In 1867, to try to end the cattle-raiding, a colonial commando was despatched against Piet Rooy who was captured and imprisoned for three months but upon his release resumed raiding. Bushmanland, Fraserburg and Somerset East districts came virtually under the control of the Korana and Bushmen. The Colony was threatened as far south as Calvinia.96
In consequence the government passed the Northern Border Protection Act in 1868 and appointed as special magistrate M.J. Jackson, who was stationed at Kenhardt, in Bushmanland, with 50 men of the Frontier Armed Mounted Police.97 It was the prelude to a war, mounted with reluctant burgher commandos, and won only because the Korana, who had fought a skilful guerrilla strategy, were divided. Significantly, the first Korana attacks of the war were on Amandelboom and De Tuin – where they succeeded in capturing weapons, horses and other instruments of war from colonial forces. The Bushmen and the Korana are said to have aimed at ‘retaking that part of the Colony which extends from the Bokkeveld to the Orange River’ (in other words, Bushmanland). Concerted action by colonial forces and those of Cupido Pofadder resulted in the capture of the leaders (by means of a ruse) and an end to hostilities by February 1870.98 The leaders, Piet Rooi, Carl Ruiters, Ian Cupido and David Diederichs, were despatched to prison on Robben Island (see also chapter 6).99
To prevent the Korana from occupying the area south of the river Jackson suggested the creation of a buffer zone of farms along the Orange from Prieska to Pella, but white colonists did not take this up. The northern bank from the Aughrabies Falls to Griqualand West (excluding the islands) was instead left in the hands of Cupido Pofadder and Klaas Lukas in recognition of their assistance in helping the Colony and on condition that they defended the Colony against incursions from the north. What the colonial government now called ‘Korannaland’ was divided at the later Currie’s Camp, with Lukas on the river above it and Pofadder below.100 In 1871 Reverend Schroeder of the Dutch Reformed Church (DRC) established a mission at Olyvenhout’s Drift, headquarters of Klaas Lukas’s Katse Korana.101 The following year Jackson proposed that Schroeder be appointed superintendent of Koranaland but the government rejected this.102 Basters (including some from De Tuin) began to move into the area – and were recognised as ‘burghers’ by Klaas Lukas – as well as white traders, who encouraged alcohol and indebtedness.103
In 1878–9 there was renewed conflict. This was part of a final fling of armed resistance against the colonisation threat which engulfed the whole eastern and northern frontier of the Cape. However it was not defence of an aboriginal way of life, but of a way of life shaped by the circumstances of the previous century, particularly the impact of the Cape Colony. These were not ‘primary resisters’ but social bandits. War on the eastern frontier between the Cape Colony and Sarili’s Gcaleka began in August 1877, drawing in Sandile’s Ngqika. After defeat in open battle in February 1878 Sandile retreated to the Amatola mountains to continue a guerrilla fight-back for several months. It was in this period, in April 1878, that rebellion broke out in Griqualand West with a conscious decision by its leaders to ‘make a stand while the government had its hands full fighting on the eastern frontier’.104 Their grievances were deprivation of land – ultimately a result of the Cape government’s annexation of the Kimberley diamond fields in 1870. As the new special magistrate of the northern border, J.H. Scott wrote, ‘the war here may be traced distinctly to the influence of the Gcaleka and Griqualand disturbances’.105 It was, writes Strauss, ‘not a solely Korana war but an uprising of all the groups living along the Orange, with the exception of the Bondelswarts’. Suppressed in Griqualand by colonial forces, the rebels retreated into Koranaland and found ready support for extending the revolt. Its leaders now included Cupido Pofadder and Klaas Lukas as well as a Xhosa named Donker Malgas, a disaffected Griqua from Griqualand West, and a member of the Afrikaner family (see chapter 4).106 By July 1878 the Griqualand rebels and Lukas’s people were entrenched on the islands of the Orange.107
Baster settlers north of the river as well as Schroeder retreated in panic to the Colony – some, along with other Basters, joining the colonial forces.108 The war – in Strauss’s account – was conducted with incredible incompetence on the colonial side, leading to mutiny and desertion by burgher forces, and to Pofadder, also once a loyal colonial ally, joining the revolt until Thomas Upington, Cape Attorney-General, took personal control in March 1979.109 The main colonial offensive took place from April, and succeeded by July in crushing the uprising, with characteristic colonial brutalities, including the killing of women and children (see also chapter 6).110 The so-called Koegas atrocities, which aroused concern even in Britain, involved the ‘iniquitous acquittal’ of persons who had murdered unarmed prisoners, including women and children.111 Many of the Korana and African rebels were reduced to farmworkers or illegal squatters on their own land.112 The chiefs, including Pofadder, were sent to Robben Island, where Klaas Lukas died in January 1880. The remaining chiefs were released from Robben Island in 1883–4, when their attempts to re-establish themselves proved futile (see chapter 6).113
Origins of the Vilander state
The first Baster state to be formed north of the Orange River was that of the Vilanders. Since the timing of the origins of this state is subject to different versions, and because it was the first, and probably the first to have a constitution, a separate treatment of it is required.
About the year 1846, one Dirk Philander, a Colonial Bastard, trekked from the Colony into this country with a band of companions. He asked and obtained permission from the Africanders, to occupy a tract of country to the north of ‘Blydeverwacht’. After some years, the Africanders attacked him; but he succeeded in repulsing the attack, and has since remained in undisturbed possession of the country occupied by him and has, for many years, had his headquarters at ‘Mier’. He has succeeded in establishing a practical ownership to the country occupied by his people, and a chieftainship over the latter.114
In 1880 the Tlharo told colonial officials that they regarded Mier as part of their territory, and had given it to Vilander about 15–20 years earlier to settle on, in other words, in about 1865.115
Figure 1.2: Dirk Vilander.
An earlier version of these events by Sir Thomas Upington, perhaps the first recorded, states:
Philander originally left this Colony as Captain or Headman of some Colonial Bastards, who by permission of Jacobus Africander, father of the present chief, settled under his chieftainship at or near Haas. After a short time Philander and the late Jacobus Africander quarrelled, the result being that in 1869 Philander and his people either were driven or fled from Africander’s country. Philander appears to have thereupon proceeded to Bechuanaland where it is said he became a subject of Bareke, the so-called paramount chief of the Batlaro tribe, by whom it is further alleged he was suffered to reside at Mier in Bareke’s country. Philander however denies any such subjection, and claims the country by right of occupation under a treaty with the British Government. I have not been able to ascertain whether such a treaty was ever made...116