CHAPTER XIX.

Paul Kruger and the Struggle for Dominion in South Africa.

At the close of the nineteenth century, not the least important among the international questions that were disturbing the nations was the controversy between the English and the Boers in South Africa, concerning the political privileges of the Uitlanders, or foreign gold miners of the Transvaal. A consideration of this subject obliges us to go back to the beginning of the century and review the whole history of colonization in South Africa.

[=The Dutch Settlement in South Africa=]

[=Great Britain in Cape Colony and the Emigration of the Boers=]

That region belongs by right of settlement to the Dutch, who founded a colony in the region of Capetown as early as 1650, and in the succeeding century and a half spread far and wide over the territory, their farms and cattle ranches occupying a very wide area. The first interference with their peaceful occupation came in 1795, when the English took possession. In 1800, however, they restored the colony to Holland, which held it in peaceable ownership until the Congress of Vienna, in 1815, came to disturb the map of Europe, and in a measure that of the world. As part of the distribution of spoils among the great nations, Cape Colony was ceded to Great Britain. Since then that country, which has a great faculty of taking hold and a very poor faculty of letting go, has held possession, and has pushed steadily northward until British South Africa is now a territory of enormous extent, stretching northward to the borders of the Congo Free State and to Lake Tanganyika.

This vast territory has not been gained without active and persistent aggression, from which the Dutch settlers, known as Boers, and the African natives have alike suffered. In truth, the Boers found the oppression of British rule an intolerable burden early in the century, and in 1840 a great party of them gave up their farms and "treked" northward--that is, traveled with their ox-teams and belongings--eager to get away from British control. Here they founded a republic of their own on the river Vaal, and settled down again to peace and prosperity.

[=A Huntsman's Paradise=]

The country in which they settled was a huntsman's paradise. On the great plains of the High Veldt or plateau (from 4,000 to 7,000 feet in height) antelopes of several species roamed in tens of thousands. In the valleys and plains of the low country the giraffe, elephant, buffalo, lion and other large animals were plentiful. The rivers were full of alligators and hippopotami. Here the newcomers found abundance of food, and a land of such pastoral wealth that the farm animals they brought increased abundantly. For years a steady stream of Boers continued to enter and settle in this land, deserting their farms in the British territory, harnessing their cattle to their long, lumbering wagons, and bringing with them food for the journey, and a good supply of powder and lead for use in their tried muskets. Their active hunting experience brought them in time to rank among the best marksmen in the world.

[=The Boers Drive Out the Blacks=]

They had not alone wild animals to deal with, but wild men as well. Fierce tribes of natives possessed the land, and with these the Boers were soon at war. A number of sanguinary battles were fought, with much slaughter on both sides, but in the end the black men were forced to give way to the whites and cross the Limpopo River into Matabeleland, to the north, which their descendants still occupy. Others of the natives were subdued and continued to live with the Boers. The latter were essentially pioneers. They did not till the soil, but divided up the land into great grazing ranges, covered with their abundant herds. And they had no instinct for trade, what little commerce the country possessed falling into British hands.

[=The South African Republic Founded=]

Two settlements were made, one between the Orange and the Vaal rivers, and the other north of the Vaal. The former had much trouble with the British previous to 1854, in which year it was given its independence. It is known as the Orange River Free State. The latter was given the name of Transvaal, and originally formed four separate republics, but in 1860 these united into one under the title of the South African Republic. The settlers were for a time covered with the shadow of British sovereignty, the claims of the British extending up to the 25th degree of latitude. But this claim was only on paper, and in 1852 it was withdrawn, Great Britain formally renouncing all rights over the country north of the Vaal. And for years afterwards the Boers lived on here free and undisturbed.

[=The Discovery of Diamonds=]

But their country possessed other wealth than that of pasture lands, and its hidden treasures were to yield them no end of trouble in the years to come. Under their soil lay untold riches, which in time brought hosts of unruly strangers to disturb their pastoral peace. The trouble began in 1867, when diamonds were found in the vicinity of the Vaal River, and a rush of miners began to invade this remote district. But the diamond mines lay west of the borders of the Transvaal, and brought rather a threatening situation than immediate disturbance to the Boer state. It was the later discovery of gold on Transvaal territory that eventually overthrew the quiet content of the pastoral community.

[=Shepstone's Annexation of the Transvaal=]

In 1877 the first intrusion came. The British were now abundant in Griqualand West, the diamond region, and on the Transvaal borders lay a host of native enemies, chief among them being the warlike Zulus, led by the bold and daring Cetewayo. Only fear of the British kept this truculent chief at rest. Meanwhile the Boer Republic had fallen into a financial collapse. Its frequent wars with the natives had exhausted its revenues and thrown it deeply into debt. A serious crisis seemed impending. On the plea of preventing this, Sir Theophilus Shepstone, secretary of Natal, made his way to Pretoria, the capital of the republic, and issued a proclamation annexing the Transvaal country to Great Britain. The public treasury he found to be almost empty, it containing only twelve shillings and six pence, and even part of this was counterfeit coin. His act was arbitrary and unwarranted, and while the Boers submitted, they did so with sullen anger, quietly biding their time.

[=The Zulu War=]

In the following year the Zulus, who had been threatening the Boers, broke out into war with the British, and with such energy that the whites were at first repulsed by the impetuous Cetewayo and his warlike followers. In this onset Prince Napoleon, son of the deposed emperor Louis Napoleon, who served as a volunteer in the British ranks, was killed. The British soon retrieved the disaster, and in the end decisively defeated the Zulus, capturing their king, who was taken as a prisoner to London. After the Zulu war Sir Garnet Wolseley led his troops into the Transvaal, telling the protesting Boers that "so long as the sun shone and the Vaal River flowed to the sea the Transvaal would remain British territory." Other acts of interference, and the attempt of the British officials to tax the Boers, added to their exasperation, and at the end of 1880 they resolved to fight for the independence of which they had been robbed. Wolseley had before this left the territory, and the troops had been reduced to a few detachments, scattered here and there.

[=War With the Boers=]

The first hostile action took place on December 20, 1880, a detachment of the Ninety-fourth regiment, on its march to Pretoria, being waylaid by a body of about 150 armed Boers, who ordered them to stop. Colonel Anstruther curtly replied: "I go to Pretoria; do as you like." The Boers did more than he liked. They closed in on his columns and opened on them so deadly a fire that the British fell at a frightful rate. Out of 259 in all, 155 had fallen dead or wounded in ten minutes' time. Then the colonel, himself seriously wounded, ordered a surrender, and the Boers at once became as friendly as they had just been hostile. They had lost only two killed and five wounded.

As soon as news of this disaster reached Natal, Colonel Sir George Colley, in command at Natal, marched against the Boers without waiting for reinforcements, the force at his disposal being but 1,200 men. He paid dearly for his temerity and contempt of the enemy. On January 28, 1881, he was encountered by the Boers at a place called Lang's Nek, and met with a bloody defeat. In about a week afterwards another engagement took place, in which the British lost 139 officers and men, while the whole Boer loss was 14. Practised hunters, their fire was so deadly that almost every shot found its mark.

[=The Stand at Majuba Hill=]

The war was going badly for the British. It was soon to go worse. Receiving reinforcements, Colley made a stand in an elevated position known as Majuba Hill, whose summit was 2,000 feet above the positions held by the Boers and its ascent so steep and rugged that the soldiers had to climb it in single file. Near the top of the ascent the grassy slopes were succeeded by boulders, crags, and loose stones, over which the weary men had to drag themselves on hands and knees. In this way about 400 men gained the summit on the morning of February 27th. The top of the hill was a saucer-shaped plateau, about 1,200 yards wide, with an elevated rim within which the British were posted.

The place seemed impregnable, but the daring Boers did not hesitate in the attack. A force of the older men were detailed to keep on the watch below--picked shots ready to fire on any soldier who should appear on the rim of the hill. The younger men began to climb the slopes, under cover of the shrub and stones. The assault was made on every side, and the defenders, too weak in numbers to hold the whole edge of the plateau, had to be moved from point to point to meet and attempt to thwart the attacks of the Boers. Slowly and steadily the hostile skirmishers clambered upwards from cover to cover, while the supports below protected their movement with a steady and accurate fire. During the hours from dawn to noon the British did not suffer very heavily, notwithstanding the accuracy of the Boer marksmanship. But the long strain of the Boers' close shooting began to tell on the _morale_ of the British soldiers, and when the enemy at length reached the crest and opened a deadly fire at short range the officers had to exert themselves to the utmost in the effort to avert disaster. The reserves stationed in the central dip of the plateau, out of reach until then of the enemy's fire, were ordered up in support of the fighting line. Their want of promptitude in obeying this order did not augur well, and soon after reaching the front they wavered, and then gave way. The officers temporarily succeeded in rallying them, but the "bolt" had a bad effect. To use the expression of an eye-witness, a "funk became established."

[=The Boers Storm the British Camp=]

It was struggled against very gallantly by the officers, who, sword and revolver in hand, encouraged the soldiers by word and by action. A number of men, unable to confront the deadly fire of the Boers, had huddled for cover behind the rocky reef crossing the plateau, and no entreaty or upbraiding on the part of their officers would induce them to face the enemy. What then happened one does not care to tell in detail. Everything connected with this disastrous enterprise went to naught, as if there had been a curse on it. Whatever may have been the object intended, the force employed was absurdly inadequate. Instead of being homogeneous, it consisted of separate detachments with no link or bond of union--a disposition of troops which notoriously has led to more panics than any other cause that the annals of regimental history can furnish. Fragments of proud and distinguished regiments fresh from victory on another continent shared in the panic of the Majuba, seasoned warriors behaving no better than mere recruits. To the calm-pulsed philosopher a panic is an academic enigma. No man who has seen it--much less shared in it--can ever forget the infectious madness of panic-stricken soldiers.

[=The Victory of the Boers=]

In the sad ending, with a cry of fright and despair the remnants of the hapless force turned and fled, regardless of the efforts of the officers to stem the rearward rush. Sir George Colley lay dead, shot through the head just before the final flight. A surgeon and two hospital attendants caring for the wounded at the bandaging place in the dip of the plateau were shot down, probably inadvertently. The elder Boers promptly stopped the firing in that direction. But there was no cessation of the fire directed on the fugitives. On them the bullets rained accurately and persistently. The Boers, now disdaining cover, stood boldly on the edge of the plateau, and, firing down upon the scared troops, picked off the men as if shooting game. The slaughter would have been yet heavier but for the entrenchment which had been made by the company of the Ninety-second, left overnight on the Nek, between the Inquela and the Majuba. Captain Robertson was joined at dawn from camp by a company of the Sixtieth, under Captain Thurlow. Later there arrived at the entrenchment on the Nek a troop of the Fifteenth Hussars, under the command of Captain Sullivan. After midday the sound of the firing on the Majuba rapidly increased, and men were seen running down the hill towards the laager, one of whom brought in the tidings that the Boers had captured the position, that most of the troops were killed or prisoners, and that the general was dead with a bullet through his head.

[=A Panic Flight=]

Wounded men presently came pouring in, and were attended by Surgeon-Major Cornish. The laager was manned by the companies, and outposts were thrown out, which were soon driven in by large bodies of mounted Boers, under whose fire men fell fast. Robertson dispatched the rifle company down the ravine towards the camp, and a little later followed with the company of the Ninety-second under a murderous fire from the Boers, who had reached and occupied the entrenchment. The Highlanders lost heavily in the retreat, and Surgeon-Major Cornish was killed. The surviving fugitives from Majuba and from the laager finally reached camp under cover of the artillery fire from it, which ultimately stopped the pursuit. With the consent of the Boer leaders a temporary hospital was established at a farm-house near the foot of the mountain, and throughout the cold and wet night the medical staff never ceased to search for and bring in the wounded. Sir George Colley's body was brought into camp on March 1st, and buried there with full military honors.

[=Peace Declared with British Suzerainty=]

Of 650 officers and men who took part in this disastrous affair the loss in killed, wounded, and prisoners was 283; the Boers had one man killed and five wounded. Majuba Hill was enough for the British, fighting as they were in an unjust cause. An armistice was agreed upon, followed by a treaty of peace on March 23d. Large reinforcements had been sent out, which would have given the British an army of 20,000 against the 8,000 Boers, capable of bearing arms; but to fight longer in defence of an arbitrary invasion against such brave defenders of their homes and their rights, did not appeal to the conscience of Mr. Gladstone, and he lost no time in bringing the war to an end. By the terms of the treaty the Boers were left free to govern themselves as they would, they acknowledging the queen as suzerain of their country, with control of its foreign relations.

[=The Gold Diggings of the Transvaal=]

The next important event in the history of the Transvaal was the exploitation of its gold mines. Gold was discovered there soon after the opening of the diamond mines, but not under very promising conditions. It exists in a conglomerate rock, whose beds extend over an area of seventy by forty miles, and through a depth of from two to twenty feet; but years passed before the richness in metal of these rocks was discovered, and it was not until after the Boer war that mining fairly began. No one in his wildest dreams foresaw that these "banket" beds would in time yield gold to the value of more than $60,000,000 a year. The yield of the diamond mines was also enormous, and these two incitements brought a steady stream of new settlers to that region, destined before many years greatly to outnumber the sturdy farmers and herders of Dutch descent.

[=The Career of Cecil Rhodes=]

In the vicinity of the gold mines, not far from Pretoria, the Boer capital, rose the mining city of Johannesburg, which now has a population of more than 100,000 souls, of whom half are European miners and nearly all the remainder are natives. The great event in the history of the diamond mines was the advent thither of Cecil Rhodes. This remarkable man, the son of a country parson in England, who was ordered to South Africa for the benefit of his failing lungs, displayed such enterprise and ability that he soon became the leading figure in the diamond mining industry, organizing a company that controlled the mines, and accumulating an immense fortune.

This accomplished, he entered actively into South African politics, and was not long in immensely extending the dominion of Great Britain in that region of the earth. He obtained from Lord Salisbury, prime minister of Great Britain, a royal charter giving him the right to occupy and govern the great territory lying between the Limpopo River on the south and the Zambesi on the north, and extending far to the north and the west of the South African Republic. With an expedition of a thousand men, volunteers from the Transvaal and the Cape Colony, Rhodes marched north through a country filled with armed Zulus,--the best fighting stuff in Africa,--and reached the spot where now stands the flourishing town of Fort Salisbury without firing a shot or losing a man. Here gold mines were opened, the resources of the country developed, and within three years as many important townships were founded and settled.

[=War With the Matabeles=]

Not until July, 1893, did trouble with the natives arise. Then a rupture took place with the Matabele chief, Lobengula, who sent against the whites powerful bands of his dreaded Zulu warriors, numbering in all over 20,000 armed blacks. These were met by Dr. Jameson, the administrator of the chartered territory, and dealt with so vigorously and skilfully that in two months the power of the Matabeles was at an end, their army was practically annihilated, their great kraals were occupied, and their king was driven from his capital into the desert, where he died two months later. Thus Cecil Rhodes added to the dominion of Great Britain a territory as large as France and Germany, very fertile and healthful, and rich in gold and other metals.

[=The Domain of the South African Company=]

Zambesia--or Rhodesia, as it is often called--now extends far to the north of the Zambesi River, being bordered on the north by the Congo Free State and Lake Tanganyika, and on the east by Lake Nyassa, and embracing the heart of South Africa. This territory was chartered in 1889 by the British South Africa Company, with Cecil Rhodes, then premier of the Cape Colony, as its managing director and practical creator.

[=What the Foreigners Brought to the Transvaal=]

The rapid development of British interests in South Africa, the acquisition of territory in great part surrounding the South African Republic,--which was completely cut off from the sea by British and Portuguese territory,--and the growth of a large foreign population on the soil of the republic itself, could not fail to be a source of great annoyance to the Boers, who deeply mistrusted their new neighbors. Their effort to get away from the British had been a failure. They were surrounded and overrun by them. It is true, the coming of the gold miners had been a great boon to the Boer in one way. From having an empty treasury, he had now an overflowing one. The tax on the gold product had made the government rich. The foreigners had also brought the railway, the electric light, the telegraph, cheap and abundant articles of every-day use, newspapers, schools, and other appendages of civilization, but it is doubtful if these were as welcome to the Boers as the cash contribution, since they tended to break up their simple, patriarchal style of living and destroy their time-honored customs.

[=Paul Kruger and the Uitlanders=]

The question that particularly troubled the Boer mind was a political one. Paul Kruger, the president of the republic, was a man of remarkable character, an astute statesman, a shrewd politician, with an iron will and keen judgment, a personage strikingly capable of dealing with a disturbing situation. While ignorant in book lore, he had associated with him as secretary of state an educated Hollander, Dr. Leyds by name, one of the ablest and shrewdest statesmen in South Africa. The pair of them were a close match for the bold and aspiring Cecil Rhodes, then premier of the Cape Colony. The difficulty they had to deal with was the following: The _Uitlander_(Outlander or foreign) element in the republic had grown so enormously as far to outnumber the Dutch. The country presented the anomaly of a minority of 15,000 ignorant and unprogressive Dutch burghers ruling a majority of four or five times their number of educated, wealthy and prosperous aliens, who, while possessing the most valuable part of the territory, were given no voice in its government. They were not only deprived of legislative functions in the country at large, but also of municipal functions in the city of their own creation, and they demanded in vain a charter that would enable them to control and improve their own city. President Kruger, fearing to have his government overwhelmed by these Anglo-Saxon strangers, sternly determined that they should have no political foothold in his state until after a long residence, foreseeing that if they were given the franchise on easy terms they would soon control the state. In this sense the gold which was making them rich seemed a curse to the Boers, since it threatened to bring them again under the dominion of the hated Englishman.

[=The Jameson Raid=]

In 1895 the state of affairs reached a critical point. The British in Matabeleland, north of the Transvaal, were in warm sympathy with their brethren in Johannesburg, and between them a plot was laid to overthrow Kruger and his people. An outbreak took place in Johannesburg, led by Colonel F. W. Rhodes, brother of Cecil Rhodes, by whom it was thought to have been instigated. It was quickly followed by an invasion from Matabeleland, led by Dr. L. S. Jameson, Cecil Rhodes' lieutenant in that region. The movement was a hasty and ill-considered one. The invaders were met by the bold Boers, armed with their unerring rifles, were surrounded and forced to surrender, and their leaders were put on trial for their lives.

Paul Kruger, however, was shrewd enough not to push the matter to extremities. Jameson and his confederates were set at liberty and allowed to return to England, where they were tried, convicted of invading a friendly country and imprisoned--Cecil Rhodes going free. This daring man soon after suppressed an extensive revolt of the Matabeles, and gained the reputation of designing to found a great British nationality in South Africa. At a later date he devised the magnificent scheme of building a railroad throughout the whole length of Africa, from Cairo to Cape Colony, and threw himself into this ambitious enterprise with all his accustomed energy and organizing capacity.

[=The Demands of the Uitlanders=]

The victory of the Boers over Jameson and his raiders did not bring to an end the strained relations in Johannesburg. The demand of the Uitlanders for political rights and privileges grew more earnest and insistant as time went on, and the British government, on the basis of its suzerainty, began to take a hand in it. The right to vote, under certain stringent conditions as to period of residence and declaration of intention to become citizens, was accorded by the Boer government, but was far from satisfactory to the foreign residents, who demanded the suffrage under less rigorous conditions.

In 1899 the state of affairs became critical, England taking a more decided stand, and strongly pressing her claim to a voice in the status of British residents under her suzerainty--despite the fact that the latter gave her no right to interfere in the domestic affairs of the state. Joseph Chamberlain, secretary of state for the colonies, demanded a more equitable arrangement than that existing, and his insistence led to a conference between the Boer authorities and those of Cape Colony. But President Kruger refused to yield to the full demands made upon him, while the concessions which he offered were not satisfactory to the British cabinet.

Negotiations went on during the summer and early autumn of 1899, but at the same time both sides were actively preparing for war, and Great Britain had begun to send large contingents of troops to South Africa. The state of indecision came to a sudden end on October 10th. President Kruger apparently fearing that Joseph Chamberlain, who conducted the negotiations, was deceiving him, and seeking delay until he could land an overwhelming force in South Africa, sent a sudden ultimatum to the British cabinet. They were bidden to remove the troops which threatened the borders of his state before five o'clock of the next day or accept war as the alternative.

Such a mandate from a weak to a strong state was not likely to be complied with. The troops were not removed, and the Boers promptly crossed the borders into Natal on the east and Cape Colony on the west. The Orange River Free State had joined the South African Republic in its attitude of hostility, and the British on the borders found themselves outnumbered and outgeneraled. The towns of Mafeking and Kimberley on the west were closely besieged, and on the east the outlying troops were driven back on Ladysmith, where General White, the British commander, met with a severe repulse, losing two entire regiments as prisoners.

Meanwhile General Buller, the British commander-in-chief, had reached Cape Town and a powerful army was on the ocean, and it was widely felt that the successes of the Boers were but preliminaries to a desperate struggle whose issue only time could decide.