Andries Pretorius

“ There were collected together about a thousand Dutch farmers all mounted. They were farmers, ready enough to fight, but not trained soldiers. More English were killed or wounded than Dutch. A dozen Dutchmen fell, and about four times that number of English. But the English beat the Dutch. This decided the fate of that territory for a short time,—and it became British under the name of the Orange River Sovereignty. Pretorius with his friends trekked away north, crossed the Vaal River, and there founded the Transvaal Republic,—as has been told elsewhere. ”

“ Pretorius was Commandant General in Natal, Potgieter Chief Commandant in the allied Western Districts. The legislative power was in the hands of a Volksraad of twenty-four members, whose ways were more vacillating and erratic than advantageous. "Every man for himself and God for all" seemed to be the convenient motto of this assembly, except perhaps on urgent occasions, when Pretorius and Potgieter were called upon as joint dictators to settle some knotty problem relating to external affairs. ”

“ The area about to be traversed, moreover, was very little known, and no exact information was forthcoming concerning the numbers or the disposition of the enemy’s troops between the Mbemkuru River and the Lindi-Massassi road. In Major Pretorius, however, the Nigerians possessed a tower of strength. This remarkable man, who in peace-time had been a professional elephant-hunter, not only knew the highways and byways of British and German East Africa more intimately than any other living soul, but had established over 162the native population a species of hypnotic influence. ”

“ But this to the Boers was poison. To them the Natives were as wild beasts,—and wild beasts whom they with their blood and energy had succeeded in expelling. Now the wild beasts were to be brought back under the auspices of the British Government!
In 1847 Andrias Pretorius was the dominant leader of the Natal Boers and he went on a pilgrimage to Sir Henry Pottinger who was then Governor in the Cape Colony. Sir Henry Pottinger would not see him,—required him to put down what he had to say in writing, which is perhaps the most heartbreaking thing which any official man can do to an applicant. ”

“ Commandant Pretorius was, however, elected president in place of Mr Boshof. Though unable to effect a durable peace with the Basutos, or to realize his ambition for the creation of one powerful Boer republic, Pretorius saw the Free State begin to grow in strength. The fertile district of Bethulie as well as Adam Kok’s territory was acquired, and there was a considerable increase in the white population. The burghers generally, however, had not learned the need of discipline, of confidence in their elected rulers, or that to carry on a government taxes must be levied. ”

“ The chief Potgieter was flayed alive, and his skin made into a kaross or cloak. The Boers were swift to revenge. President Pretorius, with an army of some four hundred, set himself to track down the assassins. The Kaffirs fled at the approach of the enemy, enclosing themselves in a huge cave, where they hoped to escape detection. This cave was blockaded by the Boers. Here the unhappy blacks went through all the horrors of famine and thirst, and when their agony became unbearable, and they sallied forth in desperation in search of water, they were remorselessly shot down one by one. ”

“ This I think may be regarded as the beginning of the occupation of the Transvaal territory by a European or Dutch population.
A sort of Republic was at once established of which Pretorius was at first the acknowledged rather than the elected Chief. The most perfect freedom for the white man,—which was supposed to include perfect equality,—was to be maintained by a union of their forces against the Natives of the country. Mazulekatze had been ejected, and the Bechuanas were again coming in upon their old land. ”

“ The Volksraad was abolished, but the claims of the Boers to the lands upon which they had squatted were liberally considered. They were, however, dissatisfied because the rights of Panda's men were also regarded, and many trekked away across the Drakensberg. Those who remained protested that their lives and property were insecure in the presence of the natives, and Pretorius was deputed to go and lay their grievances before the British Governor at the Cape. ”

“ He had under him Commandant Hendrik Pretorius (of Jacobsdal) and Commandant Visser. The latter was the man who, when the burghers from Fauresmith, even before the taking of Bloemfontein, had remained behind, broke through with seventy or eighty troops. He had always behaved faithfully and valiantly until, in an engagement at Jagersfontein, he gave up his life, a sacrifice for the rights of his nation. His name will ever be held in honour by his people. ”

“ TRANSVAAL DISSENSIONS
Among other things an attempt was made on the part of the Boers to annex the Orange Free State. President Pretorius crossed the Vaal in 1857, at the head of a large commando, with the intention of seizing on the neighbouring territory. He was doomed to disappointment, however, for his intended raid was stopped by the timely resistance of the forewarned President of the Orange Free State. An encounter was happily avoided through the intervention of Mr. Kruger, and finally the two Republics decided to mutually recognise each other's independent States. ”

“ But as the Intelligence officer handed over his department to the quarter-guard of the 20th Dragoon Guards for safe keeping until the morrow, Miss Pretorius was saddling a pony in the kraal. She had to find her father before daybreak. Her father with his two sons was at Nieuwjaarsfontein!
Richmond Road is not a township. It is only a railway-station, but it boasts of one winkel [11] adjoining the railway buildings. [41] Here the O.C. of the New Cavalry Brigade had taken up his quarters for the night, and here the Jew proprietor had arranged food and lodging for the staff. ”

“ They put forth a proclamation appealing against the oppression of man and to the justice of God, with all the fervour of the Old Testament Christians they were.
The arrogance of Pretorius and his crew had now so seriously increased that Sir George Napier, seeing danger ahead, decided to [Pg 10] establish a camp near the border of the State, and Durban was occupied. Captain Smith, in command of some three hundred men, made a rapid march across country to Natal, merely to be informed that the Boers had placed themselves under the protection of Holland. ”

“ Most of the criticism in question came as usual from a few noisy people in England, who quite forgot the absurdly few casualties that were sustained by the Imperial troops in the Zulu War, as compared with the number of Zulus who were killed; nor did they remember that Pretorius, at the famous battle of Blood River, had three men wounded (including himself) , as against 3,000 Zulus killed. It is one of the ironies of life that persons wholly ignorant, or almost wholly ignorant, of local conditions, succeeded in getting many to attend to and believe their clamour. ”

“ Among the Boers only three were wounded, while the victors counted over 3,000 Zulu dead. Dingaan fled into the eastern hills, and Pretorius, marching upon the royal kraal, buried the remains of Retief and his companions, which he found bleaching in the sun.
Natal, except for the British settlement on the coast, was now effectively occupied by the Boer emigrants. This raised an awkward problem for Britain and the Cape Government. Under English law a subject of the Crown cannot, by adventuring in the waste places of the earth, acquire sovereignty for himself, but only for his king. ”

“ The intimation of the impending grant of self-government to Cape Colony was regarded by both Boer republics as bringing nearer the prospect of their union with the British colonies. But just at that time differences arose between Great Britain and the republics as to the ownership of the Kimberley diamond fields which estranged the Boers (see Griqualand and Transvaal) . In the Transvaal Pretorius was succeeded by T. F. Burgers, a man totally unfitted to govern a country distracted by factions, harassed by wars with natives, and with an almost depleted exchequer. ”

“ Pretorius junior nor Mr. Burgers ever be regarded as benefactors of their country or as great statesmen; but the bosoms of each have no doubt swelled with the aspiration of being called the Dutch Washington of South Africa. I think I may say that Mr. Brand, who is now President of the Orange Free State, is imbued with no such vaulting ambition, whatever may be his ideas on the course of things in the womb of time. ”

“ Thither a gallant civilian named King, who was one of the pioneers, rode in ten days; and on June 25, when the little garrison was in extremity, it was relieved by sea. Pretorius withdrew into the interior, and the Volksraad at Pietermaritzburg, the capital of the Republic of Natalia, voted the submission of the Boers. Pending a final settlement it was allowed to remain in authority over the settlers, but the district around Durban Bay was at once taken over as British territory. ”

“ Dingaan fled and the column marched on to Umgungundhlovu, where Retief's mouldering body was found on the hill of mimosas, and on it the deed of grant of land at Durban. Pretorius was ambushed by Zulus disguised as cattle, crawling on all fours and wearing ox hides; but he escaped with slight loss, and returned to the Tugela. "Dingaan's Day," December 16, is kept by the Boers as a festival of thanksgiving and rejoicing.
Soon a new complication beset the harassed emigrants. ”

“ In one case a native called Karle was endeavouring to escape over a wall, but was wounded in the thigh. On seeing he was not dead, Stoffel Visagie, of Skuilhoek, drew a revolver and shot him through the head. The charge against these natives appears to have been that they harboured British scouts.
Case of Jim Zulu.—On or about October 18, 1901, V. C. Thys Pretorius (presumably of Pretoria) , with seventy men, visited Waterval North, on the Pretoria-Pietersburg line, and practically [141] murdered two natives, wounding three others, one of whom afterwards died. ”

“ To-morrow I go to the bymakaar at Paarde Kraal to take counsel with Paul Krüger and Pretorius, and the other ‘fathers of the land,’ as they call themselves. If I throw in my weight against rebellion there will be no rebellion; if I urge it there will be, and if Oom Silas will not give me Bessie, and Bessie will not marry me, I will urge it even if it plunge the whole country in war from the Cape to Waterberg. Patriotism! Independence! Taxes!—that is what they will cry till they begin to believe it themselves. ”

“ Towards the close of that year, an army of 10,000 Zulus attacked the Dutch farmers in a strongly intrenched position at the Umslatoos river. The engagement took place on Sunday, the 16th of December. For three hours overwhelming masses of natives endeavoured to force the emigrant camp, until Pretorius, finding that ammunition was beginning to fail, ordered 200 men to sally forth on horseback, and take the enemy in flank. This manœuvre was successful, and the forces of Dingaan were compelled to fly, after leaving a large number on the field. ”

“ Sir Garnet Wolseley then went home, and Sir Pomeroy Colley in March, 1880, succeeded him as High Commissioner for South Eastern Africa. Events rapidly culminated. On December 13th, the Triumvirate of Kruger, Joubert, and Pretorius being formed (Lanyon in Pretoria still being nominal administrator of the country) , three commanders were organized, one of which went and met the 94th Regiment at Bronkhorst Spruit, another to Potchefstroom, where it besieged the Court-House and Fort, while the third made Heidelberg its headquarters. ”

“ I found Prätorius in the irritable mood of an old man awakened at an untimely moment, who had besides all the aversion of an old bureaucrat to a young man of birth. He said, with a contemptuous smile, "It is very annoying, Herr Referendarius, when a man can do nothing for himself ”

“ But in Spain, the senators about Sertorius, and others of the nobility, finding themselves strong enough for their enemies, no sooner laid aside fear, but their minds were possessed by envy and irrational jealousies of Sertorius's power. And chiefly Perpenna, elevated by the thoughts of his noble birth, and carried away with a fond ambition of commanding the army, threw out villanous discourses in private amongst his acquaintance. "What evil genius," he would say, "hurries us perpetually from worse to worse? ”

“ Part of the [261] pursued rabble went north, half hurled itself across the Cape Government Railway in the vicinity of Paauwpan. Plumer's spurt was just too short to bring about the definite result required, and he crawled into Hopetown to further revive his energy. In the meantime it was learned from prisoners and other sources that the group of fugitives trying to cross the Orange River north of Hopetown was Judge Hertzog's and Pretorius's party. Brand had made the passage at Mark's Drift, while De Wet, with the ex-President, was still in the Colony heading for Philipstown. ”

“ X. While Sertorius was considering where he should betake himself to, the Lusitani sent ambassadors to invite him to be their leader; for they were much in want of a commander of great reputation and experience, to oppose the formidable power of the Romans, and Sertorius was the only man whom they would trust, as they knew his character from those who had been about him. Now it is said that Sertorius was a man who never yielded either to pleasure or to fear, and while he was naturally unmoved by danger, he could bear prosperity with moderation ”