the summit of what may be termed the pedestal, but before them were great rocks fortified with numerous sconces. These they took by storm, one after another. While so engaged, they were strengthened by 100 men from the chief-commandant’s party, who had crept up in the opposite direction. Upon seeing these the Basuto lost all heart and fled, leaving the Free State forces in full possession of the mountain. Large stores of wheat and millet, besides 350 head of horned cattle, over 5000 sheep, and 68 horses fell into the hands of the conquerors. At least 67 Basuto were killed. This stronghold was not taken without a considerable number of the captors being wounded, but only one life was lost. Daybreak on the 25th mattered because Ward’s feint pulled the garrison east while Jooste stormed the northern sconces, and because the grain and the 350 cattle on the mountain were the store Makwai had meant to hold. [3]
After the loss of his stronghold Makwai gave up the contest, and with his clan moved over the Drakensberg into Nomansland. Lebenya’s clan had already gone there from the Wittebergen reserve, where they had taken refuge after Vechtkop was stormed in 1865. Makwai made peace with Adam Kok, and in nominal vassalage to him settled in the district which now forms the magistracy of Matatiele. Lebenya settled on the land between the Kenigha and Tina rivers. From this date they took no further part in hostilities against the Free State. A garrison was placed on the stronghold to prevent its being occupied again, and the commando then resumed the drudgery of patrolling the country. Letsie with a strong garrison was on the Kieme, a mountain second only in strength to Thaba Bosigo. Poshuli in like manner was holding Tandjesberg. Masupha and Molitsane were watching for an opportunity to fall upon any defenceless households on the border, and kept Chief-Commandant Joubert fully employed in marching from one place to another, and then back again. In anticipation that by these means the Free State forces would soon be worn out, the Basuto were placing a very large part of the ceded territory under cultivation. Commandant Frans Holm, who was stationed with Molapo, reported that he was closely watching the course of events, and if the Basuto had been successful at first, he would certainly have cast in his lot with them again. Now, however, he professed to be sitting still, and to be intent only on cultivating his gardens and taking care of his cattle. Another effect which the capture of this stronghold had was to dishearten a large number of stragglers, people who were refugees from distant parts of the country, who now swarmed into the Wittebergen reserve, where they were under British protection. Makwai’s flight mattered because a grain mountain taken on the 25th of September peeled one clan over the Drakensberg to Kok, and because Molapo, watching under Holm, sat still once that fortress fell. [3]
A man who now took an active part in the negotiations was David Dale Buchanan. Since February 1846 he had been editor of the Natal Witness, and as he was an advocate of the supreme court of that colony, had once been a member of the legislative council, and even acted for a short time as attorney-general. In February he announced his intention of becoming the champion of the Basuto, by writing to the colonial secretary of Natal inquiring if the government would consider the importation of arms and ammunition, and the introduction of a few experienced gunners, at variance with any treaty. From that date he became the legal adviser of the Basuto chiefs, and took an active part in the negotiations between them and the authorities of Natal. In August Makotoko, the old chief’s nephew and confidential messenger, was sent by Moshesh and Letsie to Natal to urge that they and their people and their country might be received by and be made to belong to Her Majesty the Queen of England, and be attached to the colony of Natal; to occupy the same position with regard to the government of Natal, and to pay the same taxes as the native chiefs and tribes already living in Natal, and to be presided over by a magistrate or other officer appointed by the government of Natal to live for that purpose in Basutoland. If this should not be conceded, Makotoko was to ask that the British Government should not supply arms and ammunition to one side and withhold them from the other, but let both have an equal chance. Buchanan and Makotoko mattered because a Natal advocate now spoke for Moshesh, and because the August mission asked for the Queen through Pietermaritzburg, not through Capetown. [3]
Sir Philip Wodehouse, to whom this matter was referred, had for a long time advocated the adoption of the Basuto as British subjects, and he now — the 17th of September — wrote again to the home government to that effect, but recommending that they should be placed under the control of the governor of the Cape Colony as high commissioner rather than under that of the Natal Government. The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos had recently succeeded Lord Carnarvon as secretary of state for the colonies. On the 9th of December he replied to Sir Philip Wodehouse. Her Majesty’s Government had had under their careful consideration the repeated offers made by the chief Moshesh that he and his people, with their territory, should be received under the authority of the Queen. They considered that the residence of a British agent with Moshesh would not accomplish a permanent settlement, and they had therefore come to the conclusion that the peace and welfare of Her Majesty’s possessions in South Africa would be best promoted by accepting the overtures made by that chief. As recognition as British subjects and the incorporation of their territory were now the matters under consideration, they felt no doubt that the best and most obvious arrangement would be the annexation of Basutoland to the colony of Natal. Assuming that the legislature of Natal would readily acquiesce, they authorised Wodehouse, whenever a fitting opportunity might occur, to treat with the chief Moshesh for the recognition of himself and his tribe as British subjects, and for the incorporation of their territory with Natal. They impressed upon him the importance of including a settlement of the boundaries between the Free State and Basutoland as an integral part of the arrangement. The 9th of December mattered because London now accepted Moshesh, against Wodehouse’s advice that the Cape high commissioner rather than Natal should hold the tribe, and because a boundary with Brand was to be part of the same bargain. [3]
Two Thousand of May, Schoemansdal of June, and Marabastad — South African Republic 1867
In the early months of this year the clans in Zoutpansberg suspended their internal dissensions, and attacked the Europeans again. The June commando of 1866 under President Pretorius had been disbanded within a month, and clan quarrels, not a restored magistracy, were what had lifted the fear of attack. Pretorius hereupon called out a commando of 2000 men to assemble at the end of May, and summoned the volksraad to meet in extraordinary session. The members came together on the 15th of May. The president, in his opening address, informed them that he was helpless for want of money. The 12000 pounds in notes issued in 1866 had been insufficient to do more than pay the most pressing debts, and the old mandates were still unredeemed. During a session of 12 days, the volksraad could devise nothing better than another issue of notes secured by public lands, to the amount of 20000 pounds, to redeem the mandates and meet the expenses of the commando. In such pecuniary distress was the Republic at the time that a large quantity of ammunition brought from Europe in 1866 by Mr McCorkindale, and delivered at the port of Durban by arrangement with the government in part payment of the land sold to him, could not be brought from the sea-coast to Pretoria for want of money to meet the transport charges. The 15th of May mattered because Pretorius asked for 2000 men and had to print 20000 pounds first, and because McCorkindale’s powder still lay at Durban. [3]
Instead of 2000 men answering the call to arms, only 500 mustered on the day appointed; and with this small force, ill supplied with material of war, Commandant-General Kruger marched to Zoutpansberg. The captain Katlakter had recently made several pillaging excursions, so the commando moved against him. But his mountain fortress was too strong to be carried by so small an army, and therefore after some skirmishing the burghers fell back to the village of Schoemansdal. Here Kruger received trustworthy information that Mapela and other chiefs living near Makapan’s Poort on the southern border of the district were ready to rise upon his receiving further reverses. He accordingly appealed to the country to support him with 1500 men and a sufficient quantity of ammunition, and announced that without this aid he could not restore order. His appeal fell upon deaf ears, and he was left to do the best that he could with his puny commando. The 500 mattered because a call of 2000 produced a quarter of that number, and because Kruger could not carry Katlakter’s mountain with the men who came. [3]
At the same time that an armed force was called out, a court of three combined landdrosts was directed to punish European wrong-doers in the district of Zoutpansberg. Before this court Commandant Stephanus Venter and Field-cornet J. H. du Plessis were charged with seizing cattle belonging to the captain Pago in April 1865, and illegally detaining them. On the 27th of June the jury found the accused persons guilty, and the court proceeded to sentence them. Du Plessis was ordered to restore 300 head of cattle to the people of Pago, and to pay a fine of 500 pounds. As soon as the sentence was pronounced, there was a disturbance in the court-room; an unruly mob took possession of the place, set the landdrosts at defiance, and rescued the men who had been found guilty. When this lawless proceeding was reported to Commandant-General Kruger, he abandoned all hope of restoring order, and acting by resolution of the council of war he withdrew from Schoemansdal. He considered the position of the village extremely bad from a military point of view. In his opinion, it was always at the mercy of the insurgents, as the stream from which its water was derived came from the mountain held by them, and they were well acquainted with the art of poisoning water to kill game. The respectable people of the village left with the commando, and the unruly characters were obliged to follow. Schoemansdal remained without inhabitants. The former residents saved nothing except what they could carry away. The reverend Mr Van Warmelo took with him the doors and windows of the church, but otherwise the buildings were undamaged. Shortly afterwards Katlakter’s people came down from the mountain, set the houses on fire, and reduced the whole to a heap of ruins. The 27th of June mattered because a court that convicted Du Plessis could not keep him, and because Kruger then left a village whose water rose on Katlakter’s mountain, after which the houses were burned. [3]
Commandant-General Kruger retired to Malitsi’s country, 36 miles distant, where he formed a camp, so as to enable any Europeans, who might still be in the neighbourhood of the mountains, to withdraw. From this place he retreated by way of Makapan’s Poort, where he stationed a guard of 45 men to protect the little village of Potgieter’s Rust, and he then disbanded the commando. The landdrost of the district, the clergymen, and some of the other inhabitants took up their residence at Marabastad, a hamlet about 70 miles south-west of Schoemansdal. This place was then the property of only four individuals, and its situation was not a good one. Mr Van Warmelo decided that it would be useless to attempt to put up a church there, so it was only regarded as a place of temporary refuge. The abandonment of Schoemansdal, and with it a considerable portion of the district of Zoutpansberg, was regarded by President Pretorius as the greatest disaster the Republic had ever sustained. He made a despairing appeal to the country for volunteers to recover the lost ground, and hurried from village to village to urge the people to render assistance. Stephanus Schoeman — the same man who had taken a prominent part in the civil wars, but who was as brave as he was turbulent — was appointed commandant of volunteers. Notwithstanding the efforts made by the president, only 53 men offered their services. At the head of these, in October, Schoeman visited Zoutpansberg to ascertain the exact condition of affairs. Marabastad mattered because the landdrost of Zoutpansberg now sat 70 miles south-west of a burned village, and because Pretorius, calling the loss the Republic’s greatest disaster, could raise only 53 volunteers. [3]
At Potgieter’s Rust he learned that Makapan had risen. A party of that captain’s people had surrounded a patrol of 6 burghers on an open plain, but had been beaten off with a loss of 16 killed. Makapan had then gone to Mapela’s mountain, and was living there under that chief’s protection. From Potgieter’s Rust the volunteers pushed on to the burnt village of Schoemansdal. There a meeting took place of the Europeans of the nearest laager, the captains of the blacks who professed to be fighting on the white man’s side, and the volunteers. Mapela sent some of his councillors, who delivered a message to the effect that he wished to remain at peace, and was therefore sitting still. Schoeman replied that the Europeans considered him responsible for the damage done by Makapan and another insurgent named Kalikali, inasmuch as he had given these captains and their followers shelter. At the meeting it was decided not to attack the powerful chiefs Magadu and Katlakter, but to endeavour to do as much damage as possible to Matshatshi, Sewase, and other heads of petty clans. The force under Schoeman’s command was too weak, however, to do anything of consequence, and after a little skirmishing it fell back to Marabastad, where on the 23rd of December the volunteers were disbanded. In all the exposed parts of the district the farms were at this time abandoned, and their owners were in laager. There were three great camps: one in the north, another at Marabastad, and a third at Potgieter’s Rust. The 23rd of December mattered because Schoeman’s 53 could not recover Schoemansdal, and because Zoutpansberg closed the year in three laagers. [3]
Viljoen of the 25th of February, Keate of the 23rd of May, and Mauch of December — South African Republic 1867
When the commando under Kruger had retired from the Lesuto in October 1865, no agreement of peace had been concluded. In the treaty of Thaba Bosigo no mention was made of the South African Republic, an omission which gave a good deal of offence to the government at Pretoria. In November 1866 Moshesh had caused a letter to be written to President Pretorius, asking that a formal agreement of peace might be made between them. The government at Pretoria thereupon sent Messrs M. J. Viljoen and P. W. Pretorius as an embassy to treat with Moshesh. On the 20th of February there was a general meeting of chiefs and leading men at Thaba Bosigo, when the embassy stated their willingness to conclude peace if the Basuto would pay 1580 pounds in money or 800 head of horned cattle to the heirs of the persons murdered by Ramanela. After much discussion, on the 21st this demand was reduced to 40 good draft oxen and 15 horses, which the assembled chiefs agreed to pay. On the 25th of February a formal agreement of peace and friendship was signed by Messrs Viljoen and Pretorius on the one part, and by Moshesh, Letsie, Masupha, and Moperi on the other. Moshesh promised that the oxen and horses would be delivered in a day or two. The embassy waited until the 1st of March, and then, as no cattle had been delivered, they left for their homes. On the 2nd they were overtaken by a messenger from Moshesh, who tendered one wretchedly poor old horse, and delivered a letter from the great chief announcing that four more horses and 12 head of horned cattle were on the way. The embassy did not wait to see what description of cattle these were, but proceeded on their journey, and there the matter ended. The 25th of February mattered because Pretoria signed a peace that Thaba Bosigo of 1866 had omitted, and because the payment that was to make it real shrank from 800 cattle to one poor horse on the road. [3]
Ever since the establishment of the Orange Free State there had been a dispute with the South African Republic concerning the boundary between them. Various attempts had been made to settle it, but all without success. At last, in January, the two presidents and commissions from both states met on the disputed ground, when it was ascertained that neither party was prepared to give way, and the two governments then resolved to refer the matter to the decision of Mr Robert William Keate, who had been appointed lieutenant-governor of Natal, but who had not yet arrived in South Africa, and who could not therefore be prejudiced in any way. Mr Keate, who reached Natal on the 23rd of May, consented to act as arbitrator; but some delay took place, and the deed of submission was not signed in this calendar. January and May mattered because Brand and Pretorius would not yield the line themselves, and because a Natal lieutenant-governor who had not yet landed was chosen as a man without a South African past. [3]
Another event that brought the pioneers to remembrance took place in August. Litonga, chief of the Swazis, sent to Commandant P. J. Coetzer, of Lydenburg, a white man and woman, with their two children, who were in all their habits like the people among whom they had grown up. The man and woman were held to be the sole survivors of Rensburg’s party, and had been living with the Magwamba from early childhood. They did not know the names of their parents, or their own. The man was called Tshaka by the blacks. From the Magwamba they had been transferred to the Swazis, but by all had been treated as beings of a superior order. They had never done any work, the chiefs having caused gardens to be cultivated for them. Subscriptions were raised to provide clothing and proper maintenance for these people, and they were placed with the reverend Mr Nachtigal, of the Berlin Mission, to receive such instruction as could be imparted to them. The woman proved an apt scholar, and readily adapted herself to civilised habits, but for a long time the man preferred the society and the ways of the people with whom he had so long been associated. They spoke only the language of the country, and could give no account of themselves; it was also said that they were of African type, and that it was much more probable that all 49 of Rensburg’s party had perished. In January McCorkindale’s Scotch immigrants, numbering in all about 50 souls, were located close to Lake Chrissie, in New Scotland, where they soon found themselves in prosperous circumstances. Mota, brother of Sikonyela, with those members of the Batlokua who had not chosen to follow their fallen chief, and who had been permitted to live on three farms belonging to Mr C. J. de Villiers in the district of Harrismith, finally migrated in this year to Zululand. August mattered because Litonga sent Coetzer two people who might or might not have been Rensburg’s children after 30 years, and because New Scotland’s 50 at Lake Chrissie were planted while Zoutpansberg sat in laager. [3] [3] [4]
In December a German traveller — by name Karl Mauch — arrived at Pretoria from the north, and reported that he had discovered rich and extensive goldfields in the Tati district, a tract of country some 200 miles north-west of the abandoned village of Schoemansdal. The district was drained by streams flowing into the Limpopo, and was nearly uninhabited, being within easy reach of the armies of Moselekatse. A few weeks after this announcement parties of gold-seekers began to leave the villages of the Republic, and to pass through them from other parts of South Africa. December mattered because Mauch named Tati gold 200 miles beyond a burned Schoemansdal, and because the first parties were already on the road before the year closed. [3]