GAME PROTECTION IN THE TRANSVAAL .l B"'+.t:.-:i ··1-u 1 9r:-_-~6 by ELIZABETH JANE CARRUTHERS University of Cape Town A Thesis Presented in the Department of History, University of Cape Town, in Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 1988 The copyright of this thesis vests in the author. No quotation from it or information derived from it is to be published without full acknowledgement of the source. The thesis is to be used for private study or non- commercial research purposes only. Published by the University of Cape Town (UCT) in terms of the non-exclusive license granted to UCT by the author. University of Cape Town ( i ) TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF MAPS ( i i ) ABBREV I AT IONS ( i ii ) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ( i V) ABSTRACT (vi) CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER 2 HUNTERS, SETTLERS AND GAME PROTECTION TO 1858 23 CHAPTER 3 TRANSVAAL HUNTING LEGISLATION, 1858 TO 1881 52 CHAPTER 4 THE PONGOLA GAME RESERVE AND THE GAME LAW, 1882 TD 1891 96 CHAPTER 5 THE EXPANSION OF PROTECTIONIST POLICY, 1892 TD 1899 141 CHAPTER 6 IMPERIAL AND COLONIAL LEGISLATION, 1900 TD 1910 192 CHAPTER 7 GAME RESERVES, 1900 TO 1910 251 CHAPTER 8 CREATING A NATIONAL PARK, 1910 TO 1926 315 CHAPTER 9 CONCLUSION 378 SOURCES 391 ( i i ) LIST OF MAPS Districts and towns of the Transvaal, c. 1860 51 General location of the Pongola Game Reserve, 1889 140 (based on N.G. Garson, 'The Swaziland question and a road to the sea', Archives Year Book for South African History, 1957, II, opp. p.271). Areas of the Transvaal in which game was protected, 1899 191 (districts and wards based on F.J. Potgieter, 'Die vestiging van die blanke in Transvaal (1837-1886) met spesiale verwysing na die verhouding tussen die mens en die omgewing', Archives Year Book for South African History, 1958, II, opp. p.141). Transvaal Game Reserves, 1910 314 (based on Map of the Transvaal Game Reserves (Pretoria, Surveyor-General of the Union of South Africa, 1911 ) . The Kruger National Park, 1926 377 (based on Transvaal Province, Report of the Game Reserves Commission, TP5-18. (Pretoria, Government Printer, 1918) and Transvaal Proclamation 71 of 6 December 1923). ( i i i ) ABBREVIATIONS AGT Auditor-General AYB Archives Yearbook for South African History BN Barberton Magistrate CA Cape Archives, Cape Town Cent. Central Archives, Pretoria cs Colonial Secretary DCU Director of Customs FD Foreign Office JPL Johannesburg Public Library JUS Department of Justice KG Kommandant-Generaal KNP Kruger National Park Archives, Skukuza LAJ Legal Assistant to the Military Governor LO Transvaal Law Department LOE Department of Lands LtG Lieutenant-Governor MGP Military Governor, Pretoria MM Minister of Mines MNW Department of Mines and Industries PRO Public Record Office, Kew, London SAAR South African Archival Records 5-HA Stevenson-Hamilton Archives, Fairholm, Lanarkshire SNA Secretary for Native Affairs SP Staasprokureur 55 Staatssekretaris TA· Transvaal Archives, Pretoria TAD Transvaal Agricultural Department TGPA Transvaal Game Protection Association TLOA Transvaal Land Owners' Association TPB Transvaal Department of Local Government TPS Transvaal Provincial Secretary UR Uitvoerende Raad voe Dutch East India Company WDGPA Western Districts Game Protection Association Wits University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg WLS Archives of the Wildlife Society of Southern Africa, Pietermaritzburg ZHC Sessional Papers ( i V) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank the many people who have been of assistance during the course of researching and writing this thesis. Colleagues, particularly in the Department of History at the University of South Africa, but also at the Unive~sities of Cape Town and Cambridge, in seminars and general discussions on this subject have given me insights and information and I would like them to know how much I have appreciated their interest. Professor Roderick Nash (University of California, Santa Barbara), Professor Robin Winks (Yale University), Professor Susan Flader (University of Misso~ri-Columbia), Professor Colin Webb (University of Natal) - my supervisor 1n the initial stages of the work - and Dr R. Bigalke, also encouraged me and offered constructive criticisms on certain draft chapters. Dr U. de V. Pienaar, Chief Director of the National Parks Board, has been unstinting in his enthusiasm, help and kindness in many ways over the years. He made available the archives of the Kruger National Park at Skukuza, provided accommodation in the Park, and shared his personal knowledge freely with me. Many members of his staff were also extremely welcoming and helpful. In addition, the National Parks Board accepted this work as one of its formal research endeavours. The generosity of Mr James Stevenson-Hamilton in allowing me to peruse the papers of his father at Fairholm in Lanarkshire, and furthermore for his hospitality and that of his wife, Jennifer, is gratefully acknowledged. I was the guest of various members of my family, in London, Cambridge and Cape Town, and I am very grateful to them. (v) The staffs of libraries and archives have been very helpful. In particular I wish to thank the staff of the Johannesburg Public Library, the Brenthurst Library, the libraries of the University of South Africa, the University of the Witwatersrand, the University of Cambridge, the Royal Commonwealth Society (London), Rhodes House (Oxford), and the Pitt Rivers Museum (Oxford); the State Archives (Pretoria and Cape Town), the Public Record Office <London), the United States Federal Archives <Washington), the Fauna and Flora Preservation Society (London) and Dr John Pringle of the archives of the Wild Life Society of Southern Africa (Pietermaritzburg). I am indebted to the Harry Oppenheimer Institute for African Studies and the Department of History of the University of Cape Town for financial assistance which facilitated a research visit to the United Kingdom, and to the Human Sciences Research Council for a bursary and grant. Opinions and co~clusions expressed here are those of the author and not those of the Human Sciences Research Council. There are certain others whose assistance has truly been invaluable and to whom I owe a special debt of gratitude. My father, Mr Raymond Swingler, drew the maps; Dr Greg Cuthbertson and Mrs Cynthia Kemp read the entire manuscript meticulously, suggesting improvements both in style and content; Professor Basil le Cordeur has been an attentive, critical and wise supervisor, and my husband, Vincent, has been unsparing of his support in every possible way. ( vi l ABSTRACT The history of wildlife protection in southern Africa has been neglected by professional historians, despite the wealth of southern African fauna, the greatly increased concern for nature conservation and the burgeoning of the literature on the subject in many parts of the world during the last few decades. Public curiosity about early conservation efforts has merely elicited superficial popular accounts of the development of game protectionist policies cast mainly in terms of dominant individuals or of over-simplified moral pageants. These approaches seriously underestimate and misrepresent the rich social and cultural context within which the ideas, attitudes and policies evolved. By contrast, this study not only examines the diverse struggles surrounding the mangagement, exploitation and protection of game resources, but also relates them to the wider political and economic concerns of the day. Attitudes to game protection have not been static or homogeneous and the broader perspective given here reveals the frequent contradictions and paradoxes which characterized game protection, as also the primacy of extrinsic circumstances over deliberate protectionist intent in shaping policy. The development of protectionist strategies under three successive political regimes in the Transvaal is closely examined. Legislation, administrative policies and actions are portrayed as having evolved in response to changing popular and official perceptions of game animals during successive phases between 1846 and 1926. The Transvaal is shown to be a unique and valuable field for this 'investigation not only because of the divergent interests of blacks, (Vii ) Afrikaners and British, but also because of the rapid and pervasive socio-economic changes of the period. The thesis also explores the ways in which the protection of wildlife in the Transvaal was interwoven with the evolution of the racial and social stratification of society. Comparisons and contrasts with developments in other countries, particularly the United States, afford valuable insights and enrich the understanding of the Transvaal situation. In the early years of white settlement and during the existence of the South African Republic, game protection measures were influenced by the commercial value of the by-products of the hunt. By the end of the nineteenth century the failure adequately to curtail hunting practices resulted in the depletion of game and this, among other factors, led to a corresponding shift in values towards wildlife. Earlier, but ineffectual, hunting regulations which had been underpinned by conservationist principles of sustainable yield were augmented by strict preservationist measures, particularly the creation of game reserves. When the Transvaal became a British colony after the South African War, the emerging international conservationist consensus was brought to bear on new protectionist initiatives, but was tempered by the sporting requirements of the settler population and the capitalist