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HISTORY TERM 4: GRADE 10 Topic 6: The South African War and Union © e-classroom www.e-classroom.co.za • Many interrelated factors led to the South African War, including the conflicting political ideologies of imperialism and republicanism, the discovery of gold on the Witwatersrand, tension between political leaders, the Jameson Raid and the Uitlander franchise. • Conflicting political ideology- After the First Anglo-Boer War, British government still wanted to unify South Africa under their Imperial Background rule and the 2 Boer republics (Orange Free State and Transvaal) still wanted to be independent. So, the Boer republics were a big problem to the South for the British Empire. • The discovery of gold on the Witwatersrand - British colonies, Boer African War: republics, and African kingdoms all came under British control eventually, this came about through 2 forces: the development of a capitalist mining industry and a number of imperialist interventions Mining by Britain. The discovery of diamonds and then gold on the Witwatersrand in the Transvaal in 1886, meant that 1000s of white Capitalism and black workers were employed on the mines there and South Africa emerged as the world’s biggest gold producer. Independent Boer governments grew in power and the Transvaal became prominent in international finance because of gold’s importance in the international monetary system. Britain ran most of the international industry and trade then and they needed a steady supply of gold to continue. © e-classroom www.e-classroom.co.za • The Orange Free State and Natal also gained from the investment mining brought to the country and as a result the Cape Colony no longer led the economy in the country anymore. The Transvaal gold mines were the richest in the world and the most difficult to mine. Large companies had to be created to handle the load which required large inputs of capital and technology. This required local and international investment and individual mining was no longer viable. • In order to reduce competition over labour and keep costs down, the group systems the gold mines established caused a pattern of labour recruitment, remuneration, and accommodation that left an indelible Background mark on the future social and economic relations in the country. Relatively high wages were earned by the scarce skilled white immigrant miners and the more numerous unskilled black migrants from throughout to the South Southern Africa, earned lower pay. In order to control the workers and cut costs, migrant miners were housed in compounds. This skewed division of labour and wages had a lasting effect on the racial relations in South African War: Africa. • A migrant labour system evolved as the search for cheap illiterate labour continued. They were called migrants because SAR did not recognize their Mining 'homelands' as part of their republic. Migrant labourers across Southern Africa; Transkei, Rhodesia and Botswana, among others, journeyed far to the gold and diamond mines seeking employment and were Capitalism accommodated in hostels. • The discovery of diamonds and then gold, and the emergence of powerful groups of like-minded capitalists in mining and agriculture united the British and the Boer republics. They both needed cheap labour. So despite their differences, they agreed that: the country needed laws to limit blacks voting and therefore power, and when Union came blacks were effectively kept off the voters' rolls. © e-classroom www.e-classroom.co.za • The Transvaalers felt threatened by the foreign mining prospectors their industry attracted, so to keep control of their mining operations they restricted the voting rights of these Uitlanders/immigrant population. Foreigners had to have been in the country for 14 years to be able to vote. The Uitlander franchise caused strain between the Transvaal and British governments and added to the precipitation of the outbreak of war because of the political tension between Boers and British subjects. • Tension between political leaders – During 1890’s there were many opposing political leaders in power in South Africa . Paul Kruger was president of the Transvaal or South African Republic (SAR) and Cecil John Rhodes the premier of Background to the the Cape Colony. These 2 leaders were in direct conflict with each other over the plans for South Africa, namely Empire vs Republicanism. South African War: • Rhodes believed that the SAR could expand with its financial power and threaten British rule and possibly gain access to a trade route to the sea, thus opposing the Mining Capitalism economies of the British colonies. • The Jameson Raid - By 1895, a confident Britain under Joseph Chamberlain as Colonial Secretary, joined with Rhodes to try to develop the British Empire even further in South Africa. The Drift Crisis between the Cape Colony and the Transvaal came about then, as a railway line from Cape Colony to Johannesburg was completed. The crisis revolved around rates increases and drifts across the Vaal were being blocked by Kruger. This sparked the involvement of The British government; Rhodes was encouraging an uprising of Uitlanders in Johannesburg, and timed it to coincide with an invasion of the Transvaal from Botswana, by Dr Leander Starr Jameson. Rhodes wanted turn the Transvaal into a British colony that would join all the other colonies in a federation. © e-classroom www.e-classroom.co.za Background to the South African War: Mining Capitalism 1 2 3 4 5 The 1895 Jameson Raid Many historians believe that Note - that the discovery of The labour market in SAR Many Afrikaners also failed; Rhodes had to resign the South African War was gold in 1886 allowed the changed dramatically, experienced a period of as premier of the Cape caused by the fight for South African Republic to through the exploitation of rapid change; imperial social Colony and the political control of the progress with its minerals and the engineering, inflated land problems between Afrikaans Witwatersrand’s rich gold modernization efforts in capitalization of settler prices and international and English-speaking people mines, the largest in the order to become a worthy agriculture. And this drew capital changed their society were much worse in the world at the time. This was opponent to Britain in the Africans into the world irrevocably. colony. The Orange Free when the world’s monetary fight for domination in economy as workers and State started to co-operate systems, mostly the British, Southern Africa. peasants, transforming class more with the Transvaal. were almost entirely structures and political ties Transvaal residents felt more dependent upon gold. The and shifting the division of threatened and they treated Rand gold-mining complex labour between men and Uitlanders with more was not in British control. women. suspicion than before. © e-classroom www.e-classroom.co.za • OVERVIEW OF THE WAR • The Jameson Raid in December 1895 was a fiasco and as a result, Rhodes was forced to resign as Premier of the Cape Colony, and the alliance he had brokered between English and Afrikaners in the Cape was destroyed. • Previously Empire loyalists, Cape Afrikaners now backed Kruger against the British. Their fellows in Orange Free State did too. South African Afrikaner nationalism increased and Milner’s determination to push British supremacy made it worse. • In 1899 a rearmed South African Republic issued an ultimatum to the British that became a declaration of war. The 2 Boer republics involved in the conflict against The South the British were the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. • Over the next three and a half years, nearly 500,000 British troops were deployed African War against an Afrikaner force of 60,000 to 65,000, at great cost to the British taxpayers and in British lives. 1899 to 1902 • The Afrikaners lost around 14,000 in action and 26,000 in concentration camps. • More than 100,000 black Africans were forced into camps too. At least 13,000 died there, over 15 000 in total died in this war. • This war was the bloodiest, longest and most expensive the British had fought in between 1815 and 1915. • The result – Britain had greater resources and this wore the Afrikaners down whose leaders were then forced to sue for peace, and a treaty was signed on May 3l, 1902. © e-classroom www.e-classroom.co.za • The war was fought in 2 distinct phases. 1st - set-piece battles and 2nd – then the Boers changed tactics to guerrilla warfare. • After “Black Week” in which the British lost many men, they sent for reinforcements. On 10 January 1900 new soldiers arrived under Major-General Lord Kitchener. With their numbers expanded, the army moved inland, The South defeating the Boers as they went. • On 13 March 1900 the British army occupied the capital of the Orange Free State. On 1 June 1900 they took Johannesburg and then on 5 June they took Pretoria too. Nearly 13 900 Boers surrendered as they felt it was African War hopeless to continue. Other Boers chose to pursue guerrilla war. • Lord Kitchener began cutting off food supplies to the Boers, who were being fed by farmers. He did this by implementing his “scorched earth” policy, destroying 30 000 Afrikaner farmhouses and more than 40 towns and all 1899 to 1902 their livestock. Plus the Children, women and black people were forced in concentration camps. • Over 40 camps housed 116 000 (26 370 died, 81% were children) white women and children, and another 60 camps housing 115 000 black people (15000 died). The camps were overcrowded, the captives underfed and the conditions poor. Poor medical support meant that diseases ravaged the camps. • Black involvement in the war – this was a “White Man’s” war, fought over which white authority had the true power in South Africa.
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