South African Independence?
Hi! Marlo here. You’ve probably heard of Nelson Mandela, the first Black president of South Africa. That land – also called Mzansi – has one of the longest histories of any modern country. But we’re going to look at a very small snippet of that history, between 1800 and 1918. This period saw the British conquer and subjugate the entire southern end of the African continent and unify it into a Dominion of the British Empire. Note that I’ll be simplifying a lot, and that this post will discuss slavery, imperialism, apartheid, and ethnic cleansing.
History
First, a basic background. The oldest known people groups in South Africa are the Khoe–Kwadi, Kx’a, and Taa–ǃKwi peoples – collectively referred to as the Khoisān. The oldest groups among them, the Sān, have lived in the southwestern deserts and grasslands of Africa for over 100,000 years. Their nomadic, pastoral lifestyle was interrupted by the Bantu Expansion between 3,000 and 1,000 years ago. This was a series of migrations of Africans across the continent, including all the way to its southern shores. The Nguni peoples developed from Bantu populations in southern Africa, and would eventually give rise to groups like the Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho, and Swati.
The Dutch began colonizing in the 1650s, building Kaapstad, or Cape Town, and enacting massacres on the Khoisān people of the area. They expanded and built plantations in the area’s mediterranean climate. The Dutch East India Company, or VOC, brought slaves from Malaysia, Indonesia, and Madagascar. Some Dutch and French men had children with enslaved women, giving rise to the Coloured population. They spoke a version of Dutch that diverged from its mother tongue, eventually becoming Afrikaans. Far to the east, the Zulu kingdom, or KwaZulu, was founded by Zulu I kaMalandela in 1709.
Now. Onto our focus. The end of the 1700s and beginning of the 1800s saw the British take over the Dutch Cape Colony. They conducted cattle raids on the Xhosa people, who still live to the east of the Cape region. While they took control, they allowed Dutch laws and elite landholders to keep their power. But a number of Dutch colonists – many of them religious and/or working-class farmers – migrated past the boundary of British control. Called the Voortrekkers at first, these people came to be known as the Boers, or “farmers”. In the “Great Trek”, many migrated into Nguni land, include the territory of the Zulu people.
The 1820s saw a period called the Mfecane or Difaqane. Instigated by Shaka, the king of KwaZulu, this was a period of expansion for the Zulu Kingdom and a scattering of peoples in new Zulu territory. This phenomenon brought a number of peoples into conflict with groups of Boers on the trek. Upon reaching land further inland, many Boer groups set up “Boer Republics”, some of which were extremely religious in nature. These included the South African Republic, or Transvaal, the Orange Free State, and Natalia. There were wars with the AmaZulu (Zulu people), BaSotho, AmaNdebele, and BaPedi.
The British began to focus on the region in the 1840s, expanding the British Cape Colony. They tasked the BaSotho, led by King Moshoeshoe, with countering Boer expansion. The Cape Colony effectively became self-governing by the 1870s. Its elections were highly unique because, unlike the Boer Republics, elections were not based on race.
Diamonds were discovered in the 1860s, and mining magnates like Cecil John Rhodes profited off of the diamond mines, which were worked by Black Africans in a system barely removed from slavery. Similarly, gold was discovered in the Witwatersrand region in 1886, which would result in the founding of the highland city of Johannesburg. In the 1880s, King Cetshwayo of the Zulu attempted to make peace with the British, to no avail.
The Anglo-Boer Wars were fought between Black South Africans, Boers, and British forces. These two wars were long. They were instigated by the British trying to annex Boer republics into the empire. The first began with a rebellion led by a Boer politician named Paul Kruger, and ended a year later with a Boer victory. Notably, no Black Africans won anything.
But the British had investments in South Africa in the form of literal mountains of gold and diamonds. In 1899, the Second Anglo-Boer War broke out. The British built concentration camps to hold Boers; by the end of the war, 26,000 White women and children had died in them; at least 17,182 Black people are known to have died in camps in the Cape colony, but Black deaths were often not recorded. The British conscripted soldiers from across their empire. Black people who fought on both sides were typically dumped in unmarked graves. Fighting only died down in 1902, after 2 years and 7 months of fighting.
Immediately after the war, Britain set about unifying the Boer Republics and incorporating them into an imperial dominion alongside the Cape Colony. In 1909, the the Cape Colony, Natal, Transvaal, and Orange Free State were made one nation, without any Black South Africans being consulted, that I know of. Everything came to be done in the name of the British crown. Years of negotiations between Boers and the British led to the creation of racist laws. Unlike in the Cape Colony, there was no race-blind voting; Black people were excluded from suffrage. In 1913, the Natives’ Land Act set up the foundations for apartheid, allocating only 8% of the new nation’s land area for its 68% Black population, and 90% of the land for its 22% White population.
South Africa’s full independence would come in 1961, when it fully left the British Empire. By that point, apartheid was in full swing, and the nation would become a segregated, hyper-racist police state until its Nationalist government fell apart in the beginning of the 1990s.First, a basic background. The oldest known people groups in South Africa are the Khoe–Kwadi, Kx’a, and Taa–ǃKwi peoples – collectively referred to as the Khoisān. The oldest groups among them, the Sān, have lived in the southwestern deserts and grasslands of Africa for over 100,000 years. Their nomadic, pastoral lifestyle was interrupted by the Bantu Expansion between 3,000 and 1,000 years ago. This was a series of migrations of Africans across the continent, including all the way to its southern shores. The Nguni peoples developed from Bantu populations in southern Africa, and would eventually give rise to groups like the Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho, and Swati.
The Dutch began colonizing in the 1650s, building Kaapstad, or Cape Town, and enacting massacres on the Khoisān people of the area. They expanded and built plantations in the area’s mediterranean climate. The Dutch East India Company, or VOC, brought slaves from Malaysia, Indonesia, and Madagascar. Some Dutch and French men had children with enslaved women, giving rise to the Coloured population. They spoke a version of Dutch that diverged from its mother tongue, eventually becoming Afrikaans. The Zulu kingdom, or KwaZulu, was founded by Zulu I kaMalandela, in 1709.
Now. Onto our focus. The end of the 1700s and beginning of the 1800s saw the British take over the Dutch Cape Colony. They conducted cattle raids on the Xhosa people, who still live to the east of the Cape region. While they took control, they allowed Dutch laws and elite landholders to keep their power. But a number of Dutch colonists – many of them religious and/or working-class farmers – migrated past the boundary of British control. Called the Voortrekkers at first, these people came to be known as the Boers, or “farmers”. In the “Great Trek”, many migrated into Nguni land, include the territory of the Zulu people.
The 1820s saw a period called the Mfecane or Difaqane. Instigated by Shaka, the king of KwaZulu, this was a period of expansion for the Zulu Kingdom and a scattering of peoples in new Zulu territory. This phenomenon brought a number of peoples into conflict with groups of Boers on the trek. Upon reaching land further inland, many Boer groups set up “Boer Republics”, some of which were extremely religious in nature. These included the South African Republic, or Transvaal, the Orange Free State, and Natalia. There were wars with the AmaZulu (Zulu people), BaSotho, AmaNdebele, and BaPedi.
The British began to focus on the region in the 1840s, expanding the British Cape Colony. They tasked the BaSotho, led by King Moshoeshoe, with countering Boer expansion. The Cape Colony effectively became self-governing by the 1870s. Its elections were highly unique because, unlike the Boer Republics, elections were not based on race.
Diamonds were discovered in the 1860s, and mining magnates like Cecil John Rhodes profited off of the diamond mines, which were worked by Black Africans in a system barely removed from slavery. Similarly, gold was discovered in the Witwatersrand region in 1886, which would result in the founding of the highland city of Johannesburg. In the 1880s, King Cetshwayo of the Zulu attempted to make peace with the British, to no avail.
The Anglo-Boer Wars were fought between Black South Africans, Boers, and British forces. These two wars were long. They were instigated by the British trying to annex Boer republics into the empire. The first began with a rebellion led by a Boer politician named Paul Kruger, and ended a year later with a Boer victory. Notably, no Black Africans won anything.
But the British had investments in South Africa in the form of literal mountains of gold and diamonds. In 1899, the Second Anglo-Boer War broke out. The British built concentration camps to hold Boers; by the end of the war, 26,000 White women and children had died in them; at least 17,182 Black people are known to have died in camps in the Cape colony, but Black deaths were often not recorded. The British conscripted soldiers from across their empire. Black people who fought on both sides were typically dumped in unmarked graves. Fighting only died down in 1902, after 2 years and 7 months of fighting.
Immediately after the war, Britain set about unifying the Boer Republics and incorporating them into an imperial dominion alongside the Cape Colony. In 1909, the the Cape Colony, Natal, Transvaal, and Orange Free State were made one nation, without any Black South Africans being consulted, that I know of. Everything came to be done in the name of the British crown. Years of negotiations between Boers and the British led to the creation of racist laws. Unlike in the Cape Colony, there was no race-blind voting; Black people were excluded from suffrage. In 1913, the Natives’ Land Act set up the foundations for apartheid, allocating only 8% of the new nation’s land area for its 68% Black population, and 90% of the land for its 22% White population.
South Africa’s full independence would come in 1961, when it fully left the British Empire. By that point, apartheid was in full swing, and the nation would become a segregated, hyper-racist police state until its Nationalist government fell apart in the beginning of the 1990s.
Conclusions
I’ll be frank with you. I’ve been to South Africa, and learned all of these things when I went. And so, when I was asked to write a blog post about a country that gained independence from Britain, my first thought was “Oh, South Africa, of course!”. I maintain it was a good history to talk about, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy, or that it feels triumphant.
History – especially anything that involves the brutal horrors of the British Empire – is messy, especially for South Africa. Altruism is not a common sight in South African history books, and few things come with glorious solutions or simple happy endings.
The point of this post was originally to talk about an independence day that is not July 4th. But South Africa’s true independence day was not May 31, 1961, when 52.3% of White voters decided to make South Africa a “Republic for the Union”. Its real independence day that is celebrated to this day is April 27, 1994, when apartheid ended. That’s because real freedom didn’t come when a far-away monarch was technically cast off by White oppressors; it came when everyone in the country could freely vote.
So let’s think about what “freedom” really means.
References
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