Boer History1871 in South Africa: Barkly, Keate, Brand, and Griqualand West
Barkly, Parliament of the 27th of April, and the Lesuto Bill — Colony 1871
Sir Henry Barkly governed the Cape Colony and held Her Majesty’s high commission when the year opened. He had taken the oaths at Capetown on the 31st of December 1870. London had sent him with written orders, dated the 17th of October 1870, that Basutoland should be annexed as soon as possible either to Natal or to the Cape Colony. The Lesuto was already British: the Basuto had been proclaimed British subjects on the 12th of March 1868, but the territory was still a separate Crown charge, not a Cape district. That is why the new governor’s first Cape year turned on whether the Cape Parliament would take the mountain country as a colonial burden, and whether the same high commissioner would also be drawn onto the Vaal, where diamond camps were already crowding both banks. [3]
President Brand and C. W. Hutton were waiting in Capetown when Barkly arrived. They had reached the town on the 29th of December 1870. Lieutenant-General Hay, still administering until the new governor landed, had refused them an official interview because Barkly was expected from hour to hour. On the 3rd of January they sat with Barkly for three hours. They could make no impression. He had not yet been able to study the diamond-field dispute except from such papers as had been printed. They remained some weeks in Capetown. The meeting mattered because Brand was not a petitioner from a weak clan: he was the elected head of a republic recognised by the Bloemfontein convention of 1854, and he had come south to explain, by word of mouth, why Free State courts already sat on the dry diggings that Waterboer’s agent claimed from Griquatown. [3]
On the 24th of January Earl Kimberley instructed Barkly not to be a party to the annexation of any territory which the Cape Colony would be unable to govern and defend by its own unaided resources. That reservation hung over every later proposal to take Waterboer’s country or the Lesuto: London would accept new ground only if the Cape paid for it and raised its own force. When Hay’s despatches were printed in blue-books they caused great irritation in South Africa. In one of them, dated the 17th of November 1870, Kimberley had written that Her Majesty’s Government would see with great dissatisfaction any encroachment on Griqua territory by the Republics, which would open to the Boers an extended field for slave-dealing. He professed the most friendly feelings towards the Republics in the same breath. The Free State had protested to the foreign secretary against British magistrates exercising jurisdiction inside its territory. The foreign secretary referred the protest to the colonial office, and Kimberley left the matter to the high commissioner’s judgment, with no other reservation than the instruction of the 24th of January. [3]
Port Nolloth, so termed since March 1855, still shipped the copper of Springbokfontein and Spektakel. The Cape Copper Mining Company had begun in 1869 a narrow-gauge railway from Port Nolloth to Ookiep, because animal power could not move ore to the sea as fast as it could be got ready. Before 1871 all the ore that reached the coast still came down by mules or oxen. The line mattered in this year because Namaqualand copper was already a colonial export, and because a railway begun in a drought was still unfinished while the high commissioner was being asked to take on new inland charges. In November Maqoma, who had begun again to foment disturbances after his return of May 1869, was once more removed to Robben Island. [3] [3]
On the 27th of April Barkly opened the Cape Parliament. He stated his intention to introduce a bill to annex Basutoland to the Cape Colony, and told the members that the hut-tax was generally paid, that the amount collected had left a considerable balance after expenses, and that the revenue was adequate for government, including police. On the 3rd of May the governor’s secretary brought the annexation bill to the legislative council, where it was received and read for the first time. It then dropped out of sight for two months. On the 3rd of July it was referred to a select committee of 8 members. The committee consulted J. X. Merriman and J. H. Bowker, as well as the colonial secretary and the attorney-general, all of whom favoured annexation to the Cape rather than to Natal. On the 1st of August the committee reported that Basutoland offered a wide field of profitable commercial enterprise; that the country having already been declared British territory, it would be undesirable for the colony not to obtain legislative control; and that annexation did not appear likely to entail any additional burden. The actual revenue received from the assumption of British authority to the 31st of May of this year was 4753 pounds: hut-tax 3721, trading licences 961, fines 63, and fees for registration of marriages 8. The expenditure Barkly proposed totalled 2550 pounds, the balance to provide a police force. [3]
The legislative council in committee adopted the report by 11 to 6, but after a warm discussion the second reading of the annexation bill was only carried by 10 votes against 8. On the 2nd of August it passed its third reading in the council. On the 5th it was brought up in the house of assembly and read for the first time. On the 9th it was read a second time. On the 10th the house went into committee, and after a very brief discussion the bill was read the third time without a division. Parliament was prorogued the next day. By this Act the Lesuto was annexed to the Cape Colony, but was not made subject to colonial law: the duty of legislating for the territory was vested in the governor. The diamond-fields were another question. On the 11th of July, before causing an annexation bill to be drafted, the colonial secretary moved in the Assembly that the house should go into committee on a proposition that the territory commonly designated the diamond-fields should be annexed to the colony. Molteno moved an amendment that the house could not at present entertain the question; it was lost by 27 against 25. On the 19th the house considered the question in committee. Porter’s amendment was lost by 35 to 16, Molteno’s by 28 to 23, and Smith’s was carried without a division. On the 20th Smith’s proposition was brought before the house and only carried by 27 votes against 26. In the legislative council an amendment that annexation should not be carried out until the dispute of territory had been finally settled was only lost, and the resolution carried, by 10 votes to 9. Barkly then abandoned the design of bringing in an annexation bill during that session. On the 5th of August, shortly before the prorogation, the colonial secretary moved that pending the adjustment of the boundary dispute the governor should adopt such measures as might appear necessary for the maintenance of order, the collection of revenue, and the administration of justice. With the assurance that it was not the intention of the government to take one inch of territory from the Free State, the proposition was adopted without a division, and two days later the council assented with the same understanding. On the 15th of August Barkly forwarded the resolutions to the secretary of state, feeling confident that Kimberley would regard the second as a substantial compliance. It struck him as out of the question any longer to uphold the fiction of acting in Waterboer’s name among some thousands of British subjects. Kimberley afterwards observed that the resolutions did not in themselves amount to a formal compliance with the conditions laid down in his despatch of the 18th of May, but Her Majesty’s Government relied entirely on the judgment and discretion of the high commissioner. His power to act was conditional. The ministers at Capetown were not dependent upon a majority in parliament: they held their offices by direct appointment of the secretary of state, and carried out whatever instructions the governor gave. They had the right of proposing measures and of debating in both chambers, but had no votes. The possession of the diamond-fields by any state or colony was regarded everywhere in the country as a great prize, and the governor believed that the Cape legislature would be eager to secure it. What hung on those July and August divisions was not a colonial majority for taking the mines: it was a narrow leave for Barkly to keep order in Waterboer’s name until London decided whether the Cape had bound itself. [3]
Maseru of the 16th of March, Griffith of August, and the Queen in Council of the 3rd of November — Lesuto 1871
As soon as Barkly’s arrival in South Africa was known, the Basuto chiefs sent him a letter of welcome. They had been persuaded by Tsekelo and Buchanan that Wodehouse had been recalled owing to their representations in England, and that the new governor would most likely favour them much more than the late one had done. He did not keep them long in suspense. Within ten weeks of his arrival in Capetown he was on his way to the Lesuto, and on the 16th of March he had a meeting with Letsie at Maseru. The governor was accompanied by Bowker and C. D. Griffith. Lieutenant-Governor Keate, of Natal, met him there by previous arrangement. Barkly announced that he intended to increase the staff of European officers and to annex the territory to the Cape Colony. Letsie used the most loyal language, and declared that he would be satisfied with anything and everything that the Queen’s Government might do. The other chiefs were equally loyal in words. Molapo asked about the ground he had lost, and was told that the Caledon was the fixed boundary, and no other must be thought of. He said that he was satisfied, as the governor knew what was best for them; but as soon as he was beyond the hearing of Europeans he burst out against Barkly and Wodehouse alike. The meeting mattered because the Caledon line of Aliwal North was now repeated to the son who had lost most by it, and because Barkly left Maseru believing the chiefs were sincere. [3]
Upon the death of Moshesh, Masupha had removed from his residence on the Putiatsana to Thaba Bosigo, against the orders of the high commissioner’s agent. He had obstructed the collection of hut-tax, and had put himself in opposition to all authority. Nevertheless, with a large armed following he met the governor and escorted him through the Berea district, declaring himself a thoroughly loyal and obedient subject. Barkly told him that he could not be recognised as a chief, nor receive any commission upon the receipt of hut-tax, until he removed from Thaba Bosigo and took up his residence in the Berea district, over which he was appointed native head. He promised to comply, but went straight back to Thaba Bosigo. Nehemiah, George, and Sophonia had just before been announcing that the chiefs should collect the revenue, pay the magistrates, and dispose of the surplus as they should see fit, and that the laws should be made by the Basuto chiefs and headmen sitting in council at Thaba Bosigo. These sons of Moshesh were now, if their professions to the governor could be trusted, the most humble and dutiful subjects. Barkly returned to Capetown convinced that the chiefs were sincere, and that there would be no difficulty in governing the tribe. The country, in his opinion, was capable of supporting many times the number of inhabitants then in it. What hung on that conviction was the annexation bill he opened in April: he told Parliament the hut-tax was paid and the revenue adequate because he had believed the escort through Berea. [3]
On the 16th of August a great meeting of the Basuto people took place at Maseru. A message from the governor was read to Letsie, informing him that no change whatever was effected in the position of the Basuto by the annexation of the country, except giving them the full privileges of British subjects in the Cape Colony. Letsie, Masupha, Nehemiah, George, Tsekelo, Makotoko for Molapo, and others, using the most loyal language, agreed to what had been done. No one raised a dissentient voice. A little later — the 11th of September — Letsie caused a letter to be written to the governor expressing his satisfaction that his country had been united to the Cape Colony, and advancing pretensions to the ownership of the best part of Nomansland. Wodehouse had located the clans of Makwai, Lebenya, Lehana, and Zibi in it, but without proclaiming it British soil. The restrictions placed by the secretary of state in 1864 upon the extension of the British dominions east of the Indwe and the Kei were still in force. Letsie’s claim could not therefore be recognised. The Lesuto was now divided into four districts, named Leribe, Berea, Thaba Bosigo, and Kornet Spruit. Over the whole Griffith had been placed, with the titles of chief magistrate and governor’s agent. On the 2nd of August he assumed the duties, when he found the only questions causing general interest were the refusal of Masupha to leave Thaba Bosigo, though Letsie professed to endorse the governor’s order, and Buchanan’s efforts to obtain the cattle promised by Moshesh to defray the cost of his mission to Europe. On the 15th of July the reverend Mr. Jousse wrote to the governor on behalf of Masupha, asking that he might remain on Thaba Bosigo, as Letsie had no intention of going to live there. On the 2nd of September the governor directed the chief magistrate to inform Masupha that he must move as soon as he conveniently could to the Berea district, but this intimation was not to be followed by any active steps unless Letsie should apply for assistance. Masupha therefore remained master of the stronghold. [3]
At Leribe Major Charles Harland Bell was appointed magistrate, and assumed duty on the 13th of May. He was received by Molapo in a very cordial manner, and at a meeting which was held to introduce him, Jonathan and Joel, Molapo’s sons, Selebalo, Molapo’s half-brother, and Mapetshuane, son of Poshuli, expressed their pleasure in welcoming him. In the district of Berea, Inspector William Henry Surmon, of the frontier armed and mounted police, was appointed to act as magistrate. The governor’s agent was also required to perform the duties of magistrate of the district of Thaba Bosigo. He resided at Maseru, and had as assistant Mr. Emile Roland. In the district of Kornet Spruit John Austen remained as magistrate. The sub-magistrates had jurisdiction in civil cases of any amount, but their decisions were subject to review by the chief magistrate. They had jurisdiction in all criminal cases, except when persons were charged with crimes punishable by death under the colonial law. All sentences of over a month’s imprisonment, or a fine of 5 pounds, or 12 lashes, were subject to the review of the chief magistrate. Persons charged with offences punishable by death were tried by a court of three magistrates, of whom the chief magistrate was to be one, and he was to preside. No sentence of death could be carried out except upon the warrant of the governor. Each district was placed under the superintendence of one of the principal chiefs, who was to be consulted by the governor’s agent in distributing the ground among the people. The hut-tax was fixed at 10 shillings per annum for each hut occupied by a family or a single man, payable either in money, or stock, or produce of the land, on the 1st of June in each year. The sale of spirituous liquors was prohibited under a penalty of 10 pounds for the first offence, and the trading licence was to be forfeited on a second conviction. No firearms or ammunition could be sold without the sanction in writing of the magistrate of the district, under a penalty not exceeding a fine of 500 pounds or 7 years’ imprisonment with hard labour. Licences to trade in other goods were to be paid for at the rate of 10 pounds per annum, or 1 pound per mensem for each shop or waggon. The magistrates mattered because Wodehouse’s police-agent arrangement was never meant to be permanent, and because the Cape bill of August now required a civil staff that could collect the hut-tax without putting the home government to expense. [3]
These regulations were to come in force on the 1st of December of this year. They had been laid before the Basuto chiefs and leading men at the meeting on the 22nd of December 1870, and Letsie had agreed to them, but some of the clauses were very objectionable to the great body of the people. In particular, the tribe was not prepared for such a revolution in the position of women. Marriages contracted before the 1st of December were to be decided according to the old customs. With the establishment of British authority in the Lesuto the French missionaries returned to their labours. The territory retaken by Wodehouse from the Free State contained all their lost stations except 4. Prior to this date the children in their schools had received instruction in no other language than their own. Though there were more than 3000 individuals in the country who could read Sesuto, Bowker was unable to obtain a single native interpreter, the few petty chiefs who understood English being considered untrustworthy by him. From this time forward the youths in the higher classes were taught English also. In 1868 a training school for teachers had been established at Morija. It was not until the close of this year that state aid could be given, and then it was only in the form of outfits for schools. On the 3rd of November the act of parliament by which the Lesuto was annexed to the Cape Colony was ratified by the Queen in council, and the existence of the territory as a separate dependency of the Crown was thus ended. The ratification mattered because London had never intended the Lesuto to remain a direct Crown charge: once the Queen in council confirmed the Cape Act, the mountain country was a colonial annex, legislated for by the governor, with Griffith as agent and Masupha still on Thaba Bosigo. [3]
Pniel of the 22nd of February, Ten Shillings of May, and Kimberley of June — Diamond Fields 1871
On the 22nd of February the mission station of Pniel was cut off from the district of Jacobsdal and created a district of itself. Its limits were now enlarged so as to embrace the dry diggings, and the landdrost Truter was removed from Pniel — where few diggers then remained — to Dutoitspan. A post office was established, and a body of police was enrolled. The change mattered because the river camps were emptying, and because the Free State could not keep order on the pans from a mission station that the diggers had already left. At length, in May, a provisional arrangement was made by the government, to have effect until the volksraad should come to a decision in the matter; and all parties expressed themselves ready to abide by it. It was to the effect that for each claim of 900 square feet a monthly licence of 10 shillings should be paid. Of this, the government was to receive 5 shillings, the proprietors of the farms 4 shillings, and the diggers’ committee 1 shilling. The committee of each camp was invested with municipal power. In June the first diamond was discovered at the mine afterwards called Kimberley, on the farm Vooruitzigt. Prospecting was then being actively carried on, and this place had twice before been examined and abandoned. 700 claims, or plots of ground, each containing 900 square feet, were marked off, and immediately taken possession of. Many of these were afterwards found to be beyond the reef, or caldron of rock which contained the diamond-bearing soil, and were therefore of no value. Less than 7 acres is the actual area of that portion which yielded so amazingly. 12 roadways, each 15 feet in width, were left across the mine by a regulation which required each claim-holder to reserve one-fourth of his plot for that purpose. [3]
The river diggings were almost deserted. Men who by mere chance secured rich claims for nothing when they were first allotted could now readily obtain 1000 pounds for half their ground. A great camp of canvas tents of all sizes and shapes covered the ground on one side of the mine. Streets and squares were shortly laid out, and soon iron buildings rose along them. Churches and schools, banks and newspaper offices, concert rooms and theatres, stores and shops, diamond buyers’ offices, hotels, canteens, and gambling houses were all to be seen before the close of the year. Along the streets passed an incessant stream of waggons, carts, carriages, and pedestrians. Similar, but on a smaller scale, were the camps at Dutoitspan, Bultfontein, and De Beer’s. The whole four mines were within a circle having a radius of a little less than 2 miles. In that little spot 30000 men, white and black, were working at once. Life at the dry-digging camps, in their early days, was full of excitement, but far from pleasant. Water was scarce and bad. The best was brought in casks from a farm 5 or 6 miles away. When at length it was obtained by sinking wells, much of it was found to contain lime in solution, and to increase rather than quench thirst. For a long time the camps were in a filthy state, and during the calms the air was offensive. The dust storms were terrific. Violent gusts of hot wind caught up the sifted ground and loose materials of every kind, and whirled them about until the atmosphere was darkened and breathing was difficult. Blacks from every tribe in South Africa congregated there, allured by the prospect of obtaining guns and ammunition with the very high wages offered. June mattered because Kimberley, not the Vaal gravel, now pulled the camps off the river, and because a mine of less than 7 acres was already large enough to be treated as a prize by every government that claimed the ground. [3]
An ordinance for the government of the diamond-fields was passed by the volksraad. In effect it did little more than confirm the provisional arrangement made by the executive authority on the 15th of May, which met with the approval of the diggers and the proprietors of the farms. The ninth clause provided for the establishment of a committee of management in each camp, to consist of 6 members elected by the diggers, with the government inspector as chairman. The tenth clause gave to the committees of management power to frame such regulations as might be found necessary for the local circumstances and social management of the diggings, subject only to the approval of the executive council. Under this system of government good order was maintained. Blacks were not allowed to roam about the camps after nine o’clock at night, canteen-keepers were prohibited from selling intoxicating liquor to them unless with the written permission of their employers, and they were not permitted to buy or sell diamonds. But these regulations were carried out in such a manner as not to oppress anyone unnecessarily. The Free State, however, was not permitted to establish the machinery of government on the diamond-fields without opposition. On the 1st of February a commission was obtained from Nicholas Waterboer for Campbell at Klipdrift, but it did not much improve his position. At the best, Waterboer was only a claimant to the territory in dispute. His following was too small to occupy more than one little village, and his residence some 90 miles distant in a direct line. No one could ascertain that he had ever exercised jurisdiction within a radius of 50 miles of Klipdrift. Early in February Campbell began to feel his way towards asserting authority on the Free State side of the river. On the 1st of the month he issued a notice cautioning all persons against purchasing or alienating land at either Klipdrift or Pniel, and on the 8th he warned the committee of management of a new camp at Cawood’s Hope, on the left bank of the Vaal, not to pay licence fees to anyone but himself. On the 8th, also, he called for tenders for the hire of strong rooms, to be used as a lock-up and a prison, at Pniel, and for the supply of maize or millet for the use of 100 mounted policemen on either side of the river. February mattered because a special magistrate whose power under the Punishment Bill was only to arrest a British subject and send him to the Cape for trial was now acting in Waterboer’s name on the bank where Truter already sat for Bloemfontein. [3]
Klipdrift of the 26th of February, Bloemhof of the 4th of April, and Keate of the 17th of October — South African Republic 1871
Shortly after his assumption of duty as high commissioner, Barkly proceeded on a visit to the Lesuto and the diamond-fields. He arrived at Klipdrift on the 26th of February, and was received with dutiful respect as Her Majesty’s representative. President Pretorius was there to meet him, and so were Waterboer and the Barolong and Batlapin chiefs. Arnot was present as adviser of Waterboer, and the reverend Joseph Ludorf as adviser of Phoi, Montsiwa, and Moroko. Theodor Doms came forward as the mouthpiece of the Batlapin captains, but they disowned him, as they stated he had been selling land in their names without authority to do so, and they selected Ludorf as their adviser and agent. All of the captains, through their agents, laid statements before his Excellency, and all professed to be willing to submit their claims to a court of arbitration. Barkly thereupon caused deeds of submission to be drawn up, and on the 1st of March one of these was signed by Pretorius and Waterboer, and another by Pretorius, the Barolong chiefs Montsiwa, Moroko, Phoi, and four others of less note, and the Batlapin chiefs Botlasitsi, Jantje, Matlabane, and Mankoroane. At the same time an agreement was concluded between Barkly and Pretorius, providing for the government of the diamond-fields on the northern bank of the Vaal until the decision of the court of arbitration should be made known. Campbell was to have authority over all British subjects, and was to receive the fees for digging-licences paid by them. In the same way J. A. de Villiers, who some months previously had been stationed as landdrost, was to have authority over burghers of the Republic. It was agreed that the judges of the arbitration court should be Anthony Alexander O’Reilly, landdrost of Wakkerstroom, on behalf of the South African Republic, and Campbell on behalf of all the other parties to the dispute. In case of the judges disagreeing, Lieutenant-Governor Keate, of Natal, was empowered to give a final decision. Barkly instructed Maximilian Jackson, the officer in command of a detachment of colonial police that accompanied him to the diamond-fields, to act as special magistrate while Campbell was otherwise employed. The 1st of March mattered because Pretorius signed without the standing committee of 3 volksraad members appointed in December 1870 to assist him in territorial disputes, and because Keate, who had given Pretoria the Klip line against the Free State, was now named as the man who would decide if the judges split. [3]
On the 4th of April the court of arbitration was opened at the village of Bloemhof. To conduct the case, Pretorius and the state attorney, Frederick Klein, appeared for the South African Republic; Arnot and Attorney D. C. Grant for Waterboer; Grant and Mr. Edwards for the Batlapin chief Mankoroane; Ludorf for the Barolong chiefs Phoi, Montsiwa, and Moroko, and the Batlapin chief Botlasitsi; and Carl Mathey for the Bangwaketsi chief Gasiitsiwe and the Batlapin chief Matlabane. From the 5th of April to the 19th of June the arbitration court listened to evidence, documentary and oral, that fills 392 pages of a blue-book. The South African Republic went into court utterly unprepared to conduct its case properly. Pretorius and Klein obtained a copy of the alleged treaty of December 1851 from Ludorf and put it in as part of their case, to show that one of the chiefs admitted their ownership of the diamond-fields along the Vaal. The so-called treaty was nothing more than an extract from certain papers which professed to be minutes of the meeting of the 30th of December 1851, taken down by Ludorf himself. No white man, except Ludorf, had ever put pen to it. The names which professed to be signatures of individuals at the foot of the document were placed there without the slightest authority. The commissioners, on examining the water-mark of the paper of this document, found it to be 1868. From the beginning it was anticipated that the decision would not rest with Campbell and O’Reilly as judges. They would see that order was preserved, that each side should have an opportunity to bring forward all the evidence it chose to produce, and that the evidence was faithfully put on record. But it was never supposed that they would agree in pronouncing judgment. The real arbiter was the final referee, Keate of Natal. He had decided in favour of the South African Republic in the question of the disputed boundary with the Orange Free State, and therefore Pretorius was willing to leave this matter also in his hands. Bloemhof mattered because Pretoria put in a paper watermarked 1868 as if it were 1851, and because the volksraad’s other object — to test whether the high commissioner might interfere north of the Vaal under the convention of January 1852 — was not brought forward at all. [3]
The judges disagreed, as was foreseen, and on the 17th of October Keate signed at Maritzburg the document known ever since as the Keate Award. It was entirely adverse to the South African Republic. It gave to Waterboer the northern and north-eastern lines which Arnot claimed for him, and gave the Barolong and Batlapin all the territory between the boundaries so assigned to Waterboer and a line sweeping round from the source of the Molopo past the source of the Hart to Makwasi Spruit. It cut off from the jurisdiction of the government at Pretoria not only the territory occupied by the clans of the Barolong and the Batlapin and the vast region bordering on the desert, to which their rights were really open to dispute, but the whole district of Bloemhof, part of the district of Potchefstroom, and part of the district of Marico, all containing farms occupied by the earliest Emigrant Farmers. The award was received by the people of the South African Republic with consternation. Public meetings were held, at which those speakers who advised resistance to the dismemberment of the Republic were most applauded. An outburst of indignation against the government followed. A commission of 3 members of the volksraad had been appointed in December 1870 to assist the president, the executive council, and the state attorney in dealing with territorial disputes, but the president had signed the deeds of submission to the court of arbitration of Bloemhof without consulting his colleagues. The 17th of October mattered because a Natal referee, deciding on the papers put in at Bloemhof, now drew a line that took settled field-cornetcies as well as the open west, and because Barkly used that line four days later when he proclaimed Waterboer. [3]
The volksraad was in session when, on the 16th of November, the award reached Pretoria. Two letters from Pretorius to Barkly were first brought on for consideration. One, dated on the 22nd of July, stated that he had learned from a report of the debates in the House of Commons that instructions had been issued by Her Majesty to accede to the request of Waterboer and the Griquas to become British subjects; that by this proceeding confidence in an impartial decision had been weakened; and that British officers could no longer be looked upon as arbitrators, but as parties in the case. Further, he protested against the reception of the Griquas as a breach of the convention of January 1852, and requested that the claim of England to act thus in disregard of the convention might be referred for decision to another power. This letter was not objected to; but the other, dated on the 10th of November, in which the president stated that on receipt of the award he would gladly comply with it, was disapproved by the volksraad. Such a hostile feeling towards the executive was now shown by the members that the principal officers thought it prudent to resign their situations. The state secretary Proes, a well-educated and able, but erratic man, though he had little or nothing to do with the arbitration, was the first to retire. The reverend Mr. Swart was immediately elected in his stead. The state attorney Klein then sent his resignation to the president, and received an honourable discharge. Pretorius next laid down his office, when the volksraad directed Daniel Jacobus Erasmus, the oldest unofficial member of the executive council, to act as president until an election could be held. November mattered because the man who had signed at Klipdrift on the 1st of March now lost the chair for it, and because Pretoria would meet Barkly for the rest of the year through an acting president who had not signed the deeds. [3]
Meantime Ludorf was doing all that was possible still further to irritate the European inhabitants of the country north of the Vaal. Barkly had in vain, both privately and officially, cautioned him to act with prudence. Before the award reached Pretoria, Barkly proclaimed in the Government Gazette of the Cape Colony the boundary fixed by the award between the South African Republic and the Bangwaketsi, Barolong, and Batlapin tribes. Thereupon Ludorf drew up a constitution for a native state which he proposed to bring into existence, and in the name of a number of chiefs issued a pompous proclamation. He styled himself commissioner and representative of the combined Barolong, Bangwaketsi, and Batlapin. On the 24th of November the volksraad instructed the acting president how to proceed, and on the following day Erasmus published a proclamation and a protest against the Keate Award. He announced that as Pretorius had neither authority nor right to sign the acts of submission singly and without the concurrence of his colleagues, the whole proceedings in connection with the arbitration were regarded as invalid, and the award would not be acknowledged as binding. On the 2nd of December a communication covering copies of the volksraad’s documents was forwarded to the high commissioner. Barkly replied that he had nothing to do with the dispute between the executive and the legislature of the Republic, that he adhered to the proceedings of the arbitration, and intended to abide by and maintain the award. Earl Kimberley approved of this reply. But in point of fact the award never was enforced. There was only one way in which the boundary laid down by Keate could be maintained, and that was by Great Britain assuming direct control in the territory west of it, and keeping a strong military or police force there. This step the Imperial Government was unwilling to take. The South African Republic therefore continued to embrace the field-cornetcies that were occupied by the farmers, and a landdrost remained in the village of Bloemhof and held a court there. Beyond the parts occupied by farmers, disorder soon reigned supreme. What hung on December was a paper line Barkly said he would maintain, and a landdrost who still sat at Bloemhof because London would not put a force west of it. [3]
Brand of the 3rd of January, the Commando of March, and Hamelberg of October — Orange Free State 1871
After his visit to the diamond-fields at the end of February and the beginning of March, Barkly touched at Bloemfontein on his way to the Lesuto. There he endeavoured to induce Brand to follow the example of Pretorius, and submit to the decision of arbitrators the right of the state to all the ground claimed by Arnot for Waterboer, and further to agree to the exclusive jurisdiction of British special magistrates over British subjects within the territory in dispute until the decision of the arbitrators should be made known. But to this the president and the executive council would in no wise consent. As regarded the Campbell district, they were willing to submit their right to it to the decision of either the president of the United States of America or the king of Holland, or they would dispose of their title on fair terms either to the Imperial or Cape Colonial Government, or they were prepared to exchange it for the district of Albania. Barkly would accept none of these proposals. In a letter to Brand, dated on the 28th of February, he stated that as long as the boundaries between the Orange Free State and the chief Waterboer remained in dispute, all acts performed under the authority and with the consent of the latter, within the limits mentioned by Hay, were, in the opinion of Her Majesty’s Government, of greater force and validity than those of the representatives of the Orange Free State. A few individuals then set the Free State authorities at defiance, upon which the president called out a commando to support the courts of law. On the 20th of March Barkly wrote to the president that his fixed determination was to repel force by force, and to protect Her Majesty’s subjects by every means in his power from all interference by the Free State authorities, whilst pursuing their lawful calling in the territory claimed by Waterboer, as long as the question of title to the territory was not disposed of by competent authority. Under the Act of the Cape Parliament, No. 3 of 1855, the governor was empowered to employ the frontier armed and mounted police within or without the colonial boundary as to him should seem meet. A troop under Commandant Bowker moved on to Klipdrift to support the special magistrate. The commando mattered because Brand would not sign as Pretorius had signed, and because Barkly now answered a Free State court with colonial police on the Vaal. [3]
Just before this the volksraad met in special session at Bloemfontein, for the purpose of discussing the perilous condition of the country. The members repudiated the assumption of the high commissioner that the Free State was actuated by any other than the most friendly feelings towards the British Government; at the same time they deprecated the treatment the Republic was receiving, and declined emphatically to submit their rights to a court of arbitration of which any of the judges should be nominated directly or indirectly by him. On the 5th of April they adopted a resolution to propose that the head of an independent foreign power be requested to give the desired decision as arbitrator, and to propose to the choice of the British Government his Majesty the Emperor of Germany, or his Majesty the King of the Netherlands, or the president of the United States of America, and that pending the said decision the jurisdiction of the Orange Free State over the disputed ground should be maintained. When this was communicated to the high commissioner, he replied that he was precluded from discussing the question further until the armed force of the Free State was recalled. The volksraad then resolved that the commando should be withdrawn, protesting at the same time that there never was any intention to oppose the British authorities, the object being to support the courts of law against resistance made in the name of Waterboer. Shortly afterwards Kimberley announced that the reference of South African disputes to the head of a foreign country could not be agreed to. On the 8th of March Barkly replied to Kimberley that it appeared to him that the British Government had gone too far to admit of its ceasing to support the cause of either Waterboer or the diggers. Kimberley then gave the high commissioner power to annex Waterboer’s territory, which he believed contained the principal diamond-fields, by a despatch dated on the 18th of May, containing a commission of Her Majesty issued on the preceding day: not without reluctance, but if the Cape Parliament would formally bind itself that the colony would undertake the responsibility of governing the territory, together with the entire maintenance of any force which might be necessary, such force not to consist of British troops. The royal commission mattered because Barkly’s power to proclaim was still conditional on a Cape law and on a finding that Waterboer was really entitled to the district — conditions the July divisions never quite met. [3]
During this time the correspondence had not ceased between Barkly and Brand. On the 18th of July the high commissioner informed the president that he held a commission under the royal sign manual, authorising him to accept the cession of territory offered by Waterboer, and to annex the same to the colony with such boundaries as he might see fit to proclaim; but that he felt extremely reluctant irrevocably to fix the boundaries in direct opposition to the claims set up by the Orange Free State, so long as the slightest chance existed of an amicable adjustment either by means of arbitration or otherwise. No solution of the difficulty was suggested, however, until the 3rd of October, when the president wrote, notifying that Advocate H. A. L. Hamelberg had been appointed plenipotentiary and diplomatic agent of the Orange Free State in England, and would bring the question of the true import of the second article of the convention of 1854 under the notice of Her Majesty’s Government. He offered to propose to the volksraad to submit all other matters in dispute to the arbitration of a board of 6 members, 3 to be chosen by the authorities of the Orange Free State and 3 by the high commissioner, with any of the heads of foreign governments previously mentioned as final umpire, in case the board could not agree upon a decision. This proposal was rejected by the high commissioner, who announced that after annexation he would consent to arbitration by a purely local court, but a foreign umpire was not admissible. Hamelberg, upon reaching London, was referred by the secretary of state for foreign affairs to the secretary of state for the colonies. The latter declined to recognise him as a diplomatic agent, and intimated that the high commissioner must be the regular channel of communication between Her Majesty’s Government and the Orange Free State. The intended seizure and annexation of the diamond-fields was not previously advertised to the world. October mattered because Brand’s last offer of a mixed board with a foreign umpire was refused before Keate signed, and because Hamelberg reached London as a plenipotentiary whom the colonial office would not receive. [3] [7]
In May provision was made by the volksraad for the appointment of landdrosts to the villages of Bethlehem and Rouxville, thus creating two new districts. Prosperity was now dawning on the Republic, after the series of arduous struggles which its citizens had gone through. Though the principal diamond-fields were still, in May, under Free State courts, an excellent market for farm produce of all kinds had already opened, and gold and silver money was becoming plentiful. Before the close of the year the bluebacks, or paper currency, rose to be worth 19 shillings and 6 pence in the pound. The public revenue was then at the rate of a little over 80000 pounds a year, and the expenditure was kept well within it, so that the loans were being paid off. Of the 43000 pounds in notes issued to meet the Basuto war expenses, 17000 were called in and destroyed before the next calendar. The memory of those who had laid down their lives for their country in the recent war with the Basuto tribe was still fresh. A monument was erected in Bloemfontein in remembrance of the brave men who had fallen. The monument was unveiled with befitting ceremony on Monday, the 29th of May, after religious service in the Dutch Reformed Church. Addresses were made by the state president, the chairman of the volksraad, and other men of note, one of the most stirring being by the clergyman of the English Church. May mattered because Bethlehem and Rouxville were new Free State districts while the same volksraad still collected licence money on the pans, and because the monument at Bloemfontein remembered a Basuto war that the Cape was, in the same month, preparing to take as a colonial charge. [3]
The 21st of October, Gilfillan of the 4th of November, and the Protest of December — Griqualand West 1871
On the 17th of October the Keate Award was published. The Free State was not concerned in it, but it gave Waterboer the north-eastern boundary which Arnot claimed for him, and one extremity of that boundary was Platberg on the Vaal. Four days later — the 21st of October — Barkly issued a series of proclamations, declaring the territory of Nicholas Waterboer part of the British dominions, making the laws of the Cape Colony applicable therein as far as circumstances would permit, establishing a high court of justice, making regulations for diamond digging, confirming the holders of land in their possession of it, and dividing the territory into the three magisterial districts of Klipdrift, Pniel, and Griquatown. The boundaries of the territory were laid down as, on the south the Orange river from Kheis to Ramah, on the east a line from Ramah to David’s Graf and thence to the summit of Platberg, on the north-east a line from the summit of Platberg to a point north of Boetsap; further, various points in the desert round to Kheis. The following officers were appointed: Advocate J. D. Barry to be recorder of the high court, Attorney J. C. Thompson to be public prosecutor, Arthur Tweed to be registrar and master, P. L. Buyskes to be sheriff, Campbell to be civil commissioner and resident magistrate of the district of Klipdrift, Francis Orpen to be civil commissioner and resident magistrate of the district of Griquatown, and Campbell, Thompson, and Bowker to be an executive committee to see that the instructions of the high commissioner were carried out. A magistrate was not appointed to the district of Pniel, in which the dry diggings were situated, as it was hoped that Truter, who was very popular with the diggers, would consent to continue his duties under the British Government. The 21st of October mattered because Platberg, a point on a Natal award to which Bloemfontein was not a party, now became the eastern corner of a British proclamation over farms the Free State courts had governed. [3]
The whole territory annexed to the British dominions received the name of Griqualand West. It was about 17800 square miles in extent. That part of it comprised between the Vaal river, the Vetberg line, and the line from Ramah to Platberg, over which the Free State courts had exercised jurisdiction, contained between 140 and 150 occupied farms. Over 200000 acres of ground in it were held under British titles, granted during the Sovereignty period. It contained also the whole of the reserves along the Vaal set apart by the Sovereignty Government for the use of the people of Jan Bloem, Scheel Kobus, David Danser, and Goliath Yzerbek, none of whom was ever dependent in any way upon Nicholas Waterboer or his father. It contained the Berlin station of Pniel. No Griquas were living within it. About 1000 Europeans, young and old, were residing on the farms. On the 4th of November a small party of the Cape frontier armed and mounted police took possession of the dry diggings, and hoisted the British flag. Instead of the enthusiasm with which Barkly anticipated this act would be received, the great majority of the diggers kept very quiet. There was no uproar, and on the other side no symptom of satisfaction shown except by a small party of blacks and a few white men not of the refined class, who followed the procession and cheered when the proclamations were read at the different camps. A protest was drawn up by Truter, and handed to Inspector Gilfillan, who commanded the police. On the 7th Brand published a formal protest, and ordered and enjoined all officers, burghers, and residents of the state to guard against any action which might lead to a collision, in the fullest confidence that the information and explanation which would be given to Her Majesty’s Government in England by the plenipotentiary would yet obtain redress. The 4th of November mattered because the flag went up on the pans without the enthusiasm Barkly had promised London, and because Truter’s protest was the Free State court’s answer on the ground itself. [3]
A British magistrate assumed duty at the dry diggings on the 16th of November, and on the same day Campbell and Thompson, on behalf of Barkly, gave Truter notice that they would prevent the continuation of magisterial and other duties by him. A prisoner charged with theft, who was in custody of the Free State police, was that afternoon rescued by the police under Gilfillan’s orders. In accordance with Brand’s instructions, the landdrost then sent in another protest, and on the 18th he retired to Bloemfontein. These acts were all approved and confirmed by the secretary of state in Her Majesty’s name, on the 8th of December, on which day a commission was issued appointing Barkly governor of Griqualand West. On the 4th of December the volksraad met in special session to consider what should be done. A very large proportion of the burghers were disposed to take up arms, even though defeat was certain, in order to draw the attention of European powers to what was taking place. Brand, who was doing all he possibly could to pacify the people, opened the session with an address of confidence that the government of England would do no injustice to the Orange Free State, but that the difficulties were solely to be ascribed to erroneous impressions: mention had been made of infringements of the territory of the natives in order to have wider scope for slave-dealing, and of the want of a regular government at the diamond-fields as a reason for adopting Waterboer, whereas nothing even remotely resembling slave-dealing existed there, and after the large increase of population the government of the state, by constituting Pniel a separate district and appointing a landdrost, had striven to meet the requirements of the diggers as fully as possible. Action so rash as war was overruled, and on the last day of the session it was agreed to publish a protest, and circulate it as widely as possible. The document, signed by F. P. Schnehage as chairman and Joh. Z. de Villiers as secretary, confirmed all the protests made up to that time by the state president against the proclamation of the 27th of October and the proceedings of the high commissioner, and likewise protested against the establishment of British supremacy over the Campbell grounds west of the Vaal. December mattered because Barkly was now governor of a separate territory the Cape Parliament had not annexed, and because Brand held his burghers to paper rather than to a war he knew they would lose. [3]
Though the principal diamond-fields were thus severed from the Free State, two mines remained within its limits: those on the farms Jagersfontein and Koffyfontein, both a long distance east of the line from Ramah to Platberg. The loss of the largest diamond-mines only affected the state treasury nominally, for the cost of government there absorbed the whole of the receipts. An excellent market for farm produce of all kinds remained, and the people of the Free State made good use of it. What hung on the line from Ramah to Platberg was not the Free State’s farm market: it was the name of the ground under the flag Gilfillan had hoisted, and the two lesser mines that still sat east of it under Bloemfontein courts. [3]
McCorkindale of the 1st of May, Button of the 8th of September, and the Constitution of November — South African Republic 1871
The final ratification of the Portuguese treaty of 24 clauses took place at Pretoria on the 10th of July. The delay had been occasioned by the arrival at Potchefstroom in December 1869 of a Portuguese diplomatic commission, under the presidency of the baron Carlos Pedro Barahona e Costa, governor of Quilimane. This commission proposed several supplementary articles, which, however, were ultimately rejected by the Portuguese Government. The treaty mattered because Delagoa Bay was the Republic’s hoped-for port that did not fly the English flag, and because the same year that cut the west by Keate confirmed a paper road to the east. After again visiting Great Britain and expending a vast amount of energy and all the resources that he could command, McCorkindale proceeded to Delagoa Bay to make a thorough inspection of the harbour and coast, and died of fever at Inyack Island on the 1st of May. He had located some 50 Scotch immigrants near Lake Chrissie in January 1867, in the district thereafter called New Scotland. The 1st of May mattered because the projector who had tried to fill that high country from Britain, and to open a road through Swaziland to the sea, now died on the coast he had gone to inspect. [3]
In the winter gold-bearing reefs were discovered in the district of Zoutpansberg. On the 8th of September Edward Button exhibited to the volksraad specimens of rich gold-bearing quartz found 9 miles south-east of Marabastad. The specimens mattered because Brand, declining a double presidency later in the year, pointed to those reefs as one reason Englishmen were now visiting the interior, and because Pretoria, reeling under Keate, now had gold in the north as well as diamonds lost in the west. In October the volksraad resolved that landdrosts should be stationed at the villages of Zeerust and Middelburg, thus creating new districts out of portions of the older ones. Zeerust, founded as a churchplace in 1868, became the seat of a landdrost in November. Middelburg, on the eastern side of the state, had previously been part of Lydenburg. Marico, as the new district of which Zeerust was the seat of magistracy, took in two long-settled field-cornetcies, one of which the Keate Award almost entirely cut off. October mattered because Pretoria laid out new magistracies on ground Keate had drawn a line across. [3]
To meet the difficulty that the president, according to the constitution, was required to be an elector of five years’ standing and a member of the Dutch Reformed Church, in November an act was passed by the volksraad amending the constitution. It provided that the president should be chosen by a majority of the burghers entitled to vote. He was to hold office for 5 years, unless he should resign sooner, or be dismissed for lawful reasons by the volksraad. He was required to be above 30 years of age, to be a member of a Protestant Church, and never to have been convicted of a dishonourable offence; but it was not necessary that he should be a burgher of the Republic at the time of his election. Anyone with the foregoing qualifications, who should receive requisitions signed by at least 100 qualified voters and published in the Staats Courant one month before the election, was to be eligible. Every burgher over 21 years of age resident in the country for 12 months, or having purchased burgher rights, was to be entitled to vote for a president. The voting was to be by ballot papers. The amendment mattered because the burghers, after Keate, wanted a man who could meet British officers in controversy on equal terms, and because such a man would have to be looked for beyond their own state. [3]
There was a strong party in favour of the election of Brand to be president of the South African Republic also. The programme of the leaders of this party was the close union of the two Republics, under one constitution if possible, and, if that could not be effected, under one president, leaving to each state its own constitution. Requisitions embodying these views in language more or less guarded were sent to Brand with over 1000 signatures attached to them. But that prudent statesman declined to allow himself to be put in nomination. Officially he replied that constitutional questions prevented him from accepting the requisitions; privately he communicated his true reasons. His was the part of the peacemaker. He pointed out that England would certainly regard the union of the two states under such circumstances as a menace, and that in face of the enormously rapid increase of the blacks which was taking place on every side, peace, friendship, the uttermost good will, ought to exist between white people in the country, no matter what nationality their ancestors were of. He had strong hope, also, that justice would ultimately be done to the Republics by the Imperial Government, for he believed that it was not from an inclination to be harsh and oppressive, but from ignorance of facts, that so many errors had been committed. What hung on Brand’s refusal was the chair Erasmus was holding only until an election could be held: the Free State president would not take Pretoria as well, and the constitution of November had opened that chair to a man who was not yet a burgher. [3]