The ‘unknown war’

If you don’t know about it, you can view plenty of videos on youtube about the Bush War – South Africa vs Angola – a war fought more than 20 years… This is a beautiful Afrikaans song. Visuals are great in the video.
Found this link: warinangola.com

I like this video clip more, as it’s not just still images – like the above video. South African troops can be proud of what they have achieved during the Bush War – they were real heroes.

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Life is not a matter of milestones, but of moments

‘Life is not a matter of milestones, but of moments’: Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy

I was more interested in the chess scene in this clip, but then inquisitively read about Joan and her story, which I knew about, though it was ‘refreshing‘ to read about it again, truly a very sad story. I guess, as things were at the time, it was ‘normal‘ for what had happened, but surely not in our modern days. I think Joan is an inspiration to us and must have been a brave woman to do what she did and believed in, especially at the very young age of only eighteen.

Joan of Arc
The story and biography of Joan of Arc which contains interesting information, facts and the history about the life of this Medieval person of historical importance.

The Childhood of Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc Lived from 1412-1431.  In the long wars between the French and English not even the Black Prince or King Henry V gained such fame as did a young French peasant girl, Joan of Arc. She was born in the little village of Domrémy . Her father had often told her of the sad condition of France, how the country was largely in the possession of England, and how the French king did not dare to be crowned. And so the thought came to be ever in her mind, “How I pity my country!” She brooded over the matter so much that she began to have visions of angels and heard strange voices, which said to her, “Joan, you can deliver the land from the English. go to the relief of King Charles.” At last these strange visions and voices made the young girl believe that she had a mission from God, and she determined to try to save France. When she told her father and mother of her purpose, they tried to persuade her that the visions of angels and the voices telling her of the divine mission were but dreams. The village priest, her young companions, even the governor of the town, all tried to stop her, but it was in vain.

1429 – Joan of Arc meets King Charles VII, the King of France, at Chinon.
Little by little people began to believe in her mission. At last all stopped trying to discourage her and some who were wealthy helped her to make the journey to the town of Chinon , where the French king, Charles the Seventh, was living. When Joan arrived at Chinon, a force of French soldiers was preparing to go to the south of France to relieve the city of Orleans which the English were besieging. King Charles received Joan kindly and listened to what she had to say with deep attention. The girl spoke modestly, but with a calm belief that she was right. “Gracious King,” she said, “my name is Joan. God has sent me to deliver France from her enemies. You shall shortly be crowned in the cathedral of Rheims. I am to lead the soldiers you are about to send for the relief of Orleans. So God has directed and under my guidance victory will be theirs.” The king and his nobles talked the matter over and finally it was decided to allow Joan to lead an army of about five thousand men against the English at Orleans.

Joan of Arc marches to Orleans
When she left Chinon at the head of her soldiers, in April, 1429, she was in her eighteenth year. Mounted on a fine war-horse and clad in white armor from head to foot, she rode along past the cheering multitude. In one hand she carried an ancient sword that she had found near the tomb of a saint, and in the other a white banner embroidered with lilies. The rough soldiers who were near her left off their oaths and coarse manners, and carefully guarded her. She inspired the whole army with courage and faith as she talked about her visions. When she arrived at the besieged city of Orleans she fearlessly rode round its walls, while the English soldiers looked on in astonishment.

Joan of Arc wins victory over the English and ends the siege at Orleans.
She was able to enter Orleans, despite the efforts of the besiegers to prevent her. She aroused the city by her cheerful, confident words and then led her soldiers forth to give battle to the English. Their success was amazing. One after another the English forts were taken. When only the strongest remained and Joan was leading the attacking force, she received a slight wound and was carried out of the battle to be attended by a surgeon. Her soldiers began to retreat. “Wait,” she commanded, “eat and drink and rest; for as soon as I recover I will touch the walls with my banner and you shall enter the fort.” In a few minutes she mounted her horse again and riding rapidly up to the fort, touched it with her banner. Her soldier almost instantly carried it. The very next day the enemy’s troops were forced to withdraw from before the city and the siege was at end. The French soldiers were jubilant at the victory and called Joan the “Maid of Orleans.” By this name she is known in history.

Joan of Arc sees the King crowned at Rheims
Her fame spread everywhere, and the English as well as the French thought she had more than human power. She led the French in several other battles, and again and again her troops were victorious. At last the English were driven far to the north of France. Then Charles, urged by Joan, went to Rheims with twelve thousand soldiers, and there, with splendid ceremonies, was crowned king. Joan holding her white banner, stood near Charles during the coronation. When the ceremony was finished, she knelt at his feet and said, “O King, the will of God is done and my mission is over! Let me now go home to my parents.” But the king urged her to stay a while longer, as France was not entirely freed from the English. Joan consented, but she said, “I hear the heavenly voices no more and I am afraid.”

Joan of Arc is captured
However she took part in an attack upon the army of the Duke of Burgundy, but was taken prisoner by him. For a large sum of money the duke delivered her into the hands of the English, who put her in prison in Rouen.

Joan of Arc is charged with Sorcery and brought to trial
She lay in prison for a year, and finally was charged with sorcery and brought to trial. It was said that she was under the influence of the Evil One. She declared to her judges her innocence of the charge and said, “God has always been my guide in all that I have done. The devil has never had power over me.” Her trial was long and tiresome. At its close she was doomed to be burned at the stake.

Joan of Arc is burnt at the Stake
In the market-place at Rouen the English soldiers fastened her to a stake surrounded by a great pile of fagots. A soldier put into her hands a rough cross, which he had made from a stick that he held. She thanked him and pressed it to her bosom. Then a priest, standing near the stake, read to her the prayers for the dying, and another mounted the fagots and held towards her a crucifix, which she clasped with both hands and kissed. When the cruel flames burst out around her, the noble girl uttered the word “Jesus,” and expired.

Source: Click here to read the original article.

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Chess and Hess

Rudolf Hess – Image: howstuffworks.com

Nazi Deputy Rudolf Hess crashes in Scotland: On May 10, 1941, German official Rudolf Hess made an unauthorized visit to Britain. He was arrested after he broke his ankle in a parachute jump from his Messerschmitt, which crashed just south of Glasgow, Scotland. Hess, whose German title of deputy Führer put him in charge of the Nazi Party apparatus, was on a solo mission. He said he wanted to negotiate a peace in which Britain would be safe from attack if it gave Nazi Germany a free hand in Europe. Dismissed as insane by the British and Adolf Hitler, Hess remained in Allied imprisonment until his death in 1987. Source: howstuffworks/american-history/

Britain and America wanted to release Hess, but the Russians didn’t want to. Perhaps, Hess was a lucky pawn in their hands.

ONE was a notorious Nazi war criminal, the other a young Tyneside soldier.

They came from different countries and from different backgrounds, but they forged a friendship of sorts and ended up playing chess together.

This is the remarkable real life story of Hitler’s deputy Rudolf Hess and Maurice Williams of the Durham Light Infantry.

Charged with guarding Hess in Berlin’s Spandau Prison, Maurice the pair ended up playing a game of chess.

“It was 1951 and our Battalion was taking up guard duty at Spandau Prison,” said Maurice, who lives at Ovington in the Tyne Valley.

“There were a number of Nazi war criminals there and I was curious about the place.

“I decided to take a tour of the prison and it certainly was a grim place. On my travels I came upon this guy in the prison garden, reading a paper.

“It turned out to be Rudolf Hess. We weren’t supposed to talk to either him or the other Nazi prisoners and, if caught, I would have been on a charge, but I was curious about him.

“He had a chess board and I asked him about it. He asked if I played chess and, luckily, I did.”

Hess challenged Maurice to a game and Maurice said: “In the end, he beat me easily. I said to him that I only thought two moves ahead and that he must be thinking about 10 moves ahead. He laughed and said: ‘Maybe a few more than that’. We played a second time and this time I gave him a much better game but, again, lost out.”

Maurice said Hess was unlike the picture he painted in the Nuremberg Trials of a man on the edge of sanity, adding: “He was a perfect gentleman and asked such things as ‘are you married?’ He spoke perfect English, better than myself!

“I told him I was single and he asked about my family, it was just like talking to the man next door. I really wanted to ask him how he felt about the Jews but the opportunity didn’t arise.

“He said he liked the British and American guards, but wasn’t too keen on the Russians.

“I’m not surprised about that as I found them a funny lot, especially when they were on the vodka, which was made out of diesel oil. If they gave it to us we had to drink it with black pepper.”

Nobody was more shocked than Maurice at what had gone on in Nazi Germany, but he didn’t class Hess as one of the hard-liners who were hanged after the war crimes trial.

“I don’t know why they didn’t let Hess go in the 1950s. Spandau was a harsh place and Hess had a room the size of a normal living room with table chair and bed and also a wireless.

“I believe that later he was given much more room.”

Apparently Britain and the USA wanted to release Hess, but the Russians wouldn’t allow it. Many think it was because it gave them a foothold in West Berlin.

Hess is said to have committed suicide in 1987.

It was not the first time Maurice had been to Germany.

He had joined the Durham Light Infantry at the end of the Second World War and witnessed the devastation as he travelled through France and Belgium toward Germany.

“In Germany we had to hammer on the doors of the civilians and tell them to get their valuables packed up within an hour and stored into the lofts or such place.

“We then took their homes over as billets as there was no army camp. They were put into a displaced persons camp.

“All the time we were there I never knew of any soldier touching the belongings of the German civilians.

“They were lovely middle class houses with lovely gardens. You know what Geordies were like for gardening, so enjoyed keeping them in shape. They could come back to their homes undamaged with nothing missing. In 1946 we were sent out to Egypt. It was later in 1951 when we were posted to Berlin and Spandau.”
Source: Here

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Churchill makes me smile

Boer Scouts in Natal

Father and son go to war – image: diggershistory.info

 How I love thee…to read these quotes – you can read similar quotes on my other link in this post.[The Boer War link on my blog]
Enjoy the music of the Hungarian Rhapsody

Update: A great entry to read:
http://politicalvelcraft.org/2012/04/05/rothschilds-british-concentration-camps-a-means-to-usurpdestroy-the-gold-standard-only-then-to-be-replaced-by-rothschilds-keynesian-economics-derivative-fiat-paper/
When the world loved the Boers…

 WHEN IN OCTOBER 1899 the British Empire went to war against the Boers or Afrikaners of the Transvaal (South African Republic) and the Orange Free State, it was widely believed that the conflict would be brief. It became, however, the largest war waged by Britain since the Napoleonic Wars, even including the Crimea, involving the strongest forces sent from English shores since Henry V’s army departed for Agincourt. It was the first of the modern media wars, waged for the hearts and minds of both metropolitan and global opinion, in which military officers and civilian politicians on all sides had to pay acute attention to the coverage provided by the press. Fought at a time when the telegraph and syndicated news agencies had begun to globalise information, it became the most publicised war waged outside Europe between the American Civil War and the First World War. Indeed, in the minds of contemporaries, the South African War shared certain similarities with the American conflict, not least the widespread perception that it involved universal issues and principles which extended far beyond the borders of southern Africa.

 

Imperialists in Britain and its colonies of settlement believed the very essence of British strength to be at stake. Thousands of volunteers from Canada, Australia and New Zealand flocked to the imperial colours in South Africa. Britain, however, was made to appear both militarily and physically degenerate by the three years and almost half-a-million men it took to defeat the Boers, whose forces never numbered more than 88,000. During the guerrilla phase of the war, between June 1900 and the Boer surrender in May 1902, the tactics of farm burning and concentration camps employed by the British added further charges of brutality and moral corruption before the bar of world opinion. The significance of the Transvaal goldfields and the political prominence of leading magnates, often caricatured as a bloated Cecil Rhodes, gave the war a whiff of the sordid, which opponents of the conflict were all too ready to exploit (even if the actual influence of capitalists in the outbreak of hostilities was and remains controversial). Meanwhile, the unexpected protraction of the struggle intensified calls for a complete reorganisation of British educational and industrial life and gave rise to that peculiar Edwardian imperialist soul-searching encapsulated under the catchphrase National Efficiency. The war polarised political opinion in Britain, where David Lloyd George, Emily Hobhouse and James Ramsay MacDonald were among its leading opponents. The war even affected the young Clement Attlee, then a schoolboy at Haileybury, who, along with the entire middle school, was beaten by his pro-Boer headmaster for taking part in a celebration of the relief of Ladysmith that he had banned. In Ireland, the war greatly deepened the alienation of unionists, whose imperialism was invigorated by the war from nationalists who were enthusiastically pro-Boer. In Canada, too, the conflict widened the gulf between French Canadian nationalists and their English-speaking countrymen and set the pattern of their future relationship. It intensified the imperialism of Australia where it appeared to herald the arrival of The Coming Man, that healthy Independent Australian Briton who represented an almost evolutionary improvement on his metropolitan ancestors, ensuring that the new federation was born with a conservative emblem of imperial sacrifice. Nevertheless, it also provided, in the form of `Breaker’ Morant, executed for shooting prisoners, yet another Australian anti-hero. In India, the unwillingness of the British to employ Indian troops in a `Sahib’s War’, together with imperial failure to ensure Indian rights, further alienated moderate nationalists, while Indian advocates of physical force, like their Irish counterparts, came to admire Boer armed resistance. More generally, at the dawn of the twentieth century the war drew on a widespread, almost millenarian sense of angst about the future, manifested in such events as the Dreyfus Affair, the Fashoda Crisis, the Spanish-American War of 1898 and the Chinese Boxer Uprising in 1900.In Europe and America, where there was enormous interest in the war, and in the United Kingdom itself, there emerged vociferous movements loosely regarded as pro-Boer. These varied greatly in outlook, however, from those who favoured an immediate end to the war and conciliation with the Boers, to those, often represented by the Irish nationalists and continental movements generally, which looked forward to a British defeat. There were also …

Source: Questia HERE. It will open in a new window.

The Guinness Book of Records lists the Anglo-Boer War as Britain’s most costly war outside of the two World Wars.

Camouflage was first used in battle by the Boers, who used camouflaged trenches and adapted battledress to blend into treeless landscapes.

The Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) was the first war of the 20th century and saw the introduction of trench warfare, the first large-scale use of concentration camps for non-combatants, and the most prolonged period of guerrilla warfare by a conquered nation’s military against a victorious army.

Young Boer soldier with the name of Conrad…

I’ve decided it was time for a new post on the Boer War as this link on my blog is now stuffed with too much info on the South African/British War. I will now add new info and links to this new entry as I lost myself amongst concentration camps and battles and thought to find myself again, this time on board with Churchill! Yes, Churchill even made me ordering this book. I like his way of playing with words and he had a humorous way of putting his hand on paper. He made me smile a few times and I’ve quoted some bits here…he even dreamt about South Africa as the country where he saw his great-grandchildren could grow up…er..South Africa is the most beautiful country in the world..no wonder he thought so too…even Ian in Hamburg thinks so too [see his comments on my About-page]. Churchill also made me smile where he writes about the soldiers and the casualties…and them thinking the Boers were defeated. Ha! England, together with Irish soldiers/Scots/ Welsh/Indian+Australian/NewZealand-soldiers+Canadian soldiers…and they fought this War over three years against an army the size of the population of Brighton, that makes you think! I also have with me another interestesting book…Battles of the Boer War – written by W B Pemberton...an English writer. A great book to read. This book is not written one-sided – as you will find most books written by English writers are, as they see it only from their perspective and colour it the way they want. One must also bear in mind, the Boers had no training in fighting wars, no orderly system was in place, whilst the British had the experience and the advantage of fighting battles was on their side! According to this  Gutenberg-link, about 15000 Boers were actively taking part in the War as soldiers. Enjoy bits from Churchill’s book..click on images to see a larger view. I must also add, this is the first book ever where I read the offensive word which we don’t use in our country – for years now – to refer to a non-white person. It was quite weird reading it – especially in this book. Where Churchill refers to the Karoo, I was really smiling…could picture him thinking what he was thinking. I’ve quoted it here too. On the above link you will find images, poetry and art about the Boer War and thousands of links to other historical sites/links linking to the War. On this link you can read about my great grandad and the role he played during the war and the peace process. His grandad was also on the most wanted-list of the British and there was a price tag of £300 on his head! [cool!] Read on the link more…
On this link you will find more history about the War on the site of Ladysmith-history, also eyewitness-accounts.[I’ve now received my book – see the cover in the next image – which I’ve ordered]
From the book:

The Boer War: Londton to Ladysmith Via Pretoria and Ian Hamilton’s March by Winston Churchill

Churchill’s adventures of the first five months of the War. Churchill was eager for news…At last news came through…Boers defeated, three battles, Penn Symonds killed…
Cape Town – 1 November 1899
We caught the Man Who Knew …setting him halfway up a ladder on the hurricane deck…the man told his story quickly, with an odd quiver of excitement in his voice… then for the first time we heard of Elandslaagte, of Glencoe, of Rietfontein…Tell us about Mafeking…someone else said…It’s a long list of casualties…the best officers in the world…Colonel Chisholme…Sherstone…Haldane…Barnes…and many more…
East London 5th November.

The train, which is built on the corridor system, runs smoothly over the rails, so smoothly, indeed, that I found no difficulty in writing. The sun is warm, the air keen and delicious. But the scenery would depress the most buoyant spirit. We climbed up the mountains during the night, and with the daylight we were in the middle of the Great Karroo, Wherefore was this miserable land of stone and scrub created? Huge mounds of crumbling rock, fashioned by the rains in the most curious and unexpected shapes, rise from the gloomy desert of the plain.
At Beaufort Wes grave news awaiting the Mail and we learnt about the capitulation of twelve hundred soldiers near Ladysmith.

Churchill dreams about South Africa…

Boer soldiers ready for War – click for a larger view

“The war declared by the Boers on 11 October 1899 gave the British, as Kipling said, no end of a lesson’. The public expected it to be over by Christmas. It proved to be the longest (two and three-quarters years), the costliest (over two hundred million pounds), the bloodiest (at least 22,000 British, 25,000 Boer and 12,000 African lives) and the most humiliating war Britain fought between 1815 and 1914.”  – Thomas Pakenham:  The Boer War

 

Image: Life – Women also took part in the war. In this post you will find the Gutenberg-link with photos from Women that played important roles during the war.

The young Winston Churchill

The news article about Churchill’s captivity – in the Telegraph…image: genealogyworld.net – click on the image for a larger view.

 

A lovely chess set! I would love to have this one…

A French Hero…

Image: Wikipedia – Villebois-Mareuil
My blogger-friend, Brandnetel,  blogged today about Villebois-Mareuil and she had us all googled for Private E Brooks in her previous entry –  as a secret mission! haha

From Wikipedia:[link at the bottom of this entry]

George Henri Anne-Marie Victor de Villebois-Mareuil (22 March 1847, Montaigu, Brittany, France – 6 April 1900, Boshof, Orange Free State, South Africa) was a Colonel in the French Infantry, and French Nationalist who fought and died on the side of the Boers during the Second Anglo-Boer War. He was the first of only two Boer foreign volunteers to be handed the grade of Major-General in the Boer Army. The second being his second in command Evgeni Maximov (1849-1904) after the death of Villebois-Mareuil. He took part in Franco-Prussian War – 1871 and drove back the Prussians from Blois.

George Henri Anne-Marie Victor de Villebois-Mareuil was born approximately 30 km South East of Nantes. He was a soldier and author. He started his military education at the École Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr where he graduated as a Second Lieutenant in 1867. He loved sport and excelled in gymnastics. Shortly after his graduation he left for Cochinchina where he joined the Marine Infantry serving under his uncle Admiral de Cornulier who was Governor of the Colony. He was promoted to full Lieutenant in 1870.

He saw in the Anglo-Boer War the chance to avenge the French humiliation at Fashoda in the Sudan in 1898.
“But she (England) can be sure that this tricolour flag, grabbed from Fachoda and ripped to shreds in London, was brought to Pretoria by French Volunteers, and has taken its place next to those of the Southern Boer Republics to support their independence against the oppressors. She gave us a Hundred Years’ War, and for a hundred years she has robbed the farmers from the Cape. Since then she has violated every peace treaty. Her hatred being even fiercer against the Boer, for there is French blood flowing through their veins.” – F. Chinier.
He arrived in Lourenço Marques on the 22 November 1899. In December 1899 he was appointed to the rank of Major by General Joubert, and fought in the Battle of Colenso. Due to his leadership capabilities he was given the rank of Major-General and commander of all Foreign Volunteers on 17 March 1900.

The average age of his troops was thirty with the youngest being Private Boiserolle who was only 17. He had a lot of respect for the fighting ability of the Germans under his command despite the lack of unity between the different German troops and commanders. He did not have the same convictions towards the Dutch under his command due to their apparent lack of courage and eagerness for battle. They were often referred to by the Boers themselves as lowly drunkards. – B. Lugan.

About the Boers he said:

He summed his thoughts about the Boer as follows: “Noble and of good race for the most, they live on their farm like in the castles of old, free and isolated… These people are standing up in the face of the whole world defying the decline of our too advanced civilizations.” – La Liberté.

Read Here more about the hero – Villebois-Mareuil.

The Gravestone of Villebois-Mareuil. He was reintered at Magersfontein – Photo: Brandnetel

“When is a war not a war?” with “When it is carried on by methods of barbarism in South Africa,” referring to those same camps and the policies that created them.
Read more  here.

image: stanford university

This next book is a must read – [I said to myself]

Sarah Raal, deserves to have had a film made of her life. Born into a prosperous farm family in the Southern Free State outside Jagersfontein, with the outbreak of war her father and four brothers immediately enlisted leaving Sarah, her mother and two small children alone on the farm. On one occasion, when the latter were shopping in Jagersfontein, her mother was denounced for feeding passing Boers and, together with her children, placed in a concentration camp. This left Sarah alone on the farm with her farm workers. After seven months of this, her brothers suddenly appeared seeking sanctuary. Word of this got out, but they all got away before their arrest could be carried out. For a few months Sarah moved from farm to farm but inevitably her luck ran out and she was incarcerated at Springfontein. There she had a run-in with the Camp Commandant that resulted in her being placed in a punishment detail from which she escaped to rejoin her brothers. As the countryside was palpably unsafe for a woman alone, she was allowed to enlist with the commando under command of a Commandant Nieuwoudt. There she took part in a number of guerrilla engagements, coming under both rifle and shell fire several times and displaying considerable bravery during the course of these actions. On more than one occasion she was in actual physical combat with the enemy, narrowly escaping injury, death or capture. She was eventually captured in an ambush and placed in a camp until the end of the war. She later wrote a book entitled Met Die Boere In Die Veld, which was published in 1936 and re-published in English in 2000.

Source: http://rapidttp.co.za/milhist/8/08sepnl.html

September 19, 1899, Wednesday

LONDON, The special dispatches from South Africa confirm the report that the Boers are massing artillery in positions commanding Laing’s Nek. Small Boer detachments occupy positions above Buffalo River.
The members of the Afrikander Bund in Cape Town intend to convene the Bund in Congress to consider the situation.
A Bloemfontein paper reports the dismissal of several Englishman from the Bloemfontein Police Force because of their refusal to promise to serve on the Commando.

Mr. Chamberlain came to London from Birmingham yesterday afternoon and spent the evening at the Colonial Office. While there he received a dispatch from Lord Salisbury, who is at Hatfield House, and sent a special messenger to the Premier.
There has been lively interchange of dispatches between the Foreign, War, and Colonial Offices, but no summons has yet been issue for a Cabinet Counsel.

Long dispatches were sent last evening to the Viceroy of India, Lord Gurzon of Kedleston, and to the British High Commissioner in South Africa, Sir Alfred Milner.
General Lord Garnet Wolseley, Field Marshal and Commander in Chief, returned to London yesterday and immediately repaired to the War Office, where he remained busily employed the greater part of the day.

The Daily Chronicle points out this morning that “the Orange Free State would probably better serve the Transvaal by remaining neutral than by active assistance, because the easiest route for marching troops to Johannesburg and Pretoria lies between Orange River and Vaal River.”

The Cape Town correspondent of the paper says: “It is reported here that Conyngham Greene (British Diplomatic Agent at Pretoria) fears that an attempt will be made to dynamite the British Agency.”

The second edition of The Times yesterday contained a dispatch from Johannesburg, which says: “There is, I am informed, some early coup in contemplation. The quantities of compressed forage forwarded in the direction of Natal border indicate some move on the part of the troops in that quarter. The Government is buying horses freely today.”

Source here:Source

London Oct 21,1901 – a Dispatch from Brussels to the Daily Mail says:

“Mr Kruger has received a report from Mr. Schalk Burger that the greater part of Cape Colony is in open rebellion and that the Boers have armed 15,000 Afrikanders within the last three months.”
Source here: Source
[Schalk Burger is my great grandad]
Images from this brutal war where many South Africans and animals died brutally…animals in the scorched earth policy by the British. Farms were destroyed and set on fire, houses burnt down and sheep butchered like at a butchery.

Rugby 1891 – “The best teams were undoubtedly the Western Provinces, played at Cape Town ; the Griqualand West (to whom the “Currie” Cup was given) at Kimberley” …source:
rugby-pioneers.blogs.com/rugby/2008/09/touring-to-sout.html

Boer Women – image: nzhistory.net.nz

Boer Soldiers -image:nzhistory.net.nz

Boer Women:Image:ictnetwork.co.uk
The Scandal of the Black Camps

A South African visitor to this site has raised the controversy about the imprisonment of Black South Africans in conditions much worse than those for Boer prisoners. Removed from farms or other areas, at least 14 000 Black people are believed to have died in these concentration camps–but for nearly a century the ordinary South African was completely unaware of their existence.

Unlike the Boer prison camps, the Black prisoners were mostly left to fend for themselves, and were not given any rations at all. They were expected to grow food or find work. In a few instances this actually improved their chances of survival because they were able to get out of the camps which were hellholes of infection and disease.
Source:http://users.westconnect.com.au/~ianmac5/exhibit8.html

Image: ToGoTo.co.za

Almost Forgotten Victims – The Anglo-Boer War Camps of Aliwal North

Southbound out of the Free State’s grassy plains, the Friendly N6 Route carries travellers across the great Senqu/Orange River into Aliwal North, gateway to the Eastern Cape.This quietly bustling provincial town was formally founded in 1850 by Sir Harry Smith, then governor of the Cape Colony, who named it in tribute to his 1846 victory over the Indian Sikhs at the Battle of Aliwal. “North” was added to differentiate it from Aliwal South, the old name for Mossel Bay. Fifty years later this hamlet would become the chosen site for two of the many horrific concentration camps of the Anglo-Boer War. Aliwal North’s Northern Post and Border News reported in January 1901 that a native refugee camp had been established at the confluence of the Orange and Kraai rivers for blacks impoverished by the war. The term “refugee” was bolstered by the fact that, initially, blacks entered the camp voluntarily, and also willingly supplied a virtually endless source of manpower for the “labour-strapped” colonial government. Towards the end of January the camp contained just over 200 refugees. At that stage the Aliwal North town council advised the Rouxville Commandant that the council could no longer cope with the Free State refugees – since the camp was a military undertaking, the council would help but would not take responsibility. In February, the council exhorted the authorities to give urgent attention to the poor sanitary conditions in the camp.According to Rev. Kessler, an American researcher on concentration camps, in August 1900 a British Intelligence officer, HR Abercrombie, recommended that defeated Boers, their families and servants should be sent to concentration camps similar to those used by General Weyler in Cuba in 1896/1897. Lord Roberts, the Supreme Commander, did not approve. However, when Lord Kitchener assumed this position, he incorporated the recommendation into his “scorched-earth policy” to end the guerrilla war. He planned to make it impossible for Boer commandos to receive any assistance from their families or the land by burning all their homes, razing crops, slaughtering all the animals and driving all black servants, Boer women and children into concentration camps.Kitchener initiated his campaign in mid-March. Within one month the black inmates had increased to over 2000 and a separate camp was established for them approximately 5 km lower down along the Orange. By May, the arrival of white women and children from the Free State villages of Rouxville, Zastron and Smithfield swelled the white camp population to over 2500; by October, when others were brought from Bloemfontein, the camp reached its maximum of almost 5000.In 1986, a local farmer, Mr Abrie Oosthuizen, suffered a severe heart attack and was given a year to live. Releasing the farm to his son, he retired to Aliwal North where he underwent a heart bypass operation. During his recovery, he found time hung heavy on his hands and he became bored. Then, Abrie enthusiastically started researching the Anglo-Boer War. The result was the publication of his first book, Rebelle van die Stormberge, six years later in 1992. After completing a second book, he turned to the military blockhouses and forts along the Orange River. In all his research, there had always been a gap – the history of the black war refugees: it seemed as if they had simply disappeared off the face of the earth. Until he came across an interesting and illuminating article in a copy of the Northern Post of 1902. It stated that the municipality had planned to construct a turbine pump station but was divided over a suitable site. One group suggested building it below Aliwal North beside the Orange River. The other preferred a higher position beside the Kraai River, since they feared contamination from the graves along these rivers. Eventually the camp superintendent provided proof that the graves were so deep that there was no likelihood of pollution. This controversy indicated that camp graves existed not only in the bend of the Kraai River above the confluence but also along the Orange River right up to Greathead’s Mill, where the pump station stands today. Abrie obtained further proof of a second camp while reading the research of Dr Jan Ploeger, the government archivist, wherein he noted that the black camp at Aliwal North had been moved five miles west of the white camp.Abrie Oosthuizen then heard of a Mr Michael Magetse who helped him identify the place through the fireside stories he had heard from his grandfather, a camp survivor. Abrie found the first camp and the remains of many black graves beside the Kraai River, which were confirmed by the land surveyor of Aliwal North, Mr N van Deventer. After a futile attempt to find the second camp, Abrie located an old map indicating a “native cemetery” five miles west of the first. It was described as Crown Land, ceded to the mayor and town council of Aliwal North in 1912 “on condition that the land hereby granted shall be used as a place of interment for Natives”. The title deed subsequently obtained from the office of the surveyor-general in Cape Town provided irrefutable proof that the one morgen terrain situated in the current township of Dukathole was the oldest formal graveyard for black people. Mr van Deventer had no trouble finding the anchor stones with rusted wire attached to them, indicating the corners of the fence surrounding the “native cemetery”. It is believed to be the first cemetery of its kind in South Africa which could be accurately located.Although a careful record was kept of white deaths, Emily Hobhouse, in her book The Brunt of the War, admits that statistics of black mortalities were scanty. Calculations based on the known number of black mortalities in Free State camps from July to October 1901, indicate that there were at least 250 to 270 black South Africans who died in the Aliwal North camp during those four months alone, mostly from pneumonia, enteric fever and diarrhoea. Conditions in the overpopulated camps had quickly deteriorated, since the little town of Aliwal North with only 800 inhabitants did not have adequate infrastructure to support the sudden influx of camp inhabitants.Two separate and magnificent monuments commemorate Aliwal North’s white victims of war; on one hilltop lies the Garden of Remembrance for 134 British and Colonial soldiers, on the other hilltop, the Concentration Camp Memorial Garden for the 720 Boer women and children who succumbed to the appalling conditions in the camps.A monument has been erected on the picturesque site of the original “Native Cemetery”, along the bank of a river that on its 2000 km long journey brings life and sustenance to vast tracts of our country and many of our people, irrespective of colour or circumstances. The original cemetery is surrounded by thousands of more recent graves extending over an area of at least five morgen. The respect with which this piece of land has been treated for over a century makes it a fitting memorial to those almost forgotten victims.Read the complete story in the June/July issue of ToGOTo

Source: http://www.togoto.co.za/?PID=2&fu=ReadArticle&gid=38&Issue=4

Johanna Brandt, one of four children, was born in 1876. Her Dutch father and Afrikaner pioneer mother greatly influenced her worldview, which eventually made Johanna Brandt a household name. Following the Anglo-Boer War, Johanna emerged as a prolific author, focussing mainly on the Boer War. In later life, however, her eccentric character came to the fore as she explored aspects of natural healing, mysticism and feminism.

Johanna died in 1964.

I am anxious to get this book filled and out of the way … our friend the enemy will come and search our house for documents and then they will carry away this chronicle of my griefs and woes and – joys, lately. What agonies I would endure if this book were to fall into strange hands ! Johanna van Warmelo, 9 February 1902.

When Johanna wrote these words, she was 24 years old and had already experienced helpless anger at the horrors of a concentration camp, the anxiety of working undercover for the Boer Secret Service and the excitement of falling in love. Her diary, secret diary and love diary, combined in this publication, weaves her remarkable experiences during the war together with her everyday life as an ordinary young woman living in an extraordinary time.

The War Diary of Johanna Brandt is an accurate reproduction of Johanna’s three diaries, two of which, the secret diary and the love diary, was originally written using lemon juice. Through these diaries, and with extensive research by Jackie Grobler, we are offered a unique insight into the war that did not allow indecision or disloyalty.

Something about the author:

Jackie Grobler is senior lecturer at the University of Pretoria, Department of Historical and Heritage Studies. He holds a Doctor Philosophiae in History and is the author of three books, co-author of a further ten chapters in books; co-editor of one book; author of 31 biographies in biographical dictionaries and author of many academic journal articles.
He lives in Pretoria with his wife Elize.
Source: http://www.ais.up.ac.za/newsletter/libnewsmay1_08/index2.htm

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Hitler and Lenin playing chess

An etching of a young Hitler playing chess against Lenin 100 years ago

Image:thetelegraph.co.uk

The image is said to have been created in Vienna by Hitler’s art teacher, Emma Lowenstramm, and is signed on the reverse by the two dictators.

Hitler was a jobbing artist in the city in 1909 and Lenin was in exile and the house where they allegedly played the game belonged to a prominent Jewish family.
In the run-up to the Second World War the Jewish family fled and gave many of their possessions, including the etching and chess set, to their housekeeper.

Now their housekeeper’s great-great grandson is selling the image and the chess set at auction. Both items have a pre-sale estimate of £40,000.

The unnamed vendor is confident the items are genuine after his father spent a lifetime attempting to prove their authenticity.

He compiled a 300-page forensic document that included tests on the paper, the signatures and research on those involved.

Experts, however, have questioned its authenticity especially the identification of Lenin who they say might have been confused with one of his associates.

When the etching was made, Hitler was 20 and Lenin was twice his age and the house was where politicos went to discuss things.

The etching is thought to be one of five and shows Hitler – playing with the white pieces – sitting by a window, with Lenin opposite him in half shadow.

It is titled “A Chess Game: Lenin with Hitler – Vienna 1909”.

It raises tantalising questions about what the two men who helped shape the world in the 20th century might have spoken of.

Lenin was already a highly influential Russian figure who in 1907 went into exile once more after the revolution was crushed by Tsarist authorities.

Richard Westwood-Brookes, who is selling the items, said: “This just sounds too good to be true, but the vendor’s father spent a lifetime proving it.

“He compiled a 300 page document and spent a great deal of money engaging experts to examine the etching.

“The signatures in pencil on the reverse are said to have an 80 per cent chance of being genuine, and there is proof that Emma Lowenstramm did exist.

“The circumstantial evidence is very good on top of the paper having been tested.

“Hitler was a painter in 1909 and his Jewish teacher Emma Lowenstramm was the person who made the etching.

“There is some suggestion that when he came to power Hitler protected her and she died from natural causes in 1941.

“At the time, Vienna was a hotbed of political intrigue and the house where this game took place belonged to a prominent Jewish family.

“Lenin at the time was moving around Europe in exile and writing “Materialism and Empirio-criticism”.

“His movements are hazy and it is known that he did play chess and later he certainly wore wigs as a disguise.

“It is also known that Lenin was a German agent and the house was where people went to exchange political views.

“The chess set is clearly the same chess set as that in the etching. It is a box chess set that folds out and the pieces are identifiable – particularly the kings and bishops.

“To my knowledge there are five etchings of this image, but this has the signatures of both men and the artist.

“The provenance is that it has come through the family of the housekeeper who was given it when the Jewish family fled in the late 1930s.

“The family is based in Hanover and it is the great great grandson of the housekeeper who is selling it.

“On all sorts of levels it is an extremely valuable artefact. Even as just an allegorical picture it shows the men playing chess possibly for the world.”

Historian Helen Rappaport, who has just written a book called “Conspirator: Lenin in Exile”, said the etching was probably a “glorious piece of fantasy”.

She said: “In 1909 Lenin was in France and there is no evidence that he was in Vienna.

“In October he went to Liege in Belgium and in November he went to Brussels. He would have visited Vienna before and after that year.

“He liked the place and went there because he travelled around Europe on trains, but he wouldn’t have been there long enough to meet a young Hitler.

“He was also as bald as a bat by 1894 with just hair on the sides of his head.

“And when in exile he was not known as Lenin and instead used a number of aliases.

“The person believed to be Lenin in the etching may well have been one of his revolutionary or Bolshevik associates who was misidentified.

“It may even have been an Austrian socialist with whom he associated in the Second International.

“The Germans did fund the Bolsheviks and gave them millions of marks for the revolutionary effort, but Lenin was not a German sympathiser.

“Although this is totally spurious it is wonderful to bring these two great megalomaniacs together.

“It makes sense retrospectively and the history of art is full of retrospective meetings between people.”

The items are to be sold at Mullock’s auction house in Ludlow, Shropshire, on October 1.

See the News article here

When you see a good move, look for a better one
–Emanuel Lasker

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Afrikaans! Afrikaans! Afrikaans!

You can click on this mosaic for a larger view.

English readers: This poem in this entry is about South Africa. I dedicated the 14th August 2008 to Afrikaans, the language I love and my mother tongue. This is, in our history, used to be an important day as we celebrated Afrikaans as our language. Afrikaans was forbidden to use by Afrikaans speaking people in the Cape when the English occupied the Cape. A sign/tag was placed around children’s necks in schools saying, “donkey”, if they had dared to speak Afrikaans.

On 14th August 1875 the GRA was founded. Their task was to promote Afrikaans. They also requested – on the 24th August 1878 – for the Bible to be translated into Afrikaans.

In this poem I refer to some places and nature.  On the link of my 2008-entry, you can see the Afrikaans Language Monument. Good news for Afrikaans too: WordPress and Facebook have gone Afrikaans! If you choose Afrikaans as your language in the settings in WordPress, you will find most terms on your dashboard in Afrikaans. 

Hoogenhout, a famous South African poet, said the following after Afrikaans was forbidden in schools in the early 1920s.

“English! English! All is English! What you see and hear

In our schools, in our churches, our Mother tongue is killed”

Was dit Hoogenhout wat in ‘n gedig gesê het:

“Engels! Engels! Alles Engels! Engels wat jy sien en hoor;
In ons skole, in ons kerke, word ons moedertaal vermoor.
Ag, hoe word ons volk verbaster, daartoe werk ons leraars saam.
Hollands nog in seek’re skole: is bedrog, ‘n blote naam!
Wie hom nie laat anglisere, word geskolde en gesmaad.
Tot in Vrystaat en Transvaal al, oweral dieselfde kwaad.
‘Dis vooruitgang’, roep die skreeuwers, ‘dis beskawing wat nou kom!
Die wat dit nie wil gelowe, die is ouderwets en dom…’.”

 I‘ve been to a few countries and many places in the UK. I still think South Africa is the most beautiful country in the world. We have such an abundance of beauty and  diversity in nature. We have the greenest canyon in the world- which is also the 3rd largest in the world, we have the highest waterfall in Africa and the 2nd highest in the world, the 3rd longest Tufa waterfall, the deepest mines, the largest zoo, the smallest butterfly, the largest diamond, the second largest amount of windmills on farms (280 000), the largest impact crater on earth, white lions, the largest ostrich population and much more.

On this link of the  The Drakensberg Mountains, you can read about my hiking trip in the Mountain when I was 15. I was on top of Mount Aux Sources, the highest peak of the mountain range in South Africa. The actual highest peak of this mountain range is in Lesotho and the peak is called, Thaba Ntlenyana (which means: beautiful little mountain). “Thaba” means “mountain” – the attributive “yana” means “little”. 

You can see a pic of one of the two chain ladders you have to go on to reach the summit. At the bottom of this post I have included an Afrikaans song by the Art teacher in my Secondary school. He was one of the two teachers on our hiking trip! He sings about “sidewalk people” and I’ve translated it roughly for you to understand.

More interesting facts – from quite a few years ago:

*Pretoria has the second largest number of embassies in the world after Washington, D.C.
*The University of South Africa – UNISA – is a pioneer of tertiary distance education and is the largest international correspondence university in the world with 250,000 students.
*Afrikaans is the youngest official language in the world.
*The Singita Private Game Reserve in the Kruger National Park was voted the best hotel in the world by the readers of travel publication, Conde Nast Traveller.
*Stellenbosch University was the first university in the world to design and launch a microsatellite.
*South Africa houses one of the three largest telescopes in the world at Sutherland in the Karoo.

South Africa is the first country to host a Fide rated Chess tournament where players from different countries played their games online! See my entry about the South African Open Chess Championships that took place in Cape Town.
Read HERE my post dedicated to Afrikaans only- last year 14th August. 

This stamp was issued October 1975. It was issued on the Inauguration of the Afrikaans Language Monument  and features the 1st edition of the Arikaanse Partiot (January 15, 1876), one of the first newspapers in Afrikaans rather than Dutch.
On this link you can see more stamps of South Africa.

Met die stigting van die Genootskap van Regte Afrikaners op 14 Augustus 1875 in die Paarl is ‘n tydvak van georganiseerde stryd om die Afrikaanse taal ingelui. In artikel IX van die Genootskap se bepalings word beoog om ‘n Afrikaanse maandblad uit te gee. Op hierdie dag in 1876 verskyn die eerste uitgawe van die maandblad Die Afrikaanse Patriot, wat die orgaan van die GRA sou wees. C.P. Hoogenhout was die eerste redakteur onder die skuilnaam Oom Lokomotief, wat deur die redakteurs na hom oorgeneem is. In Die Patriot dek die GRA die terreine van hul doelstelling, naamlik die van land, volk en taal. Daarin is leiding gegee ten opsigte van landsake, die Afrikaanse taal, geskiedenis en belangrike nuus. —lees meer op die link!

LEES HIER!!

Jan 2015 –Indien jy beplan om my eie gedigte te ‘leen’ vir jou Facebook bladsy of jou privaat blog of website, kan jy asseblief so vriendelik wees om my daaroor in te lig en daarna ook my skryfnaam ‘Nikita’ daarby te publiseer -soos dit by al my eie gedigte hier op my blog is! Dit is ‘n klein en simpel versoek. Ek vind my eie gedigte op heelwat ander websites and dit is vir my aangenaam om te weet dat ander mense my gedigte waardeer, maar daar is kopiereg reëls en ek sal dit waardeer indien jy dit sal respekteer en erkenning gee aan die skrywer van die gedig. Dan — vind ek ook my gedigte op internet bladsye van mense met sekere politieke sieninge en oorweginge waarmee ek nie saamstem nie. Ek het herhaaldelik gevra om my gedigte te verwyder en my versoeke word bloot geignoreer. Dit wys dat daar mense is wat nie ander se werke (eiendom) respekteer nie. Dit is die groot rede waarom ek die boodskap hier plaas.

Suid-Afrika: my land

Jy’s indrukwekkend, manjifiek
jou sondeurdrenkte landskappe
weerkaats helder beelde in my siel
jou pragtige wonders flikker oneindig
lank in die stilte van jou nagrus

Mount Aux Sources – so elegant en grasieus
verrys jy vanuit die voetheuwels, soos
‘n fakkel by die Spele ets jy lekkende
beelde teen die muur van my geheue
en voel ek jou hitte gloeiend teen my hart

O Blyde! ek fantaseer oor jou
magiese kragte wat jy sorgloos
en galant in die galery van my
stille gemoed stilletjies uitpak terwyl
my dawerende applous eggo
oor die velde van my gedagtes

Moederstad! hoe inskiklik laat jy my
telkens hakkel wanneer ek my herinneringe
sagkens koester – jou fasades!
waar ek jou gambiet betree
en gewillig my pionne oorgee

En saans voel ek jou fluweelagtige
skoonheid van elke sonsondergang
stadig neerdaal in my gemoed terwyl
ek stadig drink van jou geloofs-fonteine
wat borrellend bruis in oorvloed

Fragmentaries vier ek feeste
ek dans en omhels jou en jy –
jy blus my gees telkens met jou
magiese heildronke: een-vir-een
op ‘n toekoms – wat mag wees!
–Nikita –14/8/09 14:00

Sidewalk People

Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move like shadows in the street past me
Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move faceless past my heart

Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move like shadows in the street past me
Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move faceless past my heart

I wish I could look at a photo
to see what your world deep inside is like
borrow a piece of your dreams
I wonder who you are

I wish I could understand the language
in which you channelled your thoughts
I wish I could for a moment
share your path of life

Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move like shadows in the street past me
Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move faceless past my heart

perhaps it’s best for sure
‘cos if we know all of all
the sadness maybe
too hard too much
the love too beautiful

walk past one another
I stay I and you stay you
a single road leading somewhere
I wish I could understand

Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move like shadows in the street past me
Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move faceless past my heart

Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move like shadows in the street past me
Sidewalk People Sidewalk People
Move faceless past my heart

—translated–nikita

image: google

Sypaadjie Mense

Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg soos skimme in die straat verby
Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg gesigloos voor my hart verby

Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg soos skimme in die straat verby
Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg gesigloos voor my hart verby

ek wens ek kon ‘n kiekie kyk
hoe jou wêreld diep daar binne lyk
‘n stukkie van jou drome leen
ek wonder wie jy is

ek wens ek kon die taal verstaan
waarin jy jou gedagtes baan
ek wens ek kon ‘n oomblikkie
jou lewenspaadjie deel

Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg soos skimme in die straat verby
Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg gesigloos voor my hart verby

miskien is dit dalk beter so
want as ons iets van almal weet
die hartseer dalk te swaar te veel
die liefde dalk te mooi

stap maar bymekaar verby
ek bly ek en jy bly jy
‘n enkelpaadjie iewers heen
ek wens ek kon verstaan

Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg soos skimme in die straat verby
Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg gesigloos voor my hart verby

Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg soos skimme in die straat verby
Sypaadjie mense Sypaadjie mense
Beweeg gesigloos voor my hart verby

Sypaadjie Mense – Johan vd Watt

Sonja Herholdt, Ek verlang na jou.

Herman Holtzhausen – Transkaroo

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South Africa – a distorted view

Image: bornagainredneck.blogspot.com

Since I have started teaching in  Secondary schools in the UK, it has been interesting to know what is being taught in schools and to compare to what we teach in South Africa. Curriculum-wise, the contents is of course exactly the same when it comes to all subjects, apart from history, as all countries teach the history of their country more intensively for obvious reasons. Colleagues are always interested to know about the country you’re from  and you do enjoy the diversity in students/teachers – all from different countries and to get to know the different cultures too. I’ve met teachers from Spain, France, Canada, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Greece, Poland, New Zealand, Australia, Portugal, Nigeria, too many to name! One thing is for sure, teachers are teachers, it doesn’t matter from which country you are, your background, we all share some personal traits. Yesterday, I had the opportunity to chat with a history teacher and I was given a text book and when paging through the book, my eye caught the topic on South Africa – and it was interesting to read through the text, but then when I read the section about slavery, I couldn’t believe the distorted account of the events/history during the 1700’s-1800’s, e.g. one “fact” was that the British abolished slavery (which is the truth), but then the distorted view:  it was the cause of the Great Trek.  As if the “boers” had wanted to have slaves and decided to trek due to the abolishment of slavery. Ee….e.r… that’s not the cause of the Great Trek in 1838… I would suggest that you read Patrick’s blog if you were taught that distorted fact at school. Also, if you are/were under the impression that we had slaves in SA –  after slavery was abolished – then you really do have a distorted view of SA and what really happened there. I would then urge you to make sure you have the facts.

 I’ve found Patrick’s blog with a clear explanation of our history. He explains it clearly, in an interesting way. I have really enjoyed reading his entry and I would like you to make an effort and visit his blog-entry. You will find the link at the bottom of this entry. I also have a link to one of my early-entries, which you might want to follow too. I’ve found tons of information and many links which you will enjoy. I think history-textbooks need to be rewritten for Secondary schools in the UK… but, we all know why history always got written the way it is written, don’t we?

C.D. Jewell, author of Liberalstein, says about Born Again Redneck:
“This blog interested me first because of the title. But the quality of Patrick Joubert Conlon’s writing has kept me coming back. His style is not presumptuous or pompous or condescending; it’s plain and simple. Good old American English. Which is funny because Mr. Conlon was born and lived in South Africa for his first twenty one years and after that spent eight years in England before finding his home here in the U. S. His blog provides a rare outsider/insider perspective on the U. S. of A. He’s been linked to by CNN on a couple of occasions and one of his posts was cited by the official Fred08 website. He does a lot of politics but also some lighter fare as well. He frequently posts spectacular photos taken on his Oregon farm.”

A quote from Patrick’s blog… and I do hope that you will follow the link and read the complete entry. All links will open in a new window.

They first introduced a law to force the Khoi and other so-called “free” blacks to work for as little as possible. The Hottentot Code of 1809 required that all Khoi and other free blacks carry passes stating where they lived and who their employers were. Persons without such passes could be forced into employment by white masters.

Parliament in London then established a circuit court to monitor conditions in the western Cape. This court offended many Afrikaner sensibilities by giving equal weight to the evidence of “servants” and “masters,” black and white alike. The British also raised a force of colonial police, including Khoi, to enforce the court’s authority. The British also forbade the use of “Cape Dutch” (which patois eventually developed into the Afrikaans language) in court.

In 1815 a Dutch-speaking Afrikaner farmer who refused to answer a court summons for mistreating a Khoikhoi employee was shot dead while resisting arrest. Relatives and neighbors rose in what became known as the Slachter’s Nek Rebellion, but their resistance was soon crushed, and the British hanged five of the rebels.

Some Afrikaners migrated eastward. These Afrikaners were known as Trekboers (itinerant farmers – “trek” is Afrikaans for “travel” and “boer” means “farmer.”) Then the British stopped the Boers eastward trek by annexing all of the Eastern Cape and establishing their own colony there in 1820. That is when my father’s ancestors, the 1820 Settlers, arrived in South Africa.
Read a clear explanation by Patrick HERE

You can read my blog-entry on the following link:

https://chessaleeinlondon.wordpress.com/2007/09/23/boer-war-art-poetry-and-history/

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My Sarie Marais

Sarie Marais (Mare) 1868

This audio file is Sarie Marais played by the Royal Marines
Any South African knows this song very well. If someone from South Africa doesn’t know this song, then he pretends his a South African- hehe. Sarie Marais is a song which runs in your blood if you’re a Saffa. Interesting to know that the British Royal Marines have adopted it…even the French! Near to the bottom of this post you can find the link to the Royal Marines’ site and I’ve found the translation of this song in English/French too. I grew up in the Transvaal, but the Eastern Transvaal, which is now called Mpumalanga and I will always sing…”bring me back to my dear Transvaal”! I have the history of Sarie Marais in Afrikaans and if you want it translated, give me a shout and I’ll do it in a week’s time. At the bottom of this post, you will find a link to an entry about Die Huisgenoot…uit Toeka se dae!

http://www.geocities.ws/paulmare69/stories/sarie_marais.htm

Sarie Marais Rose – image: sariemarais.com

Sarie magazine, first published in 1949 under the title, Sarie Marais

Image: sarie.com…the first Sarie published 6th July 1949! volg die link na Sarie-webadres. The link to Sarie’s site will open in a new window.
http://www.sarie.com/lees/artikels/waar-het-sarie-haar-naam-vandaan-gekry

Sarie is 60! Image: sarie.com

Sarie on the web! at sarie.com

Susara Margaretha (Sarie) Maré
Die eerste dogter van Jacob Philippus Maré en Cornelia Susanna Jacoba Erasmus was Susara Margaretha. Sy is op die plaas Eendraght, Suikerbosrand, distrik Heidelberg, gebore op 15 April 1869. Haar pa was Jacob Maré, wat later ‘n lid van die uitvoerende raad van die Transvaal geword en na wie ‘n straat in Pretoria genoem is.

Hierdie is dié Sarie Marais (eintlik Maré) wat in die wyk van die Mooirivier gewoon het, ook bekend as Tant Mossie, volgens die SA biblioteek se katalogus-inskrywing AP.1998-227.

Haar ouers was Voortrekkers, en het hulle in die omgewing van die Suikerbosrand gevestig. Die dorpie Heidelberg het toe nog nie bestaan nie. Die grootste konsentrasie Voortrekkers het hulle in die wyk Mooirivier bevind, waar die dorp Potchefstroom aangelê is.

In hierdie tyd was daar vyf wyke in Transvaal:

Mooirivier (Potchefstroom)
Magaliesburg (Rustenburg)
Marico (Zeerust)
Ohrigstad
Zoutpansberg (Pietersburg).
Suikerbosrand was in die wyk van Mooirivier geleë, wat gestrek het vanaf Potchefstroom tot die huidige Wolmaransstad en Makwassie.

Toe sy 16 jaar oud was, het sy vir Jacobus Petrus Toerien, ‘n verslaggewer van Di Patriot van die Paarl, ontmoet. (Hy was toe in Pretoria om ‘n onderhoud met haar pa te voer). Hy het onder die skuilnaam Jepete in “Ons Kleintje” geskrywe in sy hoedanigheid as subredakteur van “Di Patriot”. Hulle is getroud en het 16 kinders gehad, van wie net 8 grootgeword het.

Hy het by Amerikaners wat in Transvaalse myne gewerk het die liedjie Sweet Ellie Rhee gehoor, wat sy oorsprong in die Amerikaanse Burgeroorlog gehad het en deur Septimus Winner (Alice Hawthorne) geskryf is. In die tydperk tussen die Eerste en Tweede Vryheidsoorloë het Jepete die woorde vertaal en só sy vrou, Sarie Maré, verewig. Die lied het ook nie aanvanklik al die versies en presies dieselfde woorde gehad het as wat ons vandag ken nie. Maré het later weens ‘n drukfout Marais geword.

 

Teen 1899 was Sarie Marais reeds ‘n treffer in Pretoria. In die Anglo-Boereoorlog het dit nie net gewild by die Boeremag geword nie, maar ook by ander soldate. Dit het later wêreldbekend geword omdat duisende Suid-Afrikaanse soldate dit in die Eerste en Tweede Wêreldoorlog gesing het.
Die gewildheid het het só gegroei dat die Britse Royal Marines dit as regimentsmars aangeneem het. Hul opleidingskip heet ook Sarie Marais. Dit is ook die regimentsmars van Paraguay se seinerskorps. Die eerste Suid-Afrikaanse seiljag se naam was ook Sarie Marais en duisende besoekers het al in die Durban-hawe op die Sarie Marais-plesierboot gevaar. Die eerste Suid-Afrikaanse rolprent se naam was Sarie Marais. Sarie, sustertydskrif van Die Volksblad, heet ook na haar. Tot hotels en woonstelblokke is na haar genoem.

Op die eerste internasionale radio-uitsending tussen Suid-Afrika, Brittanje en Amerika op die verjaardag van mev. Isie Smuts, vrou van die destydse premier, generaal Jan Smuts, het die sangeres Gracie Fields Sarie Marais gesing.

In die Tweede Wêreldoorlog het ‘n buitestasie van soldate in Noord-Afrika die naam “Sarie Marais Calling” gehad. Die Suid-Afrikaanse weermag is steeds lief om die mars op parades te speel, terwyl die Franse Vreemdelinge-legioen dit ook gebruik. Dit is ook die amptelike lied van die Girl Guides in Sri Lanka (Ceylon) wat dit aan die begin van die vorige eeu by die Boerekrygsgevangenes daar gehoor het. In die jare dertig van die vorige eeu is dit verkeerdelik op die Olimpiese Spele in Amerika as Suid-Afrika se amptelike volkslied gespeel. Duitsers het ‘n pienk roos met die naam Sarie Marais gekweek, waarvan voor die Pantserskool in Tempe, Bloemfontein, geplant is.

Inligting: sien die geocities-link soos hierbo aangedui.Daar word beweer dat “My Sarie Marais” se “oorsprong” is van die Amerikaanse liedjie:

Sweet Ellie Rhee

Sweet Ellie Rhee, so dear to me
Is lost forever more
Our home was down in Tennessee
Before this cruel war
Then carry me back to Tennessee
Back where I long to be
Amid the fields of yellow corn
To my darling Ellie Rhee.

My Sarie Marais

My Sarie Marais is so ver van my hart,
Maar ‘k hoop om haar weer te sien.
Sy het in die wyk van die Mooirivier gewoon,
Nog voor die oorlog het begin.

Koor:

O bring my trug na die ou Transvaal,
Daar waar my Sarie woon:
Daar onder in die mielies by die groen doringboom
Daar woon my Sarie Marais,
Daar onder in die mielies by die groen doringboom
Daar woon my Sarie Marais.

Ek was so bang, dat die kakies my sou vang,
En ver oor die see wegstuur;
Toe vlug ek na die kant van die Upington se sand
Daar onder langs die Grootrivier.

Koor

Die kakies is mos net soos ‘n krokodillepes
Hul sleep hou altyd watertoe.
Hulle gooi jou op ‘n skip vir ‘n lange lange trip
Die josie weet waarna toe.
Koor

Verlossing het gekom, en die huistoe gaan was daar,
Trug na die ou Transvaal,
My liewelingspersoon sal seker ook daar wees
Om my met ‘n kus te beloon.

Koor
English translation:

Sarie Marais

My Sarie Marais is so far away from my heart,
But I hope to see her again.
She lives in the district of Mooiriver,
Since before the war began.

Refrain:

Oh, take me back to my dear Transvaal,
To where my Sarie lives:
There down by the maïsfields near the green thorn tree,
That’s where my Sarie lives.
There down by the maïsfields near the grren thorn tree,
That’s where my Sarie lives.

Refrain:

I was so scared that the English would catch me,
And send me away accross the sea;
That’s when I fled in the direction of the sandflats near Upington,
There down by the Orange River (formerly Great River)

Refrain:

The English are just like crocodiles,
They always drag you down to the water.
They trow you on a ship for a very long trip,
Only the Lord knows where to.

Refrain:

Liberation came, and it was time to return home,
Back to my dear Transvaal.
The person I love will certainly be there,
To reward me with a kiss.

SARIE MARAIS was also adopted by the French Army

Sarie Mares

Chant d’amour Sud-Africain du XVIII° siècle, il est chanté dès 1946 au peloton d’Extrême-Orient. A partir des années 1970, il s’impose comme chant de marche à l’EMIA.

O Sarie Mares, belle amie d’autrefois
En moi tu demeures vive.
L’amour est plus fort que la pluie et que le vent.
Qui peut arrêter son élan ?

Oui, je veux revoir, dans mon vieux Transvaal,
Ma ferme au toit de chaume.
Où le parfum du miel, et des conifères embaument.
L’air pur est clair comme un cristal. (bis pour les deux derniers)

O Sarie Mares est bien loin de mon coeur
Mais je crois en son amour.
Car c’est entre ses bras que j’ai connu le bonheur.
J’irai la revoir un jour. (bis pour les deux derniers)

Quand j’étais petit, je croyais qu’un démon
Venait me ravir ma maison.
Mais lorsque je fus grand, ce fut une horrible guerre
Qui m’emmena loin de mes terres. (bis pour les deux derniers)
http://www.nationalanthems.us/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1136108511

Sarie Marais
Arranged Sir Vivian Dunn
This march was adopted by the Royal Marines in 1953 as the offical march of the Royal Marines Commandos and is played after the Regimental March on ceremonial occassions. This recording is taken from the CD ‘The King’s Squad’ by the Band of HM Royal Marines Commando Training Centre and features the Adjudant giving that famous order “Royal Marines, to you duties… quick march”

http://www.royalmarinesbands.co.uk/audio/Index_audiomp3.htm

Helmut Lotti – Sarie Marais – with a perfect Afrikaans accent!

 Royal Marines Commandos – Sarie Marais

On youtube you can watch the French version too.
And Sarie Marais in the movies!

Op hierdie volgende link kan jy lees oor die Huisgenoot uit Toeka se dae! Die link sal in ‘n nuwe bladsy oopmaak.
https://chessaleeinlondon.wordpress.com/2009/01/17/from-ye-olde-and-not-so-old/

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Joan of Arc

Joan of Arc

This song by OMD is one of my favourite songs. Coincidentally, it was also today Joan of Arc’s info which I’ve found on “this day in history”. Enjoy this song on this Saturday night!

Joan’s birthplace is now a museum

Joan of Arc, or Jeanne d’Arc in French,(c. 1412 – May 30, 1431)was a 15th century national heroine of France. She was tried and executed for heresy when she was only 19 years old. The judgment was broken by the Pope and she was declared innocent and a martyr 24 years later. She was beatified in 1909 and canonized as a saint in 1920.

Joan of Arc was born to Jacques d’Arc and Isabelle Romée in Domrémy, a village which was then in the duchy of Bar (and later annexed to the province of Lorraine and renamed Domrémy-la-Pucelle). Her parents owned about 50 acres (0.2 square kilometers) of land and her father supplemented his farming work with a minor position as a village official, collecting taxes and heading the local watch. They lived in an isolated patch of northeastern territory that remained loyal to the French crown despite being surrounded by Burgundian lands. Several local raids occurred during her childhood and on one occasion her village was burned.

Joan said she was about 19 at her trial, so she was born about 1412; she later testified that she experienced her first vision around 1424 at the age of 7 years, or other sources say at the later age of 12 when she was out alone in a field when the voices appeared. She had said she cried when they left as they were so beautiful. She would report that St. Michael, St. Catherine, and St. Margaret told her to drive out the English and bring the Dauphin to Reims for his coronation.

At the age of 16 she asked a kinsman, Durand Lassois, to bring her to nearby Vaucouleurs where she petitioned the garrison commander, Count Robert de Baudricourt, for permission to visit the royal French court at Chinon. Baudricourt’s sarcastic response did not deter her.She returned the following January and gained support from two men of standing: Jean de Metz and Bertrand de Poulengy. Under their auspices she gained a second interview where she made a remarkable prediction about a military reversal near Orléans.

She has remained an important figure in Western culture and many other nations. From Napoleon to the present, French politicians of all leanings have invoked her memory. Major writers and composers who have created works about her include Shakespeare, Voltaire, Schiller, Verdi, Tchaikovsky, Twain, Shaw, Brecht, Anderson, Honegger, Cohen and Anouilh. Depictions of her continue in film, television, song, and even video games.

Read more about Joan here.

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The Battle of Blood River – Ncome river

Image: geni.com
The Laager…of the Trekkers…at the Ncome river. Read on the Wiki-link more about this battle. All links in this post will open in a new window. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Blood_River

Today, 16th December, is an important day in the history of South Africa. In 1838 a battle was fought on the banks of the River Ncome. The battle was won by a small number of Trekkers vs thousands of Zulus. Previously, this day was called the Day of the Covenant, now it’s called Reconciliation Day. This day will always remind us of our forefathers that sought a better life.  History is one thing you can’t change. Governments can change, people can change, but not history.

Day of the Vow.
Read on this WIKI-link more about the 16th December, the Day of the Vow. On this next link you can read about the Boer War on my blog.

https://chessaleeinlondon.wordpress.com/2007/09/23/boer-war-art-poetry-and-history/

On 16 December 1838 where a meagre force of 470 Voortrekkers defeated an army of ten thousand Zulus under the command of Dingane. Only three Voortrekkers were wounded, and some 3,000 Zulu warriors were killed.
After suffering heavy losses at the hands of the warriors of Zulu King Dingane (c. 1795-1840), a Voortrekker commando advanced against the former in December 1838. As it was evident that they would be faced by superior enemy numbers, the Voortrekkers were induced by A.W.J. Pretorius (1798-1853) and S.A. Cilliers (1801-1871), to enter into a covenant with God. Its exact words were not recorded, but eyewitnesses’ later versions concurred that God had been requested to assist them in vanquishing the Zulu Army. Should they be victorious, the Voortrekkers undertook that they and their descendants would annually dedicate the day of the conquest to the glory of God alone. The Battle of Blood River took place on 16 December 1838, marking the Voortrekkers’ desired victory. On the same day, the Covenant was fulfilled for the first time on the very battlefield. Thus the oldest Afrikaner national celebration, later known as Dingaan’s Day or Day of the Covenant, came about.
Initially the Covenant was commemorated in a small way by families and religious associates. In 1864 the General Synod of the Afrikaners’ Natal Churches agreed that 16 December would henceforth be celebrated as ecclesiastical day of thanksgiving by all its congregations. This was the result of the efforts of two Dutch clergymen and supporters of Revival Theology, namely Revs. D.P.M. Huet (1827-1895) and F.L. Cachet (1835-1899). In 1865 the Executive Counsel of the South African Republic declared 16 December to be a public holiday in this Boer Republic. During the Anglo Transvaal (1880-1881) and Anglo Boer Wars (1899-1902), the commemoration of the Covenant inspired Afrikaners. The celebrations acquired a deeply nationalistic significance. A growing number of Covenant ceremonies were annually being organised throughout the Boer Republics and northern Natal. In 1894 the Government of the Free State also declared 16 December to be a public holiday. English-speaking compatriots and members of other races in general attached little importance to the Covenant, normally utilising 16 December for recreational purposes only. In 1910 an act was passed by Parliament according to which 16 December would be celebrated as a national holiday (Dingaan’s Day) throughout the Union of South Africa, as of 1911.

The celebration of the Covenant of 1838 has had an inestimable influence on Afrikaner and even South African cultural history. It played an important religious, national, social and educational role in everyday life, stimulating and shaping the Afrikaner’s creativity, historical consciousness, ethics and intercultural relations. In 1952 the name of the day was changed from Dingaan’s Day to Day of the Covenant. After 1994, in post-apartheid South Africa, it has still remained a public holiday, even though it is now known as Day of Reconciliation. The fact that it has been retained as a holiday is regarded as a significant gesture of goodwill towards Afrikaners.

On this next link you can read a Master’s Dissertation..in Afrikaans about the Vow and the meaning.
http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-07242003-161607/

Image: Wikimedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day_of_the_Vow

On this image the Vow can be read…in Dutch.

English: Here we stand before the holy God of heaven and earth, to make a vow to Him that, if He will protect us and give our enemy into our hand, we shall keep this day and date every year as a day of thanksgiving like a sabbath, and that we shall erect a house to His honour wherever it should please Him, and that we also will tell our children that they should share in that with us in memory for future generations. For the honour of His name will be glorified by giving Him the fame and honour for the victory.

Blood River – painting

 Image: southafrica-travel.net
On this link you can read more about King Dingane, the Zulu king and Piet Retief,  battles that were fought, also about the Battle of Weenen in South Africa’s history.

Blood River: Voortrekker Monument Pretoria

Image:http://picasaweb.google.com/Korostrand/VoortrekkerMonument

Blood River painting

Image: debruinfamily.com/DieGrootTrek/

‘Outa Flink’

Oktober 2010:  Hierdie foto van ‘Outa Flink’ is deur die Voortrekker/Msunduzi Museum, Pietermaritzburg aan my verskaf en ek wil graag vir Elrica Olivier daar bedank! Volgens inligting is ‘Outa Flink’ tydens die Slag van Bloedrivier gevange geneem en het hy vir Schalk Burger gewerk en is hy op die plaas Goedgedacht begrawe! [Goedgedacht is waar ek groot geword het!] Ons is tans besig om meer inligting oor ‘Outa Flink’ te bekom as ook die Gelofte Kerkie. 

Update oor Outa Flink

Hy het op die plaas vir Schalk Burger gewerk. Hy is dood as gevolg van ouderdom en het daar bly woon na die ABO omdat sy familie nie opgespoor kon word nie. Schalk Burger het hom oor hom ontferm en basies vir hom ‘gesorg’.

‘Bloedrivier’

In 1838 is God se hulp gevra om die boere in hul nood te steun, te behoed en te bewaar
‘n Monument sal hulle bou en die dag sal heilig bly,
Hul grootste wapen – hul geloof – met die Here aan hul sy …

Die nag was kul en donker, die impi’s staan en wag,
die lampies op die ossewaens soos Mahlozi’s in die nag
‘n Strandwolf sluip daar tussendeur, hy’s onheilspellend daar
Die mis sak toe, die vyand druis, hul wag op die bevel.

In die geslote walaer, in ‘n see van heidendom
is daar ‘n lig wat helder skyn – die lig van Christendom.
Die stemme van ‘n mannekoor weerklink deur digte mis
Psalm agt-en-dertig, stel almal weer gerus.

KOOR
Maar dieselfde God van Bloedrivier is steeds ons God vandag
Hy verstaan ons grootste vrese, Hy staan by ons deur die nag
Kom ons almal vat weer hande, erken sy grote Mag
Want dieselfde God van Bloedrivier is steeds met ons vandag

Twee skote van ‘n dubbel-loop, die stryd het pas begin
Die isilongo kondig aan Dingaan – ons sal oorwin
Maar God ons Vader is met ons, die vyand word verslaan
Die veld drink bloed, soos op Golgota – dit moet ons verstaan

KOOR
Maar dieselfde God van Bloedrivier is steeds ons God vandag
Hy verstaan ons grootste vrese, Hy staan by ons deur die nag
Kom ons almal vat weer hande, erken sy grote Mag
Want dieselfde God van Bloedrivier is steeds met ons vandag

The Battle Of Blood River
A word of thousands of Zulus on their way,
Made the boere’s wives ready to pray,
The question: to meet them or to wait?
That was Cilliers and Andries’ debate.

464 Boere waited quietly and shiver,
Next to a donga and the Ncome river.
That evening around the laager the mist lay,
But ghostly lamps kept the zulus at bay.

As dawn finally broke on a Sunday,
All of Zululand sat there that day.
10 000 Zulu warriors ready for blood,
Running to fight through the river’s mud!

Andries Pretorius was the boer leader,
The Zulus attacked without a breather.
Assagai and the long throwing spear,
Had the single shot boer Muskets in fear.

Dambuza and Ndlela’s thousands of zulu men,
Made Pretorius feel they’re in the lion’s den.
Zulus shot running through the river’s mud,
Made the river’s water turn to human blood.

The boere prayed and asked the Lord in fear,
To deliver them from the zulu spear.
Vowed to build a church and always remember
To Sabbath the date of 16 December.

Two hours later and 4 waves of spears,
Pretorius’ men let go of their fears.
Chased after the zulus as they scattered.
Truly that day the warriors got battered.

Dead bodies in the field that day was rife,
But 464 of God’s children was alive.
Although three was injured and lying in bed.
More than 3000 zulus was counted as dead.
Written by Louis van Niekerk on 05 October 2009
http://sites.google.com/site/louispvanniekerk/Home/poetry/english/the-battle-of-blood-river

Die volgende inligting kom van die Bloedrivier.org website.

Wie was daar met die slag van Bloedrivier?
Soek gerus jou famielie naam op, hul bloed vloei nog daagliks deur jou are !

Met erkenning aan Johann Janse van Rensburg en byvoegings deur Gerhard Swart. (bloedrivier.org)

Hier volg ‘n lys van 351 persone van die totale getal van 464 (verwys #) blanke krygers en die 59 kleurlinge wat aan die slag van Bloedrivier op 16 Desember 1838 deelgeneem het.

Waar moontlik word die persoon se genealogiese nommer ook verskaf. (BRON (verwys ##): Die Bloedrivierse Eeufeesgedenkboek opgestel deur A.C. du Toit en Dr. Louis Steenkamp, die lys is verder bygewerk deur die Genealogiese Genootskap van Suid-Afrika – N-Tvl Tak.)

Hoofkommandant:
1. Pretorius Andries Wilhelmus Jacobus (verwys nota 1) (b3c1d5e11)

Assistent-HoofKmdt:
2. Landman Karel Pieter (b2c10)

Kommandante:
3. Jacobsz Pieter Daniel(a15b5c3d8e1)
4. de Lange Johan Hendrik (Hans Dons)(b10c2)
5. Potgieter Jacobus (Koos)
6. Erasmus Stephanus Petrus
7. Uys Jacobus Johannes(b1c5d2e4)
8. Meyer Lucas Johannes

Laerkommandante:
9. Pretorius Albertus (ook kannonnier)
10. Erasmus Lourens
11. Moolman Piet (Rooi Piet)
12. Fronemann Christoffel Cornelis (b7)

Veldkornette:
13. Steyn Johannes C
14. Viljoen Gert
15. Pretorius Hercules Albertus (Bart)(b3c1d5e14) Broer van AWJ Pretorius (kanonier)
16. van Staden Gert (verwys nota 2)
17. Lombard Hermanus Stephanus
18. Scheepers Jan
19. Fourie Hermanus
20. Cowie William (a1)
21. Labuschagne Casper
22. Joubert Jan (ook kanonnier)

Godsdiensleiers:
23. Cilliers Sarel Arnoldus(b2c1d7e4)
24. du Plessis Johannes (Jan) (ook ‘n Veldkornet)
25. Joubert Pieter Jacobus (b10c6d9 moontlik)

Kanonniers:
26. Rudolph Petrus Johannes (b1c1d2)
27. Pretorius Gerhardus

Manskappe:
28. Aucamp Piet

29. Badenhorst Hendrik
30. Badenhorst P
31. Bantjes Jan Gerritze (b1c3d3)
32. Bantjies I
33. Beneke Johannes
34. Bester Barend Jacobus (b4c3d4e3) (sneuwel by slag van Umfolozi)
35. Bester Lourens ERasmus (b4c3d4e2)
36. Bester Paul Ma(i)chiel (b4c3d4e1)
37. Bezuidenhout Daniel Pieter
38. Biddulph Thomas Jervis (a1)
39. Bierman Isak
40. Biggar Alexander Harvey (a1) (sneuwel by slag van Umfolozi)
41. Bodes Barend Hendrik
42. Bornman Johannes Jurgens (b1c3)
43. Boshoff Jakobus (Jan)
44. Botha Ernst Adriaan Lodewyk (b1c7d1e15)
45. Botha Hendrik
46. Botha J C
47. Botha Jan
48. Botha L
49. Botha P J
50. Botha P R
51. Botha T F
52. Botha Theunis
53. Bothma Carel A
54. Bothma Daniel
55. Breytenbach Chris
56. Breytenbach Izaak Johannes (b4c1d4)
57. Breytenbach Jacob Coenraad
58. Breytenbach Johan Hendrik
59. Breytenbach Johannes Jacobus
60. Bronkhorst Johannes Jacobus (b6c6)
61. Bronkhorst Johannes Jacobus (b6c6d4)
62. Bronkhorst Samuel Johannes (b6c6d9)
63. Bruwer Eduard Christiaan Daniel (b7c4d12)
64. Bruwer Hans
65. Bruyn Piet
66. Buitendagh Carel Hendrik
67. Burger Jacobus Johannes
68. Burger Schalk Willem
69. Buys Piet

70. Claassens Christiaan Cornelis
71. Coetzee Cornelis (P-zn)
72. Coetzer Johannes Jacobus
73. Coetzer Philippus Jeremias
74. Coetzer Thys
75. Combrinck Gerhardus Hermanus Jacobus
76. Cronje Abraham Martinus
77. Cronje Piet

78. Davel Henning
79. Davel Jan
80. Dannhauser Thomas Richard (b6)
81. de Beer Christiaan Marthinus (Snr)
82. de Beer Abraham Samuel Jacobus
83. de Beer Christiaan Marthinus (Jnr)
84. de Beer Johannes (Jan) Christiaan
85. de Beer Johannes Adam
86. de Beer Stephanus A (Snr)
87. de Beer Zacharias Jacobus
88. de Bruyn Petrus Frederik
89. de Clercq Abraham Johannes
90. de Clercq Barend Jacobus
91. de Clercq Cornelis
92. de Clercq Jacob (b6c3d5)
93 de Clercg Johannes Wilhelmus
94. de Jager Frederick Johannes
95. de Jager Izak J
96. de Jager Johannes Wilhelmus (b1c11d5e5)
97. de Jager Lodewyk
98. de Lange Adriaan (Jnr)
99. de Lange Adriaan Jacobus (Snr, Hans Dons se broer)
100. de Lange Robertus Burnet (Broer van Hans Dons)
101. de Wet Kootjie
102. de Wet Pieter
103. de Winnaar Carel Stephanus
104. Dreyer Christiaan Lourens Sr.
105. Dreyer F
106. Dreyer I
107. du Plessis Francois
108. du Plessis Johannes (Jan)
109. du Plessis Pieter
110. du Plooy Hendrik
111. du Plooy Cornelis Willem
112. du Plooy Dirk Wouter
113. du Preez Pieter Daniel Andreas Salomon
114. Deysel F

115. Engelbregt Adriaan Stephanus
116. Engelbregt E
117. Engelbregt Gerhardus Johannes
118. Engelbregt H (jong)
119. Engelbregt H H (Snr)
120. Engelbregt Johannes Hendrik
121. Enslin Johannes Jacobus
122. Erasmus Antonie Philippus
123. Erasmus Barend Christoffel
124. Erasmus Cornelis Johannes
125. Erasmus Daniel Elardus
126. Erasmus Hans
127. Erasmus Jacobus
128. Erasmus Pieter ERasmus
129. Erasmus Stephanus E
130. Esterhuizen Jan Christoffel

131. Ferreira Marthinus Stephanus
132. Fick Hendrik (JC?)
133. Fisher Jan
134. Fourie Christiaan Erns
135. Fourie Dirk S
136. Fourie Hermanus
137. Fourie Philip Jacobus (Gewond tydens slag van Bloedrivier)
138. Fourie MVA

139. Garden Kapt. (Engels)
140. Geers Carel Frederik Christoffel (of Geer)
141. Geere Johannes (Jan) Coenraad Jonas
142. Giezing Fredrich (a1)
143. Goosen Marthinus2
144. Gouws Daniel
145. Gouws Jacob I
146. Gouws Jacob Marthinus
147. Gouws Pieter Marthinus
148. Greyling Jan Cristoffel (b11c2d3)
149. Greyling Pieter Jacobus (b11c2d2)
150. Grobbelaar Nicolaas (b9c11)
151. Grobbelaar Pieter Schalk (b9c11d2)
152. Grobler J
153. Grove Hermanus Gerhardus (b3c9d5)

154. Hammes Pieter Johannes (b1c2)
155. Hattingh Christiaan
156. Hattingh Francois (b8c7d4e1)
157. Hattingh Johannes Dewald
158. Hattingh Johannes Hendrik (Hans) (b11c1d2e1)
159. Herbst Marthinus Johannes Hendrik
160. Heydenreich Cornelis Frederik (b6c2d2)
161. Human Petrus Gerhardus

162. Jacobs Gabriel Gerhardus Nicholaas Nic (a15b5c3d8e1f7) (Kmdt. Jacobz se seun)
163. Jacobs Pieter Daniel (a15b5c3d8e1f2)
164. Jacobsz Jan (Kmdt. Jacobz se seun)
165. Janse van Rensburg Lukas Marthinus
166. Janse van Rensburg Nicolaas Marthinus (C-zn)
167. Janse van Rensburg Willem Cornelis
168. Janse van Vuren Luckas (of Lucas) Gerhardus
169. Janszen Willem
170. Jordaan Willem
171. Joubert Abraham Benjamin
172. Joubert Gideon
173. Joubert Jan (Jacs-zn)
174. Joubert Jan (jnr.)
175. Joyce Robert (a3)

176. Kemp Gerhardus Philippus
177. Kemp Jacobus Frederik
178. Kemp Petrus Johannes
179. Kilian Justus Daniel (Nageslag boer steeds op Vryheid)
180. Klaassen P
181. Klopper Hendrik Balthazar
182. Klopper Jacobus Marthinus
183. Klopper Johan Christiaan
184. Koekemoer C
185. Koekemoer Marthinus
186. Kritzinger Lewis
187. Kritziinger Matthys S B
188. Kruger Jan
189. Kruger Pieter Ernst
190. Kruger Tobias Johannes

191. Laas Cornelius Johannes
192. Laas C Mathys
193. Laas JAM
194. Labuschagne J P
195. Labuschagne Jan Harm (Jan Groen)
196. Labuschagne Willem Adriaan
197. Landman Jan A Karel Pieter (Snr)
198. Landman Jan (Doringberg)
199. le Roux D
200. le Roux Nicolaas (verwys nota 2)
201. Leech
202. Liebenberg Christiaan Jacobus (b2bc2d2e2)
203. Liebenberg Christiaan Jacobus (b2c2d6)
204. Lindeque Gerrit Johannes (Snr)
205. Lindeque Petrus
206. Lombard Hans
207. Lombard Hermanus Antonie
208. Lombard S
209. Lotter Johannes (Lotter Jacob?)
210. Ludick M J

211. Malan Daniel Jacob Johannes
212. Malan David Daniel
213. Malan Jacob Jacobus
214. Malan Stephanus Marcus F
215. Marais Coenraad
216. Marais Johannes L
217. Marais Stephanus Abraham
218. Marais F
219. Marcus F
220. Mare Wynand Wilhelmus (b9c7d7)
221. Maritz Pieter
222. Maritz Salomon Gerhardus (b1c8d1e2)
223. Maritz Salomon Stephanus (b1c8d2e1)
224. Martens Hendrik Jacobus (a5b1c7)
225. Martens Jan Thomas (snr) (a5b1c6)
226. Martens Jan Thomas (jnr)
227. Marx Frans Engelbertus (b3c6d4)
228. Meintjes Albertus Jacobus
229. Meinties Jacobus William
230. Meintjes Schalk Willem
231. Mey Christiaan Lodewyk
232. Meyer Adriaan Willem Petrus
233. Meyer Jacob
234. Meyer Jan
235. Meyer Lukas (L-zn)
236. Meyer Theodorus
237. Mienie Frederik Christiaan
238. Mienie Johannes
240. Moolman I
241. Moolman Adriaan Izak
242. Moolman Jacobus Philippus
243. Muller Johannes Christiaan (moontlik a1b5c7d4)
244. Muller Jan (moontlik a11b2)

245. Naude Jacob
246. Naude Philip Jacobus
247. Naude Francois Paulus
248. Neethling Hendrik Ludolf
249. Neethling Schalk Willem
250. Neethling Willem Hendrik
251. Nel Louis Jacobus
252. Nell Theunis Jacobus
253. Nell Willem Gabriel
254. Nortje Joachim

Oberholzer Jan Albert
Olivier (Lang) Gert
Olivier Ockert
Oosthuizen A
Oosthuizen Jan (J-zn) (verwys nota 2)
Oosthuizen J J (Snr)
Oosthuizen Marthinus Jacobus (b1c4d7e2)
Opperman C
Opperman D
Parker Edward
Pieters Coenraad
Pieterse Frederik
Pieterse H J
Pieterse Nicolaas
Potgieter Cornelis
Potgieter Evert F
Potgieter Hendrik
Potgieter Jurgen
Potgieter Matthys
Potgieter Petrus Hendrik Theunis
Potgieter Theodorus
Pretorius A P
Pretorius Barend
Pretorius Dewald Johannes (b3c1d2e4f4)
Pretorius Gideon
Pretorius Henning Petrus Nicolaas (b3c1d5e12)
Pretorius Marthinus Wessel (b3c1d5e11f1)
Pretorius Nicolaas
Pretorius Petrus Gerhardus (b3c9d7)
Pretorius Petrus Gerhardus (b3c9d7e2)
Pretorius Samuel
Pretorius Willem H
Pretorius Willem Jacobus
Prinsloo Jochemus Johannes Petr (b2c3d6e1f3)
Prinsloo N J
Prinsloo Willem P
Raads D
Raath Philip
Raath Pieter
Raath Roelof
Raatz Gerrit1
Ranger Simon
Reineke Adam
Retief Jacobus
Robbertse I
Robbertse Jan
Robbertse Matthys
Roets Hendrik
Rood
Roos Cornelis J
Roos Gysbert
Roscher P
Roux Dirk
Rudolph Jacobus Andreas (b1c3)
Rudolph Johann(es)Bernard (b1c1)
Rudolph Gerhardus Jacobus (b1c2)
Scheepers Coenraad F(swaer v. Erasmus Smit)
Scheepers Gert
Scheepers H
Scheepers J A
Scheepers Jacobus Johannes
Scheepers Stephanus Johannes
Scheepers M (G-zn)
Scheepers Marthinus
Schoeman Gert

Schoeman Johannes
Schutte Jan Harm Thomas
Slabbert G
Smit Andries Adriaan
Smit Chr. (C-zn)
Smith F
Snyman Coenraad F W (b7c4d9e7)
Snyman J H
Steenkamp Hermanus
Steenkamp Jan Harm (b7c2d3e2)
Steenkamp Piet L
Steenkamp Thomas Ignatius
Steyn Hermanus
Steyn Johannes Christoffel
Steyn Pieter
Strydom D J
Strydom Hendrik
Strydom J
Strydom Pieter Gerhardus
Swanepoel Willem
Swart Marius
Swart Pieter Johannes
Uys Dirk Cornelis (b1c5d2e12)
Uys Jacobus Johannes (b1c5d2e4f3)
Uys Jan C
Uys Petrus Lafras (Piet Hlobane)(b1c5d2e3f4)
van den Berg Hendrik (b1c10d6)
van den Berg Hendrik Stephanus (b1c10d6e3)
van der Berg Isak
van der Merwe Andries
van der Merwe C
van der Merwe Christiaan Pieter (verwys nota 3)
van der Merwe Frederik J
van der Merwe Jan
van der Merwe Josias
van der Merwe L P
van der Merwe Lukas J
van der Merwe M
van der Merwe Willem
van der Schyff D
van der Schyff J D
van Deventer Jan (a1b5c10d6)
van Dyk Joseph
van Dyk Sybrand
van Gass Ferdinand Paul George (b1)
van Gass J F
van Jaarsveld A
van Loggerenberg Hendrik
van Niekerk Izak Andries (b3c7d4e4)
van Niekerk J A P
van Niekerk Pieter Johannes
van Rooyen Cornelis J
van Rooyen Dirk
van Rooyen G T
van Rooyen Gert F
van Rooyen Gert Reinier
van Rooyen I
van Rooyen Lukas
van Rooyen Stephanus
van Schalkwyk Christiaan
van Schalkwyk Gert
van Staden Cornelis
van Staden V C
van Straten Jacob
van Venen D
van Vuuren P
van Zyl Jacobus
Venter Albert
Venter C I
Venter P A
Venter Willem Daniel
Vermaak Cornelis
Vermaak J
Viljoen Christoffel
Viljoen Gideon
Viljoen Johan H
Viljoen M
Viljoen Sarel
Visagie Jan
Visser

Notas:
1. Gewond gedurende die slag van Bloedrivier.
2. Dood gedurende die opvolg operasie om Dingaan te probeer vang op 27 Desember 1838.
3. Slegs lig gewond gedurende die slag van Bloedrivier.

Ander brokkies inligting:
Johann Bernhard Rudolph was van die begin van die trek betrokke met die administrasie en is in 1839 as die eerste Weesheer aangewys en in 1842 as Landros van Pietermaritzburg.
Lucas Johannes Meyer aangestel as die eerste Ontvanger van Inkomste.
William Cowie is die persoon na wie Cowie’s Hill naby Pinetown vernoem is.
Thomas Jervis Biddulph was ‘n 1820 Settelaar.
Coenraad Snyman was ‘n fotograaf. Hy was ook baie groot, so groot dat hy nie perd kon ry nie. ‘n Broek van hom is in bewaring by die Gelofte Kerk Museum in PMB.
Hendrik Jacobus Martens is aangestel as die eerste bode van die hof.

# Daar is ook bronne wat verwys na 407 blankes. J.G. Bantjes verwys egter na sowat 464 blanke manskappe uitsluitend die kommandante. Daar is ook bronne wat verwys na sowat 200 swartes wat saam met A.Biggar, E.Parker en R.Joyce aan die geveg kom deelneem het.
## Ander bronne: P.S. de Jongh, Sarel Cilliers; E Smit, Dagboek van Erasmus Smit; J.A. Heese & R.T.J.Lombard, SA Gegeslagsregisters; De Villiers & Pama, Geslagsregisters van ou Kaapse Families; B. Cilliers, Genealogieë van die Afrikaner Families in Natal; SABW 1-5; A. Walker, The Great Trek.

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Guy Fawkes

Tomorrow is….again…that time of year some of us don’t like at all….because all dogs want to hide in places you don’t have in your home, some dogs get lost due to some fireworks – which sound more like bombs and dog owners want to go mad at those setting of the fireworks (bombs) unexpectedly. Sometimes it goes non-stop during the night! We had some fireworks about 5 houses away from us Saturday night…maybe it was still some people celebrating Diwali…but it’s crazy! at about 1am/2am in the morning! I mean, some people are night owls, others not. It’s not to say that if you go to bed at 3am that you don’t have to respect your neighbours or people near you.

Image: supercoolpets.com

Remember, remember the Fifth of November,
The Gunpowder Treason and Plot,
I know of no reason
Why Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.

The Museum of London is holding a Guy Fawkes study day on November 5, whilst over at the Museum in Docklands, Toy Theatre retells the story of Fawkes – but with a different ending. © London Museums
Please follow THIS LINK -which will open in a new window-to find out more!

Basically, Guy Fawkes was a man who tried to blow up the King of England by setting the Houses of Parliament ablaze in 1605. He was a member of an English Roman Catholic group who opposed the Protestant rule in England. English folks make effigies or stuffed figures representing the famous conspirator and burn them.

 Image:britannica.com

On the 5th of November, the king and his leaders were about to meet. So, Guy Fawkes men placed barrels of gunpowder in one of the cellars beneath the building where the king was having his meeting. Guy Fawkes was to light the fuse that would set off the explosion. But the plot was discovered before he had a chance to do this. The king was saved, and Guy Fawkes was hanged
Ever since, Guy Fawkes Day has been a time for merrymaking. It is a holiday that both children and adults can enjoy. And the fun really begins when darkness falls, then “the “Guy” is tossed onto the bonfire, and set alight. Then the fireworks go off, and “the Guy” goes up in a flames.

As early as 1607 there are records of bonfire celebrations on the 5th of November. James I had declared the day a public holiday in his joy at the overthrow of the Gunpowder Plot.

Children would often blacken their faces with the ashes on Bonfire night, in imitation of Guy fawkes who it was believed to have done this also, to try to camouflage himself.

Guy Fawkes (13 April 1570 – 31 January 1606) sometimes known as Guido Fawkes, was a member of a group of English Roman Catholic revolutionaries who planned to carry out the Gunpowder Plot.

Although Robert Catesby was the lead figure in thinking up the actual plot, Fawkes was put in charge of executing the plan for his military and explosives experience. The plot was foiled shortly before its intended completion, as Fawkes was captured while guarding the gunpowder. Suspicion was aroused by his wearing of a coat, boots and spurs, as if he intended to leave very quickly.

Fawkes has left a lasting mark on history and popular culture. Held in the United Kingdom (and some parts of the Commonwealth) on November 5 is Bonfire Night, centred on the plot and Fawkes. He has been mentioned in popular film, literature and music by people such as Charles Dickens and John Lennon. There are geographical locations named after Fawkes, such as Isla Guy Fawkes in the Galápagos Islands and Guy Fawkes River in Australia.

The plot itself may have been occasioned by the realisation by Protestant authorities and Catholic recusants that the Kingdom of Spain was in far too much debt and fighting too many wars to assist Catholics in Britain. Any possibility of toleration by Great Britain was removed at the Hampton Court conference in 1604 when King James I attacked both extreme Puritans and Catholics. The plotters realised that no outside help would be forthcoming unless they took action themselves. Fawkes and the other conspirators rented a cellar beneath the House of Lords having first tried to dig a tunnel under the building. This would have proved difficult, because they would have had to dispose of the dirt and debris. (No evidence of this tunnel has ever been found). By March 1605, they had hidden 1800 pounds (36 barrels, or 800 kg) of gunpowder in the cellar. The plotters also intended to abduct Princess Elizabeth (later Elizabeth of Bohemia, the “Winter Queen”). A few of the conspirators were concerned, however, about fellow Catholics who would have been present at Parliament during the opening. One of the conspirators wrote a warning letter to Lord Monteagle, who received it on 26 October. The conspirators became aware of the letter the following day, but they resolved to continue the plot after Fawkes had confirmed that nothing had been touched in the cellar.

Lord Monteagle had been made suspicious, however; the letter was sent to the Secretary of State, who initiated a search of the vaults beneath the House of Lords in the early morning of 5 November. However, nothing was moved, in order not to alert the conspirators that the plot had been uncovered. Fawkes, who was resolved to blow himself up along with Parliament if need be, was seized as he attempted to ignite the powder charge. Peter Heywood, a resident of Heywood, Lancashire, snatched the torch from his hand at the last instant. Fawkes was arrested and taken before the privy council where he remained defiant. When asked by one of the Scottish lords what he had intended to do with so much gunpowder, Fawkes answered him, “To blow you Scotch beggars back to your own native mountains!”

When they asked for his name Fawkes replied “John Johnson”. He was tortured over the next few days. King James directed that the torture be light at first, but more severe if necessary. Sir William Waad, Lieutenant of the Tower of London at this time, supervised the torture and obtained Fawkes’s confession. For three or four days Fawkes said nothing, nor divulged the names of his co-conspirators. Only when he found out that they had proclaimed themselves by appearing in arms did he succumb. The torture only revealed the names of those conspirators who were already dead or whose names were known to the authorities. Some had fled to Dunchurch, Warwickshire, where they were killed or captured. On 31 January, Fawkes and a number of others implicated in the conspiracy were tried in Westminster Hall. After being found guilty, they were taken to Old Palace Yard in Westminster and St Paul’s Yard, where they were hanged, drawn and quartered.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Fawkes. The link will open in a new window.

Image: britian4kiwikids.org.nz

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Wartime Recipes

I was given this book quite a time ago and it was also one of the …27 drafts! on my blog…so 26 more to go! Sometimes, when I want to blog about something…but later… you know sometimes you want to do something…but then you say in your head…”later”…not now…ok, now you know what I’m talking about…Langenhoven – a wise “King Solomon” of South Africa…(see some of his quotes on the side bar of my blog)…used to say…and I translate…”the lazy person/sluggard’s day of work is ‘tomorrow’ “ – (Die luiaard se werksdag is “môre”!)..That means…I was too lazy to blog it immediately…lol! not really, I was only busy with something I found more enjoyable/interesting to blog…I usually save stuff on draft and there it waits…for one rainy day! So, having some rainy weather here now…also some quite cold weather, much colder than last week…here’s today’s draft no 12 for you…. A collection of recipes from WWII. I’ve thought to share a few recipes from this cute little book! I do hope you find it “interesting” too! Click and zoom in on the images to have a larger view and print them off!

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Jane Austen

I’m back! With Jane! as I promised in about 4 posts ago. If you’ve read the post saying…

“Let’s take the road”, you would have read about my sudden idea – or my “on the spur of the moment”-idea to “take the road”. We drove south, to the direction to Southampton and  went on the small countryside roads. On the roadmap we saw that we were near Jane Austen’s house and I was really excited and suggested that we go there. By looking at the images at the bottom of this post, you will agree with me that the garden is beautiful! I wish my garden was as big as this one! It was interesting to visit the house, but there were many other people too and some rooms are really small and you sometimes couldn’t look at everything in detail. We weren’t allowed to take pictures indoors. There are security cameras in all the rooms, but I’ve found a website where you can view the rooms in the house too. At the bottom of my post you can follow the museum-house-link to view more of the rooms. I’ve added the basin, Jane’s room and her piano from the museum-house-site here. Information in this post was found on the sites at the bottom of this post. Do enjoy!

Jane Austen, one of England’s foremost novelists, was never publicly acknowledged as a writer during her lifetime. She was born on December 16, 1775, at Steventon Rectory in Hampshire, the seventh child of a country clergyman and his wife, George and Cassandra Austen. She was primarily educated at home, benefiting from her father’s extensive library and the schoolroom atmosphere created by Mr. Austen’s live-in pupils. Her closest friend was her only sister, Cassandra, almost three years her senior.

Though Austen lived a quiet life, she had unusual access to the greater world, primarily through her brothers. Francis (Frank) and Charles, officers in the Royal Navy, served on ships around the world and saw action in the Napoleonic Wars. Henry, who eventually became a clergyman like his father and his brother James, was an officer in the militia and later a banker. Austen visited Henry in London, where she attended the theater, art exhibitions, and social events and also corrected proofs of her novels. Her brother Edward was adopted by wealthy cousins, the Knights, becoming their heir and later taking their name. On extended visits to Godmersham, Edward’s estate in Kent, Austen and her sister took part in the privileged life of the landed gentry, which is reflected in all her fiction.

As a child Austen began writing comic stories, now referred to as the Juvenilia. Her first mature work, composed when she was about 19, was a novella, Lady Susan, written in epistolary form (as a series of letters). This early fiction was preserved by her family but was not published until long after her death.
In her early twenties Austen wrote the novels that later became Sense and Sensibility (first called “Elinor and Marianne”) and Pride and Prejudice (originally “First Impressions”). Her father sent a letter offering the manuscript of “First Impressions” to a publisher soon after it was finished in 1797, but his offer was rejected by return post. Austen continued writing, revising “Elinor and Marianne” and completing a novel called “Susan” (later to become Northanger Abbey). In 1803 Austen sold “Susan” for £10 to a publisher, who promised early publication, but the manuscript languished in his archives until it was repurchased a year before Austen’s death for the price the publisher had paid her.

When Austen was 25 years old, her father retired, and she and Cassandra moved with their parents to Bath, residing first at 4 Sydney Place. During the five years she lived in Bath (1801-1806), Austen began one novel, The Watsons, which she never completed. After Mr. Austen’s death, Austen’s brothers contributed funds to assist their sisters and widowed mother. Mrs. Austen and her daughters set up housekeeping with their close friend Martha Lloyd. Together they moved to Southampton in 1806 and economized by sharing a house with Frank and his family.

In 1809 Edward provided the women a comfortable cottage in the village of Chawton, near his Hampshire manor house. This was the beginning of Austen’s most productive period. In 1811, at the age of 35, Austen published Sense and Sensibility, which identified the author as “a Lady.” Pride and Prejudice followed in 1813, Mansfield Park in 1814, and Emma in 1815. The title page of each book referred to one or two of Austen’s earlier novels—capitalizing on her growing reputation—but did not provide her name.

Chawton cottage…Jane’s house
Austen began writing the novel that would be called Persuasion in 1815 and finished it the following year, by which time, however, her health was beginning to fail. The probable cause of her illness was Addison’s Disease. In 1816 Henry Austen repurchased the rights to “Susan,” which Austen revised and renamed “Catherine.”

During a brief period of strength early in 1817, Austen began the fragment later called Sanditon, but by March she was too ill to work. She and Cassandra moved to 8 College Street in Winchester to be near her doctor. Austen died in the early hours of July 18, 1817, and a few days later was buried in Winchester Cathedral. She was 41 years old. Interestingly, Austen’s gravestone, which is visited by hundreds of admirers each year, does not even mention that she was an author.

Persuasion and Northanger Abbey were published together in December 1817 with a “Biographical Notice” written by Henry, in which Jane Austen was, for the first time in one of her novels, identified as the author of Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, and Emma. Austen’s novels have never been out of print and are often included on lists of readers’ favorites. Her surviving letters are also a source of entertainment and biographical information (Jane Austen’s Letters, edited by Deirdre Le Faye, Oxford University Press, 1995).

4 Sydney Place, Bath…where she lived too.

A Selection of Biographies
J. E. Austen-Leigh, A Memoir of Jane Austen and Other Family Recollections, edited by Kathryn Sutherland (Oxford University Press, 2002) (also contains biographical memoirs by Austen’s brother Henry and her nieces Anna Lefroy and Caroline Austen).

Jan Fergus, Jane Austen: A Literary Life (Macmillan Press, 1991).

Park Honan, Jane Austen: Her Life (St. Martin’s Press, 1987).

Elizabeth Jenkins, Jane Austen: A Biography (1938 and later reprints).

Deirdre Le Faye, Jane Austen: A Family Record (Cambridge University Press, 2004).

Claire Tomalin, Jane Austen: A Life (Alfred A. Knopf, 1997).

Cassandra Elizabeth (1773-1845) was Jane Austen’s only sister, and her closest confidante. Over a hundred letters from Jane Austen to Cassandra have survived, giving us our most intimate look at some of the details of Jane Austen’s life. Cassandra’s fiancé Thomas Fowle died of yellow fever in the Caribbean in 1797; he had gone there as a military chaplain. Possibly Cassandra’s experience is reflected in Mrs. Musgrove and Mrs. Croft’s abomination of “long engagements” and “uncertain engagements” in Jane Austen’s Persuasion (he and Cassandra had continued engaged since about 1794, due to lack of money; see “Money and Marriage”). After this, Cassandra never married. (See Cassandra’s poem on love.) Cassandra (like Jane) frequently visited her brothers and their families, and other relatives and friends (it was the separations between herself and Jane, resulting from visits on which they did not both go, that necessitated the letters between them).

 This poem was written by her sister, Cassandra, to Jane

2. MISS AUSTEN (CASSANDRA).
Love, they say, is like a rose;
I’m sure ’tis like the wind that blows,
For not a human creature knows
How it comes or where it goes.
It is the cause of many woes:
It swells the eyes and reds the nose,
And very often changes those
Who once were friends to bitter foes.
But let us now the scene transpose
And think no more of tears and throes.
Why may we not as well suppose
A smiling face the urchin shows?
And when with joy the bosom glows,
And when the heart has full repose,
‘Tis mutual love the gift bestows.

 Jane Austen enjoyed social events, and her early letters tell of dances and parties she attended in Hampshire, and also of visits to London, Bath, Southampton etc., where she attended plays and such. There is a famous statement by one Mrs. Mitford that Jane was the “the prettiest, silliest, most affected, husband-hunting butterfly she ever remembers” (however, Mrs. Mitford seems to have had a personal jealousy against Jane Austen, and it is hard to reconcile this description with the Jane Austen who wrote The Three Sisters before she was eighteen).

In January 1805 her father died. As would have been the case for the Bennets in Pride and Prejudice if Mr. Bennet had died, the income due to the remaining family (Mrs. Austen and her two daughters, the only children still at home) was considerably reduced — since most of Mr. Austen’s income had come from clerical “livings” which lapsed with his death. So they were largely dependent on support from the Austen brothers (and a relatively small amount of money left to Cassandra by her fiancé), summing to a total of about £450 yearly. Later in 1805, Martha Lloyd (sister of James Austen’s wife) came to live with Mrs. Austen, Cassandra, and Jane, after her own mother had died.

QUOTES of Jane
I do not want people to be agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them.
—-
To sit in the shade on a fine day, and look upon verdure is the most perfect refreshment.
—

Where so many hours have been spent in convincing myself that I am right, is there not some reason to fear I may be wrong?
—-
One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other.
Jane Austen, Emma
Silly things do cease to be silly if they are done by sensible people in an impudent way.
Jane Austen, Emma
A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

Everybody likes to go their own way–to choose their own time and manner of devotion.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

I cannot think well of a man who sports with any woman’s feelings; and there may often be a great deal more suffered than a stander-by can judge of.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

I pay very little regard…to what any young person says on the subject of marriage. If they profess a disinclination for it, I only set it down that they have not yet seen the right person.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

If any one faculty of our nature may be called more wonderful than the rest, I do think it is memory. There seems something more speakingly incomprehensible in the powers, the failures, the inequalities of memory, than in any other of our intelligences. The memory is sometimes so retentive, so serviceable, so obedient; at others, so bewildered and so weak; and at others again, so tyrannic, so beyond control! We are, to be sure, a miracle every way; but our powers of recollecting and of forgetting do seem peculiarly past finding out.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

It will, I believe, be everywhere found, that as the clergy are, or are not what they ought to be, so are the rest of the nation.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

Nothing amuses me more than the easy manner with which everybody settles the abundance of those who have a great deal less than themselves.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

Oh! Do not attack me with your watch. A watch is always too fast or too slow. I cannot be dictated to by a watch.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

One cannot fix one’s eyes on the commonest natural production without finding food for a rambling fancy.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

The enthusiasm of a woman’s love is even beyond the biographer’s.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

There will be little rubs and disappointments everywhere, and we are all apt to expect too much; but then, if one scheme of happiness fails, human nature turns to another; if the first calculation is wrong, we make a second better: we find comfort somewhere.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park
We have all a better guide in ourselves, if we would attend to it, than any other person can be.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park
Where any one body of educated men, of whatever denomination, are condemned indiscriminately, there must be a deficiency of information, or…of something else.
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park
But when a young lady is to be a heroine, the perverseness of forty surrounding families cannot prevent her. Something must and will happen to throw a hero in her way.
Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.
Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

In every power, of which taste is the foundation, excellence is pretty fairly divided between the sexes.
Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey, 1818

For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn?
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 1811
Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance. If the dispositions of the parties are ever so well known to each other or ever so similar beforehand, it does not advance their felicity in the least. They always continue to grow sufficiently unlike afterwards to have their share of vexation; and it is better to know as little as possible of the defects of the person with whom you are to pass your life.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
How little of permanent happiness could belong to a couple who were only brought together because their passions were stronger than their virtue.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book! When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

I have no pretensions whatever to that kind of elegance which consists in tormenting a respectable man.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
Loss of virtue in a female is irretrievable; that one false step involves her in endless ruin; that her reputation is no less brittle than it is beautiful; and that she cannot be too much guarded in her behaviour towards the undeserving of the other sex.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
No one can be really esteemed accomplished who does not greatly surpass what is usually met with.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously…. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, first line.

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Basin

Jane’s bedroom

Her Piano..not her real piano, but they believe that her piano looked like this one.

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How could I resist the African Marigolds!!

http://www.artworksgallery.co.uk/book.html

http://www.jane-austens-house-museum.org.uk/

http://www.janeaustensociety.org.uk/

http://www.peopleandprofiles.com/ProfileLinks-28/Jane%20Austen.html?profile_id=235&type=link&st=160&linkid=28

http://www.pemberley.com/janeinfo/janelife.html#favniece

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Hallelujah

Image: Beautiful South Africa by Tessa Jouhin

Vryheid – Freedom
In the Gregorian calendar, 31st May is the 151st day of the year.

This day is also a very important day in South Africa’s History. The day when South Africa became a Republic.  

31 May was a significant day in South African history, being both the day in 1902 on which the Treaty of Vereeniging was signed, ending the Second Anglo-Boer War, and the day in 1910 on which the Union of South Africa came into being, which then came to an end and was re-established as the “Republic of South Africa”.

Enjoy this piece of music by Handel

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The Past

I came across this brilliant site….www.fad.co.za/default.htm…..this is about Durban, a coastal city in South Africa… I was actually looking for vintage postcards! I’m a collector of them…have a couple packed away in SA! and would really love to have it now to blog it… so, enjoy this picture about Durban in the 1950’s…and if you go to the site…you will find the most wonderful pictures and links…

I love history…anything  history. I can’t resist books about historical events…and now even websites!  I’ve got two more books to read!! why can’t I just walk passed these books and not looking at them! They always have to jump at me! “Russia under the last Tsar” and “The American Revolution”… and I’m still busy with the Irish book…and that book is a fat book. What do you call someone that’s addicted to books…I can remember when I was a child I even read all the advertisements…every single one…and I couldn’t go to the bathroom without something to read! Is this a “syndrome” or something?

By Neil Gould – May 2007

“Greetings Alan, since posting my picture of The Nest and Cuban Hat, I am truly inspired by your website. I left Durban in 1974 as a 19-year-old lad on board the Pendennis Castle, to Southampton, England, where I lived until 1995, after which my family and I settled in Hong Kong. Although I paid for my ticket I did spend time on board entertaining the passengers.”

Read more on this link….www.fad.co.za/Resources/memoirs/gould/gould.htm…….

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Baku Chess round 5

 

Round 5 can be called “The (K)nights..or is it..the day of the draws”…Click on the images for a larger view… on the second image…. Radjabov’s attention was caught by…. I wonder…by what! hehehe  On this next image you can see the end position of Kamsky and Carlsen’s game… on the side bar of the blog..you will find a “live” link where you can play through the games of the day…and on THIS LINK you will find a games-link to all the games played so far in all the finished rounds.

On these images you can see the pairings for round 6-8. Tomorrow is a free day.

The Fortress Wall of Old City Baku

By Fuad Akhundov
The fortress wall of the old city of Baku is a source of pride to Bakuites. Not every city with a rampart constructed at the time of the Crusaders is so well preserved. Nor do many extend for a distance of 500 meters, as Baku’s rampart does. The rampart also enabled the preservation of the medieval image of the old town, with its numerous lanes, snaking streets and the flavor of an oriental city.

Initially, two ramparts encircled Baku. The internal rampart is almost completely preserved. It was constructed by King Manuchekhr II (1120-1149). The outer wall was much lower in height, and was installed by the local ruler, Zufuqar-khan in 1608-1609. The walls were surrounded by a deep moat that could be filled by underground water in times of danger.

The khanate of Baku (a kind of Muslim duchy) was annexed to the Russian Empire in 1806. The fortress walls were last used for defense in 1826. Cannons mounted on the walls repelled a last, desperate Persian attack.

At the beginning of industrial exploitation of oil in the 1870’s, Baku grew rapidly. In 1859, the population of the city barely exceeded 13,500 inhabitants, most of who lived inside the old city walls. By 1903, there were 143,000 Bakuites, and by 1913, the “black gold” had increased the population to more than 214,000.

The tiny medieval fortress was, of course, too small to hold all these people. So the outer rampart was taken down in 1884, along with the wall on side of the old city facing the sea. Stones from this wall were used to renovate the inner wall.

But Bakuites did not want to lose the old, outer wall forever. The primary entrance to the old city, Shemakha Gate had one gate in the outer wall, and one in the inner wall. So, as the outer was dissembled, stonemasons skillfully inserted a copy of the outer entrance into the inner wall, side by side with the original inside gate. A visitor with a sharp eye for color will notice that the stones of the left entrance are slightly whiter. City residents renamed the gates “Gosha-Gala Gapysy,” meaning, in Azeri, the Twin Gates. This is the only double entrance among the five gates of the fortress wall.

The most interesting detail over both entrances is the oldest coat of arms of Baku. It is composed of two lions, and the head of a bull with two discs around the bull’s head. The German traveler, Kempfer, deciphered the symbols in 1863, as follows:

Lions were often used in Oriental heraldry as symbols of strength. The bull and the cow were sacred animals to the Zoroastrians (even today, killing these animals is prohibited in India). The discs symbolized the sun and moon. So, Kempfer concluded, the lions (that is, the fortress walls) protect the bull (i.e., the city) during day (the sun) and night (the moon).

This oldest emblem of Baku probably did not meet with favor when Islam arrived in Baku, and was at some point consigned to history. Other emblems took their place until the 1880’s. Then, a new coat of arms was designed with three torch flames representing the Zoroastrian tradition. But the way the flames were carved in the limestone of the mayor’s office, they resemble moneybags. So people used to joke that the emblem had nothing to do with fire, but represented the wealth of Baku during the first oil boom.
Source:
Read HERE MORE! about Baku.

see some wonderful photos about Baku on: bakuphotos.blogspot.com
Read on THIS LINK about the world’s 25 dirtiest cities, which Baku is apparently one of them. Baku 2016 Olympic…Baku is officially bidding for the 2016 Summer Olympics …read on the link more…

Pollution
The World’s Dirtiest Cities
Tiffany M. Luck 02.26.08, 3:15 PM ET
Unless you’re in the oil business, there’s little reason to brave the choking pollution of Baku, Azerbaijan. Fetid water, oil ponds and life-threatening levels of air pollution emitted from drilling and shipping land the former Soviet manufacturing center at the bottom of this year’s list as the world’s dirtiest city.

Baku is bad, but far from alone. For residents of the 25 cities on this year’s list, black plumes of smoke, acid rain and free-flowing sewage are part of everyday life. Not as immediately visible: the impact on the population’s health and life expectancy.

To see which cities in the world were dirtiest, we turned to Mercer Human Resource Consulting’s 2007 Health and Sanitation Rankings. As part of their 2007 Quality of Life Report, they ranked 215 cities worldwide based on levels of air pollution, waste management, water potability, hospital services, medical supplies and the presence of infectious disease.

All cities are positioned against New York, the base city with an index score of 100. For the Health and Sanitation Rankings, the index scores range from the worst on the list–Baku, Azerbaijan, with a score of 27.6–to the best on the list–Calgary, Canada, with a score of 131.7.

Lead-poisoned air lands Dhaka, Bangladesh, the No. 2 spot on the list. Traffic congestion in the capital continues to worsen with vehicles emitting fatal amounts of air pollutants daily, including lead. The World Bank-funded Air Quality Management Project aims to help.

“Addressing air pollution is the easiest way to be able to fix someone’s well-being because we’re always breathing, and there are all sorts of harmful particulates in the air,” says Richard Fuller, founder of the New York-based Blacksmith Institute, a nonprofit dedicated to solving the pollution problems of the developing world. “In fact, the biggest pathway for lead poisoning is particulates in the air. So in areas with a lot of air pollution, shutting down the worst forces of these types of pollution really does make a difference.”

Nos. 3 and 4 on this year’s list are the capital cities of Madagascar and Haiti, respectively. Antananarivo, Madagascar and Port au Prince, Haiti, both face the challenge of a rapidly growing urban population and the ever-growing need for efficient water and waste management.

Mexico City, Mexico, ranks No. 5 on this year’s list. Residents can thank industrial and automobile emissions for air quality so bad that city ozone levels fail to meet World Health Organization standards an estimated 300 days of the year. But things could be worse.

“Mexico City has actually seen great improvement recently in terms of air pollution,” says Dave Calkins, founder of the Sierra Nevada Air Quality Group and former chief of the Air Planning Branch of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in San Francisco. “So much so that the government actually has to campaign to let everyone know that pollution is still a problem.”

Economies suffer, too. Health care costs and lost productivity drag on business. Companies also face added costs in the form of remuneration packages when relocating employees and their families to some of these cities, noted Slagin Parakatil, senior researcher at Mercer. Cost-benefit analysis certainly suggests making progress toward cleanup. According to a study done by WaterAid, for every $1 spent on improved sanitation, the benefit equals $9 resulting from decreased cost of health care and increased productivity.

“If you do the numbers,” says Fuller, “to clean up the worst of it doesn’t really cost that much. It’s the 90/10 rule. To do 90% of the work only costs 10% of the money. It’s the last 10% of the cleanup that costs 90% of the money. For relatively little, we can do an awful lot to save a whole lot of lives.” Source: See the link in the start of this article.
 
Baku Round 5 from the Fide website

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Oranje Blanje Blou

 

Flag of 1928-1994
Following the Union of South Africa , that is the joining if the former colonies of Natal, Cape, Transvaal and Orange River on 31 May 1910, South Africa used defaced red and blue ensigns. Having suffered defeat in the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902), many South Africans particularly of Boer extraction found these flags unacceptable. Discussions about a new flag had taken place from time to time but were interrupted by such pressing issues as World War I and achieving Dominion Status within the British Empire etc. and it was only in 1925 that the matter began to receive renewed attention. The Balfour Declaration adopted at the Imperial Conference of 1926 defined in general terms the mutual constitutional relationship of the self-governing members of the British Empire (later Commonwealth) whereby Great Britain and the dominions were “equal in status, in no way subordinate to one another” and as such South Africa, as an independent state was entitled to a flag of its own. The flag issue in South Africa was also considered along with the question of nationality.

The issue of inclusion of the Union Jack proved to be a very emotional subject, with the English-speakers on the one side demanding its inclusion and the Afrikaners (Boers) seeing its a symbol of British imperialism demanding it be excluded! A number of proposals were put forward but it was not until the Princevlag design based on the House of Orange that consensus began to emerge. This design was based on the commonly held view that Jan van Riebeeck has raised an orange, white and blue horizontal tricolour when he arrived at the Cape in April 1652. The original design had a quartered shield in the centre, each quarter having a symbol to represent the territories making up the Union. Various other designs were submitted to a Parliamentary Committee which had been established to resolve the issue but none found favour.
Read on this link HERE more and it is really worth visiting…very extensive site with information/flags/history on South Africa ….

This song, unfortunately in Afrikaans, is beautiful… “oranje”… = orange…”blou” = blue…it’s a song to motivate people in South Africa to stand together… and to keep spirits high… to have hope….worth listening even if you don’t understand…beautiful images of the country you will enjoy… This flag is…of course you know perhaps….also our country’s old flag.. and we used to call it the “Oranje Blanje Blou”….

ORANJE-BLANJE-BLOU

Woorde: EITEMAL, na “O.D., hoch in Ehren”
Musiek: HENRY HUGH PIERSON

Die Hoogland is ons woning,
die land van son en veld,
waar woeste vryheidswinde waai
oor graf van meenge held.
Die ruimtes het ons siel gevoed,
ons kan g’n slawe wees,
want vryer as die arendsvlug,
die vlugte van ons gees.

[REFREIN]
Dis die tyd, dis die dag,
om te handhaaf en te bou.
Hoog die hart, hoog die vlag,
hoog Oranje-blanje-blou!
Ons gaan saam die donker toekoms in
om as een te sneuwel of oorwin,
met ons oog gerig op jou,
ons Oranje-blanje-blou!

Die ruwe bergereekse
staan hoog teen awendlug,
soos gryse ewighede daar
versteen, verstyf in vlug.
En stewig soos die grou graniet
ons Boeretrots en -trou,
die fondament waarop ons hier
‘n nuwe nasie bou.

[REFREIN]
Dis die tyd, dis die dag,
om te handhaaf en te bou.
Hoog die hart, hoog die vlag,
hoog Oranje-blanje-blou!
Ons gaan saam die donker toekoms in
om as een te sneuwel of oorwin,
met ons oog gerig op jou,
ons Oranje-blanje-blou!

Die God van onse vaders
het ons hierheen gelei,
ons dien sy grootse skeppingsplan,
solank ons Boere bly.
Ons buig ons hoof voor Hom alleen;
en as Hy ons verhoor
omgord ons bly die lendene:
Die toekoms wink daar voor.

[REFREIN]
Dis die tyd, dis die dag,
om te handhaaf en te bou.
Hoog die hart, hoog die vlag,
hoog Oranje-blanje-blou!
Ons gaan saam die donker toekoms in
om as een te sneuwel of oorwin,
met ons oog gerig op jou,
ons Oranje-blanje-blou!

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Pretoria is Pretoria

 

On THIS LINK you can see pics of Pretoria and pics about the roads…and on THIS LINK you can see why it’s also called the Jacaranda City…and Pretoria is one of 3 capitals of SA…in case you didn’t know…it… Cape Town and Bloemfontein are the other capitals…on one of my links you can read why we have 3 capitals! On these three videos, you can follow the history of the Voortrekker Monument …and why Pretoria is called Pretoria… To me…Pretoria will be PRETORIA and not..Tshwane!! According to WIKI Tshwane comes from “black cow” or “monkey” – from the Ndebele word “tshwene”!

The words of the song on the last video…it gives me goosebumps to hear it!! When I was at school… we used to sing this song…. about  “Young South Africa”, the National Anthem, the Flag song AND the school song…every week…yes, every school in SA has got a song as part of the school ethos……. and you are very proud when singing it…you would stand to attention when singing it…it’s really a beautiful song, hope I can get a translation somewhere!  It describes the country in a beautiful way…
DIE LIED VAN JONG SUID-AFRIKA

Woorde: EITEMAL; gewysig: P. MCLACHLAN
Musiek: HUGO GUTSCHE; verwerk: DIRKIE DE VILLIERS

En hoor jy die magtige dreuning?
Oor die veld kom dit wyd gesweef:
die lied van ‘n volk se ontwaking
wat harte laat sidder en beef.
Van Kaapland tot bo in die Noorde
rys dawerend luid die akkoorde:
Dit is die LIED van Jong Suid-Afrika,
dit is die LIED van Jong Suid-Afrika,
dit is die LIED van Jong Suid-Afrika.

Die klop van die Voortrekkerwawiel
het die eeue se rus verstoor;
die klank van die voorlaaierskote
het klowe en kranse gehoor.
Die diere het stil staan en luister,
die bome het bewend gefluister:
Dit is die KOMS van Jong Suid-Afrika,
dit is die KOMS van Jong Suid-Afrika,
dit is die KOMS van Jong Suid-Afrika.

Waar songloed in glorie die berge
oor hul fronsende voorhoof streel,
waar ruisende wind oor die vlaktes
met grassaad kerjakker en speel,
die land wat ons vaders gekoop het,
met bloed tot ons eie gedoop het:
Dit is die LAND van Jong Suid-Afrika,
dit is die LAND van Jong Suid-Afrika,
dit is die LAND van Jong Suid-Afrika.

Die golwende veld is ons woning
en ons dak is die hemelblou;
die Vryheid alleen is ons koning,
sy wagwoord is: “Handhaaf en bou”.
Die stryd wat ons vaders begin het
sal woed tot ons sterf of oorwin het.
Dit is die EED van Jong Suid-Afrika,
dit is die EED van Jong Suid-Afrika,
dit is die EED van Jong Suid-Afrika

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Cilliers Ancestors

This is the family coat of arms.

Update – 5/8/2018 – I have found more info and will add it soon.

Areas where the Dutch and French Huguenots were given farms to settle.

The French Huguenots from La Rochelle

The Huguenot monument in Franschhoek (the Huguenots fled religious persecution in France, and many settled in the Cape). Today, many Afrikaner names show their French origins and I’m one of  those many South Africans. I’m busy with  a family-history-study of my ancestors and this is what I’ve found so far. This post will get updated as I find more information. Most links in this post will open in a new window.

 Update: 30/6/2013

The Haidee

Read HERE MORE about the French Huguenots that settled in South Africa. (This link does not work anymore!) 

Jan.09 update: Please follow this link if your surname is Celliers/Cilliers/Cillie…etc.

http://www.myheritage.com/site-33834231/cilliers-family-web-site

Josue Cellier, b. 1667, Orleans, France

Another record…Josube Cellier, b 1676, Orleans, France..

Click on THIS LINK to use the search facility to find ancestors…..
On Olivetree HERE you can see more passenger-lists…Please click HERE for more information on the France Huguenots that came to South Africa.
And on THIS LINK you can read  more about the Religion War and French Huguenots…
This LINK HERE is a passenger ship-list of Huguenots that arrived in South Africa between 1683 and 1756.

Search THIS SITE  for more information on these records.

The REYGERSDAL arrived at Table Bay in 1700…passengers on the ship, click on the image for a clear, larger view.

NOTES:
1. Married (2) Paul Roux in 1722

2.Brother of Elizabeth Couvret. He returned to Europe in 1712 with his wife and 4 children.

Josué CELLIER
*Frankryk, Orléans c1667
+Paarl //.10.1721
xElisabeth Couvret
*Frankryk, Orléans c1676
+c1743
xxc1722 wew-Paul Roux
*Frankryk, Orange c1665
+Paarl 07.02.1723
xc1688 Claudine Seugneté
*Frankryk, Saintogne, c1671
+
(xxElisabeth Couvret)

Kinders van Josué Cellier en Elisabeth Couvret
b1 Josué =Paarl 02.01.1701 X Ongetroud, + 19.04.1770
b2 Jan *c1702, X Paarl 5.12.1728 Anna Marais weduwee van Gabriel Rossouw
b3 Pierre =Paarl 10.11.1703, +Voor 1712
b4 Elisabeth =Paarl 26.07.1705, X c1724 Pierre Malherbe
b5 Francina =Paarl 30.10.1706, X Paarl 12.04.1727 Pierre le Roux
b6 Maria =Kaapstad 07.09.1708, X Paarl 7.09.1732 Johannes Hubertus van Amsterdam XX Paarl 8.05.1735 Urbanus Sauermann van Mühlbeck
b7 Abraham =Paarl 21.09.1709, X Paarl 6.12.1744 Anna Rossouw
b8 Pieter =Stellenbosch 16.08.1711, Ongetroud, +04.12.1792
b9 Susanna =Paarl 24.09.1713, Ongetroud, +Paarl 14.07.1733
b10 Judith =Paarl 01.03.1716, Ongetroud, +Paarl 24.07.1733
b11 Magdalena =Paarl 26.12.1717, X Stellenbosch 29.04.1736 Pierre le Roux

Kinders van Paul Roux en Claudine Seugneté
1. Paul *c1689
2. Pieter *c1692
3. Hester *c1693
4. Anne =Paarl 25.12.1694
5. Joseph =Paarl 14.10.1696
6. Jeremie =Paarl 01.09.1697
7. Jean =Paarl 22.04.1699

Josué Cellier was afkomstig van Orléans, Frankryk waar hy in ongeveer 1667 gebore is. Hy was moontlik die seun van Josué Cellier en Judith Rouilly wat `n seun Nicolaas in die naburige dorpie Bazoches-en-Dunois laat doop het. Elisabeth Couvret is nege jaar later in ongeveer 1676 ook in Orléans gebore.

Bronne verskil oor wanneer Josué en Elisabeth Frankryk verlaat het. Volgens een bron in 1685, na die herroeping van die Edik van Nantes, toe Josué 18 jaar oud was en Elisabeth 9. Hierdie edik het vir bykans `n honderd jaar `n mate van godsdiensvryheid aan die Protestante verleen en die herroeping daarvan het `n oormatige vervolging van die Protestante tot gevolg gehad. Volgens `n ander bron het hulle Frankryk in 1697 verlaat na die beëindiging van die negejarige oorlog tussen Nederland en Frankryk toe hulle onderskeidelik 30 en 21 jaar oud was.

Of hulle wel in Frankryk getroud is, is onseker.

Simon van der Stel het in 1679, pas na sy aanstelling as goewerneur aan die Kaap, `n versoek gerig dat boere toegelaat moet word om na die Kaap toe te kom, maar aangesien die Kaap slegs as `n verversingspos beskou is, is sy versoek geweier. Die toenemende getal Franse vlugtelinge wat na Nederland gestroom het na die herroeping van die Edik van Nantes het egter tot `n beleidsverandering gelei wat dit vir Josué en Elisabeth moontlik gemaak het om na die Kaap te verhuis.

Persone wat oorweeg sou word om na die Kaap te gaan, moes selfonderhoudend wees en Josué met sy kennis van landbou, wynbou en sy vaardigheid as timmerman het hieraan voldoen. Verskeie voorwaardes is ook gestel, onder andere:
– Hulle sou kosteloos op die skepe van die handelsmaatskappy die Verenigde Oos-Indiese Kompanjie (VOC) vervoer word, mits `n eed van getrouheid aan die Kompanjie afgelê word.

– Geen bagasie, behalwe dié wat vir eie gebruik nodig was, kon saamgeneem word nie. Op kontantgeld was daar egter geen beperking nie.
– Landbouers sou soveel grond kry as wat hulle kon bewerk, terwyl landbougereedskap, saadkoring en vee aan hulle verkoop sou word.
– Hulle sou verplig wees om vir vyf jaar aan die Kaap te bly, maar kon met die nodige motivering `n versoek tot die Here XVII, die hoogste gesag van die VOC, rig om die tydperk te verkort.
– Indien hulle na vyf jaar weer na Nederland wou terugkeer, moes hulle teen `n vasgestelde tarief die reisgeld betaal en kon hulle niks uit die Kaap saamneem nie, behalwe dit wat hulle aan hul persoon gehad het.

Die eerste Franse vlugtelinge vertrek einde 1687 uit Nederland en in 1699 is die VOC versoek om nie meer Franse Kaap toe te stuur nie. Dit is dus onseker of Josué en Elisabeth onder die voorgemelde voorwaardes na die Kaap gekom het en of hulle dit op eie inisiatief gedoen het. Hulle seil op 2 Mei 1700 aan boord van die Reygersdaal vanaf Goeree, `n Suid-Hollandse eiland. Ook aan boord was Elisabeth se broer Paul Couvret, sy vrou Anne Valleté en hul dogtertjie.

Vir beter beskerming het `n aantal skepe gewoonlik saam uitgevaar, maar daar kon nie vasgestel word of enige ander skepe saam met die Reygersdaal uitgevaar het nie. `n Reis na Kaap het in daardie jare enigiets van drie tot ses maande geduur en die Reygersdaal arriveer Saterdag 21 Augustus 1700 in die Kaap, maar moes tot die volgende middag voor die hawe lê. ‘Op de naarmiddag’ van Sondag 22 Augustus anker hulle in die hawe ‘onder een slap zuyd west luchtje’.

Oor die algemeen was die skepe waarmee die vlugtelinge oorgekom het maar klein en het passasiers gewoonllik hutte op die agterdek gehad sonder enige wasgeriewe. Voedsel wat aan boord geneem is, is noukeurig deur die VOC gespesifiseer – brood, ingelegde vleis, stokvis en soutvis, ingelegde haring, bier, Franse en Spaanse wyn, brandewyn, botter, olie, asyn, lemmetjiesap, stroop vir ontbyt en vir die bier, pruimedante, rysgort, grou- en groenertjies, mosterdsaad, mierikwortel en sout. Kos, water en bier het betreklik gou bederf terwyl wyn langer goed gebly het.

Skeurbuik, wat hoofsaaklik deur die gebrek aan vars voedsel veroorsaak is, het algemeen voorgekom en het bygedra tot `n hoë persentasie sterfgevalle tydens `n seereis. Verder was daar nog gevare soos storms, brand en aanvalle deur seerowers. Die skipper van die Reygersdaal, Martin de Jeught, rapporteer met hul aankoms in die Kaap slegs een sterfgeval en agt siekes aan boord wat die indruk skep dat Josué en Elisabeth se vaart sonder enige buitengewone voorvalle afgelê is. Twee weke na hul aankoms sit die Reygersdaal sy vaart na Batavia (Djakarta op die Indonisiese eiland Java) voort.

Uit die huwelik tussen Josué en Elisabeth word elf kinders gebore, vyf seuns en ses dogters. Slegs Pierre sterf as kind terwyl Susanna en Judith binne tien dae van mekaar sterf; Susanna op 20-jarige ouderdom op 14 Julie 1733 en Judith op 19-jarige ouderdom op 24 Julie 1733. Die oudste en jongste seuns Josué en Pieter is nooit getroud nie en sterf respektiewelik op 69-jarige en 81-jarige ouderdom. Die twee seuns deur wie die vanne Cellier, Celliers, Cillié en Cilliers voortgedra sou word, is Jan wat in 1728 met die weduwee Anna Marais trou en Abraham wat in 1744 met sy broer Jan se stiefdogter Anna Rossouw trou. Elisabeth trou in ongeveer 1724 met Pierre Malherbe, Francina in 1727 met Pierre le Roux en Magdalena in 1736 ook met `n Pierre le Roux, `n neef van haar suster Francina se man. Maria trou in 1732 met Johannes Hubertus, `n Hollander, en na sy dood hertrou sy in 1735 met Urbanus Sauermann, `n Duitser – sy is die enigste kind wat nie met `n Hugenote-afstammeling getroud is nie.

Die Paarl se kerk waarin Josué en Elisabeth se oudste kinders gedoop is, was nie veel meer as `n saaltjie wat die Franse aanmekaar getimmer het nie en is na geweldige storms in Oktober 1716 so beskadig dat dit onbruikbaar was. Totdat die nuwe kerk in 1720 in gebruik geneem is, is dienste aan huis van die predikant ds Van Aken gehou en hul jongste kind Magdalena is moontlik hier gedoop. Pieter en Maria is moontlik in Stellenbosch en Kaapstad gedoop omdat daar vanaf 1707 tot 1714 geen predikant in die Paarl was nie. Die twee kinders wat wel gedurende hierdie tyd in die Paarl gedoop is, is moontlik deur `n besoekende predikant gedoop.

Beide Josué en Elisabeth, soos talle ander Hugenote, was ongeletterd. Alhoewel sommige geleer het om hulle naam te teken en ook om te skryf, was Josué en Elisabeth skynbaar nie onder diegene nie. In 1720 maak Josué sy merk wanneer hy hul gesamentlike testament teken en wanneer Elisabeth in 1724 `n nuwe testament opstel, teken sy ook deur haar merk te maak.

Die peil van onderwys aan die Kaap was laag en Paul Roux, met wie Elisabeth na Josué se dood sou trou, word as onderwyser van die Franse gemeenskap in die Paarl aangestel. Huismeesters is ook deur sommige gesinne in diens geneem en hul vergoeding het meestal bestaan uit 8 tot 14 gulden per maand, 1 tot 2 pond tabak, voedsel, drank, goeie huisvesting en soms klere aan die einde van die jaar. Jacob Naudé wat in 1718 as matroos in die Kaap aangekom het, was eers huismeester by Pierre Joubert teen 10 gulden en `n halwe pond tabak per maand en vanaf 1719 tot 1720 huismeester by Josué Cellier teen 10 gulden en een pond tabak per maand.

In haar testament van 1724 stel Elisabeth vir Jan as voog oor sy minderjarige broers en susters aan en bepaal dat hy ‘verpligt zijn’ om hulle eerlik op te voed en ook om hulle te laat leer, lees, skryf of `n handvaardigheid te laat aanleer. Dokumente wat deur vier van haar kinders geteken is, is teëgekom; Francina teken as beide Fransina Cellie en Fransina Celie, Maria as Marie cellier; Magdalena as Madalena Cellie en Pieter as Piter Seliee.

Of Josué en Elisabeth Hollands matig was, is onbekend, maar hul kinders sou weens regeringsbeleid Hollands moes aanleer. Hierdie beleid het veroorsaak dat die Franse taal aan die Kaap in onbruik geraak en uitgesterf het. Nadat die eerste predikant van die Paarl, Pierre Simond, die Kaap in 1702 verlaat het, verklaar Goewerneur Willem Adriaan van der Stel hom bereid om te sorg dat die Franse taal in onbruik raak deur die gebruik van Hollands op skool en in die kerk in te stel. Vertoë is gerig omdat min mense `n preek in Hollands kon volg en daarna is twee dienste op `n Sondag toegelaat, een in Hollands en een in Frans, maar na 1726 word daar nie weer melding gemaak van Franse dienste nie.

Josué en Elisabeth vestig hulle aanvanklik op die plaas Het Kruys Pad (Kruispad), naby die huidige voorstad Brackenfell, waar hulle tot ten minste 1709 gewoon het. In Januarie 1708 ‘ten huijse van Josua Sellier geleegen aant kruispad tusschen de bottelerije en tijgerbergen’ het daar twaalf mense ‘zaaten en dronken’. `n Vryswarte wat op sy eie grond geboer het, Pieter Harmensz, algemeen bekend as Brasman, kom toe daar aan en beskuldig vir Jacob Bourbonnais, een van Josué se gaste, daarvan dat hy sy sweep gesteel het. `n Onderonsie ontstaan en Brasman steek vir Bourbonnaise met `n mes en snou hom toe : ‘Jou donders kind, daar heb je genoeg daar is bloed’. `n Eis vir skadevergoeding word ingestel, Bourbonnaise vir ongemak en pyn asook verlore tyd en Jacob Bisseux, in wie se huis Bourbonnais verpleeg is, vir sy verpleging en gepaardgaande uitgawes. Brasman se vonnis was om gegesel te word, skadevergoeding en kostes te betaal en hy word lewenslank uit die Kaap verban.

Nog `n insident waarby Josué betrokke was, was die ontevredenheid oor Goewerneur Willem Adriaan van der Stel se administrasie. Aanvanklik is VOC-amptenare nie toegelaat om te boer nie omdat hul mededinging die boere finansieel kon knak, maar teen die tyd dat Josué en Elisabeth in die Kaap aankom, boer Van der Stel en bykans al die hooggeplaaste VOC-amptenare op hul eie plase. Mettertyd tree hulle ook tot die mark, wat alreeds swak was, toe en bly die gewone boere met hul podukte sit. In 1706 word `n klagskrif van ondermeer omkopery en afpersing teen Van der Stel en verskeie amptenare opgestel en Elisabeth se broer Paul Couvret is een van die persone wat dit onderteken. Op sy beurt stel Van der Stel `n getuigskrif op wat tevredenheid met sy administrasie uitspreek en ook van sy goeie karakter en eerlikheid getuig. Persone wat weier om te teken word ondermeer gedreig dat hulle van hul grond ontneem sou word. Josué teken die getuigskrif – die inskrywing by sy se merk lui : ‘het merke van Josue Siljee’. Die meeste van die Hugenote wat geteken het, het later verklaar dat alhoewel hulle ontevrede was met Van der Stel se wanbestuur hulle bang was dat hulle hul grond sou verloor. Moontlik was dit ook by Josué `n oorweging aangesien hy op hierdie stadium nog nie sy eie plaas besit het nie. Die uiteinde van die klagskrif was ondermeer dat Willem Adriaan van der Stel en van sy volgelinge van hul poste onthef en na Holland teruggeroep is.

In 1709 word Josué nog in die opgaafrolle van die Distrik Stellenbosch, waaronder Kruispad geresorteer het, opgeneem. Geen opgaafrolle het vir die jare 1710-1711 behoue gebly nie en in 1712 word hy in die opgaafrolle van die Distrik Drakenstein opgeneem. Het Kruys Pad word op 15 Maart 1712 aan Josué toegeken, maar daar kan nie veel van hierdie datum afgelei word nie aangesien plase wat aan boere toegesê is, d.w.s toestemming verleen is om die grond te bewoon en te benut, dikwels eers etlike jare later aan hulle toegeken is, d.w.s hul eiendom geword het. In die Paarl koop hy die plaas Orléans (57 morg 300 vk roede) wat op 11 Oktober 1713 op sy naam oorgedra word. Hier boer hy en Elisabeth tot en met hulle dood.

‘n Dokter (chirurgyn) Gideon le Grande het joernaal gehou van sy mediese dienste en `n gedeelte van sy joernaal vir 1710 het behoue gebly. Op 9 Februarie 1710 skryf hy medikasie van scafran vir Josué Cellier voor, maar hierdie inskrywing is later weer doodgetrek. Wat scafran is, is onbekend en waarom die inskrywing later doodgetrek is, is ook onbekend. Van die siektes wat aangeteken is, is bloedvloeiing, geswelde voete, keelseer, kopseer, kortasem, krampe in die ingewande, longsiekte, maagpyn, niere, sooibrand, snydings, sweer en verkoue. Bloedlating as behandeling kom die meeste voor, ondermeer vir pyn aan die arm en skouer; daarna purgasies van sennablare en nieskruid.

In 1712 keer Elisabeth se broer Paul Couvret en sy gesin na `n verblyf van twaalf jaar aan die Kaap terug na Europa. Hy het op die plaas Goede Hoop, 60 morg, in die Paarl geboer.

Die Paarl se lidmaatregisters is waarskynlik sedert die stigting van die gemeente in 1691 bygehou, maar die eerste register wat behoue gebly het, is dié van 1715. Onder ‘Der Ledematen die de Predikant Van Aken in die Kerke van Drakenstyn in den jare 1715 gevonden heeft’, was ‘Jossue Sellier en syne vrouw Elizabeth Couvret’ en die totale aantal lidmate is as 104 aangeteken. Teen 1725 het die aantal lidmate tot 146 gegroei.

Oor Josué se boerderyaktiwiteite gedurende sy eerste paar jaar aan die Kaap is min bekend weens die onvolledigheid van die opgaafrolle. In 1704 besit hy slegs 4 koeie, maar teen 1709 verbou hy reeds 8 000 wingerdstokke, besit hy 5 perde en 18 beeste en het hy ook 60 mud koring geoes. In latere jare besit hy tot 300 skape en produseer jaarliks tot 3 lêers (1 731 liter) wyn.

Josué sterf op 54-jarige ouderdom in Oktober 1721 en laat die 45-jarige Elisabeth agter met tien kinders tussen die ouderdomme van 4 en 20 jaar. Van die items wat in sy boedelinventaris gelys word, met die waarde in guldens Indiese valuta aangedui, is:
Die plaas Orleient 2 900
15 beeste 450
1 wa 100
en 16 lêers wyn 480.

Elisabeth hertrou in ongeveer 1722 met die 57-jarige wewenaar Paul Roux. Hul presiese huweliksdatum is onbekend aangesien die Paarl se huweliksregisters vir hierdie tydperk verlore is. Paul en Elisabeth kon nie baie lank getroud gewees het nie aangesien hy op 7 Februarie 1723 oorlede is, sestien maande na haar eerste man. Na Paul se dood het Elisabeth nie weer hertrou nie.

Paul Roux was `n bekwame man wat kort na sy aankoms in die Kaap in 1688 aangestel is as onderwyser, voorleser en sieketrooster vir die Franse gemeenskap in die Paarl, poste wat hy tot sy dood toe beklee het. Saam met Pierre Simond was hy gereken as een van die grootste stryders vir die gebruik en behoud van die Franse taal aan die Kaap. Teen die tyd dat hy en Elisabeth getroud is, was die kinders uit sy eerste huwelik almal reeds mondig. Hy het ‘n kleinerige plasie Oranje, 2 morg 250 vk roede, in die Paarl besit wat na sy dood na sy seun Jeremie Roux gegaan het. Vir meer inligting kyk ook onder stamvader Paul Roux.

Na haar tweede man se dood, sit Elisabeth en haar vier seuns die boerdery op die plaas voort. Verdere hulp met die boerdery word verkry met die aankoop van haar eerste slaaf in 1728 en teen 1743 besit sy vier slawe, een slavin en twee slawekinders. Vanaf 1732 tot 1734 werk haar skoonseun, Johannes Hubertus, as kneg op die plaas. In ‘n kontrak wat op 27 September 1732 tussen hulle gesluit is, onderneem hy om haar ‘voor den tyd van een geheel Jaar trouw en naarstig te dienen als knegt’ teen `n maandelikse betaling van twaalf Caabse guldens asook huisvesting en voedsel. Hierdie kontrak word op 26 Oktober 1733 vir nog `n jaar verleng. Teen 1743, kort voor haar dood, word 10 lêers (5 773 liter) wyn geproduseer en met tye was daar tot 6 perde, 30 beeste en 200 skape op die plaas. Benewens koring, word rog ook gesaai.

In 1738 boer die 62-jarige Elisabeth en drie van haar seuns, Josué, Abraham en Pieter, nog op die plaas en bied hulle vir nagenoeg `n jaar skuiling aan die 39-jarige voortvlugtende Estienne Barbier, `n sersant in diens van die VOC. Estienne was ook van Orléans, Frankryk afkomstig en het in 1734 as gewone soldaat in diens van die VOC in die Kaap aangekom. In Mei 1737 lei Estienne se beskuldigings van ondermeer geldverduistering en korrupsie teen `n luitenant tot `n lastersaak en Estienne word skuldig bevind. Hy appèlleer, besef weldra dat sy appèl nie veel kans het om te slaag nie en ontsnap op 24 Maart 1738 uit die Kasteel waar hy onder arres was. Na sy ontsnapping bly hy ongestoord op Orléans, omdat die owerhede onder die indruk was dat hy hom op `n skip versteek en na Holland teruggekeer het. In Februarie 1739 verlaat hy Orléans en begin `n hoofsaaklik skriftelike veldtog teen die ongeregtighede van die owerhede. Met die ontevredenheid wat reeds in die Kaap geheers het, het hierdie veldtog die potensiaal gehad om `n burgelike opstand te begin en in Maart 1739 word hy deur die owerhede ‘vogel-vry’ verklaar – hulle soek hom, lewend of dood. Hy word eers ses maande later in hegtenis geneem, verhoor en ter dood veroordeel. Hierdie vonnis, wat in die openbaar voltrek is, het behels dat hy aan `n kruis vasgebind word, onthoof word, sy regterhand afgekap word, die res van sy liggaam gevierdeel word en sy ingewande onder die skavot, waar die vonnis voltrek is, begrawe word. Sy liggaamsdele is daarna op pale in die openbaar vertoon – sy kop en regterhand by die ingang van die Roodezandkloof, tussen Paarl en Tulbagh, en sy vier liggaamsdele langs die besigste paaie in die Kaap.

Elisabeth sterf op 67-jarige ouderdom in ongeveer 1743. In haar testament van 1724 het sy bepaal dat haar kinders gelykop moet erf en alhoewel dit `n algemene bepaling was dat `n plaas aan `n spesifieke persoon bemaak word teen `n vasgestelde bedrag, doen sy dit nie. Sy spreek slegs haar begeerte uit dat Orléans na haar afsterwe ‘soude in volle bezit gegeeven werden aan haar oudste zoon Josua Cellier’. Skynbaar het Josué nie veel erg aan boerdery gehad nie aangesien hy na sy ma se afsterwe by sy suster Elisabeth in die Wellington omgewing gaan woon het. Jan boer in 1743 reeds op sy eie plaas Druiwevallei. Abraham neem van die vee oor, word die eerste Cellier wat oor die berge trek en vestig hom in die huidige Rawsonville omgewing waar hy homself hoofsaaklik op veevoerdery toespits. Pieter neem die oorblywende vee, slawe en die plaas oor en was, sover vasgestel kon word, die laaste Cellier-eienaar van Orléans.
Vansverandering van Cellier na Celliers, Cillié en Cilliers

Die verandering van Josué Cellier se nageslag se van van Cellier na Celliers, Cillié en Cilliers kon nie aan ‘n spesifieke tyd of geslag gekoppel word nie. Selfs op die dokumente wat vir Josué nagegaan is, word sy van benewens Cellier ook as Celliers, Sellier, Selliers, Siljee, Silliers, Sollier en Zilie gespel.

Vir die volgende drie geslagte (b, c en d-geslagte) is die spelling van Josué se nasate se van legio, onder andere Celie, Celje, Cellie, Cellier, Celliers, Cielje, Cilie, Cilje, Cilli, Cillie, Cillier, Cilliers, Cillje, De Cilliers, De Silliers, Seliee, Seliers, Selje, Sellie, Sellier, Sielje, Silie, Silje, Siljee en Silliers.

Dit is eers vanaf die vierde geslag (e-geslag) dat die spellings Celliers, Cillié en Cilliers meerendeels gebruik is, maar van die voorgemelde variasies het steeds voorgekom. Daar kon ook nie altyd bepaal word watter spelling ‘n spesifieke persoon gebruik het nie omdat spelling van dokument tot dokument kon verskil en dit het tot in die 1900’s nog voorgekom. Verder was ‘n bepaalde spelling ook nie altyd deur al die lede van ‘n gesin en hul nageslag gebruik nie.

Cilliers is die spelling wat die meeste teëgekom is.

Die eerste afstammeling van Jan (b2) wat die Celliers spelling algemeen gebruik het, was Jacob Daniel (b2c1d1e1f4) en daarna sy nageslag, maar Jacob Daniel se twee broers en hul nageslag het weer hul van as Cilliers gespel. Onder die nageslagte wat die Kaap Kolonie verlaat het, wil dit voorkom asof die Celliers spelling algemeen in die Lichtenburg- en Vryburg-omgewing gebruik is terwyl die Cilliers spelling weer in die Marico-omgewing asook in die Oranje Vrystaat en Natal gebruik is. By Abraham (b7) se afstammelinge wat in die Kaap Kolonie gebly het, is die Celliers spelling net by enkele lede van ‘n gesin teëgekom, maar hierdie spelling is dikwels nie behou nie.

Alhoewel die Cillié spelling wel op dokumente van Abraham (b7) se afstammelinge voorkom is, is die spelling nie behou nie. Hierdie spelling is slegs deur sommige van Jan (b2) se afstammelinge behou. Die eerste afstammeling van Jan (b2) waar hierdie spelling algemeen deur ‘n gesin gebruik is, is by sommige van die kinders van Petrus (b2c1d2), maar selfs hier wissel die spelling op dokumente vir dieselfde persoon nog tussen Celliers, Cillié, Cilliers asook sommige van die voorgemelde variasies. Sover vasgestel kon word, is sy seun Petrus Johannes (b2c1d2e2) se nageslag die enigste wat die Cillié spelling behou het terwyl sy seun Johannes Arnoldus (b2c1d2e6) se nageslag hul van as Celliers, Cillié en Cilliers spel.

Bronne:
Genealogiese Publikasies
De Villiers, C C en Pama, C Geslagsregisters van Ou Kaapse Families, A A Balkema, Kaapstad en Rotterdam, 1981.
Heese, J A en Lombard, R T J/GISA, Suid-Afrikaanse Geslagsregisters – Deel 1-4, A-K.
Ander Publikasies
Böeseken, A J, et al, Drie Eeue Die Verhaal van ons Vaderland, Nasionale Boekhandel, Kaapstad, 1952.
Botha, Colin Graham The French Regugees at the Cape, Struik, Cape Town, 1970.
Burman, Jose So High the Road, Human & Rousseau, Cape Town, 1963.
Coertzen, Pieter Die Hugenote in Suid-Afrika 1688-1988, Tafelberg, Kaapstad, 1988.
De Jongh, P S Sarel Cilliers, Perskor, Johannesburg, 1987.
De Klerk, W A Klein Reis deur Drakenstein, Perskor, Johannesburg, 1974.
Franken, J L M Argiefjaarboek vir Suid-Afrikaanse Geskiedenis – Die Hugenote aan die Kaap, Pretoria, 1978.
Hugenote Vereniging van Suid-Afrika, Franschhoek – Verskeie Bulletins.
Le Roux, J G Bewaarders van ons Erfenis, GISA, Stellenbosch.
Le Roux, J G Hugenotebloed in ons Are, RGN, Pretoria, 1988.
Le Roux, J G Ons Drakensteinse Erfgrond, Drakenstein Heemkring, Paarl.
Muller, C J F (Ed), Five Hundred Years, A History of South Africa, Academica, Cape Town and Pretoria, 1973.
Penn, Nigel Rogues, Rebels and Runaways, David Philip Publishers, Cape Town, 1999.
Schoeman, Karel Armosyn van die Kaap, Human en Rousseau, Kaapstad, 1999.
Trewhella, Cameron (Red), Nuwe Geskiedenis van Suid-Afrika, Human & Rousseau, Kaapstad, 1986.
Kaapse Argiefbewaarplek, Kaapstad
Boedelinventaris MOOC 8/4 no 33
Handtekeninge by W A van der Stel se getuigskrif C2416-p20
Huwelikshofnotules
Joernaal van Gideon le Grande MOOC 14/1 Vol 1, no 19
Kontrak CJ 2883-no81
Likwidasie- en Distribusierekenings
Opgaafrolle
Resolusies van die Politieke Raad – Dele 1 tot 10
Sterftekennisse
Testamente CJ 2600 no 28 en CJ 2602 no 33
Vendusierolle
VOC Dagregisters 1699
Weilisensies
N G Kerk Argief, Kaapstad
Doderegisters
Doopregisters
Huweliksregisters
Lidmaatregisters

Navorsing deur:
Mariana Olivier omariana@lantic.net

Bron: Stamouers. com

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Anne Frank

 

On THIS LINK on my blog, you can read more about the Boer War. You will find some Boer War art, poetry and a lengthy entry about the war with many links to other sites too.

Today I was  inspired by Rosalind due to  her post about the concentration camps during the British/Boer-War in the late 1800’s-early 1900’s…I’ve got a book about the concentration camps and it was so sad to read how those people were treated and the circumstances they lived in! My mum has had a relative – Dorie Burger –  that was there and in this book she was also quoted where she mentioned who died again in the camp and how they were rationed on food and that the food wasn’t enough. According to her, many children were still hungry at night and couldn’t sleep due to insufficient food. You just feel like crying when you read the book!

 Rosalind’s post also  immediately  reminded me about the Jews and the holocaust and my  very own first English “story”-book… Anne Frank’s diary… as a birthday present when I was 12. My birthday  is one day before Anne’s birthday – 12th June – and that  made the book – as a child – even more special. I’ve always been interested in War-books, fiction as well as non-fiction. I’ve blogged before about other books written about wars…the Cambodian war… the war in Kosovo…Today, when you see the word “Holocaust”  it usually refers to this time in which the German Army systematically  killed nearly 6 million Jews. People need to learn about the Holocaust and the reasons why it happened.  Some say it never happened at all, but we know it did because there are too many witnesses and survivors who lived to tell the world about those darkest of times. Click HERE to visit the site about Anne Frank  and there’s a link to the museum.

 

This picture was taken on the 10th March 1933…. that means… Monday, 10th March…more than 70 years ago.

 

The movable book case

Anne Frank’s diary made into a musical…

 from the Guardian newspaper:

 

It might not seem the most obvious material for a song-and-dance number, but the Diary of Anne Frank will take centre stage next month when a Spanish musical based on the most famous book about the Holocaust opens in Madrid.

Having been rewritten for films, plays and TV dramas, the story of the Jewish girl hiding out with her family in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam has never before been made as a musical. The Anne Frank Foundation, which jealously guards the rights to the diary – it once turned down Steven Spielberg when he wanted to make a film – has given its support. Jan Erik Dubbelman said: “This production respects the message of tolerance, within the tragedy, that we want to keep alive. Being in Spanish, it can also help to take the message of Anne Frank to Latin America.”The Spanish theatre group behind the musical has visited the tiny flat where Frank hid from the Nazis, seeking inspiration for their characters and performing some of the songs for members of the foundation. Isabella Castillo, a 13-year-old born in Cuba who has been chosen for the lead role, said she had been moved by the visit: “If you’re doing a musical of the family and how they lived and the house and everything, I think it’s very special, and a very important detail, to come to this house.”Frank wrote the diary while she and her family hid in a secret annexe behind a bookcase in a canal-side warehouse. For 25 months, she wrote down her experiences as a teenager – her love-hate relationship with her parents, spats with schoolfriends, crushes on film stars – while in the background the war raged outside. The family was betrayed and arrested in August 1944 and Frank died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in March 1945. Her father Otto was the only one to survive, and returned to Amsterdam after the war, where he discovered that her diary had been saved. First published in Dutch in 1947, it went on to be translated into 60 languages and has sold more than 25m copies worldwide.Rafael Alvero, who developed the musical project, said it was the culmination of a decade’s efforts to gain the confidence of the foundation. He said the show would be inspirational, comparing Frank’s life story to a tragic opera.

“When I first came here they [the foundation] had this doubt, about how somebody can do a musical of a story like this,” said Alvero. “The thing we want to do is … through the music, to understand the story better,” he said.

Once the foundation had given its permission, the hunt for actors capable of mixing the sombre nature of the material with the high energy of a musical began. Castillo said she felt honoured to be playing such an important role, and that there were things the two had in common.

The Franks moved from Germany to Holland in 1933, when Anne was four. Castillo’s mother fled from Cuba when Isabella was young, and they lived in hiding in Belize before immigrating to Miami.
Please click HERE for the original article about the musical.

Image: Gardenofpraise

Today if you visit the site of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp you can see a memorial to Anne Frank and her sister Margot.

This picture shows the streetside view of the building. Otto Frank’s offices were at the front of the building and the hiding place was at the rear.

The hiding place became known as the Secret Annex. It was located at 263 Prinsengracht. The Frank family would occupy two rooms on the first floor. A week later Mr. and Mrs. Van Pels and their son would move into the two rooms on the second floor. From Peter’s tiny room they could access the attic where food was stored. There was a small bathroom on the first floor. Images: gardenofpraise.com

This is what my book looks like…and the next book is a picture book which I’ve bought for my primary y5/6  kids… it’s really an easy book for them to understand Anne’s story.

 

This book is one of  many on my bookshelf  that I still need to finish reading…it’s about a gripping account of how a group of young children who, when forced into isolation by the Nazi occupation of their home town in Czechoslovakia, refused to be silenced and fought back by creating and circulating their own newspaper called Klepy (which means gossip). The “Underground Reporters” chronicles — the lives of the young people who contributed to the newspaper. On the blurb it says: “…They founded a secret newspaper that was to become an inspiration to the Jews of Budejovice, uniting them and giving them something to fight for and be proud of. These young people were the Underground Reporters and this is their story.”

 This book seems to be a great book to read, I’ve just ordered it from Amazon. You can read the review I’ve found on the internet.

 Review from this site:historicalnovelsociety.org/london-conference.htm

No Place for a Lady

Ann Harries

The thrilling and sweeping new novel from the award-winning author of
‘Manly Pursuits’

It is the turn of the twentieth century and war is razing the Boer Republics of South Africa to the ground. Kitchener’s army has intensified its most barbarous campaign: to burn down the homes of thousands of obstinate Boers, forcing a desperate migration to disease-ridden concentration camps. Yet the vastly outnumbered Boers still will not surrender to the British.

In the midst of these horrors is a group of women, each fighting their own battle. Sarah Palmer is an angelically pretty nurse who arrives from England with her madcap friend Louise. Their relationship is threatened when Sarah falls deeply in love with a sick Colonial trooper of humble origin as Louise cannot help but become painfully jealous of her friend’s natural magnetism and beauty. And then arrives the dynamic Englishwoman, Emily Hobhouse, who has come to bring succour to the destitute and dying women and children and to stir the consciences of Britain over the holocaust of the camps.

As their dramas unfold, so too does the history of the war. It was intended to be a quick annexation of the Boer Republics but it turned in to a protracted, savage conflict. Harries shows a depth of knowledge and compassion in her writing; the involvement of the blacks who were promised the vote if they joined the British side, and the injustices and deep inequalities in South Africa which lie at the heart of the story. ‘No Place for a Lady’ is historical fiction at its finest. Ann harries has drawn unforgettable characters and made the period with all its complexities come vividly alive. This is a thrilling, beautifully written, and utterly compelling novel.

Ann Harries was born and educated in Cape Town, where she worked in township schools and community centres. On moving to England she became active in the anti-apartheid movement. The author of the acclaimed Manly Pursuits, she divides her time between the Cotswolds and South Africa.

‘History is ingeniously rewritten in this witty and engaging novel.’

J.M. Coetzee

‘Outstanding…Funny, well observed and beautifully written.’
Sunday Times

‘Brilliantly funny and inventive…Enjoyable and vivid throughout… I haven’t turned any pages faster this year than I have turned these.’
Spectator

‘A hugely ambitious novel that takes on an impressive range of themes, from history, colonialism and racism to science, evolution, sexual repression and betrayal…Both an entertaining read and a richly evocative portrait of that era.’
Observer

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Ex Unitate Vires

On THIS LINK and on THIS link you can read more about the British/Boer-War. You can also view some War-Art… and HERE you can also read  about the War.
On THIS LINK you can read more about General De La Rey….

Words of the second song in English….

I’ve asked Jasper to translate the song in English…so, enjoy his translation!

On the hill tops at night
In shadows and darkness we wait
The night chills te mud and the guts for my bed
While the rain and old rags sleeps with me

With the life that they burned
from my farm to take pride
in capturing me
They opened my soul to the flames
That fans the dark furnace in me

De La Rey, De La Rey
We need you to show us the way
De La Rey, De La Rey
General De La Rey
United we’ll fight till we fall
General De La Rey

You could hear the Queens force
mocking an end
to this brotherhood of men
Cornered by cliffs they did think
For us it’s the end

How they failed to conceive
The heart of a man
That they came to call Boer
Beware the pale horse from the west
The Lion that comes for his kin

De La Rey, De La Rey
We need you to show us the way
De La Rey, De La Rey
General De La Rey
United we’ll fight till we fall
General De La Rey

In the dark camps of death
My wife and my child pays the bill
For in the footprint of Khaki’s
This nation will rise once again

De La Rey, De La Rey
We need you to show us the way
De La Rey, De La Rey
General De La Rey
United we’ll fight till we fall
General De La Rey
(c) Jandre Neethling

Discrimination!! this song is forbidden to be sung on Loftus Versfeld in Pretoria!! oh my DEAR!!! can you believe it!! South Africa, wake up!!! It’s a SONG about HISTORY!!!!!!!

http://www.news24.com/Rapport/Nuus/0,,752-795_2070988,00.html

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Pilgrim’s Rest

I’ve posted before about before about Pilgrims Rest and don’t want to bore you again with the history of the town. In short – for those “lazy” readers… – oh yes, HERE is a link! – this is a historical town in the Eastern part of the country… Mpumalanga. Mpumalanga means… place where the sun rises..so, it’s the East! Previously, it was called Eastern Transvaal and you were lucky (like me!) if you grew up in this part of the country as it is one of the most beautiful places in the country. This historical town – Pilgrims Rest – was founded during the Gold Rush in South Africa and the town is now a tourist attraction and really a “must go” when you go to South Africa. I’ve got some fantastic pictures that will get posted tomorrow about views of the town and more about museums in the town and from the displays in the musems and also from the Hotel itself. So…keep watching this space!

The Royal Hotel was THE place to be – I guess for those miners after a hard day’s work! If you walk into the Royal Hotel, you can “hear” them talking “gold”!  The atmosphere is really a relaxing atmosphere. The main road doesn’t go through the town anymore like before and that makes wondering/lingering through the town quite safe and less stressful!

These two pictures are some old posters and it grabbed my attention immediately!

I got permission from this art shop to take some pics inside and they sell the most wonderful art/pottery! Just have a look at all the designs, rich in colour and rich in Africa! I love these designs!

These menus can’t be ignored! You have to sit down and have something to eat, my favourite of course…scones and jam+cream! and those Koeksisters!! how can you resist it!

On these pics you can see evidence of the mining that was going on. There’s museums in the town that is very informative about the area and the “Gold Rush”.Read HERE MORE about the Gold Rush in Pilgrims Rest.

Click ON THIS LINK to see more beautiful pictures of Pilgrim’s Rest and take a tour through the eastern part of the country!

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My Five Favourites

I was tagged by MEGHNA to do a meme. This meme is about 5 links on your blog that you like most and then I have to tag 5 other bloggers to do the same!

It was really difficult for me to decide which 5 links are my favourite, as I have more favourites than just 5 for the following reasons: I love History…and I have  quite a few posts relating to History. I do love poetry! and I really have so many poets that I favour, it was really difficult to decide which link! I love chess! and I think at this stage…with the covering of Corus and the African Juniors… I think about 1/4 of my links are chess-related posts, as I have about 20 of my own games posted too! Then…books! Drop me at any bookshop and I’m happy as a pig in Palestine!! So…I tried to focus on what I like/love and tried to find posts that I think might interest you as the reader! Enjoy!

1. Read on Still Tuesday about The Butterfly Lion..and Meghna…I do hope you get hold of this book to read it…the setting starts in South Africa and then moves to England…one of the best books I’ve read…although it’s a book for children age 9-11… due to my work…in South Africa as a library teacher too…I read zillions of books to be able to support children in knowing what’s good to read! and I love children’s books…they are the best!

2. Chess!! African Junior Chess Championships that took place early in January 2008 in Malawi. I covered the tournament with interactive games …so…enjoy yourself with the best from the rest!

3. Suncatcher! Sonvanger On this link you can listen to the song in Afrikaans whilst following the words in English… really a nice song, beautifully sang by two artists and one of them, Laurika Rauch, is really gold dust in South Africa!

4. On Seven II you will find a poem which I translated. Read what it is about, a very sad incident in one of our country’s best poet’s life.

5. VERY interesting history to be read here… about South Africa.

Tag time! I’m tagging the following bloggers…they are all in my blogroll…MyKop’nBlog…Boer-in-Ballingskap…Krokodil-kou-aan….and Willie-werkie…unfortunately, only Krokodil-kou-aan’s blog is an English blog…but beautiful photos to see on the other blogs!

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This day in History..Anne of Cleves

I consider King Henry VIII to be a vicious King! If you know his whole history, you will agree on this. I think he was known for many things! – some not very pleasant if you ask me!   He was married six times! And… for primary children to remember what happened to all his wives, they learn in schools this little rhyme…”divorce, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded survived”! Yes, he even beheaded two of his wives! But…did you know that he composed Green Sleeves?

 Read more HERE about it. …

Henry VIII (28 June 1491 – 28 January 1547) was King of England and Lord of Ireland, later King of Ireland, from 22 April 1509 until his death. Henry was the second monarch of the House of Tudor, succeeding his father, Henry VII. Henry VIII is famous for having been married six times. He wielded perhaps the most unfettered power of any English monarch, and brought about the Dissolution of the Monasteries and the union of England and Wales.Henry VIII was the second son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. His elder brother, Arthur, Prince of Wales, died in 1502, leaving Henry as heir to the throne.

Many significant pieces of legislation were enacted during Henry VIII’s reign. They included the several Acts which severed the Church of England from the Roman Catholic Church and established the king as the supreme head of the Church in England.

Henry VIII is known to have been an avid gambler and dice player. In his youth, he excelled at sports, especially jousting, hunting, and real tennis. He was also an accomplished musician, author, and poet; his best known piece of music is Pastime with Good Company (”The Kynges Ballade”). Henry VIII was also involved in the original construction and improvement of several significant buildings, including Nonsuch Palace, King’s College Chapel, Cambridge and Westminster Abbey in London. Many of the existing buildings Henry improved were properties confiscated from Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, such as Christ Church, Oxford, Hampton Court Palace, palace of Whitehall, and Trinity College, Cambridge. He founded Christ Church Cathedral School, Oxford in 1546.

……..Henry desired to marry once again to ensure that a male could succeed him. Thomas Cromwell, now 1st Earl of Essex, suggested Anne, the sister of the Protestant Duke of Cleves, who was seen as an important ally in case of a Roman Catholic attack on England. Hans Holbein the Younger was dispatched to Cleves to paint a portrait of Anne for the King. Although it has been said that he painted her in a more flattering way, it is unlikely that the portrait was inaccurate, as Holbein remained in favour at court. After regarding Holbein’s portrayal, and urged by the complimentary description of Anne given by his courtiers, Henry agreed to wed Anne. On Anne’s arrival in England, Henry is said to have found her utterly unattractive, privately calling her a “Flanders Mare.” Nevertheless, he married her on 6 January 1540.
Read more HERE on this link.

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Battle of Blood River — ANC “song”

Will South Africans have to steel themselves for the future? Read the article at the bottom of this post and try answering this question!

This Battle took place on 16th December 1838. For some South Africans, like myself, the 16th December will always be a day to “remember”…a day to commemorate….on this day, the Battle of Blood River took place between the Zulu impis of Dingane and the Voortrekkkers. On this picture you can see the Voortrekker laager in a D-shape. That was because of the two rivers that meet there, the Donga – and the Ncome rivers. Sarel Cilliers, a Voortrekker leader and a preacher, had promised God that they will build a church and commemorate this day as a Sabbath day to thank God for helping them. God intervened in this Battle and till 1993, this day was always a public holiday in South Africa to commemorate the events of that day. Today, after 1994, it is now called  a day of “Reconciliation”. Read HERE about it. On the  first image you can see information about the two groups and on the Wiki-link, you can even read more….
This is a fantastic site to read more and there are really great pictures to see too…CLICK here to read more and you can even visit other historical sites!

On THIS link there is a time line and you can see all the kings of the Zulu, very interesting reading!

“On December 16th, dawn broke on a clear day, revealing that ” ‘all of Zululand sat there’ ,” said one Trekker eyewitness (Mackenzie 1997:74). On his deathbed 30 years later, Sarel Cilliers recalled that before the battle commenced, the Trekkers had made a vow to God that if He should deliver them, they would build a church and commemorate the day as a Sabbath.”

Read HERE about the Battle of Blood River between the Voortrekkers and the Zulu impis of Dingane.

From the news front:News24.com
24.com/news/?p=tsa&i=790538
South Africa

2007-12-16 22:13

Johannesburg – Democratic Alliance leader Helen Zille has slammed the singing of Umshini wam (Bring me my machine gun) by delegates at the African National Congress’s 52nd national conference in Polokwane. “What will the world conclude about delegates who sing Bring me my machine gun – and that on the official Day of Reconciliation?” asked Zille.

“The contest for the top job has become a battle for access to perks of various offices and the institutions of state to use against other opponents” she said in a statement.

Zille could understand why ANC president Thabo Mbeki and others lamented this state of affairs.

Read the complete  News article here.

This next poem is about Blood River…
source: http://365spore.blogspot.com
Deur Theo Wassenaar
Die Slag van Bloedrivier
==16 Desember 1838==

Die Ooste gloei. Dit is die dag.
Wat vóór die Ooster-poorte wag
En aarsel om die donker waas,
Waar voor sy oog hang, weg te blaas:

Want o, wat sal sy oog aanskou –
Dan bloed, dan bloed, dan moord en rou?
Maar nee, hy skeur die sluier oop…
Dáár word Suid-Afrika gedoop!

Wat is dit, wat ek ginds gewaar,
Daar langs die donker berge, dáár?
Dit is Dingaan se swarte drom,
Dit is Dingaan! Die Zoeloes kom!
Gryp, Trekker, gryp jou kruit en roer
En staan jou man, jou naam is Boer!
Beskawing moet hier segevier,
Of Afrika is vir die dier!

Hul kom! Hul kom met woede aan,
Soos vuur, in hoë gras geslaan,
Wat, op die wind se vlug gedraag,
Al knett’rend oor die grassaad jaag,
En vir geen pad of vóórbrand stuit;
Die vlamme-arrems gryp vooruit,
Verteer al wat hul beet kan kry,T
ot as alléén nog orig bly.

Hul kom! Hul kom soos aasvoëls aan,
Die wye vlerke oopgeslaan,
En bek en pote rooi gekleur
Van prooi, nog pas uiteengeskeur.
O hoor hoe dreun dit, soos hul kom!
Die woel en wemel rond en om,
Van skildvel, assegai, barbaar!
Van Zoeloes, Zoeloes aan mekaar!

Hul storm! Hul storm! Die swarte drom,
En skreeu en bokspring soos hul kom.
Maar in die Treklaer is dit stil,
Want elke Boer weet wat hy wil:
So oog hou wag; sy hart herhaal
Die vroom gelofte elke maal,
En naas hom staan sy Sanna klaar,
Die kruit en koeëls lê bymekaar.

Hul kom! Hul Kom! . . . maar ry aan ry
Stort neer om daar vir goed te bly.
Die Sannas bulder, die osse brul
En hardloop rond, met angs vervul;
Dit kletter hier, dit knetter daar,
Dit reën asgaaie op die laer.

Hul kom! Hul kom!. . . maar deins weer trug.
Hul kom! . . . maar kom met weifelsug,
Hul kom! . . . maar weifel weer, weifel,
Hul kom! . . . dit was die laaste keer.

Dis moed, wat volhou na begin,V
ertroue is dit, wat oorwin.
Sou vier maal honderd Trekkers dan
Vir twaalf maal duisend Kaffers kan
Verslaan? Aanskou die water maar,
Aanskou die sloot, die vlakte dáár:
Drie duisend lyke daar lê daar rond! . . .
Pretorius alleen is lig gewond.

O hart, wat blydskap het gesmaak,
Wie kan die trotse dag genaak,
Van Afrika’s beskawingsdoop,
En koud bloed deur sy hart laat loop?
Ja, Stem van donker Afrika,
Ons, wat jou naam met eer moes dra,
Ons woon hier op ‘n wêrelddeel,
Ons moes regeer, en is verdeel!

Persone wat aan die Slag van Bloedrivier deelgeneem het/People taking part in this battle
(lys is nie 100% bygewerk nie, maar die volgende persone is reeds geverifieër)
Source: http://www.boerevryheid.co.za/forums/showthread.php?t=11001
Hoofkommandant
Andries Wilhelmus Pretorius

Assistent Hoofkommandant
Karel Pieter Landman

Kommandante
Johannes H de Lange (Hans Dons), Jacobus Potgieter, Pieter Daniel Jacobs, Stephanus Erasmus, Jacobus Uys, Lukas Meyer

Laerkommandante
Albertus Pretorius (ook kanonnier), Lourens Erasmus, Piet Moolman (Rooi Piet), Christoffel Cornelis Froneman

Veldkornette
Johannes C Steyn, Gert Viljoen, HA Pretorius, Gert van Staden, Stephanus Lombard, Jan Scheepers, Hermanus Fourie, William Cowie, Casper Labuschagne, Jan Joubert (ook kanonnier en godsdiensleier)

Godsdiensleiers
Charl Cilliers, Jan du Plessis

Kanonniers
Piet Rudolph, Gerhardus Pretorius

Manskappe
Aucamp Piet
Badenhorst H
Badenhorst P
Bantjes Jan Gerritze
Beneke J
Bester Barend
Bester Lourens
Bester Paul Michiel
Bezuidenhout Daniel P
Biedolf
Bierman Isak
Biggar Alexander (kolonel)
Bodes Barend
Bornman Johannes Jurgens
Boshof Jan
Botha Ernst Adriaan Lodewyk
Botha Hendrik
Botha JC
Botha L
Botha PJ
Botha PR
Botha Theunis
Botha TF
Bothma Carel A
Bothma Daniel
Breytenbach Chris
Breytenbach Johannes Jacobus
Breytenbach Jacob Coenraad
Breytenbach Johan Hendrik
Bronkhorst Jacobus
Bronkhorst Johannes Jacobus
Bronkhorst Sam
Bruwer Eduard CD
Bruwer Hans
Bruyn Piet
Buitendag CH
Burger Jacobus J
Buys Piet
Claassens Christiaan
Coetzee J
Coetzer JJ
Coetzer Phillippus Jeremias
Coetzer Thys
Crombrink G
Cronje Abraham
Cronje Piet
Henning Dafel
Jan Dafel
Thomas Richard Dannhauser
De Beer Abraham
De Beer Christiaan M
De Beer C (sr)
De Beer Jan Christiaan
De Beer Johannes A
De Beer Stephanus A (sr)
De Beer Zacharias Jacobus
De Clercq Abraham
De Clercq B
De Clercq C
De Clercq J
De Jager A
De Jager Frederik J
De Jager Izak J
De Jager JW
De Jager Lodewyk
De Lange Adriaan (jr)
De Lange Robert
De Wet Kootjie
De Wet P
De Winnaar S
Dreyer C
Dreyer F
Dreyer I
Du Plessis Francois
Du Plessis Jan
Du Plessis P
Du Plooy Wouter
Du Plooy Hendrik
Du Plooy Willem
Du Preez PD
Dysel F
Engelbrecht Adriaan
Engelbrecht E
Engelbrecht Gerhardus
Engelbrecht H (Jong)
Engelbrecht HH (sr)
Engelbrecht Johannes Hendrik
Enslin Johannes Jacobus
Erasmus Antonie
Erasmus Barend
Erasmus Cornelis
Erasmus Daniel Elardus
Erasmus Hans
Erasmus Jacobus
Erasmus Pieter
Erasmus
Erasmus SE
Esterhuizen Jan
Ferreira Marthinus Stephanus
Fick Hendrik
Fisher Jan
Fourie Christiaan Erns
Fourie Dirk
Fourie Hermanus
Fourie Philip
Geer Carel
Giesing F
Gouws Daniel
Gouws J Marthinus
Gouws Jacob J
Gouws PM
Grove Hermanus
Greyling Jan
Grobbelaar Nicolaas Johannes
Grobbelaar Pieter Schalk
Hammes PJ
Hattingh C
Hattingh F
Hattingh JH (Hans)
Herbst M
Heydenreich Cornelis Frederik
Human PG
Jacobs Gabriel
Jacobs J Daniel
Jacobsz Jan
Hanse Willem
Jordaan Willem
Joubert Abraham Benjamin
Joubert Jan (Jacobus seun)
Joubert Jan (jr)
Joubert Pieter J
Joyce Robert
Kemp G
Kemp Jacobus
Kemp Petrus J
Klaassen P
Klopper Jacobus
Klopper H
Koekemoer C
Koekemoer Marthinus
Kritzinger Lewis
Kruger Jan
Kruger PE
Kruger TJ
Laas Cornelis
Laas Matthys
Labuschagne JP
Labuschagne JH (Jan Groen)
Labuschagne Willem Adriaan
Landman Jan AKP (sr)
Landman Jan (Doringberg)
Leech
Le Roux D
Le Roux Nicolaas
Liebenberg C
Liebenberg C (sr)
Lindeque P
Lombard Hermanus Antonie
Lombard Hans
Lombard S
Lotter J
Ludick MJ
Malan David D
Malan DJJ
Malan Jacob Jacobus
Malan Stephanus
Marcus F
Marais Coenraad
Marais Johannes L
Marais Stephanus Abraham
Mare Wynand Wilhelm
Maritz Pieter, Maritz Salmon Gerhardus
Maritz Stephanus
Martens Hendrik Jacobus
Martens J Thomas (sr)
Martens J Thomas (jr)
Marx Frans
Meintjies Albertus Jacobus
Meintjies Jacobus William
Meintjies Schalk
Mey Christiaan Lodewyk
Meyer Jacob
Meyer Lukas
Meyer Jan
Meyer Theodorus
Mienie Carel Johannes Hendrik
Mienie Jan Willem
Mienie Frederik Christiaan
Mienie Willem
Moolman I
Muller Christiaan
Naude Francois Paulus
Naude Jacob
Naude Philip Jacobus
Neethling Hendrik Ludolf
Neethling Schalk Willie
Neethling Willem
Nel LJ
Nel Theunis Jacobus
Nel Willem Gabriel
Nortje Joachim
Oberholzer Jan Albert
Olivier O
Olivier (Lang) Gert
Oosthuizen JJ (sr)
Oosthuizen Jan
Oosthuizen Marthinus
Opperman C
Opperman D
Parker Edward
Pieterse Frederik
Pieterse Nicolaas
Pieterse HJ
Potgieter Cornelis
Potgieter Evert F
Potgieter Hendrik
Potgieter J
Potgieter Matthys
Potgieter Hendrik Theunis
Potgieter Theodorus
Pretorius AP
Pretorius B
Pretorius Dewald Johannes
Pretorius Gideon
Pretorius MW
Pretorius Nicolaas
Pretorius Piet
Pretorius P (P seun)
Pretorius Samuel
Pretorius WJ
Pretorius Willem H
Prinsloo Jochemis (H seun)
Prinsloo NJ
Prinsloo W
Raads D
Raads G
Raath Philip
Raath Pieter
Raath Roelof
Ranger Simon
Reineke Adam
Retief Jacobus
Roscher P
Robbertse I
Robbertse Jan
Robbertse Matthys
Roets Hendrik
Rood
Roos Cornelis J
Roos G
Roux Dirk
Rudolph Bernard
Rudolph Pieter
Scheepers Coenraad F
Scheepers Gert
Scheepers H
Scheepers Jacobus Johannes
Scheepers Marthinus
Scheepers M (G seun)
Scheepers Stephanus Johannes
Schoeman Gert
Schoeman Johannes
Schutte Jan Harm Thomas
Slabbert G
Smit C (C seun)
Smith F
Snyman Coenraad FW
Snyman JH
Steenkamp Hermanus
Steenkamp Jan Harm
Steenkamp Piet L
Steyn Johannes Christoffel
Steyn Hermanus
Steyn Pieter
Strydom DJ
Strydom Hendrik
Strydom J
Strydom Pieter Gerhardus
Swanepoel Willem
Swart Pieter Johannes
Uys Dirk C
Uys Jan
Uys JJ (jr)
Uys Piet
Van der Berg H
Van der Berg Isak
Van der Merwe Andries
Van der Merwe C
Van der Merwe Christiaan Pieter
Van der Merwe Frederik J
Van der Merwe Jan
Van der Merwe Josias
Van der Merwe Lukas J
Van der Merwe LP
Van der Merwe M
Van der Merwe Willem
Van der Schyff D
Van der Schyff JD
Van Deventer Jan
Van Dyk Joseph
Van Dyk Sybrand
Van Gass Ferdinand P
Van Gass JF
Van Jaarsveld A
Van Loggerenberg H
Van Niekerk Izak Andries
Van Niekerk JAP
Van Niekerk P
Van Rensburg Lucas
Van Rensburg Nicolaas M
Van Rooyen GF
Van Rooyen Gert Reinier
Van Rooyen GT
Van Rooyen I
Van Rooyen Lukas
Van Rooyen Stephanus
Van Schalkwyk Christiaan
Van Schalkwyk Gert
Van Staden Cornelis
Van Staden VC
Van Straten Jacob
Van Venen D
Van Vuren Janse Lukas Gerhardus
Van Vuuren P
Van Zyl Jacobus
Venter A
Venter PA
Venter WD
Vermaak CI
Vermaak J
Viljoen Christoffel
Viljoen Gideon
Viljoen Johan H
Viljoen M
Viljoen Sarel
Visagie Jan
Bloedrivier is slegs ‘n week voor Geloftedag (16 Desember 2007) geskryf en gekomponeer. Bloedrivier is vir die eerste keer gesing op 16 Desember 2007 op Bloedrivier. Bloedrivier word op DV 18 Januarie 2008 in ‘n ateljee opgeneem waarna hy in CD formaat beskikbaar sal wees.

Bloedrivier – die liedjie

Resource: http://www.bravoland.co.za/forum/index.php/topic,207.msg30967.html

In 1838 is God se hulp gevra om die boere in hul nood te steun, te behoed en te bewaar
‘n Monument sal hulle bou en die dag sal heilig bly,
Hul enigste wapen – hul geloof – met die Here aan hul sy …

Die nag was kul en donker, die impi’s staan en wag,
die lampies op die ossewaens soos Mahlozi’s in die nag
‘n Strandwolf sluip daar tussendeur, hy’s onheilspellend daar
Die mis sak toe, die vyand druis, hul wag op die bevel.

In die geslote walaer, in ‘n see van heidendom
is daar ‘n lig wat helder skyn – die lig van Christendom.
Die stemme van ‘n mannekoor weerklink deur digte mis
Psalm agt-en-dertig, stel almal weer gerus.

KOOR
Maar dieselfde God van Bloedrivier is steeds ons God vandag
Hy verstaan ons grootste vrese, Hy staan by ons deur die nag
Kom ons almal vat weer hande, erken sy grote Mag
Want dieselfde God van Bloedrivier is steeds met ons vandag

Twee skote van ‘n dubbel-loop, die stryd het pas begin
Die isilongo kondig aan Dingaan – ons sal oorwin
Maar God ons Vader is met ons, die vyand word verslaan
Die veld drink bloed, soos op Golgota – dit moet ons verstaan

KOOR
Maar dieselfde God van Bloedrivier is steeds ons God vandag
Hy verstaan ons grootste vrese, Hy staan by ons deur die nag
Kom ons almal vat weer hande, erken sy grote Mag
Want dieselfde God van Bloedrivier is steeds met ons vandag

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Corrie ten Boom

Cornelia Johanna Arnolda ten Boom, generally known as Corrie ten Boom, (April 15, 1892 – April 15, 1983) was a Dutch Christian Holocaust survivor who helped many Jews escape the Nazis during World War II. Ten Boom co-wrote her autobiography, The Hiding Place, which was later made into a movie of the same name. In December, 1967, Ten Boom was honored as one of the Righteous Among the Nations by the State of Israel.

Read more here ….

And… here to visit the Corrie ten Boom museum….

This is the book I’ve read and would like to read it again, as a chess player mentioned it to me, I’ve thought to read it again!

http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

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13 wives and 30 children?

Update 10th October 2008: Today is Paul Kruger day…well, it used to be…when “history” in South Africa was history…this entry here is my entry for 10th October 2007….

Update for 2009! …enjoy reading…

Paul Kruger was the President of South Africa during the British-South African War…also called…the Boer War. He was born on the 10th October and in the old South Africa, this day was always a public holiday. I was on a hiking trip in the Transkei. Read here about Mkambati and on this link about the trip in the Transkei ..and here more…about the Magwa Falls, the links will open in a new window.
Uncle Mauritz —a very friendly uncle Mauritz used to live in Lyttleton, Centurion (near Pretoria)…and he took us to the most beautiful and interesting places in the Transkei on a hiking trip…I was a student at the time… We spent a few days walking the Wild Coast-route from Port St Johns…to Port Edward….see the links….and he also took us to a black lady, she lived about 50m from the beach and she had a very interesting story which she shared with us. We were tired and thirsty when we reached her home and she had cool drink with ice ready for us. This lady…I can’t remember her name!, was the 13th wife of the attendant of Paul Kruger. Now, you would think that with 13 wives there would be zillions of children…nope! only about 30! that brings you with an average of 2-3 children per wife, which is really a small number of children, as African women tend to have about 5 children (or more). She showed us a bed in her house which was her husband’s with artifacts of Paul Kruger on it. Of course we all took photos of it! Paul Kruger’s photo was also on the bed and she told us how they admired him. Her husband was the last attendant of Paul Kruger. She told us…very interesting!! …that every year on the 10th of October…she and all the other wives, come together near Potgietersrus/Pietersburg to celebrate Paul Kruger’s day! I wonder if they are still alive and… how many of them… and if they still do it! That was really an amazing day out on our trip…I can still picture about 20 geese around her house…and the sound of the waves…

…Read on Wikipedia about Paul Kruger too… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Kruger

Youth: Paul Kruger (Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kruger) was born on October 10 1825 at his grandfather’s farm, Bulhoek in the Steynsburg district and grew up on the farm, Vaalbank. He wasn’t a well educated man and only had three months formal education. Growing up in a rugged farm area he learnt a lot about the wild. When the Great Trek started in 1836, Kruger’s father, Casper Kruger, joined the trek party of Hendrik Potgieter and the family moved to what later became known as Transvaal, to try an establish and independent state.

Settling in the Transvaal: Paul Kruger’s father decided to settle in an area now known as Rustenburg. At age 16, Paul Kruger was entitled to choose a farm for himself. He chose a farm at the base of the Magaliesberg mountains and settled there in 1841. In 1842 he married Maria du Plessis and the couple moved to the Eastern Transvaal. Paul Kruger and his small family later returned to Rustenburg and Kruger’s wife and infant son died soon after. It is presumed the double death is likely to have been caused by Malaria. Paul Kruger then married Gezina du Plessis, who bore seven daughters and nine sons and died in 1901. Many of Kruger’s children died in infancy.

Kruger emerges as leader: Later Paul Kruger’s strong leadership qualities started emerging. He eventually became Commandant-General of the then South African Republic , later known as Transvaal. His leadership skills became more prominent when he was appointed member of a commission of the Volksraad the Transvaal Republican Parliament who were tasked with drawing up a constitution. His leadership ability started to attract attention, and it is said that he later played a prominent role in ending the quarrel between the Transvaal leader, Stephanus Schoeman, and M W Pretorius.

Vice-President 1874: Paul Kruger resigned as Commandant-General, in 1873 and took no political office for a time. He retired to his farm, Boekenhoutfontein. His stint away from politics only lasted a year the next year he was elected to the Executive Council. Shortly after that he became Vice-President. Kruger’s life remained heavily centred around politics from 1877 till 1882. In this time Paul Kruger lead a resistance movement and became leader of a deputation. The first Anglo Boer war was 1880 and the British forces were defeated in a battle at Majuba in 1881. At this time Paul Kruger was instrumental in negotiations with the British, which later led to the restoration of Transvaal as an independent state under British rule.In 1882, the 57 year old Paul Kruger was elected president of Transvaal. He left for England in 1883 to revise the Pretoria Convention of 1881, an agreement which was reached between the Boers and the British that ended the first Anglo Boer War. Paul Kruger acquired many allies in Europe during this time. In Germany, he attended an imperial banquet at which he was presented to the Emperor, Wilhelm I, and spoke at length with the renowned Bismarck.

The Discovery of gold: The discovery of gold in the Transvaal, changed the political climate of the Witwatersrand. Many goldseekers from around the globe flocked to Africa. The Transvaal Republic regarded gold seekers as ‘uitlanders’ (foreigners).

Jameson raid: Kruger’s leadership was put to the test at the end of 1895, when the Jameson Raid took place. The Jameson Raid led by Doctor Starr Jameson. Jameson later became premier of the Cape of Good Hope Colony, or the Cape Colony as it is now called. In December, 1896 a group of This unsuccessful raid, started the breakdown of good relations between the British and the Boers and this breakdown of relations ultimately led to the second Anglo Boer War. Kruger was elected as president four times, his last re-election was in 1898.

The Anglo-Boer war: The second Anglo-Boer War, also known as the South African war, started on October 11, 1899. Paul Kruger attended the last session of the Volksraad and on 29 May, and fled from Pretoria as Lord Roberts advanced on the town. He remained underground for weeks and eventually, he took refuge with his European allies, while the war continued. In October 1900 he left from Lourenco Marques and Dutch Queen Wilhelmina sent the battleship, De Gelderland, to transport him. Gezina Kruger was very ill when the party left and could not accompany him. She died on 20 July 1901.

Kruger’s party landed in Marseilles. He travelled through Europe to Holland where he stayed for remainder of the war. His last respite was at Oranjelust in Utrecht and it was here that he received the news of the Treaty of Vereeniging had been signed. Paul Kruger moved to Clarens in Switzerland where he stayed for the last six months of his life and died on 14 July 1904. He was buried on 16 December 1904, in the Church Street cemetery, Pretoria.

Resource: http://www.krugerpark.co.za/Krugerpark_History-travel/paul-kruger-history.html

On the next link you can read about Paul Kruger and Queen Wilhelmina…unfortunately, it’s an Afrikaans link.

http://365spore.blogspot.com/2008/09/13-september-1900-koningin-wilhelmina.html
http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

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Huisgenoot 1916

The “Huisgenoot” magazine is certainly THE oldest family magazine in South Africa. These pics come from the magazines which I found on TUKKIES (University of Pretoria) website. I myself have got a few of these old Huisgenoot mags, but they are in bits! I’ve got a few complete pages and others are half pages and bits…and…pieces….I think my oldest one dated 1932.(all in SA packed away) In our family, I was always the one that liked the old history stuff and wanted to keep all kinds of precious, (well to me) historical “artifacts” safe. I hated History as a subject at school when I had to study and learn for exams, but love to read about it and visit historical places and museums. In my last two years of study, I had an optional “subject”, called Museum studies. We visited every Thursday a museum in the city….or near the city…we were only about 15 students…my History tutor was really an interesting man. He joined us on all those trips and could come up with the most amazing facts about Pretoria and you were like…”oh my….gosh…I didn’t know that! and I do live here!”…your jaws dropped every minute he was talking…anyway…those trips were just big fun…the Post Office museum…which is not in Pretoria anymore, but in Cape Town….was the biggest fun…we played like 10-year old kids with everything, about the only museum where we were allowed to touch everything…we made phone calls to one another with the old phones and sent messages with the morse code machine…that was great fun! We had to hand in a folder with information abut every visit and museum by the end….and….I still have mine! …I couldn’t throw away such precious articles and photos/post cards/information/leaflets/notes …etc.

On these adds you can still see a little bit of Dutch, as Dutch was the spoken language and Afrikaans was still very young and not the official language at the time. Afrikaans was a young, upcoming language at that time….

Old Huisgenoot to be found HERE on the University’s website. The link will open in a new window..

If you click on the images, you would get a larger image to view and read. You will only be able to read if you can read the Dutch language, as that was the language spoken. We have a saying in Afrikaans that says: “Die Kaap is weer Hollands”….”The Cape is Dutch again”….and that means…everything is again OK. When the English ruled the Cape, the Dutch didn’t like it…..so when the Cape was given back…they said…”The Cape is again…Dutch!”…and we’re still using that saying in any situation…to say…everything is OK!…if things had gone wrong….

In this article, 1916, Afrikaans was recognised in the Church! as a language…only in the Free State….one of the provinces of South Africa.

This is now the current “logo” of Huisgenoot….and also in its modern format.

This issue has got Nuweland on the cover, Nuweland is THE place to be for rugby in Cape Town…it is a 1962-issue…and inside there were lots of rugby photos, rugby was and still is, THE sport of the day in South Africa.

http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

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Boer War Art Poetry and History

Read this newspaper clip below – where an Englishman described how kind the Boers were and that everything that was said in England about the Boers, was not true.

From the Boer War Facebook page

From the Boer War Facebook page

Artist: Ron Wilson….

LW: This post gets updated every now and then – more then than now –  when I find more resources and information…new information and links will be added at the bottom of this post. Most links  will  open in a new window. When you see this  link icon – you will know there’s a link to follow up. I hope this helps. I apologise and know it must be very confusing. Please check the bottom of this page for most of the links – without this icon. This post was written 12 years ago! I hope that all links will still be active.

Boer War Diary

The following extracts from a diary, of the authenticity of which we have obtained sufficient assurance, illustrate one aspect of the process of “clearing” tracts of the country occupied by the enemy.

Amsterdam, New Scotland, February 14 1901. This morning, about eight o’clock, the cavalry of the enemy entered the town, the infantry following.

Every garden and tree was stripped of everything. All the livestock was taken. General Campbell arrived; he was very abrupt. He said they, the English, had come to give us food and protection.

Mother replied that we were quite satisfied with the food and protection our own people afforded us. Then he said we were to be ready to leave the following day at 10 a.m.

Feb. 15. Worse than ever. The Provost Marshal, Capt. Daniels entered the house and began searching. They took what they wanted – soap, candles, mealies & c. even to white sewing cotton. When mother came in, Capt. Daniels turned to her and said, ‘Those devils of Boers have been sniping at us again, and your two sons among them, I suppose. If I catch them, they will hang.’

Feb. 17. At dawn Capt. Ballantyne said we would be allowed a quarter of an hour to load, and only to take the most necessary things. Beds, clothing, mattresses, chairs, chests & c., odds and ends of all kinds were burnt. Foodstuffs were also taken. At 9 p.m. we out-spanned in a hard rain. It was pitiful to hear the children crying all night in the wet wagons for water and food.

March 5. Annie very sick. Must be the food, as we have only meat, and mealies (corn) when we can pick them.

March 6. Annie very ill all day. A driving misty rain. Oxen with lung sickness are made to pull until they fall down in the yoke to die.

April 19 [in captivity at Volksrust]. Message that Major Watt, Assistant District Commissioner, wanted to see [Mother] at once. Mother, Annie and Polly Coltzer went with the policeman. Major Watt was in a dreadful rage.

‘You are Mrs. Cameron?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘You are a most dangerous woman, you have been speaking against the British Government. You are an English woman.’ ‘All my sympathies are with the Boers.’ ‘Make a note of that. All the concessions we intended making you will be withdrawn. You will not be allowed to receive any parcels.’

April 25. We received the following: ‘I beg to inform you that you are to proceed to Maritzburg tomorrow by the 11p.m. train. A wagon shall convey your luggage to the station.’

B. R. Cameron, Prisoner of War, May 31 1901. Green Point, Pietermaritzburg, Natal.

Resource: 

https://www.theguardian.com/news/1901/sep/26/mainsection.fromthearchive

A history to be proud of – till 1992

Image: anglo-boer.co.za

“When is a war not a war?” — “When it is carried on by methods of barbarism in South Africa,” referring to those same camps and the policies that created them.

–see my link in this post: “Churchill makes me smile”– for more on this…see bottom of the page for the link.

Image: anglo-boer.co.za

Image: Tararualibrary…Wording on back:

“Boer war 1900 Troops parading prior to their departure.

Site: Cnr Millers Rd and Stanley St Paynes house on the right still there HBF garage on left hand corner”

Above image: HERE on the site of Tararualibrary. The link will open in a new window.

The British controlled government implemented Pass Laws in 1923 paved the way for further restrictions on non-Whites social and political freedoms when Afrikaner-led political parties gained control of the government in 1948 (the birth of Apartheid). This segregation along racial lines has further widened the gap between the White Afrikaans speakers and Coloured Afrikaans speakers…

Source:Diversity South Africa

Since the people were of white European descent, nobody was seriously punished for their part in the war….so…if they were black??

Read what ELN says on this link…

http://elliotlakenews.wordpress.com/2007/03/17/british-concentration-camps/
Source:
http://everything2.com/e2node/Concentration%2520Camps%252C%2520A%2520British%2520Idea

The Boer War (1899 – 1902)

The Boer War shaped the destiny of South Africa and, as Rudyard Kipling remarked, taught the mighty British Empire ‘no end of a lesson’.

It was said to be the last of the ‘gentleman’s wars’, a ‘white man’s war’ and it would be over by Christmas. It was none of these things. The Boer War was brutal, racially explosive and it took the greatest empire in the world nearly three years to beat a Boer army smaller than the population of Brighton.

The Boer War capitulated the world into the 20th Century, prefiguring the worst excesses of modern conflicts: the indiscriminate bombing of civilians, scorched earth, rape, concentration camps. It was a civil war dividing families, communities and races.

It was a bitter conflict between two small Boer nations fighting for their life and freedom and a great empire asserting what it saw as it’s legitimate authority.

Source: 
http://neilmulligan.com/JamesMulcrone.htm

I often get people who got directed here – via google – with the search engine term: Boer – well, I would like to suggest you go back to google, put in a search the following: ‘South African farmer[s]‘ – you might like what you’ll see. Good Luck.

THE BOER NATIONS (“boer” is the Dutch word for “farmer”)

Take a community of Dutchmen of the type of those who defended
themselves for fifty years against all the power of Spain at a time
when Spain was the greatest power in the world. Intermix with them a
strain of those inflexible French Huguenots who gave up home and
fortune and left their country for ever at the time of the revocation
of the Edict of Nantes. The product must obviously be one of the most
rugged, virile, unconquerable races ever seen upon earth. Take this
formidable people and train them for seven generations in constant
warfare against savage men and ferocious beasts, in circumstances
under which no weakling could survive, place them so that they acquire
exceptional skill with weapons and in horsemanship, give them a
country which is eminently suited to the tactics of the huntsman, the
marksman, and the rider. Then, finally, put a finer temper upon their
military qualities by a dour fatalistic Old Testament religion and an
ardent and consuming patriotism. Combine all these qualities and all
these impulses in one individual, and you have the modern Boer — the
most formidable antagonist who ever crossed the path of Imperial
Britain. Our military history has largely consisted in our conflicts
with France, but Napoleon and all his veterans have never treated us
so roughly as these hard-bitten farmers with their ancient theology
and their inconveniently modern rifles.
See link at the bottom of this page to continue reading…
Concentration Camps
In early March 1901 Lord Kitchener decided to break the stalemate that the extremely costly war had settled into. It was costing the British taxpayer 2,5 million pounds a month. He decided to sweep the country bare of everything that can give sustenance to the Boers i.e. cattle, sheep, horses, women and children.
This scorched earth policy led to the destruction of about 30000 Boer farmhouses and the partial and complete destruction of more than forty towns.. Thousands of women and children were removed from their homes by force.They had little or no time to remove valuables before the house was burnt down. They were then taken by ox-wagon or in open cattle trucks to the nearest camp.

Conditions in the camps were less than ideal. Tents were overcrowded. Reduced-scale army rations were provided. In fact there were two scales. Meat was not included in the rations issued to women and children whose menfolk were still fighting. There were little or no vegetables, no fresh milk for the babies and children, 3/4 lb of either mealie meal, rice or potatoes, 1 lb of meat twice weekly, I oz of coffee daily, sugar 2 oz daily, and salt 0,5 oz daily (this was for adults and children who had family members on commando).

In the camps – image – photosearch

hmmm….not very nice of them burning down people’s houses, hey… we all know war is war…but…to take away from women and children! That’s really not very humane!

Image: http://www.erroluys.com/BoerWarChildsStory.htm

Image: …soldiers on a koppie…(hill) war-art.com/lucknow.htm

Battle of Colenso…1899…Image:www.war-art.com/lucknow.htm
See more art here : http://www.war-art.com/lucknow.htm

On this next link, you can read extracts from the Parliamentary debates  that were going on during the War in the British Parliament…you will see the death numbers too – not sure if that is correct, you know what politics are like…they will of course hide the exact figures as we all know – anyway..children’s deaths are about 10 times more than adults and women were held as prisioners as they were not allowed to leave the camps if they wished too. I’m sure more of the deaths could be prevented if people were not held in the camps. To say they were “fed” is just an excuse! They knew it was the only way to force the Boers to surrender, as the Boers couldn’t let these women and children dying in the camps like sheep on their way to a butcher!

http://www-sul.stanford.edu/depts/ssrg/africa/hansxcv1.html

Concentration Camps
In early March 1901 Lord Kitchener decided to break the stalemate that the extremely costly war had settled into. It was costing the British taxpayer 2,5 million pounds a month. He decided to sweep the country bare of everything that can give sustenance to the Boers i.e. cattle, sheep, horses, women and children. Read more on the link I’ve given you. — What a shame for the Britain! Putting women and children in concentration camps to starve… that’s just as cruel as Hitler’s gass chambers! Killing people in this way when you know you can’t defeat them…. And what’s more… Britain has already got more experience in fighting and wars than the South Africans, a small upcoming nation…..Hierdie Engelse sal ook nooit “jammer” se oor wat hulle weet hulle gedoen het nie. Hierdie konsentrasiekampe was vir my net so erg soos die Duitsers met hulle gaskamers! Ek het ‘n boek gekoop by ‘n museum op Lady Smith and daarin lees ook toe die naam raak van ‘n niggie van my ouma wat in ‘n kamp was! As jy die link “great grandad” volg, sal jy verstaan waarom ek so ‘n passie vir die oorlog-geskiedenis het en gedurig weer terugkeer na iets wat daarmee te doen het. Ek sal graag meer kuns en gedigte wil kry om hierdie week te plaas, veral kuns en ek was nogal verbaas om hierdie een van Coetzer te kry. Ek het afgekom op ‘n baie oulike webbladsy van ‘n ou in die USA en ek gaan die link hier plaas, daar is verskillende
Sources: Enslin Vosloo painting…

 

Ladysmith Town hall image: tokencoins.com/book/boer.htm#zar04

“Duty called the Cordons to South Africa and the plains of the Transvaal to fight the Boers. The Boers were regarded as an easy enemy and naturally would be overcome quickly. Boers were self reliant farmers dressed in civilian khaki suitable for the vast veldt. Most of British Army still favoured red jackets, white pith helmets and Crimean War tactics. Whereas the Boers formed commando groups to move across country swiftly and stealthily living off the land. They were extremely good shots armed with the accurate Mauser rifle and a common cry was Victory through God and the Mauser.”…from the same site as the site where the image comes from…

On THIS LINK you can read more about the War…read these poems too….see more pictures…some very upsetting…the link will open in a new window.
C Louis Leipoldt (excerpt)
A poem written by Leipoldt in Afrikaans and it was translated…
You, who are the hope of our people;
You, who our people can barely spare;
You, who should grow up to become a man;
You, who must perform your duty, if you can;
You, who have no part in the war;
You, who should sing and jump for joy –
You must perish in a children’s camp
You must be eliminated for peace:
Fold your hands tight together,
Close your eyes and say amen!
Whooping-cough and consumption, without milk:
bitter for you is the fate of life!
There is your place, at the children’s graves –
Two in one coffin, a wedding couple!
Al you gain is that we will remember:
Our freedom more precious than woman or child!

~~~~~ also the next one…by Leipoldt
In the Concentration Camp
(Aliwal North, 1901) C Louis Leipoldt (excerpt)
You are cringing away from the gusts of the wind
The chill seeping through the hail-torn tent –
Your scanty shield against torturing torrents;
The June chill bursts over the banks of the Vaal –
And all you can hear are the coughs from your child, and the
ceaseless patter of rain on the canvas.
A candle stub, just an inch before death
faintly flickering in a bottle
(a sty offers more comfort and rest)
But here, at night every thought is
a round of torture and tears.
Here, the early-born child flounders
Here, the aged fades away
Here, all you can hear is wailing and sighs
Here, every second is a lifetime of dread;
Every minute leaves scars on your soul, sacrifice without end.
Forgive? Forget? Is it possible to forgive?
The sorrow, the despair demanded so much!
The branding iron painfully left its scar
on our nation, for ages to see, and the wound is too raw –
Too close to our heart and to deep in our souls –
“Patience, o patience, how much can you bear?”
~~~

Leipoldt also wrote heart-breaking verses on a soap box to the memory of children who could at least be buried in this luxury:

Image: http://appiusforum.net/hellkamp.html – where I refer to hellkamp at an image, it refers to this site (update 2019 – site link is dead – don’t bother to visit!)
They made you in England, little soap box
To serve as coffin for our children
They found little corpses for you, soap box
And I have witnessed you as coffin
 

Equally unforgettable is AG Visser’s description of an orphan in the concentration camp in his poem,
The Youngest Burgher:

The camp of women is ruled by silence and darkness
The misery kindly concealed by the night
Here and there a minute light is flickering
Where the Angel of Death is lingering.
In this place of woe and of broken hearts
A young boy’s muffled whimpers quiver through the night
Who can count all the tears, who can measure the grief
of an orphan alone in the world

Later on in the poem De Wet describes the struggle to the escaped child who wishes to join the commando:
Freedom demands from our ranks
Men of courage who taunt mortal danger.
But also in the camp, the mother, the nurturer
And the innocent child on her breast.
And the reward? Perhaps on the plains
A lonesome grave doused by no tears.
Sometime, perhaps, posterity might honour our heroes…
Boy, do you feel up to it? General, I do!

This Afrikaans poem is about a solder that was beheaded…by a bomb.

Die ruiter van Skimmelperdpan

Op die pad wat verdwyn in die Skimmelperdpan,
By ‘n draai in die mond van die kloof,
Het ‘n bom in die oorlog ‘n vlugtende man
Op ‘n perd soos ‘n swaardslag onthoof.

Aan die saalboom krampagtig die hande verstyf,
Met ‘n laaste stuiptrekkende krag,
En die bene geklem soos ‘n skroef om sy lyf,
Op die perd sit die grusame vrag.

Met sy neusgate wyd en die ore op sy nek,
Soos die wind yl verbysterd die dier,
Met die skuim in wit vlokke wat waai uit sy bek,
En gespan soos ‘n draad elke spier;

By die huisie verby waar ‘n vrou staan en kyk …
In die afkopding ken sy haar man …
Met ‘n onaardse geil val sy bleek soos ‘n lyk …
Perd en ruiter verdwyn in die Pan!

Wee die reisiger wat daar onwetend kom skuil
Waar bouvallig die huisie nog staan,
En vreesagtig by wyle ‘n nagdiertjie huil
By die newelige lig van die maan!

Want by middernag waai daar ‘n wind deur die kloof,
Waai en huil soos ‘n kindjie wat kerm,
En dan jaag daar ‘n perd met ‘n man sonder hoof …
Wie dit sien, roep verskrik: “Heer, ontferm!”

Want die vuurvonke spat waar die hoefslae dreun,
En dit vlam uit sy neus en sy oog;
Styf en stram sit die ruiter na vore geleun,
En die bloed uit sy nek spuit ‘n boog;

En dan eensklaps van uit die vervalle gebou
Kom ‘n vreeslike skrikbeeld gevaar,
Al die hare orent – ‘n waansinnige vrou
Met ‘n hande-wringend gebaar:

“Waarom rus jy nie, rus jy nie, Jan van der Meer?
Waarom jaag jy my elke nag op?
Sal daar nimmer ‘n einde kom … altyd maar weer
Die galop … die galop … die galop?!”

Die afgryslike klank – nog gehuil nog gelag –
En die perd met die romp van ‘n man …!
Dis geen plek vir ‘n Christenmens daar in die nag
Langs die pad na die Skimmelperdpan!

A.G. Visser
Uit: Die Purper Iris.

Slagveld – Majuba

So sing die jonges vol van vreugde,
maar ag, oom Gert se hart is seer
as hy straks diep en dieper peinsend
gaan langs die slagveld van weleer.

Dáár lê Majuba, donker kleurig,
sy sye een en al terras;
dis of die berg van alle eeue
vir wonderdaad geskape was.

Daar lê Laingsnek; dis of Gods hande
dit vir ‘n skanswerk uit wou bou.
En daar’s Ingogo’s kronkelbedding—
net om die vyand op te hou.

Daar’s nog die wonderlike hoeke,
net om die vyand vas te keer;
maar ag, oom Gert voel nou so anders,
sy hart is onverklaarbaar seer.

Hy sien nou oral groot kanonne,
hy weet nie of die ding sal gaan.
Die treine voer nou alle soorte
van wapens uit die hoofstad aan.

Daar is hom ook so baie mense,
en baie goed word aangevoer;
voorheen was daar so min maar nodig:
‘n ryperd, biltong en ‘n roer.

Dis nodig, ja, die tyd die vorder,
en daarom swyg hy maar en kyk.
Maar heel die Amajuba-wêreld,
alles wil hom so anders lyk.

Tog leef hy weer, die troue krygsman,
al trek hy nou maar same net:
‘n oorlogsperd die stamp en runnik
wanneer hy hoor die krygstrompet!

Uit Goue Gode…XV : Verse van Totius

C. Louis Leipoldt:
DIE KOPERKAPEL
Die koperkapel kom uit sy gat
En sluip die randjie rond:
“Dit het gereën; die veld is nat,
En nat is die rooi-geel grond.”
Die meerkat kom, en sy ogies blink,
En hy staan orent en wag.
En die stokou ystervark sê: “Ek dink
Die reën kom weer vannag.”
Maar die geitjie piep: “Dis glad nie reën!
Dis kollerig, swart en rooi:
Kom jy sulke reën in jou lewe teen –
So glad, so styf, so mooi?”
En die wyse steenuil waag sy woord:
“Dis bloed, dis mensebloed!
Dis die lewensbloed wat hierdie oord
Se bossie-wortels voed!”

Wittekind in die Konsentrasiekamp

(Aliwal Noord, 1901) O, pazienza, pazienza che tanto sostieni! Dante. Jou oê is nat met die trane van gister;
Jou siel is gemartel, deur smarte gepla;
Van vrede en pret was jy vroër ‘n verkwister;
En nou, wat bly oor van jou rykdomme? Ja,
‘n Spreekwoord tot steun–daar’s geen trooswoord beslister:
“Geduld, o geduld, wat so baie kan dra! Hier sit jy te koes teen die wind, wat daar suie
Yskoud deur die tentseil, geskeur deur die hael–
Jou enigste skuil in die nag teen die buie;
Die Junielug stort oor die stroom van die Vaal–
Jy hoor net die hoes van jou kind, en die luie
Gedrup van die reendruppeltjies oor die paal. ‘n Kers, nog maar anderhalf duim, voor hy sterwe,
Brand dof in ‘n bottel hier vlak naas jou bed.
(‘n Kafhuis gee makliker rus: op die gerwe
Daar lê ‘n mens sag, en sy slaap is gered!)
En hier in die nag laat jou drome jou swerwe
‘n Aaklige rondte met trane besmet. Hier struikel die kind, wat te vroeg was gebore;
Hier sterwe die oumens, te swak vir die stryd;
Hier kom ‘n gekerm en gekreun in jou ore;
Hier tel jy met angs elke tik van die tyd;
Want elke sekond van die smart laat sy spore
Gedruk op jou hart, deur ‘n offer gewyd. En deur elke skeur in die seil kan jy duister
Die wolke bespeur oor die hemel verbrei;
Geen ster skyn as gids; na geen stem kan jy luister–
(Eentonig die hoes van jou kind aan jou sy!)
Wat sag deur die wind in jou ore kom fluister:
“Geduld, o geduld, wat so baie kan ly! Vergewe? Vergeet? Is dit maklik vergewe?
Die smarte, die angs, het so baie gepla!
Die yster het gloeiend ‘n merk vir die eeue
Gebrand op ons volk, en die wond is te na,
Te na aan ons hart en te diep in ons lewe–
“Geduld, o geduld, wat so baie kan dra!” Uit: Oom Gert Vertel en Ander Gedigte,  C. Louis Leipoldt, Uitg. Mij. v/h. J. Dusseau & Co, Kaapstad 1921

Images..:south-africa-tours-and-travel.com

Read on THIS LINK about Jan Smuts. The link will open in a new window.

Image: mcelroy.ca/history/mcelroy/images/002-0251.jpg

Shaw, John Byam : The Boer War (1901)
 

The painting shows – well, what it obviously doesn’t show is the Boer War, or any individual episode from Britain’s Imperial war in South Africa, which had ended the year before this picture was painted. But the likely link between words and image isn’t hard to find. A lone woman stands by a stream at the bottom of a field or garden. She was the fiance or wife or sister of a man killed in the war. She’s lately heard the news, and gone off on her own. Or she’s been in mourning some time, but the place – this is where they used to walk, and never will again – calls out a sudden pang of memory and grief.

The Boer War is her back story, then, her motivation, the reason for her state of mind. It is the content of her invisible thought bubble. It is, in a sense, a perfectly straight descriptive title for this picture. For how do you show the Boer War except by depicting scenes from the war? And why shouldn’t those scenes include, not only battlefields and sieges, but also the scenes of bereavement and desolation that were the immediate consequence back home?

Read the complete article… HERE ….
This next poem was written by Totius and it’s about the Afrikaner nation/Afrikaans that was stepped upon/damaged by the English and his message in this poem for the Afrikaner nation/Afrikaans is: “you’re strong, you will get up again, you will be a strong nation again and you should forgive what was done to you. The scars will be there, but you should grow to be strong again.”… a very deep poem…
Vergewe en vergeet

Daar het ‘n doringboompie
vlak by die pad gestaan,
waar lange ossespanne
met sware vragte gaan.

En eendag kom daarlanges
‘n ossewa verby,
wat met sy sware wiele
dwars-oor die boompie ry.

“Jy het mos, doringstruikie,
my ander dag gekrap;
en daarom het my wiele
jou kroontjie platgetrap.”

Die ossewa verdwyn weer
agter ‘n heuweltop,
en langsaam buig die boompie
sy stammetjie weer op.

Sy skoonheid was geskonde;
sy bassies was geskeur;
op een plek was die stammetjie
so amper middeldeur.

Maar tog het daardie boompie
weer stadig reggekom,
want oor sy wonde druppel
die salf van eie gom.

Ook het die loop van jare
die wonde weggewis –
net een plek byl ‘n teken
wat onuitwisbaar is.
Die wonde word gesond weer
as jare kom en gaan,
maar daardie merk word groter
en groei maar aldeur aan.
Totius
The Concentration Camps

1. Introduction The concentration camps in which Britain killed 27,000 Boer women and children (24,000) during the Second War of Independence (1899 – 1902) today still have far-reaching effects on the existence of the Boerevolk. This holocaust once more enjoyed close scrutiny during the visit of the queen of England to South Africa, when ten organizations promoting the independence of the Boer Republics, presented her with a message, demanding that England redress the wrongs committed against the Boerevolk.

Women and children in the camps – image:hellkamp

2. Background The Second War of Independence was fought from 1899 to 1902 when England laid her hands on the mineral riches of the Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek (Transvaal) under the false pretence of protecting the rights of the foreigners who swarmed to the Transvaal gold fields. On the battlefield England failed to get the better of the Boers, and decided to stoop to a full-scale war against the Boer women and children, employing a holocaust to force the burghers to surrender. 3. Course of the holocaust 3.1. The war against women and children begins Under the command of Kitchener, Milner and Roberts, more than homesteads and farms belonging to Boer people were plundered and burned down. Animals belonging to the Boers were killed in the cruellest ways possible while the women, whose men were on the battlefield, had to watch helplessly.

Leaving sheep to rotten – image: hellkamp

The motive behind this action was the destruction of the farms in order to prevent the fighting burghers from obtaining food, and to demoralize the Boers by leaving their women and children homeless on the open veld.

Before the blast – images:hellkamp

The Blast

After the blast

Destroyed for king and country

 However, England misjudged the steel of the Boer people. Despite their desperate circumstances, the women and children managed to survive fairly well in the open and their men continued their fight against the invader.

Women and children on the run…away from the English

More severe measures had to be taken. The English hoarded the Boer women and children into open cattle trucks or drove them on foot to concentration camps.

3.2. False pretences

To the world England pretended to act very humanely by caring for the fighting Boers’ women and children in “refugee camps”. An English school textbook published in 1914 in Johannesburg, but printed in England, Historical Geography: South Africa, by JR Fisher, makes the following claim:

“During the later stages of the war, the relations, women and
children, of those Boers still in the field, were fed and cared
for at the expense of Great Britain, a method of procedure which,
though humane, postponed the end of the war, at the expense of
many valuable lives and much money.”
This statement is contradicted by various sources. The Cape Argus of 21 June 1900 clearly states that the destitution of these women and children was the result of the English’s plundering of farms: “Within 10 miles we (the English) burned not less than six farm homesteads. Between 30 and 40 homesteads were burned and totally destroyed between Bloemfontein and Boshoff. Many others were also burned down. With their houses destroyed, the women and children were left in the bitter South African winter in the open.” The British history text book says nothing about this.

 

 Awfully generous of the English to care for those whose houses they destroyed!

Breytenbach writes in Danie Theron: “The destruction was undertaken in a diabolic way and even Mrs Prinsloo, a 22 year old lady who gave birth to a baby only 24 hours ago in the house of Van Niekerk, was not spared. A group of rude tommies (British soldiers), amongst whom a so-called English doctor, forced their way into her room, and after making a pretence of examining her, they drove her out of the house. With the aid of her sister, she managed to don a few articles of clothing and left the house. Her mother brought a blanket to protect her against the cold. The soldiers robustly jerked the blanket out of her mother’s hands and after having looted whatever they wanted to, put the house to fire. Afterwards the old man was driven on foot to Kroonstad by mounted kakies (British soldiers), while his wife and daughter (Mrs Prinsloo) were left destitute on the scorched farm.”

England’s claim of caring for the Boer women reminds one of somebody who boasts to have saved the life of someone he himself has pushed into the water. However, there is one vital difference: The holocaust on the Boer women and children began in all earnest once they had been forced into the concentration camps under the “care” of the British!

Family at the beginning – newly arrived with tea and bread (Nasty English Propaganda)

Despite the English claims that the concentration camps were “voluntary refugee camps” the following questions must be asked:

– From whom did the refugees flee? Certainly not from their own husbands and sons!

– How can the fact that the “voluntary” women and children had to be dragged to the concentration camps by force be explained?

– Why should the “voluntary refugee camps” be enclosed by barbed wire fences and the inmates be overseen by armed wardens? Kimberley camp had a five meter high barbed wire fence and some camps even had two or three fences!

– Why would one of the camp commanders make the following statement quoted by Emily Hobhouse: “The wardens were under orders not to interfere with the inmates, unless they should try to escape.”? What kind of “voluntary refugee” would want to escape?

Perhaps the words of the Welsh William Redmond are closer to the truth: “The way in which these wretched, unfortunate and poor women and children are treated in South Africa is barbarous, outrageous, scandalous and disgraceful.”

3.3. Planning for death

The English claim of decent actions towards the Boer women and children are further contradicted by the location of the concentration camps. The military authorities, who often had to plan and erect camps for their soldiers, would certainly have been well aware of the essential requirements for such camps. Yet the concentration camps were established in the most unsuitable locations possible.

Boer-family in the camps

At Standerton the camp was erected on both banks of the Vaal River. It was on the Highveld, which ensured that it was extremely cold in winter and infested with mosquitoes in summer. The fact that Standerton had turf soil and a high rainfall, ensured that the camp was one big mud bath in summer, even inside the tents.

The same circumstances were experienced in camps such as Brandfort, Springfontein and Orange River. At Pretoria, the Irene Camp was located at the chilly southern side of the town, while the northern side had a much more favourable climate. Balmoral, Middelburg and other camps were also located on the south-eastern hangs of the hills to ensure that the inhabitants were exposed to the icy south easterly winds.

Merebank camp was located in a swamp where there was an abundance of various kinds of insects. Water oozed out of the ground, ensuring that everything was constantly wet and slimy.

By October 1900 there were already 58 883 people in concentration camps in Transvaal and 45 306 in the Free State.

The amenities in the camps were clearly planned to kill as many of the women and children as possible. They were accommodated in tattered reject tents which offered no protection against the elements.

Emily Hobhouse, the Cornish lady who campaigned for better conditions for the Boer women, wrote: “Throughout the night there was a downpour. Puddles of water were everywhere. They tried to get themselves and their possessions dry on the soaked ground.”

(Hobhouse: Brunt of the War, page 169.)

Dr Kendal Franks reports on the Irene Camp: “In one of the tents there were three families; parents and children, a total of 14 people and all were suffering from measles.”

In Springfontein camp, 19 to 20 people where crammed into one tent.

There were neither beds nor mattresses and nearly the whole camp population had to sleep on the bare ground, which was damp most of the time.

One person wrote the following plea for aid to the New York Herald: “In the name of small children who have to sleep in open tents without fire, with barely any clothes, I plea for help.”

According to a British journalist, WT Stead, the concentration camps were nothing more than a cruel torture machine. He writes: “Every one of these children who died as a result of the halving of their rations, thereby exerting pressure onto their family still on the battle-field, was purposefully murdered. The system of half rations stands exposed and stark and unshamefully as a cold-blooded deed of state policy employed with the purpose of ensuring the surrender of people whom we were not able to defeat on the battlefield.”
 

3.4. Let them die of hunger
The detainees received no fruit or vegetables; not even milk for the babies.

The meat and flour issued were crawling with maggots. Emily Hobhouse writes: “I have in my possession coffee and sugar which were described as follows by a London analyst: In the case of the first, 66% imitation, and in the case of the second, sweepings from a warehouse.”

In her book, Met die Boere in die Veld (With the Boers in the field), Sara Raal states that “there were poisonous sulphate of copper, grounded glass, fishhooks, and razor blades in the rations.” The evidence given on this fact is so overwhelming that it must be regarded as a historical fact.

3.5. No hygiene

The outbreak of disease and epidemics in the camps were further promoted by, inter alia, the lack of sanitary conveniences. Bloemfontein camp had only 13 toilets for more than 3 500 people. Aliwal North camp had one toilet for every 170 people.
A British physician, Dr Henry Becker, writes: “First, they chose an ill-suited site for the camp. Then they supplied so little water that the people could neither wash themselves nor their clothes. Furthermore, they made no provision for sufficient waste removal. And lastly, they did not provide enough toilets for the overpopulation they had crammed into the camps.”

 

A report on a Ladies’ Committee’s visit to Bloemfontein camp stated: “They saw how the women tried to wash clothes in small puddles of water and sometimes had to use the water more than once.”

3.6. Hospitals of homicide

Ill and healthy people were crammed together into unventilated areas conducive to the spreading of disease and epidemics. At first there were no medical amenities whatsoever in the camps.

Foodline

Later doctors were appointed, but too few. In Johannesburg there was one doctor for every 4 000 afflicted patients.

A report on the Irene camp states that, out of a population of 1325 detainees, 154 were ill and 20 had died during the previous week. Still this camp had only one doctor and no hospital.

In some camps matters were even worse. The large Bloemfontein camp did not have a single doctor; only one nurse who could not possibly cope with the conditions. During a visit to Norvalspont camp Emily Hobhouse could not even find a trained nurse.

The later appointment of medical personnel did not improve the conditions. They were appointed for their loyalty towards the British invasion; not for their medical capability. They maltreated the Boere.

Emily Hobhouse tells the story of the young Lizzie van Zyl who died in the Bloemfontein concentration camp: “She was a frail, weak little child in desperate need of good care. Yet, because her mother was one of the ‘undesirables’ due to the fact that her father neither surrendered nor betrayed his people, Lizzie was placed on the lowest rations and so perished with hunger that, after a month in the camp, she was transferred to the new small hospital. Here she was treated harshly. The English disposed doctor and his nurses did not understand her language and, as she could not speak English, labeled her an idiot although she was mentally fit and normal. One day she dejectedly started calling:
Mother! Mother! I want to go to my mother! One Mrs Botha walked over to her to console her. She was just telling the child that she would soon see her mother again, when she was brusquely interrupted by one of the nurses who told her not to interfere with the child as she was a nuisance.” Shortly afterwards, Lizzie van Zyl died.

Treu, a medical assistant in the Johannesburg concentration camp, stated that patients were bullied and even lashed with a strap.

Ill people who were taken to the camp hospitals were as good as dead. One woman declared: “We fear the hospitals more than death.”

The following two reports should give an idea of the inefficiency of the camp hospitals: “Often people suffering from a minor ailment were violently removed from the tents of protesting mothers or family members to be taken to hospital. After a few days they were more often than not carried to the grave.”

“Should a child leave the hospital alive, it was simply a miracle.”

(Both quotations from Stemme uit die Verlede – a collection of sworn statements by women who were detained in the concentration camps during the Second War of Independence.)

3.7. The highest sacrifice

In total 27 000 women and children made the highest sacrifice in the British hell camps during the struggle for the freedom of the Boerevolk.

Mrs Helen Harris, who paid a visit to the Potchefstroom concentration camp, stated: “Imagine a one year old baby who receives no milk; who has to drink water or coffee – there is no doubt that this is the cause of the poor health of the children.”

Should one take note of the fact that it were the English who killed the Boers’ cattle with bayonets, thereby depriving the children of their food sources, then the high fatality rate does not seem to be incidental.

Despite shocking fatality figures in the concentration camps, the English did nothing to improve the situation, and the English public remained deaf to the lamentations in the concentration camps as thousands of people, especially children, were carried to their graves.

The Welshman, Lloyd George, stated: “The fatality rate of our soldiers on the battlefields, who were exposed to all the risks of war, was 52 per thousand per year, while the fatalities of women and children in the camps were 450 per thousand per year. We have no right to put women and children into such a position.”

An Irishman, Dillon, said: “I can produce and endless succession of confirmations that the conditions in most of the camps are appalling and brutal. To my opinion the fatality rate is nothing less than cold-blooded murder.”

One European had the following comment on England’s conduct with the concentration camps: “Great Britain cannot win her battles without resorting to the despicable cowardice of the most loathsome cure on earth – the act of striking at a brave man’s heart through his wife’s honor and his child’s life.”

The barbarisms of the English is strongly evidenced by the way in which they unceremoniously threw the corpses of children in heaps on mule carts to be transported to the cemeteries. The mourning mothers had to follow on foot. Due to illness or fatigue many of them could not follow fast enough and had to miss the funerals of their children.

According to PF Bruwer, author of Vir Volk en Vryheid, all the facts point out that the concentration camps, also known as the hell camps, were a calculated and deliberate effort by England to commit a holocaust on the Boerevolk

4. Consequences

4.1. “Peace”

As a direct result of the concentration camps, the “Peace Treaty” of Vereeniging was signed, according to which the Boer Republics came under British rule.

4.2. Called up by the enemy

It is a bitter irony that during World War I England laid claim to the same boys who survived the concentration camps to fight against Germany, which was well-disposed towards the Boerevolk.

Thereby they had to lay their lives upon the line for the second time to the benefit of England.

Kroniek van die Kampkinders (Chronicle of the camp children) by HS van Blerk describes how, after World War I, this generation were, in addition, kept out of the labor force and how they were impoverished – all simply because they were Boers.

4.3. Immortalised in our literature

In this modern world it seems as if few people realize the hardships our forefathers had to endure in order to lose our freedom only without forfeiting the honor of our people.

Therefore, it is proper to look at the reflection of the concentration camps in our literature, where the nobility of our forefathers is immortalized.

4.4. We may not forget

In total there were 31 concentration camps. In most cases, the adjoining cemeteries are in still in existence and are visited as often as possible by Boer people to mentally condition themselves to continue their struggle towards freedom.

There were concentration camps at: Irene, Barberton, Volksrust, Belfast, Klerksdorp, Pietersburg, Potchefstroom, Vereeniging, Turffontein, Balmoral, Nylstroom, Standerton, Heilbron, Kimberley, Bloemfontein, Middelburg, Kroonstad, Heidelberg, Krugersdorp, Vryburg, Vredefort, Brandfort, Springfontein, Bethulie, Norvalspont, Port Elizabeth, Aliwal North, Merebank, Pinetown, Howick and Pietermaritzburg.

4.5. Pillars of support

Amidst all the misery brought upon our people by the English, there were pillars of support: firstly the certainty that our cause was just and fair and based upon faith. However, there also were people who made major sacrifices in an effort to ease the burden of Boer women and children.

No study of the concentration camps could possibly be complete without mention of the name of Emily Hobhouse. This Cornish lady was a symbol of light and decency for Boer women and children.

Emily Hobhouse did everything within her power to assist the women and children. As a result of her efforts to persuade the invaders towards an attitude of humanity and reason, she was banned from South Africa by the British authorities.

However, the Boerevolk remains grateful towards Emily Hobhouse for her efforts and her remains are resting in a place of honor under the Women’s Monument in Bloemfontein.

Other people who spoke out against the barbaric methods of England were: J Ellis (Irish), Lloyd George (Welsh), CP Scott (Scottish), William Redmond (Welsh) and Ramsey McDonald (Scottish).

5. Effects

Today, the numbers of the Boerevolk are at least 3 million less that it would have been, had the English not committed genocide on the Boerevolk. This robs our people of our right to self-determination in the new so-called democratic system. (In truth, democracy means government by the people and not government by the rabble as is presently the case in South Africa.”)
The holocaust, together with treason committed by Afrikaners (take note: not Boere) such as Jan Smuts and Louis Botha, forced the Boerevolk to sign the peace accord of Vereeniging which deprived our volk of its freedom.
The alien and inferior British culture was forced onto our people.
The various indigenous peoples of South Africa were insensitively bundled into one Union without giving a thought to their respective identities and right to self-determination.
As in the case of the Boerevolk, the local black nations were effectively robbed of their freedom, which gave rise to the establishment of the ANC in 1912 (two years after the foundation of the Union) to struggle for black nationalism.
The British system of apartheid, which they applied all over the world (for instance also in India, Australia and New-Zealand), had to be imported to control the mixed population. The first manifestation of this were signs reading “Europeans” and “Non-Europeans”. No Boer ever regarded himself as a “European”. Apartheid invoked racial friction and even racial hatred which has in no means abated to this very day, and the bitter irony is that the Boerevolk, who had not been in power since 1902 and who also suffered severely under apartheid in the sense that apartheid robbed them of their land and their work-ethics, are being blamed for apartheid today.
England’s pretence for the invasion was the rights of the foreign miners. Yet after the war, these very same miners were treated so badly by their English and Jewish bosses that they had to resort to general strikes in 1913 and 1922 (3 and 12 years after the establishment of the British ruled Union), during which many mine-workers were shot dead in the streets of Johannesburg by the British disposed Union government. So much for the rights of the foreign miners under English rule.
The efficient and equitable republican system of government of the Boer Republics was replaced with the unworkable Westminster system of government, which led to endless misery and conflict.
6. Summation

The concentration camps were a calculated and intentional holocaust committed on the Boerevolk by England with the aim of annihilating the Boerevolk and reeling in the Boer Republics.

Comparing the killing of Jews during World War 2, proportionately fewer Jews were killed than Boer women and children during the Second War of Independence.

Yet, after World War 2, England mercilessly insisted on a frantic retribution campaign against the whole German nation for the purported Jewish holocaust. To this day, Germany is being forced to pay annual compensation to the Jews, which means that Germans who were not even born at the time of World War 2, still have to suffer today for alleged atrocities committed by the Germans. Should England subject herself to the same principles applied to Germany, then England must do everything within her power to reinstitute the Boer republics and to pay annual compensation to the Boerevolk for the atrocities committed against the Boerevolk.

“Their only crime was that they stood between England and the gold of Transvaal.”

Sources

http://www.boer.co.za/boerwar/hellkamp.htm
Message of Vryheidsaksie Boererepublieke to the queen of England.
Mediadienste. –1995–P 1 – 7.
Suid-Afrikaanse en Algemene Geskiedenis vir Senior Matriek, (Tweede Uitgawe) by BG Lindeque. Juta —1948– Pp 235, 239, 240, 249 – 258, 268 – 272.
Juta se Nuwe Geskiedenisleesboeke vir primêre Skole, Standerd IV by Alice Jenner. Juta. (Date of publication unknown) Pp 41, 42, 49 – 54.
Russia and the Anglo-Boer War 1899 – 1902 by Elisaveta Kandyba- Foxcroft. CUM Roodepoort. –1981– P 254.
Vir Volk en Vryheid by PF Bruwer. Oranjewerkers Promosies. –1988– Pp 346, 348, 407, 411 – 413, 416 – 455.
Die Laaste Veldslag by Franz Conradie. Daan Retief Publishers. —1981—Pp 62, 77, 78, 83, 123 – 126, 129 – 132.
Historical Geography of South Africa. Special edition for Standard III of South African Schools edited by F Handel Thompson. Henry Frowde, Oxford University Press, Hodder & Stoughton, Warwick Square EC. –1914– Pp 160, 165, 167 – 168.
Gewapende Protes by PG Hendriks. Oranjewerkers Promosies. –1988–Pp 8, 11, 12, 21, 24, 27, 29, 30, 46, 53 – 62, 94, 95.
Kroniek van die Kampkinders by HS van Blerk. Oranjewerkers Promosies. –1989– Pp 35 – 38, 49, 65 – 67, 70, 74, 75, 152.
From Van Riebeeck to Vorster 1652 – 1974. An Introduction to the History of the Republic of South Africa by FA van Jaarsveld.Perskor.—1975—Pp 197, 199, 202 – 205, 209, 217 – 220, 253.
Vyftig Gedigte van C Louis Leipoldt, ‘n keur deur WEG Louw. Tafelberg Publishers. (First edition 1946–Pp 19 – 23.
Gedigte by AG Visser (third print). JL van Schaik. –1928– Pp 57 -61.
Family narrations as recounted since the Second War of Independence from generation to generation. (Author’s great-great-grandmother was detained and tortured in the concentration camp at Heilbron.)
Source …….. http://appiusforum.net/hellkamp.html [if the link doesn’t open on this link, type “hellkamp.html” in after the main url and you will find the actual link of the Source]

Recently a kind lady from Louisiana mailed me a copy of the “History of the Boers in South Africa,” written in 1887 by a Canadian missionary with no political axe to grind: namely George McCall Theal.

It contains a map showing the territories which were being farmed by the Boers: from the Olifants/Limpopo rivers in the north to below the Orange River in the South (Colesburg).

It shows the names of the towns they had started wihich carried names such as Lydenburg, ( Place of Suffering) Vryheid, ( Place of Freedom) Pietermaritzburg, (named after the famous Voortrekker leader) Pilippolis and Bethulie, (named after their beloved Bible) and Potchefstroom, Rustenburg, Winburg and Bloemfontein… as they Trekked, the Boers named the map of South Africa, and many of its vegetation and wildlife as well.

All these Boer names are now being wiped off the map of South Africa in one fell swoop by the ANC-regime — even though the Boers’ official history had ended in 1902, long before the elitist-Afrikaners who ran the secret Afrikaner Broederbond cabal had started apartheid in 1948.

Yet this is not the first time that the Boers are facing such an ethnic cleansing campaign by a nation which is hell-bent to remove their very rights to exist in South Africa – this is actually already the third time in Boer history.

The first time the British tried to eradicate them from the map of South Africa with their vicious war and their even more vicious concentration camps where many tens of thousands of Boer women, children and elderly starved to death within just a few months.

After this first genocide to target the Boer nation, their descendants still managed to cling to their identity for at least another generation – until …..

Read more HERE
Report of Emily Hobhouse…

Image: and source: http://www-sul.stanford.edu/depts/ssrg/africa/cotext.html#676

Drummer Hodge ~Thomas Hardy
They throw in Drummer Hodge, to rest
Uncoffined – just as found:
His landmark is a kopje-crest
That breaks the veldt around;
And foreign constellations west
Each night above his mound.

Young Hodge the Drummer never knew –
Fresh from his Wessex home –
The meaning of the broad Karoo,
The Bush, the dusty loam,
And why uprose to nightly view
Strange stars amid the gloam.

Yet portion of that unknown plain
Will Hodge forever be;
His homely Northern breast and brain
Grow to some Southern tree,
And strange-eyed constellation reign
His stars eternally.

Boer War and the movies…

Sean Mathias is directing Colossus, based on Ann Harries’ Manly Pursuits, a novel about the Boer War. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the film’s scored a pretty impressive cast, considering that its budget is a relatively small $15 million: Colin Firth, Rachel Weisz, Ian McKellen and Susan Sarandon are all on-board. Though it’s not yet been announced which roles the stars will play, the movie “tells of ailing arch-colonist Cecil Rhodes’ [probably McKellen] belief that he can only recover his health if he can hear the sound of English song birds outside his window in Cape Town.” Get this: Someone is sent from England with 500 freaking songbirds. When he gets there, he falls in love and decides he needs to stop the Boer War from happening. Ah, if only all men in love would immediately resolve to end wars — what a lovely world this would be.
Source:

http://www.cinematical.com/2006/05/21/cannes-casting-news-tenderness-colossus-woman-of-no-importanc/

Boer War
Boer Art
Boer HistoryBristish War
Boer and British War
Boere OorlogConcentration campsBoer Concentration campsBoers
South African Wars
South African history
South Africa
Poetry
Afrikaans Poetry
Afrikaans
Gedigte
AG Visser
General Louis Botha
Arthur Conan Doyle
Louis Leipoldt
John Shaw
Genl Smuts
boer-war-art-poetry-and-history

Please click HERE for the Gutenberg-files about the Boer Women during the War and then click on this file-number: files/20194/
Click HERE for a list of Africana books about the war, there’s a list of about 177…English as well as Afrikaans.

Available below is a 1901 recording of the Boer War sentimental favourite Goodbye Dolly Gray. An extract of the song’s lyrics are also provided.

The song was written by Will D. Cobb (lyrics) and Paul Barnes (music). Although it gained widespread fame during the Boer War it had earlier been sung in the U.S. during the U.S.-Spanish War of 1898. The song saw renewed airings with the onset of the First World War in 1914.

Listen to the song here:

Goodbye Dolly Gray

I have come to say goodbye, Dolly Gray,
It’s no use to ask me why, Dolly Gray,
There’s a murmur in the air, you can hear it everywhere,
It’s the time to do and dare, Dolly Gray.

So if you hear the sound of feet, Dolly Gray,
Sounding through the village street, Dolly Gray,
It’s the tramp of soldiers’ true in their uniforms so blue,
I must say goodbye to you, Dolly Gray.

Goodbye Dolly I must leave you, though it breaks my heart to go,
Something tells me I am needed at the front to fight the foe,
See – the boys in blue are marching and I can no longer stay,
Hark – I hear the bugle calling, goodbye Dolly Gray.

Source: http://www.firstworldwar.com/audio/goodbyedollygray.htm

Image and caption: nzhistory.net.nz/media/photo/boer-soldiers-posing
General Joubert’s unit of Boer soldiers and their African servant stop for lunch at Newcastle, Natal, less than a week after war was declared in 1899. Several of the soldiers are leaning against Dr Visser’s travelling medical wagon. Photographed by Robert Gell, 17 October 1899.

British tactics during the South African War included the burning of farmhouses and destruction of livestock so that they would not fall into the hands of Boer commandos. Here members of New Zealand’s Seventh Contingent pose with the carcasses of chickens and sheep.

Fashion could be important, even out on the veldt, as the garments of these Boer women suggest. Photographed by Rough Rider John McGrath

Drummer Hodge…poetry of the Anglo-Boer War.

Drummer Hodge: Poetry of the Boer War—van Wyk Smith, M.
Clarendon Press, Oxford  1978
ISBN: 0198120826  Source: elizabethsbookshop.com.au

These people were as near akin to us as any race which is not
our own. They were of the same Frisian stock which peopled our own
shores. In habit of mind, in religion, in respect for law, they
were as ourselves. Brave, too, they were, and hospitable, with
those sporting instincts which are dear to the Anglo-Celtic race.
There was no people in the world who had more qualities which we
might admire, and not the least of them was that love of
independence which it is our proudest boast that we have encouraged
in others as well as exercised ourselves.Source:

http://infomotions.com/etexts/gutenberg/dirs/etext02/gboer11.htm

Shaw, John Byam : The Boer War (1901)

Wednesday, 5 March 2008

The title of a painting,” said Marcel Duchamp, “is another colour on the artist’s palette.” He also talked of treating the title “like an invisible colour”. Duchamp’s remarks were part of his ongoing argument with the art of painting.
His point was that painting should not be understood as a purely visual or optical or (to use his favourite jibe), “retinal” art. That was the state to which Impressionism had reduced it. But painting should mobilise all its resources of meaning, among them the title. This verbal component shouldn’t be neutrally descriptive, nor be seen as something extraneous. It could be an integral effect, like another colour.  

Comparing titles to colours was, of course, provocative, because colour is often considered the least verbal, the most inarticulate and untranslatable factor in a painting. But Duchamp’s phrase is more than a tease. It suggests that the title should be liberated. It should be used, not as a caption that presides over the whole picture, but as one more ingredient in the mixture, an active element in the picture’s drama.

Titles were to be given free play. Duchamp’s own were often spectacularly lateral, puzzles and mini-poems in their own right. There was Tum’. There was The Bride Stripped Bare by her Bachelors, Even. And other 20thcentury artists, Dadaist, surreal, abstract, conceptual, took up the challenge, putting the oblique title through all its possible paces.

But the device itself was not the invention of modern art. In the 19th century, while Impressionism flourished in France, another kind of painting had sprung up in England, which would later be criticised, not as “retinal”, but on the contrary as “anecdotal”. In the works of the pre-Raphaelites and their contemporaries, the title of the picture was often made to do crucial extra business.

The Last of England, The First Cloud, The Awakening Conscience, Our English Coasts – these titles are vital ingredients. They introduce story, symbolism, state of mind and always something more or something other than what the picture shows. They make the viewer’s mind jump from the image to an idea behind or beyond the image. And sometimes the jump itself, the sense of distance between the title and the rest of the picture, is where the work’s real power lies.

John Byam Shaw’s The Boer War is far from being a great work. But it’s a work that understands the rich possibilities of the oblique title. The ways that its title performs in the viewer’s mind, both connecting and disconnecting to the image, makes it a kind of masterpiece.

The painting shows – well, what it obviously doesn’t show is the Boer War, or any individual episode from Britain’s Imperial war in South Africa, which had ended the year before this picture was painted. But the likely link between words and image isn’t hard to find. A lone woman stands by a stream at the bottom of a field or garden. She was the fiancée or wife or sister of a man killed in the war. She’s lately heard the news, and gone off on her own. Or she’s been in mourning some time, but the place – this is where they used to walk, and never will again – calls out a sudden pang of memory and grief.

The Boer War is her back story, then, her motivation, the reason for her state of mind. It is the content of her invisible thought bubble. It is, in a sense, a perfectly straight descriptive title for this picture. For how do you show the Boer War except by depicting scenes from the war? And why shouldn’t those scenes include, not only battlefields and sieges, but also the scenes of bereavement and desolation that were the immediate consequence back home?

So the title fits. But at the same time, clearly, we’re to feel a great rupture and estrangement between those words, The Boer War, and the scene before us. And this distance can stand for and stress the various other distances – geographic, experiential – that the work evokes.

There is the distance between peace and war. There is the distance between the green English countryside and the dusty South African veldt. There is the distance between the woman and the man who was absent far away and is now absolutely dead and gone. There is the distance between the woman, with her mind fixed on loss and death, and the burgeoning natural world around her – further emphasised by the way her figure slightly sticks out against the landscape like a piece of collage.

The classic pre-Raphaelite manner of Byam Shaw’s painting, with its manic eye for the proliferating detail of nature, contributes to this effect. You can see it as how the woman herself sees her surroundings. Shock and grief can cause the mind to become blankly transfixed by the minutiae of the physical world, seeking something clear and particular to hold on to – as the narrator in Tennyson’s poem “Maud” focuses on a tiny sea shell after his world has fallen in.

Or again: the way the title, The Boer War, fails to “mean” the picture is like the way those words might become a malignantly empty phrase in the woman’s mind, words she must continually reiterate to herself and to others – the Boer War, the Boer War, he was killed in the Boer War – but which call up nothing and have no purchase on her loss.

Reading things into it? Yes, exactly. That’s what this kind of picture, this word image-juxtaposition, invites you to do. Reading things in, letting scene and title interact in the mind, is the way it works. In more than one way, Byam Shaw’s painting about a remote Imperial war has a rather contemporary feeling.

THE ARTIST

John Byam Shaw (1872-1919) was the second wind and last gasp of true pre- Raphaelitism. By the end of the 19th century, the movement had moved away from the Ruskin-Millais ideals of intense observational realism and moral commitment. It had drifted towards an airy-fairy religiose symbolism. Byam Shaw recovered some of the old ground – just at the point when this kind of art was about to go completely out of fashion, even in Britain. His name is now too small to get into all but the very biggest artdictionaries. But it is preserved in the north London art school that he founded, The Byam Shaw, which exists to this day.
Source:

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art-and-architecture/great-works/shaw-john-byam–the-boer-war-1901-791899.html

The chair Pres Paul Kruger used on the cruiser..Ms Gelderland and his hat on the next image On this next link on my blog you can read something interesting. https://chessaleeinlondon.wordpress.com/2007/10/10/13-wives-and-30-children/

source:

http://www.rijksmuseum.nl/aria/aria_assets/NG-311?lang=en&context_space=aria_encyclopedia&context_id=00047459

“Boers”…During the Gold Rush…. Image: http://www.kruger2canyons.com/learningcentre/kruger_history_the_gold_rush.php

On this link you will find a list of battlefields near to the bottom of the post.

http://battlefields.kzn.org.za/battlefields/about/2.xml

Another link to visit… http://www.talana.co.za/index.html
Storming of Talana Hill ….F. C. Dickinson from a Sketch made on the spot
From: H. W. Wilson, With the Flag to Pretoria, 1902
Read about Talana Hill on this link:
http://www.pinetreeweb.com/conan-doyle-chapter-05.htm

 Read Cecil Grimshaw’s diary…on this link:..http://www.grimshaworigin.org/Webpages2/CecilGrimshaw.htm

18th August… I’ve added lately a lot of links and here’s another:

http://www.ourcivilisation.com/smartboard/shop/indexhi.htm
Add new info…6 Sept 2008

A Boer Girl’s Memories of the War

Hester Johanna Maria Uys

(Interviews with Errol Lincoln Uys,1970)Johanna, or Joey as she was later called, was born in July 1892. Her mother was killed in a train crash in 1896, and Joey and her sister went to live with an uncle and aunt in Bethulie, Orange Free State, Magiel and Lettie Roux. When the Second Anglo-Boer War broke out in October 1899, Magiel joined the Bethulie Commando.

In September 1900, as British troops rolled over the veld, Magiel and thirty commandos attempted to flee the Orange Free State for the Transvaal. Joey and her cousins, the child Magiel and Johann, were in the convoy when it was attacked and captured by the British “Tommies” near Springfontein in the Free State.

We trekked with fourteen wagons, seventy women and children, escorted by thirty Boer commandos. Three days after leaving Bethulie, the Tommies found us.

“O, God, ons is nou gevang!” – (“O, God, now we’re caught!”)

It was daylight. I hid under a wagon. Magiel and Johann lay on the wagon floor. They couldn’t understand what was happening. There was confusion. People screaming. Shouts. “Rooinek vark!” – (“Redneck pig!”)

Women were shooting and killing Tommies. Tant (aunt) Lettie was a crack-shot. She kept firing till she’d no more bullets.

Several Boers were killed. Then we ran out of ammunition. We surrendered with a white flag on a stick.

I still see the red faces of the Tommies. They wore khaki, brass buttons, and leggings. Their heavy boots thudded as they walked.

They gathered our men together and took their guns and horses.

Before they were led away, our commandant warned us to obey the Tommies or be shot.

My uncle said goodbye. We were all crying.

Magiel looked at me. “Never desert her,” he said to my aunt. “If you’ve one crust of bread, break it in half and give it to her.”

As Joey recounted the attack on the wagons to me, she sang a line of an old Boer War song: “Zij geniet die blouwe bergen op die skepe na Ceylon.” — “They enjoy the blue mountains on the ships to Ceylon.”

Magiel went as POW to Sri Lanka where five thousand Boer guerillas were interned during the war. The British shipped four times that number to other camps in India, St. Helena and Bermuda.

At the wagons, the Tommies searched the women and went through their belongings.

The soldiers weren’t cruel. They hadn’t tasted real war yet.

While they searched our stuff, my aunt sat on a trommeltjie filled with bottles of Lennon’s home remedies. The Tommy’s never looked inside the medicine chest.

Tant Lettie had hidden gold sovereigns under the bottles.

After they took our men away, they made us get back into the wagons. We trekked across the veld to a station. We stayed there all night, some lying down, others sitting up in the wagons. In the morning, they pushed us into boxcars.

I couldn’t see anything. There were vents on top and one of these slammed onto my aunt’s head. When the train moved off, the boxcar shook so much we fell against each other.

My mother’s reference to a boxcar is unusual. Most women and children were herded into fetid cattle trucks to be shunted across the Free State under a boiling sun or through frigid nights.

We realized we were going to Bloemfontein.

“You’ll get food, everything you need in the camp,” the Tommies said.

At Bloemfontein, we were placed in carts. We were taken three miles outside town and dumped down on the veld.

They put up bell-tents for us, one next to the other. Hundreds of round tents, far as the eye could see. We met one of Tant (aunt) Lettie’s sisters and stayed together for a while.

A woman in the tent next to us went into labor. Her baby was born that night. The child contracted some disease and died soon after.

We slept on the bare ground. No bedding, no pillows, only some blankets from the wagon. It rained heavily. In the beginning, we didn’t know we had to loosen the tent ropes and let the water run off. We got sopping wet. Tant Lettie and I went outside in the rain. We released the ropes and knocked in the pegs again. It was a quagmire. Exhausted, we lay down in the mud to sleep.

We lit a paraffin lamp in the tent at night. At nine o’clock, all lights had to be out. Women were kicked and beaten if they disobeyed the orders of the Tommies. We obeyed.

We were issued ration cards and stood in line for food. We got meat, sugar, mealie meal, condensed milk. The meat was chilled. Even after cooking, it had chunks of ice in it. We used a paraffin tin outside the tent for a stove, same as a ‘kaffir-koggel ,’ with holes in the sides and irons to hold pots. We collected firewood on a kopje next to the camp. Water was brought from a river by cart. Every morning we stood in line to fill our buckets. We were always short of water.
Tant Lettie, the two boys and Johanna were designated “Undesirables,” a term applied to Boers who don’t go voluntarily into captivity or had family members on commando. “Refugees” described displaced Boers who surrender, the “hands-uppers” and their dependants. The latter are rewarded with a few extra spoonfuls of sugar, condensed milk and the luxury of the occasional potato. In either case, rations are insufficient to stave off starvation and disease.

If we had grievances, we were taken in front of the camp commandant. Usually, we kept quiet. We didn’t want trouble with the Tommies.

During the day, the women visited each other. We walked around the camp. The sun burnt us black. Our shoes wore out. Our clothes were unironed and filthy. Afterwards we got blue soap to wash our things. The toilet was horrible. A big hole with plank seats and sacking around it, you climbed up on top of the planks. No newspaper, no rags.

The camp was lice-infested. I watched Tommies take their leggings off, unwinding them like strips of bandages. They used broken glass to scrape the lice from their legs. My aunt had to cut all my hair off.

There was a church but I don’t remember going to it or to a school begun in the camp. Tant Lettie read to us from the Bible.

Theft was rife. There were fights between women.

Prostitutes carried on with Tommies and Boers in the camp. Most of the men were elderly. One old man called De Wet was a bastard. He wanted to interfere with my aunt. She chased him out of the tent. Tommies also interfered with the women.

I remember a short man with a gray beard. I hated him.

My aunt became friendly with one of the Tommies. She stole someone else’s skirt and walked with him.

Thousands of newcomers arrived at Bloemfontein camp. Thousands became sick. The marquee hospital tents were always full. The doctors worked day and night.

We found pieces of blue stone vitriol in the sugar. Lots of people were poisoned.

People died like rats. Carts came down the rows of tents to pick up the dead. There were funerals every day.

In the eighteen months Johanna and her family were in Bloemfontein concentration camp, the population soared to six thousand three hundred and twenty two. Of this number, one thousand six hundred and ninety-five perished from want and sickness.

British propagandists alleged that Boer mothers were killing their children through their own stupidity and carelessness. When seven-year-old Lizzie van Zyl died of hunger at Bloemfontein, a report said her mother starved her.

Emily Hobhouse, an English activist, spent six months in South Africa from January to June 1901 visiting Bloemfontein and six other camps. She saw Lizzie van Zyl die on an airless April day.

“I used to see her in her bare tent lying on a tiny mattress which had been given her, trying to get air from the raised flap, gasping her life out in the heated tent. Her mother tended her. I got some friends in town to make a little muslin cap to keep the flies from her bare head. I was arranging to get a cart made to draw her into the air in the cooler hours but before wood could be procured, the cold nights came on and she died. I found nothing to show neglect on the mother’s part.”

Emily returned to England to campaign against “a gigantic and grievous blunder caused not by uncaring women but crass male ignorance, helplessness and muddling.” Her militancy brought the scorn of the British people who called her a rebel, a liar, an enemy of the nation, hysterical and worse.

No one hated Emily more than Lord Kitchener, whose troops burnt down 30,000 farm houses, torched a score of towns and interned 116,572 Boers, a quarter of the population.

“It is for their protection against the Kaffirs,” said the British War Secretary, oblivious to the fact that Africans were being armed and encouraged by the English to attack a mutual enemy. Also ignoring the fact that 115,000 “black Boers” were sent to their own concentration camps, loyal servants who saw twelve thousand of their number die.

Miss Hobhouse was banned from visiting the most terrible of all camps that had been established just outside Bethulie, a place name meaning “Chosen by God.” My mother considered it a blessing of the Almighty that they weren’t interned at Bethulie where twelve hundred died in one six-month period from pneumonia and measles and from hunger.

The concentration camps claimed the lives of 27,972 Boers. Of these, 22,074 were children like Lizzie van Zyl.

We guarded the gold sovereigns day and night. After lights out, we slept next to the box where Tant Lettie had hidden the coins.

Women could apply to the camp commandant for a pass to go into Bloemfontein. Tant Lettie went to buy extra food. This was all that kept us alive.

I think of the thousands who died in the camps. I thank God that we survived.

In summer 1902, as Kitchener’s cordon strangled Boer resistance, Tant Lettie got notice that she and the children were going to another camp.

My mother was too young at the time to know why they were moved, whether Tant Lettie’s Tommy friend pulled strings or what other reason was behind the transfer. They went from Bloemfontein to a camp at Kubusie River near Stutterheim in the Eastern Cape, nestled in the green hills of the Amatola Range, a world away from the horrors of the dumping ground at Bloemfontein.

This time, Johanna recalled making the two-hundred-and-fifty mile journey in a cattle truck. According to one report, some of the refugees were supplied with tents, which they ingeniously erected on the beds of railroad cars. Others were covered with tarpaulins like so much baggage.

“The former arrived more contented and less sullen. All were provided with hot water and cocoa en route.”

We were vaccinated on arrival at Kubusie. Our arms swelled up. Magiel and Johann became sick but after a while we were all OK.

We lived in a one-roomed house. A big room with a plank table, plank chairs and three plank beds with straw mattresses.

Our days at Kubusie were happier. Farmers in the district helped the Boers. The camp was small, nothing like Bloemfontein. I don’t recall anyone dying at Kubusie.

A Miss O’Brien taught school in the camp. I learnt English from her. After school, she invited me to her room. My dress was in rags. Miss O’Brien cut up her own clothes to make dresses for me. She taught me how to knit and gave me a ball of wool for a pair of socks.

Who was Miss O’Brien? Was she English or Irish as her name might suggest? Was she one of Emily Hobhouse’s angels of mercy? It matters not, just that she was there, sitting with a child pretty as a flower, teaching her to knit a pair of socks.

Today, the site of Kubusie Concentration Camp has been turned into a car park and the surface area graveled and curbed.

“The socks were yellow,” Johanna said a lifetime later. She never forgot Miss O’Brien’s kindness.

Joey…in the late 1920’s info on this link:

http://www.erroluys.com/BoerWarChildsStory.htm

Gallery of images on this link! some upsetting!

http://angloboer.com/gallery.htm

Update: October 2008…this poem is an Afrikaans poem about the concentration camps…very sad poem, maybe I should try and translate it sometime for English readers…

C. Louis Leipoldt (1880-1947)

In die konsentrasiekamp

Aliwal-Noord, 1901

O, pazienza, pazienza che tanto sostieni! – Dante

Jou oë is nat met die trane van gister;
Jou siel is gemartel, deur smarte gepla;
Van vrede en pret was jy vroeër ’n verkwister;
En nou, wat bly oor van jou rykdomme? Ja,
’n Spreekwoord tot steun – daar’s geen trooswoord beslister:
“Geduld, o geduld, wat so baie kan dra!”

Hier sit jy en koes teen die wind wat daar suie
Yskoud deur die tentseil, geskeur deur die hael –
Jou enigste skuil in die nag teen die buie;
Die Junie-lug stort oor die stroom van die Vaal –
Jy hoor net die hoes van jou kind, en die luie
Gedrup van die reëndruppeltjies oor die paal.

’n Kers, nog maar anderhalf duim voor hy sterwe,
Brand dof in ’n bottel hier vlak naas jou bed.
(’n Kafhuis gee makliker rus: op die gerwe
Daar lê ’n mens sag, en sy slaap is gered!) –
En hier in die nag laat jou drome jou swerwe
’n Aaklige rondte met trane besmet.

Hier struikel die kind wat te vroeg was gebore;
Hier sterwe die oumens te swak vir die stryd;
Hier kom ’n gekerm en gekreun in jou ore;
Hier tel jy met angs elke tik van die tyd;
Want elke sekond’ van die smart laat sy spore
Gedruk op jou hart, deur ’n offer gewyd.

En deur elke skeur in die seil kan jy duister
Die wolke bespeur oor die hemel verbrei;
Geen ster skyn as gids; na geen stem kan jy luister
(Eentonig die hoes van jou kind aan jou sy!)
Wat sag deur die wind in jou ore kom fluister:
“Geduld, o geduld, wat so baie kan ly!”

Vergewe? Vergeet? Is dit maklik vergewe?
Die smarte, die angs het so baie gepla!
Die yster het gloeiend ’n merk vir die eeue
Gebrand op ons volk; en dié wond is te ná –
Te ná aan ons hart, en te diep in ons lewe –
“Geduld, o geduld, wat so baie kan dra!”
–uit: Groot Verseboek, 2000

Die Oorwinnaars
By die kindergrafte uit die Konsentrasiekamp van Nylstroom

Oorwinnaars vir ons volk,
bly u vir al wat beste in ons is ‘n ewig’ tolk;
nooit weer sal vyandsvoet u stof so diep vertrap en smoor
dat ons u langer nie kan sien – en hoor.
Nie onse Helde, wat die magtig’ leër
op glansryk’ velde kon weerstaan en keer;
nie onse Seuns, wat aan die galg en teen die muur
die diepe liefde vir hul eie moes verduur;
nie onse Moeders, wat met bloeiend hart en seer,
in swart Getsemane die ware smart moes leer;
nie onse Generaals, vereer met krans en riddersnoer;
– was waardig vir ons volk die hoë stryd te voer
en te oorwin.
Nie ons, met vuile hand en hart ontrou was waardig
om die vaandel hoog te hou.
Maar u, o bleke spokies, in U kermend’, klagend’ wee,
staan voor ons ewiglik beskermend – uit die lang verlee.

Eugene Marais

Boer internees were separately held from black Africans. There were a total of 45 tented camps built for Boer internees and 64 for black Africans. Of the 28,000 Boer men captured as prisoners of war, 25,630 were sent overseas. The vast majority of Boers remaining in the local camps were women and children, but the camps established for black Africans held large numbers of men as well. A number of the black African internees were used as a paid labour force as they were not considered by the British to be hostile, although they had been forcibly removed from Boer areas. The majority of the black African internees however languished in the camps and suffered a high mortality rate.—so, “apartheid” by the British during the Boer/British war!

Source: HERE The link will open in a new window.

Please click on the image for a larger view

Danie Theron

Danie Theron: The man picked for the job was Danie Theron, who was a lawyer from Krugersdorp. Even before the outbreak of the war he had formed a bicycle corps of Scouts believing that the effectiveness of horse mounted men was being undermined because modern bicycle technology was not being utilized properly.

He made a submission to Transvaal President Paul Kruger and General Joubert requesting the formation of a bicycle corps by pointing out that a horse needs rest and food, whereas a bicycle needs only a pump and oil.

To support his belief in the superiority of the bicycle he had planned a race between a bicycle and a horse from Pretoria to the Crocodile River a distance of 75 km.

The man he picked to ride the bicycle against the horse was cycling champion JP Koos Jooste.

The Cape Argus of 21 June 1900 clearly states that the destitution of these women and children was the result of the English’s plundering of farms: “Within 10 miles we (the English) burned not less than six farm homesteads. Between 30 and 40 homesteads were burned and totally destroyed between Bloemfontein and Boshoff. Many others were also burned down. With their houses destroyed, the women and children were left in the bitter South African winter in the open.” The British history text book says nothing about this.

Read more on this blogentry on another site about the concentration camps on this link which will open in a new window.

 

Farmers’ houses burnt down.

Another farm house to be burnt down.

An old man sits in front of his house with a few saved belongings. On this next link you can order some books and I’ve found these three images on this link too. The link will open in a new window. The books are in English, but the site in Afrikaans, you can give me a big shout if you need any help with the site! If you click on the link “kontak ons”, on this site where you can order the books, – it means “contact us” – you will find an email address and contact details.

http://www.kraaluitgewers.co.za/boeke/algemeen.html

  Lord Alfred Milner – Rothschild front man, executor of the “Scorched Earth Policy” and concentration camps for Boer women and children in 1899-1902; and spokesman for the Royal Institute of International Affairs, which branched into such organizations as the CFR and the Trilateral. His spirit and his legacy lives on in the present genocide of the Boers.

Apartheid is properly the legacy of Britain –- which has been under the control of the Rothschilds and his London Elite for centuries, and which refused to give independence to the Black nations currently within present-day SA, as it did to the cannibal Basuto tribe (Lesotho), and to the Swazis (Swaziland), before forming the Union of South Africa in 1910 out of the two former Boer republics of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State; and her two SA colonies viz: …read more on this link, but be warned, a very upsetting image…on this link.
On the following link: Deirdre Fields – reports on the heroic Boer struggle for survival and self determination.

http://www.davidduke.com/?p=3375

Johanna Brandt

The Boer Republics had no organised force. In the event of war against natives or against some foreign Power, the burghers were called up from their farms, the husbands, fathers, sons of the nation, to fight for home and fatherland. This left the women and children unprotected on the farms, but not unprovided for, for it is an historical fact that the Boer women in time of war carried on their farming operations with greater vigour than during times of peace. Fruit trees were tended, fields were ploughed, and harvests brought in with redoubled energy, with the result that crops increased and live-stock multiplied.

Read on the Gutenberg-link more from the book written by Johanna Brandt.

The following update: 26/9/09 – from an Afrikaans blogger and her grandma who survived the Irene Concentration camp and she blogged today about things her grandma told her when she was little. I will translate for you in short.

Trisia says the following: Her grandad was put in jail and they were given food with worms in it. After the war he worked  for a sjieling per day to reconstruct/rebuild the burnt-down farms. Her grandma told her some gruesome stories and one is where the English took her little cat, swung it on its tail and smashed it against the wall. [POOR KITTY!] Also, they took her grandma’s dolls and burnt it with all their other stuff. [I can imagine their grusame smiles on their faces while doing it] Please find “Maankind”-s link (Trisia) if you want to read the entry on her blog – of course it is in Afrikaans only.

Oupa het graag vertel hoe hy as seun saam geveg het, en van sy hoed met die koeëlgaatjie in waar hy rakelings aan die dood ontkom het. Sy baadjie se moue het te kort geword gedurende die oorlog, en ek sien steeds die prentjie van die rankerige boerseun met die baadjie met driekwart moue in my kop. Hy het ook grusame verhale vertel van sy verblyf in die tronk as rebel, en van die wurms in die sop. Dan ook hoe hulle later na die oorlog op die paaie gewerk het teen ‘n “sieling” ‘n dag om hulle plase weer te kon opbou.
Ouma se stories was meer hartseer. Sy het die oorlog as dogtertjie beleef, wat gehuil het oor haar poppie, wat die Engelsman gegryp het en in die vuur geslinger het, en hoe hulle moes staan en kyk hoe hulle huis met alles daarin, in vlamme opgaan.
Wanneer ouma se oë sonder uitsondering vol trane geraak het, en haar stem gebewe het, is elke keer as sy vertel hoe die “Ingelsman haar katjie gegryp het en aan sy agterpootjies geswaai het, en sy koppie teen die muur papgeslaan het.

http://maankind.wordpress.com/2009/09/25/anglo-boereoorlog/#comment-41

new: 3/10/09

Woman also fought this war…image: Life.com

Article here: http://www.africancrisis.co.za/Article.php?ID=59477

Please click on the image for a clearer view

25th December 2009

A CHRISTMAS GHOST-STORY

South of the Line, inland from far Durban,
A mouldering soldier lies—your countryman.
Awry and doubled up are his gray bones,
And on the breeze his puzzled phantom moans
Nightly to clear Canopus: “I would know
By whom and when the All-Earth-gladdening Law
Of Peace, brought in by that Man Crucified,
Was ruled to be inept, and set aside?
And what of logic or of truth appears
In tacking ‘Anno Domini’ to the years?
Near twenty-hundred liveried thus have hied,
But tarries yet the Cause for which He died.”
Christmas-eve 1899. – Source:

marksrichardson.wordpress.com/2009/12/25/the-amusement-of-the-dead%e2%80%93%e2%80%93at-our-errors-or-at-our-wanting-to-live-on-xmas-day-1890-thomas-hardys-christmas-verse/

Update: A great entry to read:
Rothschild’s British Concentration Camps: Way Back When, It Was A Means To Usurp/Destroy The Gold/Silver Standard ~ Only Then To Be Replaced By Rothschild’s Keynesian Economics ‘Derivative Fiat Paper’

Online reading about the ‘Groot Trek’ – The Great Trek – in English

http://www.ourcivilisation.com/smartboard/shop/ransford/index.htm

Online reading: ‘Commando’
A Boer Journal Of The Boer War by Deneys Reitz (1929)

http://www.ourcivilisation.com/smartboard/shop/reitzd/commando/index.htm

Please click HERE to visit the Canadian site about the Boer War to read more. There is also a short movie and this link will open in a new window.

This is a link to a quick time movie : http://www.filmarchive.org.nz/archive_presents/boerwar/qt_BoerWar.html

http://www.filmarchive.org.nz/archive_presents/boerwar/firstpictureshow.html

Follow this link to read about the “stalemated” Boer/British War and you will find a link to the Canadian War museum. The link will open in a new window.

On my blog HERE  you can read about the Boer/British-War and Melrose House . The link will open in a new window. On this link you can also read about the role my great grandad played during the war.

A very good site about the Boer-war HERE …the link will open in a new window.

Please click HERE to read the complete online book of Arthur Conan Doyle about the Boer War…the link will open in a new window.

I’ve also started a new post on the Boer War as I’ve decided this post is now stuffed with too much info, I lost myself here and tried to find myself again…with Churchill on board of a train…[hehe] the following link is my new link and it will open in a new window.
https://chessaleeinlondon.wordpress.com/2009/12/29/churchill-makes-me-smile/
New link: 2 December 2009 – lots of photos about the concentration camps toohttp://www.allatsea.co.za/abw/index.htm

new: 26/9/09 – and 3/10/09 
Another link to read
http://elliotlakenews.wordpress.com/2007/03/17/british-concentration-camps/

‘How Botha Saved the Union in South Africa’
Click HERE to read…about Genl. Botha…the link will open in a new window.

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Spring!

The first day of Spring in South Africa!! And this is how I remember Pretoria!! The Jacaranda trees almost fully in bloom! When it’s October, I will just admire these pictures and picture it in my mind!

On this picture you can see the City Hall of Pretoria.

Telcom Tower in Groenkloof
The city also called the Jacaranda City.
This picture shows the view from the city from the Union Buildings, you can see the gardens of the Union Buildings. The “black” building is the Reserve Bank and the tallest building to the right of it is Absa-bank.

These last two pictures are from the Union Buildings, it was made of sandstone and was designed by Sir Herbert Baker and in November 1910 the cornerstone was laid.

Click here to see what the weatheris like in Pretoria.

http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

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Lydenburg Heads and home to the black leopard

 

Lydenburg Heads..about 310 km from Pretoria

Lydenburg Heads… image: metmuseum.org

Lydenburg is the town where I grew up since my 5th birthday….on the farm “Goedgedacht” about 15 km outside the town, near Pilgrim’s Rest. Follow this link to read about the Lydenburg Heads….

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/lyde/hd_lyde.htm

This group of seven fired earthenware heads is named after the site where they were discovered in the eastern Transvaal of South Africa. Radiocarbon dating of charcoal samples from the excavation site has established that the heads were buried there around 500 A.D., making them the oldest known African Iron Age artworks from below the equator.

The reconstructed heads are not identical, but do share a number of characteristics. Modeled strips of clay form the thinly opened oval eyes, slightly projecting mouths, noses, and ears, and raised bands decorating the faces, while the backs of the heads are adorned with incised linear patterns. The columnar necks are defined by large furrowed rings. Necks ringed with fat have been and continue to be viewed as a sign of prosperity by many African peoples. However, it is currently impossible to know whether the rings on the Lydenburg heads were intended to be read in this way due to the scant information available on the ancient culture that produced them.

Two of the largest heads could have been worn like helmet masks. They are differentiated from the smaller heads by the animal figures poised on their peaks and the small clay spheres that articulate what appears to be raised hairlines. The animals, once covered by a heavy slip, are now difficult to identify but have disk-shaped faces reminiscent of a lion’s mane.

The five smaller heads are similar to one another, with the exception of one that has an animal visage with a projecting snout. Too small to have been worn as helmets, these heads all have small holes on either side of their lowest neck rings that may have been used to attach them to something else.

For a variety of reasons it has been speculated that the heads were used in initiation rites, perhaps even worn. Specularite, a variety of hematite whose crystals glisten when rotated, was placed strategically on the masks in incisions and raised areas such as the eyebrows. This has been cited as a possible indication that the heads were used in public ceremonies, as they would have shimmered impressively when moved in the light. The holes in the five smaller heads and the helmet size of the two larger ones could also indicate that these earthenware heads were masks worn for various ceremonies. None of this can be known for certain, however, and the use and meaning of the heads remain a matter of conjecture. Nevertheless, it is clear from the deliberate manner in which the heads were buried that whatever significance they may have held, they were respected enough to be interred with care.
Resource: metmuseum.org

This tunnel is in the Eastern part of the country….on the road from Lydenburg to Tzaneen… awesome views in this area! Read more about Advocate J G Strijdom, one of the Prime Ministers of South Africa:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johannes_Gerhardus_Strijdom

If you follow this link….http://www.griquas.com/2006/6.htm you will find fantastic pictures of places in South Africa, historical sites…very interesting!

Click for larger view

The first school in Lydenburg— built in the 1850’s!

The Dutch Reformed Church, built in 1890

 

The town of Lydenburg (55 km from Sabie) have a rich history associated with the Voortrekkers and the Anglo-Boer War. The name “Lydenburg” means Place of Suffering and the town was so named after the many deaths of Voortrekkers at Ohrighstad due to malaria. In 1856 De Republiek Lijdenburg in Zuid Afrika was formed with Lydenburg as the capital. A year later this independent republic merged with the republic of Utrecht (in KwaZulu-Natal) and in 1860 became part of the Zuid–Afrikaansche Republiek once again.
 

The first church in Lydenburg was completed in 1853. It is the oldest church outside of the Cape Province that survived the wars of the country. Near the church is the original Voortrekker school. It was built in 1851 and was also used as a church building before the church was completed. The Dutch Reformed church was built in 1890 and features a superb pulpit (made from kiaat wood) which is an exact replica of the Stellenbosch Church pulpit.

Lydenburg and areas around is the home of the black leopard!

Love mountain biking/hikes/birdwatching …..and other outdoor sports….read here…

http://www.sabie.co.za/about/mountainbiking/index.html

http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

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Great Granddad

Schalk Willem Burger – image: Wikimedia [my great granddad]

To Dan [chess-player friend!], As I promised you earlier on my blog…more about my great grandfather…. When he signed the Peace Treaty of Vereeniging in 1902, he said, “Hier staan ons by die graf van die twee republieke.” – Translated in English: ‘Here we stand at the grave of the two republics.’

The “Acting President” of the Transvaal, was born at Lydenburg in the year in which the Sand River Convention was signed, 1852.  His grandfather, one of the original Voortrekkers, had the distinction of having the price of £300 set on his head by the British Government, in consequence of his share in a Natal rebellion.  His grandson was more of a politician than a soldier.

I Just loooooove this! My great granddad’s grandpa had a price tag on his head…hahaha..the most wanted by the British…[hehehe!]

Source – please clickand the link will open in a new window.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schalk_Willem_Burger
6th President of the South African Republic (Acting)
In office
1900 – 1902
Preceded by Paul Kruger, (1900)
Succeeded by British Empire (until Unionization in 31 May 1910)

Born 6 September 1852 (1852-09-06)
Lydenburg, Transvaal
Died 5 December 1918 (1918-12-06) (aged 66)
Goedgedacht, Krugerspos
Spouse(s) Alida C De Villiers
Religion Dutch Reformed Church

Schalk Willem Burger (6 September 1852 – 5 December 1918) was a South African military leader, lawyer, and statesman, and was the sixth and last President of the South African Republic from 1900 to 1902 (acting).
Military Service.
He served in a number of military conflicts such as the Sekhukhune Wars of 1876, and later during the First Boer War of 1881, he served as Acting Field Cornet.

He was elected as Commandant of the Lydenburg Commando in 1885. When the Second Boer War started, he served as Commandant-General in a number of military conflicts, including the Battle of Spion Kop and Battle of Modder River on 30 October 1899.

Political Career
As a politician, he was described as “enlightened and shrewd” and it was reported that he rivaled Paul Kruger in his influence over his countrymen.

After the Battle of Spion Kop, due to illness, he withdrew from the fighting and pursued his political career once more. He was elected to the Volksraad (House of Assembly) in 1887, later serving as Chairman.

He served as Vice President under President Paul Kruger and later succeeded Kruger as State President, after Kruger had left for Europe.[3]

During the “Krigsraad” (military council / tribunal) in May 1901, he advocated a cessation of hostilities, but his proposal was strongly opposed by President Marthinus Theunis Steyn of the Orange Free State. Burger remained president until the Treaty of Vereeniging on 31 May 1902.

He died in 1918 at Goedgedacht, Krugerspos.

My great grandad – far right – with his brothers.

Photo: Burgerfamilie.com
 

OUPA WILHELM VAN DEN BERGH OP KOMMANDO
SAAM MET GENERAAL C.R. DE WET – COLENSO

Ds. Kestell wie ook op kommando was het die slag van Colenso ook meegemaak en skryf daaroor “Dit was ‘n verskriklike dag – ‘n dag wat niemand wat dit deurleef het ooit kan vergeet nie. Dit was onuithoudelik warm en ons – maar veral die arme gewondes – het onbeskryflik gely weens die dors. Om vyfuur die middag het enkele groot druppels teen die rotse gespat. Dit blits en dit donder. Dit raas teen die gebulder van die kanonne. Dit reën naderhand so hard dat die bloed van die gewondes afgewas word. Nou juis verdubbel die vyand sy pogings en veg nog harder as ooit in die dag. Maar hulle kan ons nie verdryf nie. Toe die reën so hard val op ons, kan ons ons dors les. Ons het dammetjies in ons reënjasse gemaak, die water daarin opgevang, en dit dan uitgesuig. Ook het waterstrome van die swaar reën deur die klippe geskiet en ons kon tot versadiging drink”.

Die groot geveg by Colenso, waar die burgers so ‘n skitterende oorwinning behaal het, het op 15 Desember 1899 plaasgevind. Oupa Wilhelm het self nie baie vertel oor hulle deelname nie, maar wat hy baie duidelik onthou en van vertel het was die gebeurtenis dat hulle op 16 Desember 1899 ‘n plegtige viering van Dingaansdag gehou het op die slagveld van Colenso. Die naam Dingaansdag was altyd in algemene gebruik, tot enkele jare gelede voordat die naam verander was na Geloftedag, en nou het dit geheel en al verdwyn en het geen naam meer nie.

Die dag is plegtig in ere gehou op die slagveld van Colenso vanwaar Doringkop sigbaar was. Die Voortrekkers het byna 62 jaar vroeër op 17 Februarie 1838 gevlug uit die Moordspruit ramp na Piet Petief se laer op Doringkop.

Generaal Schalk Burger het op ‘n kanonwa gestaan en die burgers roerend toegespreek. Aan die einde van die plegtigheid het hy die Voortrekker Gelofte herhaal:

 

Hier staan ons voor die Heilige God van Hemel en Aarde om ‘n Gelofte aan Hom te doen, dat, as Hy ons sal beskerm en ons vyand in ons hand sal gee, ons die dag en datum elke jaar as ‘n dankdag soos ‘n Sabbat sal deurbring, en dat ons ‘n huis tot Sy eer sal oprig waar dit hom behaag, en dat ons ook aan ons kinders sal sê dat hulle met ons daarin moet deel tot nagedagtenis ook vir die opkomende geslagte. Want die eer van Sy naam sal verheerlik word deur die roem en die eer van die oorwinning aan Hom te gee.

http://rapidttp.co.za/milhist/diaries/oumaab3.html

On this image you can see  Melrose House…and on this link here:
Melrose House….you can visit  the Melrose House-site.
The Peace Treaty of Vereniging  was signed in Melrose House…my great grandad signed it as Acting President of the ZAR. (The Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek)…read on this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_African_Republic more about the ZAR.

 Paul Kruger, the President of the time, was in Switzerland and he fell ill there too. There is also a Kruger Museum in Switserland. He died there, but was burried in South Africa in the Heroes Acre in Pretoria.

Read on this blog-post on my blog more about the Boer War

https://chessaleeinlondon.wordpress.com/2007/09/23/boer-war-art-poetry-and-history/

My great granddad – Schalk Willem Burger. He is buried in the family graveyard on the family  farm – “Goedgedacht”, Krugerspos, near Lydenburg/Pilgrims Rest. I was lucky to grow up on the family farm! Pilgrims Rest is the historical town near the Kruger National Park in the Mpumalanga Province, previously – Eastern Transvaal.

On this map: The farm “Goedgedacht”…Krugerspos…near Lydenburg.

On this picture, you can clearly identify Paul Kruger third from the left. He was talking to some Americans, I think they wanted to join the South Africans fighting against the British. haha…I think they loved our country….for the gold …of course!

And on this picture: you can see some South African farmers…”Boers”…”Boer” is the Dutch word for “farmer”…also the word for the Dutch Settlers.

My view of the War…I think it was a horrible and ghastly act to put the women and children in concentration camps when the British knew they couldn’t defeat the South Africans [Boer]. Yes, and they had the Australians and the Canadians to fight alongside with them. The South Africans, not having any experience of wars before and a commando as big as the population as Brighton, a coastal city of England, bravely stood up and fought this war for more than two years! They only surrendered because of the suffering of the women and children in the camps. Women and children died on a daily basis due to hunger, lack of clean running water and sanitary conditions.  Like the gas chambers of Hitler -just in another version. Farms were burnt down to the ground, even the family farm house where I grew up. It shows how inhumane a nation can get due to greed. They knew they couldn’t defeat us and so they used this very inhumane method to win a battle. I myself see that as  cowardly. If you’re a loser, admit it..surrender and move on! But, they wanted the gold..that mattered to them- not humans and their lives! If wasn’t it for Emily Hobhouse to investigate –  and believe me, the English/British don’t like you talking about Emily Hobhouse  because that’s a soft spot.

During the Boer/British war, the South Africans showed how they could stand together as a nation…”Unity is strength!” 
This LINK HERE has got fantastic pictures from the Battlefields and the museum at Ladysmith….worth visiting!

See more links/backtracks to other entries on my blog – follow links in the comments boxes.

Read about the 2 Boer/British wars..

Wiki Boer war.
Read here on the Gutenberg-link more about the Boer War.
On THIS LINK you can read about the concentration camps.
Link to the Australians who took part…

Australians who took part here.

and New Zealand in the War…!

New Zealand anotherinteresting link.
Follow THIS link to read about the war and the different battles.

The South AfricanWar Virtual library.

BBC Radio retrospective on the Anglo-Boer war, 1899-1902

By Brian Smith
29 September 1999

This October marks 100 years since the outbreak of the second South African War, better known as the Boer War. Over the next three years the centenary will be celebrated in South Africa with a variety of anniversaries and memorials. A number of books are planned for release and a spate of broadcasts will mark the occasion.

One such programme was aired on BBC Radio 4 during two weeks in mid-September. Entitled The Boer War, it was narrated by the historian Denis Judd, author of Empire: The British Imperial Experience, from 1765 to the Present, and sought to examine new perspectives on the war. The first part looked at the claim that it was merely a “white man’s war”, whilst the second considered the use of concentration camps by the British, and the claim that they had a deliberate policy of genocide toward the Boers.

The programme made use of aural archives and interviewed a number of leading historians. It also employed actors to speak the words of historical accounts of the day, and in one instance interviewed a 109 year-old woman who remembers the war as a nine-year-old girl. It made for an absorbing programme.

Part One opened with a visit to Mafeking, ancestral home of the Tswana-speaking Baralong people, and scene of the most famous siege of the Boer War. The Baralong feel affronted at the events of 100 years ago. They are considering suing the British government for compensation over the help they gave the British during the war, which was denied by Colonel Robert Baden-Powell, the commanding officer at Mafeking.

Professor Shula Marks, of the London School of Oriental & African Studies, believes that “Imperial historiography took for granted that it was a white man’s war, and simply didn’t see blacks as participants in the war, or indeed as active agents in history at all.” Since the end of apartheid in South Africa this is being reconsidered, and many, including white conservatives, can see the need for rewriting black people back into history.

The programme considered the discovery of gold in 1886 in the Transvaal, one of the republics controlled by the Afrikaners, as the key reason for the outbreak of war. For Britain, “the temptation to intervene was too great”. Britain then justified its wish to intercede by the apparent need to protect the Uitlanders (from the Dutch for ‘foreigners’—British and other Europeans who flooded into the Transvaal following the discovery of gold). This view of the causes of the war is a little simplistic.

It is true that gold was a factor. Indeed it was widely believed at the time, and for half a century later, that the mine owners had manipulated the British government into provoking the war. However, government papers released during the 1960s make it clear that the British government manipulated the mine owners as much as the reverse. The mines would have remained in private ownership and the gold would have been traded on the London bullion market whichever government controlled the Transvaal. It was not gold, therefore, which primarily motivated the British government to go to war.

The late nineteenth century was the time when the European powers were dividing Africa up amongst themselves, in what became known as “the scramble for Africa”. South Africa, with its location at the tip of the continent, is a strategic location, with all shipping trade to the east passing by. Britain’s control of the Cape colony and Natal gave it control of the whole southern coastline and these colonies were not under threat. In 1884, Germany had gained control of South West Africa (Namibia), immediately north-west of the Cape Colony. Portugal had controlled Mozambique (immediately to the north-east of Natal) for some time. Britain’s strategic interests lay, therefore, in a push northward up between the two.

Britain feared an independent Afrikaner state, especially one that was wealthy. This was not because it felt its current colonial possessions were under threat, but because its future possessions might be. In particular, Britain was anxious to make sure that such a state would not have access to the sea and thus the ability to operate completely outside of British influence. Britain had consequently annexed Zululand and Tongaland (in 1887 and 1895 respectively) stopping Boer advances toward the Indian Ocean and thereby isolating the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. The military intervention into the Transvaal represented the logical conclusion to the previous 30 years’ policies of the British government, in which it had also annexed Basutoland and southern Bechuanaland and had made inroads into Rhodesia.

The isolation of the Transvaal was complete. Germany and the United States, who might have been seen as allies of the Afrikaners, actually supported Britain’s aims as they stood to gain from the opening up of the Transvaal. The US compared the Afrikaners to the slave owners of the pre-war southern States. Republican sympathisers from the US and Europe did support and aid the Afrikaners, but the world powers in general supported Britain and thought it natural that the greatest power in the world should go to war to support its strategic interests.

Professor Bernard Mbenga of the University of the North West in Mafeking sees three main reasons why the Boer war was thought of as a white man’s war. Firstly, both sides considered it distasteful, morally indecent and outrageous to use blacks in a war between whites. Secondly, the British were confident of an early victory. Lastly, both sides thought it dangerous to arm blacks on a large scale, as it might lead to a rebellion against white control later.

Finding themselves under unexpected pressure from the Boers, the British did, however, arm black Africans. Jan Smuts, a leading Afrikaner intellectual, wrote to a British newspaper declaring that it was horrendous for Britain to have armed blacks. It was, he argued, far worse than the use of concentration camps or the deaths of women and children, because it would hang over the future.

General Piet Cronje, in a letter to Colonel Baden-Powell, was of the same opinion: “It is understood that you have armed Bastards, Fingos and Baralongs against us—in this you have committed an enormous act of wickedness … reconsider the matter even if it cost you the loss of Mafeking … disarm your blacks and thereby act the part of a white man in a white man’s war.”

The British, with antiquated battle strategies, were totally unprepared for the war, in a terrain they did not understand and fighting an enemy they could not see. This incompetence led to the deaths of some 22,000 British soldiers—13,000 died from disease—and forced a reappraisal of the role of black Africans in the fighting. Somewhere between 10,000 and 30,000 were armed and participated in the war, although Baden-Powell denied it. They took part in a variety of offensive military operations, including on Boer farms and going behind enemy lines to steal cattle, etc. Black involvement was widespread—many participating for their own reasons, not least the chance to settle old scores.

There was a strong belief amongst blacks that Britain represented a more liberal order, and that they would reward loyalty after the war. The renowned black diarist at the siege of Mafeking, Solomon T. Plaatje, who went on to become one of the founders of the African National Congress, believed that Britain represented a future that was fair and free. Britain betrayed this trust and went against their own pronouncements of 1901, in which they considered that it would be “shameful” to exclude blacks from the franchise. They compromised with the Afrikaners at the peace treaty of Vereeniging by excluding Africans from any political rights. This was later compounded in the creation of the Union of South Africa in 1910, which enshrined white supremacy in its constitution . The question of “native franchise” was to be left until there was “responsible government”. In the event, it took until the end of apartheid in 1994.

The second part of the programme described a meeting between Neville Chamberlain and Hermann Goering, in which Chamberlain complained about Germany’s use of concentration camps. Goering flourished an encyclopaedia reference, claiming that Britain had invented them. The programme examined whether the Nazi concentration camps and Britain’s were comparable.

Elria Wessels, curator of the Anglo-Boer War Museum in Bloemfontein, took Judd to the site of one of the camps. She described what the scene would have been like. Between 5,000 and 7,000 people were incarcerated at Bloemfontein, and it was only one of about 50 camps. Fully 27,000 women and children died in the camps, of which 81 percent were children. While Britain has tried to write this chapter out of history, the Afrikaners at the other extreme attempted to elevate it to folklore. Both routes led to a distorted history.

The British were unable to fight the Boer soldiers into submission. In 1900, General Sir Herbert Kitchener authorised a scorched-earth policy in response. Dr. Keith Surridge described how British soldiers scoured the countryside looking for farms to burn. He estimated that some 30,000 farm buildings were destroyed. Livestock was killed in huge numbers and often left to rot. This policy caused a vast refugee problem, with those who were left behind often requesting that the British take them away. The British agreed, walking them to the defensive laagers, which in time became concentration camps.

Not only had the British now to feed 250,000 to 400,000 soldiers, but also the civilian population of the war zone. Since they had wiped out most of the agriculture within the region, they had to import food. The task overwhelmed them. Professor Albert Grundlingh of the University of South Africa in Pretoria suggested that the herding of so many people into such small areas was comparable to rapid urbanisation of these farmer people. In the unhygienic conditions diseases spread quickly—thousands died of measles.

The programme explained that the war was not just a tragedy for the Boers. Just as many blacks were caught up in the fighting. Tens of thousands were displaced along with the families they worked for. This suffering has gone largely unrecognised. Grundlingh pointed out that more than 14,000 died in the black camps, in which conditions were even worse than for the Boers. He claimed that the memory of the black experience during the war largely receded within the black community, as the experiences of apartheid came to dominate. The Boer War became just one of many bad experiences. For the Afrikaners, however, the war remains a focal point.

Many Afrikaners thought at the time, and still think, that Britain implemented a policy of deliberate genocide in setting up the camps. Grundlingh argued cogently against this. He believed that this viewpoint was manufactured for political purposes and that the reasons why so many died in the camps were poor administration and a lack of medical care. He also pointed out that the British did not treat their own sick very well.

Other academics agreed. Dr. Donal Lowry of Oxford Brookes University made the point that the treatment of the Boers fed the grievances at the base of Afrikaner nationalism and paranoia. It led to a sense of their being aggrieved and besieged and fed into the perspective of affirmative action for poor whites that became popularly known as apartheid.

Grundlingh observed that the war represents an heroic period for the Afrikaners, with the British as the perpetrators of injustice. It was a period in which they held the moral high ground and for which they do not feel the need to apologise. The war is now being resurrected as a sacred period of history.

The programme ended with the family of Eugene Terre-Blanche (founder of the fascist South African AWB party) visiting the war memorial. He imagined the difference to the white population if 26,000 women and children had not been killed and reckoned on the white population now being at least 10-12 million, instead of 5.4 million, which he asserts could have changed the situation in the country. “In the new South Africa” he said “they will change the syllabuses and tell them about the Kaffir wars, but not about the wars that have been fought by white people”.

Both these programmes were valuable in drawing attention to the work of recent historians who have tried to break away from the old nationalist myths developed under the apartheid regime in South Africa. Their work shows that the British concentration camps were not like those of the Nazis, part of a deliberate and conscious programme of genocide, but were nevertheless one of the most brutal aspects of an imperialist war for strategic control of land and resources.

Emily Hobhouse, the humanitarian campaigner, was able to travel without threat to her personal safety or liberty to the British concentration camps and, on her return, to expose in the press the appalling conditions and horrendous loss of life, particularly among women and children. This would have been impossible in Nazi Germany. The comparison with fascism was a superficial and self-serving attempt to portray the Afrikaners as a down-trodden people, whose privileges under apartheid merely redressed previous injustices.

At the same time, the programmes unwittingly demonstrated that historians today are under pressure to present a version of South African history that is in line with new nationalist conceptions. In post-apartheid South Africa, the Baralong see the vindication of their part in the Anglo-Boer War as the means to win financial compensation that will benefit them in the struggle for investment. The role of black Africans in the war, whether fighting on behalf of British imperialism or their suffering in the camps, has a place in the history books which has until now been denied, but one nationalist interpretation of history cannot be allowed to replace another. The black nationalism of the ANC cannot answer the rhetoric of Terre-Blanche, because neither gives an objective picture of the past.

Bibliography:
Pakenham, T., The Boer War, London 1979

Smith, I.R., The Origins of the South African War 1899-1902, New York 1996

The New Encyclopaedia Britannica, Chicago 1991
Click HERE to read the original article.

From the newspaper: Rekord Centurion 25th May 2012 – Burgerspark named after my great grandad.

Page 1 – The Peace Treaty of Vereeniging 1902

Page 2 – The Peace Treaty of Vereeniging 1902

Page 3 – The Peace Treaty of Vereeniging 1902

Page 4 – The Peace Treaty of Vereeniging – signed 31st May 1902

Source of The Peace Treaty images:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Vereeniging

Peace Treaty of Vereeniging: 31 May 1902

THE FOLLOWING NOTICE is hereby published for general information. By order of His Excellency the High Commissioner and Administrator of the Transvaal. WE Davidson, Acting Secretary to the Transvaal Administration -3rd June 1902.

ARMY HEADQUARTERS, SOUTH AFRICA

General Lord Kitchener of Khartoum, Commander in Chief

AND

His Excellency Lord Milner, High Commissioner, on behalf of the BRITISH GOVERNMENT,

AND

Messrs S.W. Burger, F.W. Reitz, Louis Botha, J.H. de la Rey, LJ. Meyer, and J.C. Krogh, acting as the GOVERNMENT of the SOUTH AFRICAN REPUBLIC,

AND

Messrs W.J.C. Brebner, C.R. de Wet, J.B.M. Hertzog, and C.H. Olivier, acting as the GOVERNMENT of the ORANGE FREE STATE, on behalf of their respective BURGHERS

Desirous to terminate the present hostilities, agree on the following Articles.

1. The BURGHER Forces in the Field will forthwith lay down their Arms, handing over all Guns, Rifles, and Munitions of War, in their possession or under their control, and desist from any further resistance to the Authority of HIS MAJESTY KING EDWARD VII, whom they recognise as their lawful SOVEREIGN.
   The Manner and details of this surrender will be arranged between Lord Kitchener and Commandant General Botha, Assistant Commandant General de la Rey and Chief Commandant De Wet.
2. Burghers in the field outside the limits of the TRANSVAAL and ORANGE RIVER COLONY, and all Prisoners of War at present outside South Africa, who are burghers, will, on duly declaring their acceptance of the position of subjects of HIS MAJESTY KING EDWARD VII, be gradually brought back to their homes as soon as transport can be provided and their means of subsistence ensured.
3. The BURGHERS so surrendering or so returning will not be deprived of their personal liberty, or their property.
4. No proceedings CIVIL or CRIMINAL will be taken against any of the BURGHERS so surrendering or so returning for any Acts in connection with the prosecution of the War. The benefit of this clause will not extend to certain Acts contrary to the usage of War which have been notified by the Commander in Chief to the Boer Generals, and which shall be tried by Court Martial immediately after the close of hostilities.
5. The DUTCH language will be taught in Public Schools in the TRANSVAAL and the ORANGE RIVER COLONY where the Parents of the Children desire it, and will be allowed in COURTS of LAW when necessary for the better and more effectual Administration of Justice.
6. The Possession of Rifles will be allowed in the TRANSVAAL and ORANGE RIVER COLONY to persons requiring them for their protection on taking out a licence according to Law.
7. MILITARY ADMINISTRATION in the TRANSVAAL and ORANGE RIVER COLONY will at the earliest possible date be succeeded by CIVIL GOVERNMENT, and, as soon as circumstances permit, Representative Institutions, leading up to self-Government, will be introduced.
8. The question of granting the Franchise to Natives will not be decided until after the introduction of Self-Government.
9. No Special Tax will be imposed on Landed Property in the TRANSVAAL and ORANGE RIVER COLONY to defray the Expenses of the War.
10. As soon as conditions permit, a Commission, on which the local inhabitants will be represented, will be appointed in each District of the TRANSVAAL and ORANGE RIVER COLONY, under the Presidency of a Magistrate or other official, for the purpose of assisting the restoration of the people to their homes and supplying those who, owing to war losses, are unable to provide for themselves, with food, shelter, and the necessary amount of seed, stock, implements etc. indispensable to the resumption of their normal occupations.

His Majesty’s Government will place at the disposal of these Commissions a sum of three million pounds sterling for the above purposes, and will allow all notes, issued under Law No. 1 of 1900 of the Government of the SOUTH AFRICAN REPUBLIC, and all receipts, given by the officers in the field of the late Republics or under their orders, to be presented to a JUDICIAL COMMISSION, which will be appointed by the Government, and if such notes and receipts are found by this Commission to have been duly issued in return for valuable consideration they will be received by the first-named Commissions as evidence of War losses suffered by the persons to whom they were originally given. In addition to the above named free grant of three million pounds, His Majesty’s Government will be prepared to make advances as loans for the same purpose, free of interest for two years, and afterwards repayable over a period of years with 3 per cent interest. No foreigner or rebel will be entitled to the benefit of this Clause.

Signed at Pretoria this thirty first day of May in the Year of Our Lord Thousand Nine Hundred and Two.
[Signed]

KITCHENER OF KHARTOUM, MILNER, S W BURGER, F W REITZ, LOUIS BOTHA, J H DE LA REY, L J MEYER, J C KROGH, C R DE WET, J B M HERTZOG, WJ C BREBNER, C .H OLIVIER

Source: http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Peace_of_Vereeniging

Melrose House 1900-1902

Die Vrede van Vereeniging, 31 Mei 1902. In Oktober 1899  breek oorlog uit tussen die Britse regering en die twee Boererepublieke van Transvaal en die Oranje Vrystaat. Op 5 Junie 1900 val die Britse troepemag onder lord Roberts Pretoria binne. Roberts woon eers in die “British Agency” in Rissikstraat 1268 voordat hy na Melrose-huis verskuif en dit as Britse hoofkwartier en residensie gebruik.
Melrose-huis word bekend as die “Imperial Headquarters in South Africa” en hiervandaan is die bevele uitgestuur wat meer as 18 maande lank die aard van die Britse oorlogsbedrywighede bepaal het.
Teen die einde van 1900 vertrek lord Roberts na Engeland en lord Kitchener van Khartoum neem sy plek in. Saam met hom is sy Sikh-bediendes wat hom sedert sy veldslae in Indie vergesel het. Die woonkamer links van die ingang gebruik Kitchener as sy kantoor en die vertrek langsaan as slaapkamer.

Die sluiting van die Vrede van Vereeniging het soos volg verloop: As gevolg van bemiddelingspogings in Europa vir vrede het die Britse Regering besluit dat die vrede in Suid-Afrika gereel moes word. Op 4 Maart 1902 ontvang genl. Schalk Burger, waarnemende Staatspresident van die Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek terwyl pres. Kruger in Europa was, vredesvoorstelle van lord Kitchener. Die Transvaalse ,regering’ tree in verbinding met pres. Steyn en die Vrystaatse regering en op 9 April kom die twee regerings te Klerksdorp byeen vir samesprekings. Daar was skerp meningsverskil, maar uiteindelik is voorstelle op skrif gestel en op 12 April was die verteenwoordigers van die verskillende regerings in Pretoria om met lord Kitchener te onderhandel.
Die eerste vredesvoorstelle word deur lord Kitchener aan die Britse Regering voorgele, maar uit London kom die antwoord dat die Britse Regering nie aan die twee Republieke se voorwaarde om hul onafuanklikheid te behou, kan voldoen nie. Die samesprekings het tot 17 April voortgeduur waarna besluit word dat die Boereleiers kans sou kry om al die kommando’s te raadpleeg.
Die Britse Regering onderneem om al die kommando’s waarvan die leiers met onderhandelinge besig was, nie aan te val nie, en Kitchener stel die spoorweg en telegraafdiens tot hul beskikking.
Op 15 Mei 1902 het 30 afgevaardigdes van elke Republiek op die dorp Vereeniging aangekom vir verdere samesprekings. In ‘n markeetent het die byeenkoms onder voorsitterskap van generaal C.F. Beyers begin. Aan Transvaalkant was onder andere: genl. Schalk Burger, staatsekretaris van die Z.A.R. F.W. Reitz, genl. Louis Botha, genl. Koos De la Rey en genl. Jan Smuts.
Tussen die Vrystaters was pres. M.T. Steyn wat hom weens swak gesondheid aan die onderhandelinge moes onttrek, genl. C.R. de Wet en genl. J .B.M. Hertzog.
Die twee notulehouers was D.E. van Velden en ds. J.D. Kestell. Dag na dag het die samesprekinge voortgegaan. Daar was groot meningsverskil: aan die een kant die wat wou vrede maak en aan die ander kant die wat wou voortgaan met die oorlog. Op Saterdag, 17 Mei is besluit om vyf generaals Hertzog, Smuts, De la Rey, Botha en De Wet, na Pretoria met nuwe voorstelle te stuur.
Die kommissie het dadelik na Pretoria vertrek en tuisgegaan in “Parkzicht”, die huis van Carl Rood, langs Melrose-huis.  Op 19 Mei het die samesprekings met die Engelse bevelvoerders begin en deur taaie onderhandelinge is die vredesvoorwaardes puntsgewys vasgestel. Na die eerste fase het dit gelyk asof die samesprekings ‘n dooiepunt bereik het, maar is oorwen deur ‘n komitee, saamgestel uit lord Kitchener, genls. Smuts en Hertzog wat die werk voortgesit het.
Die finale dokument, bestaande uit tien klousules, is deur Chamberlain en die Britse Kabinet goedgekeur. Die kommissie moes die dokument aan die afgevaardigdes op Vereeniging voorle en daar sou kans gegee word tot 31 Mei 1902 om JA of NEE daarop te antwoord. Om 9vm op 29 Mei is die eerste sitting gehou en die rapport voorgelees.
President Steyn het intussen bedank en genl. De Wet as waarnemende president van die Vrystaat benoem. Die vredesvoorwaardes is drie dae ernstig bespreek en die finale stemming was 54 teen 6 vir die aanname van die voorwaardes.
Maatreels is getref vir die vervoer per spoor na Pretoria van die lede van albei regerings om daar die Vredestraktaat te onderteken. Kort voor elfuur die aand het hulle by Melrose-huis aangekom en is op versoek ‘n rukkie aIleen gelaat in die eetkamer om die Besluit van Vereeniging weer deeglik deur te lees. Lord Kitchener en lord Milner het binnegekom en aan die hoof van die tafel aan die suidekant gaan sit. Langs Milner het die ses Transvalers gesit en langs Kitchener die vier Vrystaters.
Die kontrak was in viervoud op perkament getik. Een eksemplaar was bestem vir die Koning van Engeland, een vir lord Kitchener, een om bewaar te word in die Pretoriase Argief, en een om in die Bloemfonteinse Argief te bewaar.
 Die eerste eksemplaar is vyf minute oor elf voor die waarnemende president van die Z.A.R., gent. Schalk Burger, geplaas en mi hom het die ander lede van die regering die dokument geteken. Na hulle het die Vrystaatse verteenwoordigers dit onderteken. Links van die tien name het die Britse Opperbevelhebber geskryf: “Kitchener van Khartoum” en daaronder het die Hoe Kommissaris die woord “Milner” geskryf. Vader Kestell het genotuleer: “Die dokument was geteken. Alles was stil in die vertrek waar daar so baie gepraat is. Nog het almal ‘n oomblik stilgesit.
Toe staan lede van die Regerings van die nou gewese Republieke asof verbyster op om die saal te verlaat. Lord Kitchener het van die een na die ander gegaan en elkeen sy hand gebied: ‘We are good friends now’ het hy gese. Daarop het almal die saal verlaat.” Na 1902 gaan die lewe in Melrose-huis voorL George Heys gaan voort met sy sakebelange en die Heys-egpaar dra graag by tot gemeenskapsdiens. In 1934 skenk George Heys ‘n klokkespel, die “Heys Memorial Chimes” vir die destydse nuwe stadsaal in Paul Krugerstraat.  Na sy vrou se dood in 1929 laat bou hy die “Heys Memorial Hall” vir die Sunnyside-Metodistekerk. George Heys is in 1939 op 87-jarige ouderdom oorlede terwyl hy by sy oudste dogter in Chulmleigh, Devon, Engeland, gekuier het. Hy is in die ou begraafplaas in Pretoria begrawe. Hy was ‘n ware pionier wat tot die ontwikkelingsgeskiedenis van Pretoria bygedra het.

Sedert Melrose-huis in 1886-1887 gebou is, het daar slegs in 1895-96 noemenswaardige veranderinge plaasgevind toe die biljartkamer, plantehuis en kombuis aangebou is en die huidige eetkamer vergroot is. Na die beeindiging van die Anglo-Boereoorlog in 1902, is die interieur opgeknap, en vandag is die huis ‘n uitstekende voorbeeld van die oorgangstydperk van ‘n laat-Victoriaanse na die Edwardiaanse styltydperke in ‘n Engelse herehuis. Vandag is die meubels, tapyte, skilderye, ornamente en gebruiksvoorwerpe wat aan die oorspronklike eienaars behoort het, nog in die huis.
Kenmerkend van die Victoriaanse tydperk is dat die style uit vorige tydperke nageboots en saamgevoeg is. Die argitektuur spreek onder andere van Nederlandse, Elisabethaanse en Klassieke invloede terwyl die meubels meestal nabootsings is van Adam-, Hepplewhite-, Chippendale- en Sheratonstyle van die 18de eeu. Daar is ook verskeie Oosterse invloede sigbaar in die huis.

Die Spekboom-rivier Brug – ook die Schalk Willem Burger-brug

Photos of the bridge from this link with photos of other interesting ‘artifacts’ too.

http://www.laervolkskool.co.za/geskiedenis.php

Van die link van Laerskool Volkskool:

Mnr Cornelius Meyer het goedgunstiglik sy Sondaghuis afgestaan sodat die weeskinders geherberg kon word. Om die kinders na ‘n Engelse skool te stuur, was onmoontlik – en onder die kerkgebou in die donker kelder, meermale genoem die “grot”, het die klein weesskool op 24 Julie 1903 geopen met Mej Anna Basson as onderwyseres.

Dadelik was daar ‘n toestroming van Afrikaanse kinders wat ook toegang wou hê. Tydens ‘n openbare vergadering is besluit om die vroeëre kerkskool te heropen onder die naam “Die Volkskool”. ‘n Beroep is op mnr Dönges gedoen om as hoof op te tree. So is Volkskool gebore, as ‘n skamele kindjie, sonder herberg, toerusting of geld, maar ryk in geloof.

Kinders het nou na die Volkskool gestroom en spoedig is die konsistoriekamer in beslag geneem en die Van Belkumsaal (Nee Hervormde Kerk) gehuur vir klaskamers. Die gesukkel sonder meubels, boeke en ruimte was groot – en toe dit op sy donkerste was, het uitkoms gekom. Die twee broers, Frederik en Willem Bezuidenhout, met hulle swaer, Cornelius Meyer het die erf waarop Volkskool tans staan, gekoop en ‘n gebou teen die koste van sowat 5000 pond deur mnr Johannes Joubert laat oprig, terwyl hulle eggenotes die grootste deel van die meublement geskenk het. Op 11 Januarie 1907 is die Volkskool plegtig ingewy deur prof. Marais, van die kweekskool van Stellenbosch en die hoeksteen gelê deur Schalk Burger, die laaste President van die Suid-Afrikaanse Republiek, In 1907 het genl. Smuts, Minister van Onderwys, besluit om al die CNO-skole in die land oor te neem as goewermentskole. So het Volkskool ‘n openbare skool geword met behoud egter van sy eie geboue en skoolkommissie.

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Zulu tribe and other African tribes

 

Africa is a continent – not a country. The true size of Africa.

Edit August 2019 – many of the previous links to different cultures are now dead links and I had to spruce up this entry of more than 10 years ago!

On this next link, you will find the following ethnic groups: Ndebele, Pedi, San, Shangaan, Venda, Xhosa and Zulu. This link is a great link as there are pictures and a substantial amount of information. Use the drop-down menu to the left of the page.

http://www.krugerpark.co.za/africa_ndebele.html

The Zulu people.

The Zulu are the largest ethnic group in South Africa. They are well known for their beautiful brightly coloured beads and baskets as well as other small carvings.

The Zulu believe that they are descendants from a chief from the Congo area, and in the 16th century migrated south picking up many of the traditions and customs of the San who also inhabited this South African area. During the 17th and 18th centuries many of the most powerful chiefs made treaties and gave control of the Zulu villages to the British. This caused much conflict because the Zulu had strong patriarchal village government systems so they fought against the British but couldn’t win because of the small strength they possessed. Finally, after much of the Zulu area had been given to the British the Zulu people decided as a whole that they didn’t want to be under British rule and in 1879 war erupted between the British and the Zulu. Though the Zulu succeeded at first they were in 6 months conquered by the British who exiled the Zulu Kings and divided up the Zulu kingdom. In 1906 another Zulu uprising was lead and the Zulu continue to try to gain back what they consider to be their ancient kingdom.

The Zulu believe in a creator god known as Nkulunkulu, but this god does not interact with humans and has no interest in everyday life. Therefore, most Zulus interact on a day to day level with the spirits. In order to interact with the spirits the Zulu must use divination to interact with the ancestors. All misfortune is a result of a evil sorcery or offended spirits, nothing just happens because of natural causes.

The Zulu are practically divided in half with about 50% living in cities and engaging in domestic work and another 50% working on farms.  

 

On this link HERE you can read about African tribes/groups and their culture and festivals/art/language/wildlife/etc. The link will open in a new window.

Nét Khoisan uniek
ELSABÉ BRITS
24/04/2008 08:03:28 PM – (SA)

DIE Khoisan het aan moederskant (mDNS) die oudste oorlewende takke van die menslike stamboom in hul genetiese samestelling behou.

Dit blyk ook dat die Khoisan tussen 90 000 en 150 000 jaar gelede van die res van die wêreld se bevolking geskei en oor ’n tydperk van duisende jare na Suidelike Afrika gemigreer het – in ’n enkele lang reis. Hulle het tot 40 000 jaar gelede hier in genetiese isolasie geleef.

Dié internasionale, omvattendste opname tot nou toe rakende Afrika se mitochondriese DNS (mDNS word net van ’n ma na al haar kinders oorgedra) is gisteraand deur die Genografiese Projek bekend gemaak.

Die span navorsers het oor die wêreld heen gereis om die mDNS van 624 mense van inheemse bevolkings te versamel om insig te kry oor die vroeë demografiese geskiedenis van die eerste moderne mense. Daar is gevind dié vroeë groepe van Homo sapiens was klein en geïsoleerd van mekaar.

 

Ndebele women…image: Kruger2Canyon

Ndebele woman…image: Kruger2Canyon

A traditional Nama Hut..Image: stripedmouse.com/site1_4_1.htm

Nama woman…Image: stripedmouse.com/site1_4_1.htm

Read more here: http://www.stripedmouse.com/site1_4_1.htm

Zulu men demonstrating fighting

Zulu bead workers

Zulu woman busy weaving

Zulu hut

Inside the Zulu hut

Zulu woman in traditional clothes

Last 6 images can be found here: http://www.fiveupfront.com/fuf/pictures/2006africa/2006africa.php

Looking for FOLKLORE— follow the link for Xhosa Folklore. The link will open in a new window.

Patterns and colours used to paint houses/homes

Beautiful art

Basotho Cultural Village [google-image]

Ndebele houses

Zulu warriors – image:history of South Africa

 

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Voortrekker Monument, Pretoria

The Voortrekker Monument was built in 1938 to commemorate the Great Trek of 1838

http://www.voortrekkermon.org.za

Click on the above link and you will have the option for Afrikaans/English to read about the Monument. The link will open in a new window.

Read about the Tapestry….it’s worth seeing these Tapestries! They look like real scenes.

The “Afrikaanse Taal-en Kultuurvereniging” ATKV’s Woman and Mother Movement donated the Historical Tapestry to the Voortrekker Monument. Nine women worked for eight years to complete the fifteen scenes from the Great Trek. The Tapestry contains 3,3 million stitches. The artist W.H. Coetzer painted the scenes on the tapestry gauze for the women to embroider.
http://www.voortrekkermon.org.za/

Update: June 2010 – as these tapestries are not anymore available on the site of the Voortrekkermonument, I’ve found a site where all 15 of them are and here are a few – you can follow the link at the bottom to view all the others.

See more on this link which will open in a new window: http://members.tripod.com/~meerkat_2/etapess.html

http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

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SA Flags…old and new

Follow this link to read more about our old flag…

http://www.atlasgeo.net/fotw/flags/za_old.html

About the NEW flag…we have different opinions as to the meaning…

http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

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