KIMBERLEY AND THE JAMESON RAID
"Ex Africa semper aliquid novi."
In the last week of the old year we started on our journey to Kimberley,
then a matter of thirty-six hours. The whole of one day we dawdled over
the Great Karroo in pelting rain and mist, which reminded one of
Scotland. This sandy desert was at that season covered with brown scrub,
for it was yet too early for the rains to have made it green, and the
only signs of life were a few ostriches, wild white goats, and, very
rarely, a waggon piled with wood, drawn along the sandy road by ten or
twelve donkeys. As to vegetation, there were huge clumps of
mimosa-bushes, just shedding their yellow blossoms, through which the
branches showed up with their long white thorns, giving them a weird and
withered appearance. It must indeed have required great courage on
behalf of the old Voor-trekker Boers, when they and their families left
Cape Colony, at the time of the Great Trek, in long lines of
white-tented waggons, to have penetrated through that dreary-waste in
search of the promised land, of green veldt and running streams, which
they had heard of, as lying away to the north, and eventually found in
the Transvaal. I have been told that President Kruger was on this
historical trek, a Voor-looper, or little boy who guides the leading
oxen.
Round Kimberley the country presented a very different appearance, and
here we saw the real veldt covered with short grass, just beginning to
get burnt up by the summer's heat. Our host, Mr. J. B. Currey, a name
well known in Diamond-Field circles, met us at the station. This is a
good old South African custom, and always seems to me to be the acme of
welcoming hospitality, and the climax to the kindness of inviting people
to stay, merely on the recommendation of friends--quite a common
occurrence in the colonies, and one which, I think, is never
sufficiently appreciated, the entertainers themselves thinking it so
natural a proceeding.
Kimberley itself and the diamond industry have both been so often and so
well described that I shall beware of saying much of either, and I will
only note a few things I remarked about this town, once humming with
speculation, business, and movement, but now the essence of a sleepy
respectability and visible prosperity. For the uninitiated it is better
to state that the cause of this change was the gradual amalgamation of
the diamond-mines and conflicting interests, which was absolutely
necessary to limit the output of diamonds. As a result the stranger soon
perceives that the whole community revolves on one axis, and is centred,
so to speak, in one authority. "De Beers" is the moving spirit, the
generous employer, and the universal benefactor. At that time there were
7,000 men employed in the mines, white and black, the skilled mechanics
receiving as much as £6 a week. Evidence of the generosity of this
company was seen in the model village built for the white workmen; in
the orchard containing 7,000 fruit-trees, then one of Mr. Rhodes's
favourite hobbies; and in the stud-farm for improving the breed of
horses in South Africa. If I asked the profession of any of the smart
young men who frequented the house where we were staying, for games of
croquet, it amused me always to receive the same answer, "He is
something in De Beers." The town itself boasts of many commodious public
buildings, a great number of churches of all denominations, an excellent
and well-known club; but whatever the edifice, the roofing is always
corrugated iron, imported, I was told, from Wolverhampton. This roofing,
indeed, prevails over the whole of new South Africa; and although it
appears a very unsuitable protection from the burning rays of the
African sun, no doubt its comparative cheapness and the quickness of its
erection are the reasons why this style was introduced, and has been
adhered to. By dint of superhuman efforts, in spite of locust-plagues,
drought, and heavy thunderstorms, the inhabitants have contrived to
surround their little one-storied villas with gardens bright with
flowers, many creepers of vivid hues covering all the trellis-work of
the verandahs.
The interest of Kimberley, however, soon paled and waned as the
all-engrossing events of the Uitlander rebellion in Johannesburg rapidly
succeeded each other. One sultry evening our host brought us news of
tangible trouble on the Rand: some ladies who were about to leave for
that locality had received wires to defer their departure. Instantly, I
recollect, my thoughts flew back to the _Tantallon Castle_ and the dark
words we had heard whispered, so it was not as much of a surprise to me
as to the residents at Kimberley; to them it came as a perfect
bombshell, so well had the secret been kept. The next day the text of
the Manifesto, issued by Mr. Leonard, a lawyer, in the name of the
Uitlanders, to protest against their grievances, appeared in all the
morning papers, and its eloquent language aroused the greatest
enthusiasm in the town. Thus was the gauntlet thrown down with a
vengeance, and an ominous chord was struck by the statement, also in the
papers, that Mr. Leonard had immediately left for Cape Town, "lest he
should be arrested." It must be remembered that any barrister, English
or Afrikander, holding an official position in the Transvaal, had at
that time to take the oath of allegiance to the Boer Government before
being free to practise his calling. The explanation of the exceedingly
acute feeling at Kimberley in those anxious days lay in the fact that
nearly everyone had relations or friends in the Golden City. Our hosts
themselves had two sons pursuing their professions there, and, of
course, in the event of trouble with England, these young men would have
been commandeered to fight for the Boer Government they served. One
possibility, however, I noticed, was never entertained--viz., that, if
fighting occurred, the English community might get the worst of it. Such
a contingency was literally laughed to scorn. "The Boers were unprepared
and lazy; they took weeks to mobilize; they had given up shooting game,
hence their marksmen had deteriorated; and 200 men ought to be able to
take possession of Johannesburg and Kruger into the bargain." This was
what one heard on all sides, and in view of more recent events it is
rather significant; but I remember then the thought flashed across my
mind that these possible foes were the sons of the men who had
annihilated us at Majuba and Laing's Nek, and I wondered whether another
black page were going to be added to the country's history.
The next day, December 29, Kruger was reported in the papers to be
listening to reason; but this hopeful news was short-lived, for on
Monday, the 30th--as usual, a fiercely hot day--we received the
astounding intelligence that Dr. Jameson, administrator of Mashonaland
and Matabeleland, had entered the Transvaal at the head of the Chartered
Company's Police, 600 strong, with several Maxim and Gardner guns. No
upheaval of Nature could have created greater amazement, combined with a
good deal of admiration and some dismay, than this sensational news. The
dismay, indeed, increased as the facts were more fully examined. Nearly
all the officers of the corps held Imperial commissions, and one heard
perfect strangers asking each other how these officers could justify
their action of entering a friendly territory, armed to the teeth; while
the fact of Dr. Jameson himself being at their head heightened the
intense interest. I did not know that gentleman then, but I must say he
occupied in the hearts of the people at Kimberley, and, indeed, of the
whole country, quite a unique position.
It was in the diamond-fields he had worked as a young doctor, usurping
gradually almost the entire medical practice by his great skill as well
as by his charm of manner. Then, as Mr. Rhodes's nominee, he had
dramatically abandoned medicine and surgery, and had gone to the great
unknown Northern Territory almost at a moment's notice. He had obtained
concessions from the black tyrant, Lobengula, when all other emissaries
had failed; backwards and forwards many times across the vast stretch of
country between Bulawayo and Kimberley he had carried on negotiations
which had finally culminated, five years previously, in his leading a
column of 500 hardy pioneers to the promising country of Mashonaland,
which up to that time had lain in darkness under the cruel rule of the
dusky monarch. During three strenuous years Dr. Jameson, with no
military or legal education, had laboured to establish the nucleus of a
civilized government in that remote country; and during the first part
of that period the nearest point of civilization, from whence they could
derive their supplies, was Kimberley, a thousand miles away, across a
practically trackless country. Added to this difficulty, the
administrator found himself confronted with the wants and rights of the
different mining communities into which the pioneers had gradually split
themselves up, and which were being daily augmented by the arrival of
"wasters" and others, who had begun to filter in as the country was
written about, and its great mining and agricultural possibilities
enlarged upon. Finally, goaded thereto and justified therein by
Lobengula's continued cruelties, his raids on the defenceless Mashonas,
and his threats to the English, Dr. Jameson had led another expedition
against the King himself in his stronghold of Bulawayo. On that occasion
sharp fighting ensued, but he at length brought peace, and the dawning
of a new era to a vast native population in the country, which, with
Mashonaland, was to be known as Rhodesia. In fact, up to then his luck
had been almost supernatural and his achievements simply colossal. Added
to all this was his capacity for attaching people to himself, and his
absolutely fearless disposition; so it is easy to understand that
Kimberley hardly dared breathe during the next momentous days, when the
fate of "the Doctor," as he was universally called, and of his men, who
were nearly all locally known, was in suspense.
During many an evening of that eventful week we used to sit out after
dinner under the rays of a glorious full moon, in the most perfect
climatic conditions, and hear heated discussions of the pros and cons of
this occurrence, which savoured more of medieval times than of our own.
The moon all the while looked down so calmly, and the Southern Cross
stood out clear and bright. One wondered what they might not have told
us of scenes being enacted on the mysterious veldt, not 300 miles away.
It was not till Saturday, January 4, that we knew what had happened, and
any hopes we had entertained that the freebooters had either joined
forces with their friends in Johannesburg, or else had made good their
escape, were dashed to the ground as the fulness of the catastrophe
became known. For hours, however, the aghast Kimberleyites refused to
believe that Dr. Jameson and his entire corps had been taken prisoners,
having been hopelessly outnumbered and outmanoeuvred after several
hours' fighting at Krugersdorp; and, when doubt was no longer possible,
loud and deep were the execrations levelled at the Johannesburgers, who,
it was strenuously reiterated, had invited the Raiders to come to their
succour, and who, when the pinch came, never even left the town to go to
their assistance. If the real history of the Raid is ever written, when
the march of time renders such a thing possible, it will be interesting
reading; but, as matters stand now, it is better to say as little as
possible of such a deplorable fiasco, wherein the only points which
stood out clearly appeared to be that Englishmen were as brave, and
perhaps also as foolhardy, as ever; that President Kruger, while
pretending to shut his eyes, had known exactly all that was going
forward; that the Boers had lost nothing of their old skill in shooting
and ambushing, while the rapid rising and massing of their despised
forces was as remarkable in its way as Jameson's forced march.
It was said at the time that the proclamation issued by the Government
at home, repudiating the rebels, was the factor which prevented the
Johannesburgers from joining forces with the Raiders when they arrived
at Krugersdorp, as no doubt had been arranged, and that this step of the
Home Government had, curiously enough, not been foreseen by the
organizers of this deeply-laid plot. There is no doubt that there were
two forces at work in Johannesburg, as, indeed, I had surmised during
our voyage out: the one comprising the financiers, which strove to
attain its ends by manifesto and public meeting, with the hint of
sterner measures to follow; and the other impatient of delay, and thus
impelled to seek the help of those who undoubtedly became freebooters
the moment they crossed the Transvaal border. Certainly Dr. Jameson's
reported words seemed to echo with reproach and disappointment--the
reproach of a man who has been deceived; but whatever his feelings were
at that moment of despair, when his lucky star seemed at length to have
deserted him with a vengeance, I happen to know he never bore any
lasting grudge against his Johannesburg friends, and that he remained on
terms of perfect friendship even with the five members of the Reform
Committee, with whom all the negotiations had gone forward. These
included Colonel Frank Rhodes,[3] always one of his favourite
companions.
As an instance of how acute was the feeling suddenly roused respecting
Englishmen, I remember that Mr. Harry Lawson, who was staying in the
same house as ourselves, and had decided to leave for Johannesburg as
special correspondent to his father's paper, the _Daily Telegraph_, was
actually obliged to travel under a foreign name; and even then, if my
memory serves me right, he did not succeed in reaching the Rand. In the
meantime, as the daily papers received fuller details, harrowing
accounts came to hand of the exodus from Johannesburg of men, women, and
children travelling twenty in a compartment meant for eight, while
others, not so fortunate, had to put up with cattle-trucks. The Boers
were said to have shown themselves humane and magnanimous. Mr.
Chamberlain, the papers wrote, was strengthening the hands of the
President, to avert civil war, which must have been dangerously near;
but the most important man of the moment in South Africa was grudgingly
admitted to be "Oom Paul." His personal influence alone, it was stated,
had restrained his wild bands of armed burghers, with which the land was
simply bristling, and he was then in close confabulation with Her
Majesty's High Commissioner, Sir Hercules Robinson, whom he had summoned
to Pretoria to deal with such refractory Englishmen. The journals also
took advantage of the occasion to bid Kruger remember this was the
opportunity to show himself forgiving, and to strengthen his corrupt
Government, thereby earning the gratitude of those Afrikanders, for
whom, indeed, he was not expected to have any affection, but to whom he
was indebted for the present flourishing financial state of his
republic, which, it was called to mind, was next door to bankrupt when
England declared its independence in 1884. If such articles were
translated and read out to that wily old President, as he sipped his
coffee on his stoep, with his bland and inscrutable smile, it must have
added zest to his evening pipe. I read in Mr. Seymour Fort's "Life of
Dr. Jameson" that the Raid cost the Chartered Company £75,000 worth of
material, most of which passed into the hands of the Boer Government,
while the confiscated arms at Johannesburg amounted to several thousand
rifles and a great deal of ammunition. Respecting the guns taken from
Jameson's force, curiously enough, we surmised during the siege of
Mafeking, four years later, that some of these were being used against
us. Their shells fired into the town, many of which did not explode, and
of which I possess a specimen, were the old seven-pound studded M.L.
type, with the Woolwich mark on them.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] Died at Groot Schuurr in September, 1905.