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 The Anglicans number 67,882 (including 13,033 natives), and are 19% of the European population. At the head of the community is the bishop of Pretoria. Next in numbers according to European membership among the Protestant bodies are Presbyterians, 19,821 (including 1194 natives), and Methodists 37,812 (including 20,648 natives). The Lutherans are the chief missionary body. Of a total membership of 24,175 only 5770 are European. The Protestant European community amounts altogether to 35% of the white population. The Roman Catholics number 16,453 (including 2005 natives) and form 5% of the European population, and the Hebrews 15,478 or 5.34% of the European inhabitants.

Defence.—A strong garrison of the British army is maintained in the province, the headquarters of all the imperial military forces in South Africa being at Pretoria. These forces are under the command of a lieutenant-general, who, however, acts under the supreme direction of the governor-general. The Transvaal forms a distinct district command under a major-general. A volunteer force was established in 1904, for service within the Transvaal, or wherever the interests of the country might require. The force, disciplined and organized by a permanent staff of officers and non-commissioned officers of the regular army, is about 6500 strong, and consists of a brigade of artillery, four mounted, three composite and four infantry corps, a cyclist corps, &c. There are also cadet companies some 3000 strong.

A. Foundation of the Republic.—At the beginning of the 19th century the country now known as the Transvaal was inhabited, apparently somewhat sparsely, by Bavenda and other Bantu negroes, and in the south-west by wandering Bushmen and Hottentots. About 1817 the country was invaded by the chieftain Mosilikatze and his impis, who were fleeing from the vengeance of Chaka, king of the Zulus. The inhabitants were unable to withstand the attacks of the disciplined Zulu warriors—or Matabele, as they were henceforth called—by whom large areas of central and western Transvaal were swept bare. The remnants of the Bavenda retreated north to the Waterberg and Zoutpansberg, while Mosilikatze made his chief kraal at Mosega, not far from the site of the town of Zeerust. At that time the region between the Vaal and Limpopo was scarcely known to Europeans. In 1829, however, Mosilikatze was visited at Mosega by Robert Moffat, and between that date and 1836 a few British traders and explorers visited the country and made known its principal features. Such was the situation when Boer emigrants first crossed the Vaal.

The causes which led to the exodus of large numbers of Dutch farmers from Cape Colony are discussed elsewhere (see and ). Here it is only necessary to state that the Voortrekkers were animated by an intense desire to be altogether rid of British control, and to be allowed to set up independent communities and govern the natives in such fashion as they saw fit. The first party to cross the Vaal consisted of 98 persons under the leadership of Louis Trichard and Jan van Rensburg. They left Cape Colony in 1835 and trekked to the Zoutpansberg. Here Rensburg’s party separated from the others, but were soon afterwards murdered by natives. Trichard’s party determined to examine the country between the Zoutpansberg and Delagoa Bay. Fever carried off several of their number, and it was not until 1838 that the survivors reached the coast. Eventually they proceeded by boat to Natal. Meantime, in 1836, another party of farmers under Andries Hendrik Potgieter had established their headquarters on the banks of the Vet river. Potgieter and some companions followed the trail of Trichard’s party as far as the Zoutpansberg, where they were shown gold workings by the natives and saw rings of gold made by native workmen. They also ascertained that a trade between the Kaffirs and the Portuguese at Delagoa Bay already existed. On returning to the Vet, Potgieter learned that a hunting party of Boers which had crossed the Vaal had been attacked by the Matabele, who had also killed Boer women and children. This act led to reprisals, and on the 17th of January 1837 a Boer commando surprised Mosilikatze’s encampment at Mosega. inflicting heavy loss on the Matabele without themselves losing a man. In November of the same year Mosilikatze suffered further heavy losses at the hands of the Boers, and early in 1838 he fled north beyond the Limpopo, never to return. Potgieter, after the flight of the Matabele, issued a proclamation in which he declared the country which Mosilikatze had abandoned forfeited to the emigrant farmers. After the Matabele peril had been removed, many farmers trekked across the Vaal and occupied parts of the district left derelict. Into these depopulated areas there was also a considerable immigration of Basuto, Bechuana and other Bantu tribes.

The first permanent white settlement north of the Vaal was made by a party under Potgieter’s leadership. That commandant had in March 1838 gone to Natal, and had endeavoured to avenge the massacre of Piet Retief and his comrades by the Zulus. Jealous, however, of the preference shown by the Dutch farmers in Natal to another commandant (Gert Maritz), Potgieter speedily recrossed the Drakensberg, and in November 1838 he and his followers settled by the banks of the Mooi river, founding a town named Potchefstroom in honour of Potgieter. This party instituted an elementary form of government, and in 1840 entered into a loose confederation with the Natal Boers, and also with the Boers south of the Vaal, whose headquarters were at Winburg. In 1842, however, Potgieter’s party declined to go to the help of the Natal Boers, then involved in conflict with the British. Up to 1845 Potgieter continued to exercise authority over the Boer communities on both sides of the Vaal. A determination to keep clear of the British and to obtain access to the outer world through an independent channel led Potgieter and a considerable number of the Potchefstroom and Winburg burghers in 1845 to migrate towards Delagoa Bay. Potgieter settled in the Zoutpansberg, while other farmers chose as headquarters a place on the inner slopes of the Drakensberg, where they founded a village called Andries Ohrigstad. It proved fever-ridden and was abandoned, a new village being laid out on higher ground and named Lydenburg in memory of their sufferings at the abandoned settlement.

Meantime the southern districts abandoned by Potgieter and his comrades were occupied by other Boers. These were joined in 1848 by (q.v.), who became commandant of the Potchefstroom settlers. When the British government decided to recognize the independence of the Transvaal Boers it was with Pretorius that negotiations were conducted. On the 17th of January 1852 a convention was signed at a farm near the Sand river in the Orange sovereignty by assistant commissioners nominated by the British high commissioner on the one hand, and by Pretorius and other Boers on the other. The first clause was in the following terms:—

At this time there were settled north of the Vaal about 5000 families of European extraction—about 40,000 persons, including young children. They had obtained independence, but they were far from being a united people. When Pretorius conducted the negotiations which led to the signing of the Sand River Convention he did so without consulting the volksraad, and Potgieter’s party accused him of usurping power and aiming at domination over the whole country. However, the volksraad, at a meeting held at Rustenburg on the 16th of March 1852, ratified the convention, Potgieter and Pretorius having been publicly reconciled on the morning of the same day. Both leaders were near the end of their careers; Potgieter died in March and Pretorius in July 1853.

Whatever their internal dissensions the Boers were united