South Africa and the Boer Wars

28.4.2: South Africa and the Boer Wars

Ethnic, political, and social tensions among European colonial powers, indigenous Africans, and English and Dutch settlers led to open conflict in a series of wars and revolts between 1879 and 1915, most notably the first and second Boer Wars. These would have lasting repercussions on the entire region of southern Africa.

Learning Objective

Explain the events of the Boer Wars and how they impacted the British role in South Africa

Key Points

  • The Transvaal Boer republic was forcefully annexed by Britain in 1877 as part of the attempt to consolidate the states of southern Africa under British rule.
  • Long-standing Boer (Dutch-speaking farmers) resentment turned into full-blown rebellion in the first Boer War, which broke out in 1880.
  • The conflict ended almost as soon as it began with a decisive Boer victory at Battle of Majuba Hill (February 1881), leading to the founding of the South African Republic.
  • The Second Boer War started on October 11, 1899, and ended on May 31, 1902. Great Britain defeated two Boer nations in South Africa: the South African Republic (Republic of Transvaal) and the Orange Free State.
  • The British were overconfident and under-prepared; the Boers were very well-armed and struck first, besieging Ladysmith, Kimberley, and Mafeking in early 1900 and winning important battles at Colenso, Magersfontein, and Stormberg.
  • Staggered, the British brought in large numbers of soldiers and fought back with overwhelming force, forcing the Boers to revert to guerrilla warfare.
  • The British solution was to set up complex nets of block houses, strong points, and barbed wire fences, partitioning off the entire conquered territory and relocating civilians into concentration camps. Many of the latter group died of disease, especially children, who mostly lacked immunity. This caused scandal in England.
  • The Boers were eventually defeated, leading to the absorption of South Africa into the British Empire as the Union of South Africa in 1910.

Key Terms

apartheid
A system of institutionalized racial segregation and discrimination in South Africa between 1948 and 1991, when it was abolished.
Boer
The Dutch and Afrikaans word for “farmer.” In South Africa, it was used to denote the descendants of the Dutch-speaking settlers of the eastern Cape frontier during the 18th century. For a time the Dutch East India Company controlled this area, but it was taken over by the United Kingdom.

South African Wars

Ethnic, political, and social tensions among European colonial powers, indigenous Africans, and English and Dutch settlers led to open conflict in a series of wars and revolts between 1879 and 1915 that would have lasting repercussions on the entire region of southern Africa. Pursuit of commercial empire as well as individual aspirations, especially after the discovery of diamonds (1867) and gold (1886), drove these developments.

The various wars of this era are usually studied as independent conflicts. They include the first and second Anglo-Boer War, the Anglo-Zulu War, the Basotho Gun War, the 9th Frontier War, and others. However, it is instructive also to see them as outbreaks in a far larger wave of change and conflict affecting the subcontinent,  beginning with the “Confederation Wars” of the 1870s and 80s; escalating with the rise of Cecil Rhodes and the struggle for control of gold and diamond resources; and leading up to the Second Anglo-Boer War and the Union of South Africa in 1910.

Background

The southern part of the African continent was dominated in the 19th century by a set of epic struggles to create a single unified state. British expansion into southern Africa was fueled by three prime factors: first, the desire to control the trade routes to India that passed around the Cape; second, the discovery in 1868 of huge mineral deposits of diamonds around Kimberley on the joint borders of the South African Republic (called the Transvaal by the British), the Orange Free State and the Cape Colony, and thereafter in 1886 in the Transvaal of a gold rush; and thirdly the race against other European colonial powers as part of general colonial expansion in Africa.

After the Battle of Blaauwberg, Britain had acquired the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa from the Dutch in 1815 during the Napoleonic Wars. Certain groups of Dutch-speaking settler farmers (“Boers”) resented British rule, even though British control brought some economic benefits.

The Trekboers were farmers gradually extending their range and territory with no agenda. The formal abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1834 led to more organized groups of Boer settlers attempting to escape British rule, some travelling as far north as modern-day Mozambique. The discovery of diamonds in 1867 near the Vaal River, some 550 miles northeast of Cape Town, ended the isolation of the Boers in the interior and changed South African history. The discovery triggered a diamond rush that attracted people from all over the world, turning Kimberley into a town of 50,000 within five years and drawing the attention of British imperial interests.

First Boer War

The First Boer War, also known as the First Anglo-Boer War or the Transvaal War, was fought from December 1880 until March 1881 and was the first clash between the British and the South African Republic Boers. It was precipitated by Sir Theophilus Shepstone, who annexed the South African Republic (Transvaal Republic) for the British in 1877. The British consolidated their power over most of the colonies of South Africa in 1879 after the Anglo-Zulu War, and attempted to impose an unpopular system of confederation on the region, which resulted in protests from Boers.

Continued British indifference to Boer protests and increasing demands placed on the Boers triggered an all-out rebellion in late 1880. The issue that finally brought the conflict to a head was the seizure of a farm wagon over tax dues. The Boers held that the British seizure was illegal because they had never recognized the annexation of the Transvaal. 5,000 Boers assembled at a farm on December 8 and began deliberating a course of action. On December 13 they proclaimed the Transvaal’s independence and intent to establish a republican government, raising the Vierkleur, the old republican flag, and beginning the “war of independence.”

The battles of Bronkhorstspruit, Laing’s Nek, Schuinshoogte, and Majuba Hill proved disastrous for the British as they were outmaneuvered and outperformed by the highly mobile and skilled Boer marksmen. With the British commander-in-chief of Natal, George Pomeroy Colley, killed at Majuba, and British garrisons under siege across the entire Transvaal, the British were unwilling to further involve themselves in a war which was already seen as lost. As a result, William Gladstone’s British government signed a truce on March 6, and in the final peace treaty on March 23, 1881, gave the Boers self-government in the South African Republic (Transvaal) under a theoretical British oversight.

Second Boer War

The Second Boer War took place from October 11, 1899 – May 31, 1902. The war was fought between the British Empire and the two independent Boer republics of the Orange Free State and the South African Republic (referred to as the Transvaal by the British). After a protracted, hard-fought war, the two independent republics lost and were absorbed into the British Empire.

The exact causes of the Second Anglo-Boer War in 1899 have been disputed ever since the events took place. Fault for the war has been placed on both sides. The Boers felt that the British intention was to again annex the Transvaal. Some feel that the British were coerced into war by the mining magnates, others that the British government manipulated the magnates into creating conditions that allowed the war to ignite. It appears that the British did not begin with the intention of annexation, but simply wanted to ensure that British strength and the regional economic and political stability of the British Empire remained unchanged. The British worried about popular support for the war and wanted to push the Boers to make the first move toward actual hostilities. This occurred when the Transvaal issued an ultimatum on October 9 for the British to withdraw all troops from their borders and recall their reinforcements, or they would “regard the action as a formal declaration of war.”

In all, the war cost around 75,000 lives — 22,000 British soldiers (7,792 battle casualties, the rest through disease), 6,000-7,000 Boer Commandos, 20,000-28,000 Boer civilians (mostly women and children due to disease in concentration camps), and an estimated 20,000 black Africans, both Boer and British allies alike.

The Boers fought bitterly against the British, refusing to surrender for years despite defeat. They reverted to guerrilla warfare under generals Louis Botha, Jan Smuts, Christiaan de Wet, and Koos de la Rey. As guerrillas without uniforms, the Boer fighters easily blended into the farmlands, which provided hiding places, supplies, and horses. The British solution was to set up complex nets of block houses, strong points, and barbed wire fences, partitioning off the entire conquered territory. The civilian farmers were relocated into concentration camps, where very large proportions died of disease, especially the children, who mostly lacked immunities.

The last of the Boers surrendered in May 1902 and the war ended with the Treaty of Vereeniging in the same month. The war resulted in the creation of the Transvaal Colony which in 1910 was incorporated into the Union of South Africa. The treaty ended the existence of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State as Boer republics and placed them within the British Empire.

The British rule of South Africa would have lasting impact throughout the 20th century. Among other harsh segregationist laws, including denial of voting rights to black people, the Union parliament enacted the 1913 Natives’ Land Act, which earmarked only eight percent of South Africa’s available land for black occupancy. White people, who constituted 20 percent of the population, held 90 percent of the land. The Land Act would form a cornerstone of legalized racial discrimination for the next nine decades, which reached its height during the period of apartheid from 1948-1991.

Photo of Boer soldiers, dressed in civilian clothes, armed with rifles and ammunition.

Boer Commandos: As guerrillas without uniforms, the Boer fighters easily blended into the farmlands, which provided hiding places, supplies, and horses.

Attributions