In the mid-seventeenth century the Dutch acquired possessions in the East Indies and by 1662 had established a replenishment station on the southern tip of Africa at the Cape of Good Hope. Soon a hardy population, mainly a mixture of Dutch, German and French, with an additional mixture of Hottentots, Bushmen and slaves imported from the Malay archipelago, had established itself not only in and around the embryo city of Cape Town, but also miles inland, ever seeking new territory and horizons. This heterogeneous population became known as Boers (farmers) a white tribe gradually encroaching north and east into Africa. They were a tough, resourceful race leading a frontier existence, often in conflict with wild animals that abounded in the interior and with native tribes into whose territory the Boers steadily encroached. By the early nineteenth century they had fanned out, over a 600-mile front, into what seemed to be a limitless interior. Much to the resentment of the Boers, Britain acquired sovereignty over the Cape and the lands beyond. English was imposed as the only official language whilst Britain’s philanthropic attitude towards the native people, at the expense of the Boers, was resented. Britain’s abolition of slavery throughout her domains in 1834 was not only cause for great bitterness but as most Boer families were slave owners, it resulted in Boer impoverishment. Although the British government offered compensation to the Boers for the loss of their slaves, Britain, with Machiavellian aplomb, decreed that compensation could only be paid out in London, 6,000 miles and two months’ journey away.
By 1836, in a great surge of bitterness, many Boers were ready to leave the land of their birth, to sell all their immovable possessions and, in stout ox-drawn wagons, trek (migrate) into the vast unknown to the north, there to establish their own republics and to govern themselves.
However, not only did the Boers disagree with the British Government, they also argued vigorously amongst themselves and although there were 10,000 of them ready to depart in a mass exodus, there was much discussion as to their destination and who would lead them, resulting in various groups heading in different directions.
Most had been aware of Port Natal’s existence which, from the exaggerated descriptions of its tropical beauty and potential, had taken on a legendary quality of a country flowing with milk and honey. As early as 1834 a Boer delegation, led by Piet Lafras Uys, arrived at Port Natal with a mandate to meet up with King Dingane and enter into negotiations for a homeland in the sun.
The Uys delegation proceeded into Zululand, guided by Richard King but were halted on the south bank of the Tugela, the river being in flood. However, Uys himself had fallen ill with fever and his younger brother, Johannes, had taken his place. Dingane, well aware through his spy network of their coming, had sent a senior induna (chief), with an escort of a hundred warriors, ahead to meet the Boers along the way but, alas, the flooded Tugela separated the two parties. Consequently the best that could be achieved was an agreement in principle that Dingane would be happy to cede the territory (that had been ceded so often before), to Uys and his followers. So, having shouted the essential terms of the negotiation back and forth across the raging Tugela, and having convinced themselves that all too easily had they acquired a slice of paradise, the Uys delegation hastened back to impart the glad tidings to their kin. Whether it was truly Dingane’s intention to bestow Port Natal on a people he had yet to meet is another matter.
At the same time other Voortrekker groups were sizing up alternative locations of the African interior, some as far as 400 miles north of Port Natal and, as the crow flies, almost 1,000 miles from Cape Town. Barring the path of one such group, led by Sarel Cilliers, was a warrior chief by the name of Mzilikazi. In the time of King Shaka, Mzilikazi had been a regimental commander but had fallen foul of his king. Well aware of the fate that awaited him, Mzilikazi kaMatshobana absconded with his entire regiment and would in time found a nation and kingdom of his own, the Matabele, and in the process acquire a reputation for ferocity which equalled that of Shaka himself. Dingane’s regiments had, in the recent past, engaged Mzilikazi in battle and had found their match. During the twenty years that had elapsed since Mzilikazi had defected from the Zulu kingdom, he had through conquest amassed fifty-six regiments of warriors. Then the emigrating Boer convoys entered his domain. Mzilikazi’s warriors fell upon the covered wagons, but not before the Boers had formed their convoy into a fighting laager at a place they later called Vegkop. With the wagons chained together, thornbush barriers rammed into the gaps between the wheels and with the women reloading the heavy-calibre flintlock muskets, the men kept the courageous but impetuous warriors at bay. Although they charged again and again, they found the embattled laager to be impregnable and were slaughtered in their hundreds. Then, as the defeated Matabele withdrew, the Boers mounted their already saddled horses and set off in pursuit, shooting the warriors down and turning their defeat into a rout.
The news of Mzilikazi’s disastrous encounter struck like a thunderbolt of fear into the hearts of southern Africa’s native rulers including the mighty Dingane. Like Shaka before him, Dingane feared the fulfilment of Jacob’s prophecy. But if the white man were to deprive him of his realm, Dingane had always assumed that his enemy would be the redcoat English soldiers. Now he had cause to think again. Surely he was about to come face-to-face with the enemy, revealed at last as Boer immigrants. It was as Dingane pondered thus that he received news that another wave of immigrants were poised beyond the Drakensberg Mountains, ready to descend into the Zulu Kingdom. Their leader, Piet Retief, and a few companions were already en route to put into effect the treaty terms that had been shouted across the flooded Tugela River three years before.
In the meantime, Allen Gardiner had returned to Africa arriving in Cape Town in March 1837. He had married again during his brief spell in England and was accompanied by his new wife and three children from his previous marriage. He also brought with him the Reverend Francis Owen, of the Church Missionary Society, who would be Gardiner’s ‘Second-in-Command’ in his war with the devil and the saving of Zulu souls. Owen was destined for the front line of battle: he was to take up residence with his family in the heart of Zululand at Mgungundlovu and within hailing distance of Dingane’s own abode.
Apart from acquiring a new wife, Gardiner’s visit to England had been less than successful. He had hoped to return with administrative power over the population of Port Natal, an authority that would enable him to make arrests and pass sentence for certain crimes. In attempting to achieve such authority he had given evidence in London before a select committee during which he presented the English population at the port as little better than rogues and pirates. The news of his disparaging description preceded him and when he arrived at Port Natal in May, he found himself to be unpopular and resented. Furthermore, during his absence, others had taken over as leaders at the Port, men who were more concerned with their safety than with their salvation.
Their leader, Alexander Biggar, would have been able to claim with some justification that he was the first red soldier to set foot in Natal and, not only a red soldier but a redcoat to boot, albeit that he was now neither, having been cashiered from the 85th Regiment of Foot on a charge of misappropriation of regimental funds. But Biggar was the right sort of swashbuckling man to lead the Port Natal community at that time. In fact, Biggar had been a cavalier type from an early age. Shortly after his fourteenth birthday he had been commissioned as an ensign in his father’s regiment, the 85th Foot; four years later, after the regiment had returned to the United Kingdom from Martinique, he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant and promptly eloped with the local minister’s daughter, Mary Straton. The pair were married at Gretna Green. In due course Biggar was promoted to Captain Paymaster of the 85th and, shortly thereafter, the regiment left for Spain where it was engaged in many bloody battles of the Napoleonic Wars thereafter. In 1812, Britain went to war with America and as part of the Light Infantry Brigade, the 85th attacked Washington where, together with other buildings, it burnt the White House and the Navy Yard. But it was a disastrous war for Britain and after two months the invaders were forced to withdraw. Back in England Biggar was held responsible for shortages amounting to £1,300 and court-martialled.
Biggar and his wife Mary, despite the many trials and disruptions their lives must have been fraught with, had no less than thirteen children, ten of whom were daughters. All the girls died, as did one of the sons, and it was with the remaining two boys that Biggar, now the appointed leader of a contingent of twenty-five settlers, landed at the Cape in 1820. However, constant warfare with the local Xhosa tribe led to his impoverishment and when in 1835 his farm was plundered, he decided to start life again in Natal. Supported by his two sons, Robert and George, he formed the Port Natal Volunteers and, due to the perceived threat from Dingane, set about the construction of a fort that, as we shall hear, was to be the home of the first redcoat occupation of Port Natal. In the meantime Dingane’s threat to attack the port was not to be ignored as the traders had taken to harbouring runaways and kidnapping young girls from the Zulu kingdom. The fact that Robert and George had both acquired young Zulu maidens by this method did not help matters.
Apart from earning a living by trading and ivory hunting, the Biggars, it seems, did bring an element of discipline to the otherwise unruly community. Undeterred, however, Gardiner lost no time in departing to state his case with Dingane and to pave the way for the Reverend Owen’s arrival.
By this time, Dingane, heartily sick of his greed-driven white neighbours, had forbidden all entry to Zululand, causing hunting and trading to cease. He was, however, delighted to see Gardiner and to receive his customary generosity: more gold epaulettes and a silver watch, amongst other things. Port Natal and its future was high on the agenda and it was not long before Gardiner was on his way back with a document, drawn by himself, signed by Dingane and witnessed by three of his senior izinduna, all of whom had made their mark, granting to the King of England the territory that had already been bestowed so many times before – more recently it will be remembered to Gardiner himself and later by yelling the terms of its cession to Piet Uys across the raging Tugela.
Gardiner, imagining there to be more to his meeting with the select committee than there had been, believed that the document carrying Dingane’s mark would be the foundation of a British Colony. But he was to be doomed to disappointment. In London Lord Glenelg (Secretary of State for War and the Colonies) was penning a dispatch that would damn all Gardiner’s hopes and dreams of authority in the land of Port Natal:
They [Her Majesty’s Government] are aware, too, of the fact that, without police, a gaol, and a Minister of Justice, the value of such a statute would be comparatively small; but they did not, on this account, deem it right to forego the use of the best obtainable remedy against the lawless conduct of British subjects on the African continent. Captain Gardiner seems to have understood the statute as implying a pledge on behalf of the government to do all that is necessary for giving complete effect to the jurisdiction with which it invests him. It is necessary, therefore, to deny the existence of any such tacit or implied engagement.
His late Majesty disclaimed, in the most direct terms, all right of sovereignty at Port Natal, and all intentions to extend his domain in that direction; and Captain Gardiner was distinctly informed by me that the Government entertained no projects of colonization in that quarter. Port Natal is a foreign land, governed by foreign chiefs, and the Government of this country has neither the right nor the intention to interfere with those chiefs.
So, for the time being, Britain had no wish to acquire Zululand or any part of it.
Five months after his arrival at Port Natal, in an atmosphere of discord and upheaval, the Reverend Owen, his wife, his sister and their Welsh maid, lugging a huge Welsh bible, made their way by wagon to Mgungundlovu with Owen determined to convert and save the souls of all he encountered. He was, however, bound by strict instructions not to involve himself in anything of a secular nature. In particular he was not to enter into any deals with Dingane whereby he would use his influence to have runaways returned to the kingdom: Gardiner’s contemptible arrangements with Dingane had received severe criticism in England.
Owen had been chosen by Gardiner as a man cast in his own religious mould and he would have found it difficult to find someone less suited to establish rapport with both the white traders and the Zulus alike. Obsessed with religion and his own righteousness; untiring in his zeal and with a craving to expose sin in all those he encountered, Owen was a very tiresome fellow.
Prior to Owen leaving for Mgungundlovu, the traders at the port would flee at his approach lest he snare them with an impassioned and impromptu sermon. On arrival in Zululand his complex and irrational religious claims became a subject of ridicule and a cause of irritation. The likelihood of a single Zulu convert to Christianity became remote. His attempt to convert Dingane was a disaster. Richard Hulley, a Port Natal trader whom Owen had employed as his interpreter, later recorded the following account:
The missionary [Owen] after speaking for about half an hour and putting as much gospel truth as he could into his message, was told by the King to stop as he had heard enough. Dingane then said ‘I have a few questions to ask you that I may understand. First, do you say there is a God and but one God?’ The minister replied: ‘Yes.’ ‘Second, do you say there is a heaven for good people and only one?’ Reply: ‘Yes’: ‘Third. Do you say there is a devil?’ Reply: ‘Yes’: ‘Four, do you say there is a hell for wicked people?’ The minister replied: ‘Yes’. Said the King; ‘If that is your belief, you are of no use to me or my people; we knew all that before you came to preach to us, I and my people believe that there is only one God – I am that God, we believe there is only one place to which all good people go, that is Zululand – we believe there is one place where all bad people go, there’, said he, pointing to a rocky hill in the distance. ‘There is hell, where all my wicked people go’. (The king had pointed to the Hill of Slaughter, near his kraal which was white with bones of his victims). Then Dingane added: ‘The Chief who lives there is uMatitwani [Matiwane] the head of the Amangwane [amaNgwane]. I put him to death and made him the devil, chief of all wicked people who die. You see then, there are but two chiefs in this country, uMatitwani and myself. I am the Great Chief – the God of the living, and uMatitwani is the Great Chief of the wicked. I have now told you my belief; [Chief Matiwane, of the amaNgwane tribe, had incurred the wrath of the Zulu monarchy some years earlier and, subsequently, believing Dingane willing to forgive him, had journeyed to Mgungundhlovu. There he was cordially received but, later having ordered his eyes to be put out, Dingane executed Matiwane on the hill adjacent to his new capital. Matiwane’s was most likely the first execution of any note to take place at Mgungundhlovu and the hill was thereafter called kwaMatiwane and it is still known by that name today.] I do not want you to trouble me again with the fiction of you English people. You can remain in my country as long as you conduct yourselves properly.’
It was the first and last time that Owen was allowed to preach the gospel to the Zulu. But living in hope that Dingane would relent, especially if Owen associated the white man’s mysterious accomplishments of writing and drawing with the white man’s religion, Owen undertook to teach both skills to whomever – from children to the King. Dingane was particularly fascinated by the way in which news was conveyed by letter and was determined to become literate. He was intrigued when Owen showed him a copy of Gardiner’s book, A Journey Through the Zulu Country, that had just arrived having being published in London earlier in the year. At first Owen had been apprehensive. Gardiner had drawn a likeness of Dingane in dancing attire which adorned the front piece of the volume but far from being offended, the King was delighted. But Owen’s subtle attempt to introduce religion into the conversation, despite reading several passages from Gardiner’s journal, ‘fell to the floor’. However, the Boer emigrants would soon be calling on Owen’s literary skills in order to put their case for a large slice of the Zulu kingdom.
Dingane must have begun to feel overwhelmed by the white man’s appeals for land, ivory, concessions and women whilst they offered nothing in return except incomprehensible rhetoric. One of Dingane’s greatest desires was to obtain firearms. However, the traders of Port Natal were determined to thwart his aspiration to arm his warriors with European weapons least they should be turned upon themselves. A certain number of firearms had been procured by the Zulu monarchy but most were either useless or had been made so by the traders. In January 1837, the South African Commercial Trader, a Cape Colony journal, reported: ‘The traders trading with Dingane in guns and powder are becoming rich – but they have hit on a happy expedient of cheating the Chief, who has at last discovered the roguery. They sell him guns, but before delivering them they take either the main spring out of the lock, or some screw, which renders the gun useless.’
Nevertheless, Port Natal traders were becoming alarmed at the number of guns that, one way or the other, were finding their way into Zululand. In November 1836, fourteen traders signed a letter of complaint addressed to the Grahamstown Journal:
. . . Mr Blanckenberg remained at the King’s place on the pretext of having important affairs with His Majesty. He shortly afterwards returned to Natal with thirty to forty heads of cattle when it transpired that the greater part of these were the produce of a sale effected by him to Dingane of a new elephant gun. In a few days after his arrival heforwarded to the King a supply of powder and lead, with a boy to cast the balls, at the King’s residence. The great price obtained for the gun induced Messrs. Lake and Isaacs [Could this be Nathaniel Isaacs having returned to Port Natal?] to follow his example. They have since sold to Dingane four elephant guns, with a proportionate supply of ammunition. Mr. R Vigor, on a late journey to the King, also sold a double-barrelled percussion elephant gun for six elephants teeth. Mr. P Kew, who has been trading fourteen guns, has also, according to his own accounts, made Dingane a present of two guns. And there are reports of one or two Hottentots following his example, and of another Hottentot being on the road to Natal to repair six guns belonging to Dingane . . .
Dingane, however, wanted an open and regular trade in firearms which, much to his chagrin, most traders were set to deny him. He also complained bitterly about the decimation of his elephants and illegal hunting: ‘I have given the whites from the Imslatense [Mhlathuze] River to the Umzimvoobo [Mzimvubu] to shoot in, which is surely large enough [Approximately 30,000 square miles – about the size of Ireland] but if they come and kill all my elephants, where shall I procure ivory to purchase things from them?’
It was thus in the mounting pressure of white demands and encroachment that Dingane received a letter from Piet Retief, with his convoy of no less than a thousand wagons, all assembled at a place called Thaba Nchu, in present day Lesotho, ready to descend the passes of the Drakensberg Mountains into Zululand. Retief believed that he already had a foot in the door of the Kingdom as it was Piet Uys, the voorloper (a person who leads or goes ahead) of the convoy, who had negotiated a deal on the banks of the flooded Tugela months earlier.
Retief’s letter, dated Port Natal 19 October 1837, had emphasised the Boers’ desire to acquire uninhabited land and live in peace as neighbours with the Zulu people. However, Retief made no reference to the location of such an uninhabited place and subtly referred to the recent Boer victory over Mzilikazi. He signed it: ‘ . . . your true friend, Retief, Governor, etc.’
Before dispatching the letter, the Boer leader read it aloud to a gathering of the Port Natal traders who were well aware that the territory Retief had in mind for a Boer Republic was none other than the land of their own occupation, the territory given, via Gardiner, to the King of England. However, they were more than happy that the Boers should take it over as clearly it was of no interest to their King or his government. (The officer that Sir Benjamin D’Urban had promised to ‘speedily be sent to Port Natal’ two years earlier had never arrived.) To make matters clear, fourteen traders signed a letter addressed to Piet Retief expressing their hope that Boer and Briton would eventually reside as neighbours. Retief replied: ‘. . . I do not doubt that the Almighty, in disposing of events, will ordain that we should be united for our mutual happiness.’ Thus it was more or less agreed – or at least intended – that Boer and Briton would unite against, one must assume, the Zulu monarch. Alexander Biggar was as pleased as anyone at the turn of events and shortly after the Boers had established a republic they would appoint him ‘Landrost’ (mayor or magistrate).
It was not long before Retief and a few companions received Dingane’s consent to proceed to the capital. The majority of the Boers regarded Retief’s mission as so fraught with danger and treachery that he was begged not to go but to send another, ‘from the many who volunteered’, in his place. But Retief would not hear of it. The deputation reached Mgungundlovu at the beginning of November 1837 and on arrival were welcomed by two days of spectacular mass dancing displays put on by the king’s regiments. Dingane, more of an impresario than a warrior king, was at pains to impress. On the great parade ground thousands of warriors clad in skins and feathers, executed feats of martial dancing, combining bounds and leaps of astounding agility, their performance accompanied all the while by an overwhelming din of militant choruses.
Then came the inevitable display of wealth, the parade of thousands of cattle all of the same colour. The Rev. Owen was present and that night recorded in his diary: ‘He [Dingane] has lately been collecting an immense herd of oxen from distant parts of the country for no other conceivable motive than to display his wealth to the Dutch.’
Retief also marvelled at Dingane’s ‘beautiful habitation’ with its many pillars clad in exquisite beadwork. Finally, on the third day, and with the Boers duly impressed, Dingane consented to get down to business. Retief’s hopes and expectations came close to being dashed.
Owen was sent for and at Dingane’s dictation and Owen’s translation, wrote the following reply to the letter Retief had written from Port Natal almost two weeks earlier:
To go on now with the request you made for the land. I am quite willing to grant it but first I wish to explain that a great many cattle have been stolen from me from the outskirts of my country by people with clothing, horses and guns. These people told the Zoolus that they were Boers, and that one part was gone to Port Natal and that they (the Zoolus) would see now what would come upon them! It is my wish now that you should shew that you are not guilty of the charge which has been laid against you, as I now believe you to be. It is my request that you should retake my cattle and bring them to me, and if possible send me the thief, and that will take all suspicion away from me, and I will cause you to know that I am your friend. I will then grant your request.
Having read the letter, a dismayed Retief denied the implied charge and suggested instead that a man by the name of Sekonyela, occupying territory high up on the Drakensberg Mountains, could be the culprit as his tribe dressed in European clothes and, furthermore, Zulu cattle had been seen in his possession. Dingane suggested that Sekonyela should be captured together with any guns and horses that he might have.
It was a daunting task. Retief was to retrace his steps for several hundred miles, climb almost 10,000 feet into the Drakensberg Mountains and attempt the recapture of hundreds of cattle from what would surely be a hostile chieftain. With apparent good grace Retief and his companions prepared to depart to accomplish Dingane’s bidding. Owen, however, attempted to discourage them, pointing out Dingane’s duplicity and that the territory they coveted had already been granted to ‘the British Government’ and would they, the Boers, if required, in order to take up occupation, become British subjects once again? Retief replied emphatically No. But, as the Boers rode back to Port Natal, Owen’s words must have rankled, giving Retief cause to ponder whether or not he was riding on a fool’s errand whilst the Zulu king planned some treachery. Foolishly, Retief decided to send a letter threatening retribution should harm befall him and using Mzilikazi’s defeat as an example of the Christian God’s vengeance:
To Dingane, King of the amaZulus.
Port Natal
. . . Massilicatzi [Mzilikazi], I do not doubt, has fled away, for he must believe that I shall punish him for his improper conduct. Have I not already grounds for complaint in that I have been constrained to kill so many of his nation simply because they executed his cruel orders?
That which just befallen Massilicatzi leads me to believe that the Almighty, the all-knowing God, will not permit him to live much longer. God’s great book teaches us that the kings who behave as Massilicatzi has done, are severely punished and that it is not granted to them to live and reign for long; and if you wish to learn more about how God deals with evil kings like these, you can find out from the missionaries who live in your country. You may believe all that these preachers tell you concerning God and his government of the world.
Regarding such matters, I’d advise you to speak frequently with these gentlemen, whose wish it is to preach to you God’s work, for they will teach you of how justly God has ruled, and still rules, over all the kings of the earth. . . .
As for the thieves who took your cattle, and what they have said, namely that they were Boers, it was a clever device to induce you to believe that I was a thief, so that they might escape with impunity. I am confident that I shall prove to the King that my people and I are innocent of this crime; Knowing my innocence, I feel that you have imposed upon me a severe obligation which I must fulfil in order to prove that I am not guilty. As for this deed which you require me to perform, accompanied as it is by expense, difficulty and risk to life, I must be answerable to you, to the world and to God, who knows all.
I go now, placing my trust in God, who gives me hope that I shall be able to execute this enterprise in such a manner as to be able to give a satisfactory answer to all. That said, I shall await convincing proof that I am dealing with a King who keeps his word . . .
If Dingane had still been pondering his options when Retief departed to recover the royal cattle, there can be little doubt that Retief’s belligerent and admonishing letter persuaded the Zulu king that the Boers were the white men of Jacob’s prophecy and must be dealt with accordingly. Their God and the God of the missionaries being one and the same – yet confusingly different: the one, as continuously described by Gardiner and Owen as being a God of love and forgiveness, and He of the Boers a God of wrath and vengeance: one who rode with his people into battle, sword in hand, to do their bidding. Had not the Boers, aided by Him, recently slaughtered, according to their own boast, 3,000 Matabele!
Yet there may have been another aspect to Dingane’s thinking in deciding the fate of the Boers. The British government of the Cape, far from wishing to see the departure of thousands of its best frontier settlers, had done much to discourage the Boer emigration and had declared that they would not only retain the status of British citizens but would be subject to British law no matter where they wandered in Africa below the 25th line of latitude – a demarcation that extended across the continent as far north as present day Swaziland and, at the time hundreds of miles from any British authority. It was legislation impossible to implement but nevertheless designed to foil the establishment of an independent Boer state. It is possible that Gardiner, regarding himself as the local representative of the British government, would have viewed the arrival of the Boers with hostility, their presence thwarting his hopes for the establishment of a British colony. Adulphe Delegorgue (of whom more later), a French scientist-adventurer, who was present in Port Natal at the time, and, it must be mentioned, detested the English in general and English missionaries in particular (He described Owen, a Cambridge MA, as ‘probably some wretched artisan from England . . . the sort of sorry creature England sometimes uses to propagate her ideas’), maintained that Gardiner and Owen had told Dingane that the Boers had ‘. . . removed themselves from the authority of their King. They would not behave in this way if they were good subjects. They are tramps who would make dangerous neighbours. They will repay the good you do them with evil.’ This is quite plausible as Jane Williams, Owen’s maid, later testified: ‘. . . a kafir [sic] messenger from Dingaan [sic] came running to us and said we were not to be frightened, that we were King George’s children and that the Boers were runaways from him.’
If that were indeed true, Dingane would likely have regarded Retief and his followers as runaways from their monarch – people comparable to his own defecting subjects and deserving of the same fate. He may even have thought that by doing away with them he would find favour with King George. Combined with Dingane’s fear of the emigrants’ seemingly superhuman fighting ability in defeating Mzilikazi for so little loss to themselves, the fear of their weapons, their horses and of Jacob’s prophecy, the missionary’s disparaging communications – if indeed such had been made – may just have tipped the scales in Dingane’s decision to exterminate the emigrants, believing it to be necessary before they destroyed him.
All along the passes, high up in the Drakensberg Mountains, a thousand wagons had been waiting, the occupants aware that if Retief was successful in recovering the royal cattle, the promised land, a lush and inviting tropical paradise that lay far below, would be theirs. They had been ordered not to move, not to descend until Retief sent word that the treaty with the Zulu king had been well and truly ratified. But the emigrants had grown weary of waiting in the cold and barren heights. As rumours spread that Retief had been successful in his quest and in capturing Sekonyela, impatience overcame caution and the massive migration down the passes began.
To the Zulu people who inhabited the region, it would have been little different had the invaders been aliens from space. Their appearance, with their great beards and flapping clothing, was particularly frightening; they also rode strange animals that did their bidding and, most terrifying of all, they could kill from a distance with a peculiar-shaped staff that emitted fire and smoke and a noise like thunder in the mountains – the very mountains from which these bizarre beings had appeared. The Zulu clans whose villages and cultivated fields lay in the path of the invaders, fled leaving their crops to be harvested by the aliens. Soon Erasmus Smit, a Boer preacher, was able to boast: ‘From the deserted Kaffir villages more than eighty heavy wagon loads [of food] have been brought into the camps, so that through God’s guidance we harvest and eat what others have planted . . .’ So confident were emigrants that Retief had concluded a deal and an alliance with the Zulu king that Smit further eulogised: ‘We thanked our God for hearing our prayers and for the good land which He has given us through all the labour of our Governor [Retief] and the good kindness of Dingane’s heart.’ Little did Smit know that within days Dingane would decide to destroy them all.
It had taken Retief almost three months to fulfil his quest. He had captured Sekonyela but guessing his fate, had later kindly released him. And instead of saving the booty of firearms and horses for Dingane, Retief had distributed them amongst his own followers. Through his network of spies, all this would have been known to Dingane who had long been preparing for Retief’s return to Mgungundlovu. Dingane was well aware that on this occasion it would be no mere diplomatic deputation of a few men as it had been previously but that there now approached a force of white men seventy strong, and as many native followers, all armed and mounted. Either a confrontation or an amicable agreement was inevitable; and, whatever the outcome, Dingane wanted Gardiner as the representative of King George, and John Cane representing the Port Natal Traders, to be present – presumably in the capacities as either witnesses or supporters of his actions. Owen was summoned to write the invitation and Richard Hulley was sent off to Port Natal to deliver it. Dingane, ominously provided Hulley with an escort of twenty warriors: ‘. . . ostensibly to carry anything I might have to bring but really to watch my movements, and to learn anything of importance that might arise,’ Hulley wrote. But Gardiner, who would normally have leapt at Dingane’s invitation, had seen Piet Retief and his armed commando riding north and, as Hulley later remembered, ‘declined to be present at the meeting, telling me he did not think it would be safe’.
At sunrise, on 2 February, while Retief was still some way from Mgungundhlovu, Dingane sent for Owen and dictated a letter. Owen recorded in his diary:
The letter was characteristic of the Chief. He said that his heart was now content, because he had got his cattle again: He requested that the Chief of the Boers would send to all his people and order them to come to the capital with him, but without their horses: He promised to gather together all his army to sing and dance in the presence of the Dutch, who he desired would also dance: He said he would give orders that cattle should be slain for them at every place thro’ which they passed on their road, and he promised to give a country. I asked how they could come without their horses. He said tell them then that they must bring their horses and dance upon their horses in the middle of the town, that it may be known who can dance best, the Zooloos or the Abalongo, the general term for white people.
Nothing was said about the guns or horses taken from Sekonyela. The Dutch will be too wise to expose themselves in the manner proposed, but I cannot conceive that Dingane meditates any treachery, which, however, he would have the power (if he chose) to exercise toward them, should they venture to come.
The following morning a volley of musket fire announced Retief’s arrival. Owen, now full of apprehension, was at home:
Large parties of Zooloos in their war dress were yesterday evening entering the town. This morning when we were at family prayers the unusual sound of muskets was heard from the west; This proved to be the arrival of the Boers who presently entered the town on horseback with their guns in their hands. An immense concourse of Zooloos were present to receive them. The deputation brought with them the cattle which they had recovered from Sekonyela. The Boers immediately showed Dingane the way in which they danced on horseback by making a sham charge at one another making the air resound with their guns. This was something the Zoolu Chief had never witnessed. In their turn the Zooloos exhibited their agility in dancing. About noon I paid a visit to Mr. Retief, who with his party (after the amusement was over) were seated under the Euphorbia trees fronting the gate of the town. The answer he gave to Dingane when he demanded the guns and horses was to shew the messenger his grey hairs and bid him to tell his master that he was not dealing with a child.’
Dingane had been unsuccessful in separating the Boers from their guns and horses but he would try again. In the meantime Retief and his men, tired of the incessant dancing and clamour and anxious to be on their way, pressed Dingane for his signature to the treaty which, written in English, had already been prepared by the Boers. Its content was much the same as the previous treaties that the Zulu monarchs had signed when bequeathing the territory. But Dingane, most likely awaiting the arrival of Gardiner, continued with his spectacle of martial dancing.
Sometime, probably later that day, Dingane having been informed by his spies that neither Gardiner nor John Cane could be expected, decided to proceed without their presence and, still manoeuvring to get possession of the Boer firearms, further decided that the best ruse would be to sign the treaty. Thus he and three senior izinduna put their mark to the document which read:
Know all men by this that whereas Pieter Retief, Governor of the Dutch, immigrant South Afrikans, has retaken my cattle which Senkonyela had stolen which cattle he the said Retief now deliver unto me – I Dingane, King of the Zoolas, do hereby certify and declare that I thought fit to resign, unto him the said Retief and his countrymen (on reward of the case here above mentioned) the place called Port Natal together with all the land annexed, that is to say from Dogeela [Tugela] to the Omsoboebo [Mzimvubu] River westward and from the sea to the north as far as the land may be useful and in my possession which I did by this and give unto them for their everlasting property.
The treaty was signed to the great joy of the Boers and, having thanked Dingane profusely, they obtained his permission to retire to their camp in preparation for a triumphant departure on the morrow.
But there was at least one white person at Mgungundhlovu who knew that the Boers had little time to live. William Wood, a youngster of about twelve years of age who had been brought up amongst the Zulus and spoke their language as fluently as they, had overheard a plan to kill Retief and all his men. This startling news he relayed to Jane Williams, Owen’s housemaid, who, perhaps due to the boy’s youth, or her own fear, ridiculed him. Nevertheless, there was a feeling of unease amongst the Boers and many wanted to mount up without delay and leave Mgungundhlovu far behind them. But Retief would not hear of it, saying that he trusted Dingane and believed that the Boers had been treated justly. Furthermore, Dingane had requested that the white men delay their departure in order to toast mutual friendship with just one more draught of native beer, to which Retief had agreed. With the treaty safe in his leather pouch, Retief seems to have lost all caution and, instead, to have become overwhelmed with trust in the Zulu king. He even agreed that, as a gesture of respect and friendship, the Boers would leave their guns in camp and would go unarmed to drink their stirrup cup of beer.
7. Piet Retief was confident he could negotiate a deal with King Dingane but, on Dingane’s orders, he and his companions were brutally murdered. (KZN Archives, Pietermaritzburg)
The Reverend Owen recorded the events of the following day:
Feb, 6 – A dreadful day in the annals of the mission! My pen shudders to give an account of it. This morning as l was sitting in the shade of my wagon reading the Testament, the usual messenger came with hurry and anxiety depicted in his looks. I was sure he was about to pronounce something serious, and what was his commission! Whilst it shewed consideration and kindness in the Zoolu Monarch towards me, it disclosed a horrid instance of perfidy – too horrid to be described – towards the unhappy men who have for these three days been his guests, but are now no more. He sent to tell me not to be frightened as he was going to kill the Boers. This news came like a thunder stroke to myself and to every successive member of my family as they heard it. The reason assigned for this treacherous conduct was that they were going to kill him, that they had come here and he had now learned all their plans. The messenger was anxious for my reply, but what could I say? Fearful on the one hand of seeming to justify the treachery and on the other of exposing myself and family to probable danger if I appeared to take their part. Moreover I could not but feel that it was my duty to appraise the Boers of the intended massacre whilst certain death would have ensured (I apprehended) if I had been detected in giving this information. However, I was released from this dilemma by beholding an awful spectacle! My attention was directed to the bloodstained hill nearby opposite my hut and on the other side of my wagon, which hides it from my view, where all the executions at this fearful spot take place and which was now destined to add sixty more bleeding carcasses to the number of those which had already cried to heaven for vengeance. [The number slain that morning including retainers was closer to 150]. ‘There (said someone), they are killing the Boers now.’ I turned my eyes and behold! An immense multitude on the hill. About nine or ten Zulus to each Boer were dragging their helpless unarmed victims to the fateful spot, where those eyes which awakened this morning to see the cheerful light of day for the last time, are now closed in death. I lay myself down on the ground. [Owen actually fainted.] Mrs and Miss Owen were not more thunderstruck than myself. We each comforted the other. Presently the deed of blood being accomplished the whole multitude returned to the town to meet their sovereign, and as they drew near to him set up a shout which reached the station and continued for some time. Meanwhile, I myself, had been kept from all fear for my personal safety, for I considered the message of Dingane to me as an indication that he had no ill designs against his missionary, especially as the messenger informed (me) that the Boer interpreter, an Englishman from Port Natal was to be preserved. [In the excitement, Tom Halstead, the interpreter, was mistakenly killed.] Nevertheless, fears afterwards obtruded themselves on me, when I saw half a dozen men with shields sitting near a hut, and I began to tremble lest we were to fall the next victims! . . . We then knelt down and I prayed, really not knowing but that in this position we might be called into another world. Such was the effect of the first gust of fear on my mind. I remember the words: ‘Call upon me in the day of trouble and I will hear thee.’ . . . Dingane’s conduct was worthy of a savage as he is. It was base and treacherous, to say the least of it – the offspring of cowardice and fear. Suspicious of his warlike neighbours, jealous of their power, dreading the neighbourhood of their arms, he felt as every savage would have done in like circumstances that these men were his enemies and being unable to attack them openly, he massacred them clandestinely!’ [Earlier that morning Owen had conversed with two of Retief’s men and recalled that they had spoken kindly of Dingane.] When I asked them what they thought of Dingane, they said he was good: so unsuspicious were they of his intentions. He had promised to assign over to them the whole country between the Tugela and the Umzimvubo Rivers, and this day the paper of transfer was to be signed. My mind has always been filled with the notion that however friendly the two powers had heretofore seem to be, war in the nature of things was inevitable between them.
Yet, despite the horror of what had happened, Owen was able to ponder on what advantage it may provide for his mission. He continued to address his diary:
The hand of God is in this affair, but how it will turn out favourably to the mission, it is impossible to shew. The Lord direct our course. I have seen by my glass [telescope] that Dingane has been sitting most of the morning since this dreadful affair in the centre of his town, an army in several divisions collected before him. About noon the whole body ran in the direction from which the Boers came. They are (I cannot allow myself to doubt) sent to join others who have been ordered to fall unawares on the main body of the Boers who are encamped at the head of the Tugela, for to suppose that Dingane should murder this handful and not make himself sure of the whole number with their guns, horses and cattle, would be to conceive him capable of egregious folly, as he must know that the other Boers will avenge the death of their countrymen. Certain it is as far as human foresight can judge, we shall speedily hear either of the massacre of the whole company of Boers, or what is scarcely less terrible of wars and bloodshed, of which there will be no end till either the Boers or the Zulu nation cease to be.
Owen, his family and Hulley’s wife and children spent a terror-filled day wondering whether, at any moment, they too might be dragged to kwaMatiwane, there to suffer the same fate as the Boers. However, the following day Dingane sent a messenger assuring them that as the people of King George, they would come to no harm and it was mentioned that young Thomas Halstead, the Englishman that had accompanied the Boers as their interpreter, had, in the uproar and confusion, been killed by mistake, which the king greatly regretted. In the meantime Hulley, having made his abortive visit to Gardiner, had been delayed for several days on this return journey due to the Tugela being impassable. It was not until three days after the massacre that he at last approached Mgungundlovu and was immediately alarmed at the almost tangible feeling of dread that the silence of the place brought upon him. Then:
. . . To the right of the Great Place, in the direction of the execution ground. I observed a large flock of vultures hovering over the place of the dead. At once I suspected that there had been some evil work going on during my absence. Leading my horse I descended the hill. About half way down I saw lying by the side of the path the sleeve of a white shirt, which had been forcibly torn from the garment; it was partly covered with blood. This greatly alarmed me, and I feared lest the mission party with my family had been put to death. When I reached the king’s kraal I rode up to the principal entrance, and from there saw a number of saddles piled one upon the other. I sent a message in to Dingane to give notice of my return; but I was anxious about the safety of my family that without waiting for the messenger to come out I mounted my horse and galloped off on the way to our huts, to see if they were all right.
Hulley eventually found the whole of the missionary party unharmed but hardly had he time to express his joy when a messenger arrived summoning him immediately to the king’s presence where he found Dingane in a peevish and dangerous mood, clearly expecting Hulley to condone the massacre on the basis that the Boers had been, or would become, the enemies of both the Zulu and English alike. When Hulley remained impassive and unsupportive, Dingane angrily retorted:
I see that every white man is an enemy to the black; every black an enemy to the white: they do not love each other, and never will. I find fault with the Boers in that they disobeyed my instructions. The chief that I told them to bring to me, they let go. Don’t you think I have done a good thing in getting rid of my enemies at one stroke? . . . What is it that Captain Gardiner and John Cane had heard that led them to decline coming to the meeting? . . . I am sorry that they were not here, as they fully deserved what the Boers received.
Hulley and Owen were aware that their lives teetered on the swing of Dingane’s mood and that at any moment they too could be an additional feast for the vultures on kwaMatiwane. But suddenly Dingane’s disposition changed. He gave them a pot of beer and sent them home.
The following day Hulley and Owen decided to seek Dingane’s permission to return with their families to Port Natal. But the king’s mood had changed again. Hulley later recalled the scene:
In reply to our request he said: ‘I must take time to think about it. I don’t yet understand you. I believe you are as much my enemies as the Boers whom I killed. My people tell me that when the Dutch [Boers] were put to death you [Owen] set up a loud cry. Would you cry for me if I were killed? No, I don’t think you would! I was told also that you stood on the front of the wagon with your glass [telescope] in your hand, and that when you saw what was going on you fell down in a faint, and were taken up insensible. No, you cannot be my friends, you are my deadly enemies. If I had done what was proper I should have had you put out of the way at the time I put to death my other enemies.’
Owen protested and cried that Dingane was mistaken. But the king interrupted.
‘I want to hear no more of your lies,’ said the chief. ‘I have had proof that you are my enemy, and I believe it, whatever you may say to the contrary.’
Shaken and consumed with dread, the two white men whispered one to the other the belief that they were about to die. They then fell silent. In the hush that followed they expected Dingane, at any second, by the nod of his head or the raising of a finger, to confirm their immediate and violent death. Then Hulley, with nothing to lose, boldly asked the king how he would explain the killing of the young interpreter, Thomas Halstead, to the English king, Hulley emphasising that Halstead was an Englishman, not a Boer. Hulley prompted that if Halstead’s death was indeed a mistake, Dingane would be wise to advise the Cape authorities. The king, taken aback, asked how this was to be done. Hulley replied that he and Owen would write a letter at Dingane’s dictation and take it with them. Within an hour, their wagons having been hurriedly packed, Owen and Hulley with their families, still fearful of treachery, headed out of Mgungundhlovu on their way back to Port Natal. Hulley’s boldness had saved their lives.
Owen’s prediction that Dingane would not stop at the massacre of Retief and his party but would send his regiments to wipe out the rest of the Boers, men, women and children, who were encamped amidst the streams and meadows of the Drakensberg foothills, proved to be prophetic. It was a slaughter more dreadful than that that had taken place on kwaMatiwane a few days earlier. Over 600 men, women and children were put to death, their wagons burnt, cattle taken and their possessions destroyed. Later, the Boers that survived, called the area ‘Weenen’ – ‘weeping’, and it is known by that name today.
Dingane had also been correct in his prediction that the English residents of the Port would side with their white Boer kin against him, a black man. As soon as the news of Retief’s death reached the ears of the traders going about their business in Zululand, most scampered back to Port Natal to form a defence. But that enterprising and entrepreneurial body of militia men, the Port Natal Volunteers, took the opportunity not only to retaliate but to line their pockets. Whilst Gardiner and many of the other white inhabitants clambered aboard the schooner Mary, which had fortuitously arrived, the Volunteers, led by Alexander Biggar, prepared to sally forth and within a week they were back at the port with hundreds of captured cattle plus as many Zulu women and children who could look to a future of being little better than slaves. Exalted by their success, the Port Natal Volunteers set out to repeat their success. It was a body to be reckoned with: 3,000 Natal Zulus of whom 400 were armed with muskets and had been well trained; the rest carried traditional weapons and all were finely disciplined under their white officers who included a number of the old hands, going back to the first arrivals, such as Richard Wood, John Cane, Charles Blankenberg and, of course, Alexander Biggar.
Bravely, but rashly, this army moved north and on reaching the Tugela its forward skirmishes crossed the river and came in sight of the main Zulu army, approximately 12,000 strong. On reporting this news there was dissent in the traders’ camp: John Cane and his supporters were in favour of building a fortification and then luring the Zulu army on to the muskets of the traders’ mercenaries. But Biggar was all for immediately crossing the river, taking the Zulus by surprise and putting them to flight. Biggar eventually had his way. Before the trader army, just across the Tugela, lay the Zulu garrison barracks of Ndondakasuka with the main army camping a little distance beyond. Stealthily crossing the Tugela in the darkness, at a drift familiar to many, the traders deployed around the barracks and, at a given signal fired into the flimsy huts, bringing down dozens of warriors as they rose from their sleeping mats, attempting to exit through the waist high doorways. The traders then advanced and set fire to all the huts, completely destroying the barracks.
Elated with this early success the invaders advanced, the musket men forming the front ranks ready to halt, take position and fire at a moment’s notice. Biggar must have been reminded of similar moments in Spain and America. The invaders did not have long to wait. Dawn had long since broken but through undulations and broken terrain the advancing Zulus were hard to discern and then, almost suddenly they were there, on top of the traders; now, with caution and stealth abandoned, the warriors were racing across the open ground, to be amongst the first to plunge their stabbing assegais into the enemy. But the traders remained steadfast while the musket men, firing at about one and a half rounds a minute, poured devastating volleys into the Zulu ranks. Legend has it that a deserter from H.M. forces, Robert Joyce, a former redcoat of the 72nd Regiment, played a distinguished role in halting the Zulu charge.
The jubilant trader army then advanced further, mainly to position itself against the threat of the Zulu right horn; Cane and Ogle’s companies being in the forefront of this manoeuvre. Indeed, the traders put the Zulus to flight but most likely, fearing a trap, the traders lost their nerve and instead of holding their ground, broke and ran for the river. The Zulus were not slow to react and raced to outflank them, denying the traders the drift crossing, pushing them instead onto and over some cliffs with a drop straight down into the river. The Zulu left horn now charged with great ferocity, forcing the traders back, and disdaining the musket fire that was dropping their companions in heaps, finally got to hand to hand contact with the assegai. The traders were massively outnumbered and driven back; back towards the Tugela where, with the river blocking further retreat, many were surrounded and killed. Robert, the last surviving child of Alexander Biggar, went down fighting and was put to death.
The horns of the Zulu army, that is the wings comprising the fleet-footed younger regiments, sprinted to close the encircling manoeuvre and it was almost over. Many of the Natal Zulus divested themselves of any telltale weaponry or insignia and passed themselves off as Zulu warriors. Those who managed to cross the Tugela, including Biggar, made as fast as they could to Port Natal where they found most of the white inhabitants, including Gardiner and the other missionaries, had sailed away to safety aboard theMary, Allen Gardiner never to return. But Providence was at hand, for hardly had the Mary crossed the harbour bar than the Comet, another little coaster, completely oblivious of the drama taking place ashore, dropped anchor. The remainder of the white survivors found room aboard, leaving their followers, their black wives and their coloured children, to survive as best they could whilst they, for over a week, sat tight watching the Zulus spread death and destruction a few hundred yards away across the water.
8. Shingana kaMpande, King Cetshwayo’s half-brother, fought at nDondakusuka, Isandlwana and Ulundi. (KZN Archives, Pietermaritzburg)
When at last the warriors’ rampage came to an end, a few brave souls rowed ashore to count the cost. Finally, reaching Gardiner’s home, they found it completely despoiled and amongst the ruins vast quantities of once-valuable books and, smashed beyond repair, the Broadwood piano that Gardiner had shipped from England at great expense.
Soon the Comet also set sail with Owen and his family amongst the crowd of passengers. He too had reluctantly accepted the futility of his mission. Another of the fleeing passengers, George Champion, the young American missionary, later wrote: ‘Now, when the Boers settle in Natal, woe to the natives under their control.’ Prophetic words indeed.
It was 4 May 1838. Only fourteen years had elapsed since the first white traders had sought contact with the Zulu nation and had been received with hospitality and friendship. However, the sun that had shone on Zululand prior to the coming of the white man, was now in decline and it would not be long before the Zulu nation would enter upon a twilight world of oppression, poverty and defeat. Dingane’s regiments that had been sent to wipe out all the Boers, men, women and children, failed to complete their mission. Those emigrants warned in time of the approaching peril, were able to laager their wagons and fight off the attackers. They were also able to hold on to those vast stretches of Dingane’s kingdom that they had already claimed as their own. And so a stand-off developed between the emigrants and the Zulu king whilst each plotted the extinction of the other; the Boers intent on vengeance and securing absolute rule over their promised land.
Word of the merits of the Boer paradise had spread back over the bleak Drakensberg Mountains where there were emigrants aplenty ready to risk all for a stake in ‘Natalia’, the name by which the Boers referred to the territory they had seized. From amongst the emigrant ranks emerged a charismatic leader, a big flamboyant man who carried a brace of pistols in his belt and from whose hand swung a naval cutlass: As seen by Piet Retief’s widow, Andries Pretorius was ‘a man sent by God’. He had assembled sixty-four wagons drawn by a thousand oxen. Each wagon had been stripped of everything non-essential until each became a segment of a mobile fortification. At night, or at the approach of an enemy, the oxen would be ‘outspanned’, that is, unharnessed, and the wagons pushed and pulled into a tight circle. The disselboom, or shaft, of each being pushed underneath the back of the wagon in front, and there chained. To prevent an agile enemy entry below the wagon floors or between the wheels, fighting, or wicket gates, made from thorn trees, were secured in place. Thus the whole became a substantial stronghold with oxen and horses tethered in the centre. There were sufficient horses to mount everyone, including the drivers and leaders. By the time Alexander Biggar, with a hundred Port Natal blacks, joined the column (Biggar was intent on avenging the death of his son Robert), Pretorius’ army amounted to 687 men armed with a variety of muzzle-loading firearms. And, well-prepared, each man carried a generous supply of powder plus many little cotton sachets each containing a number of lead balls, that would enable the Boers, with one shot, to dispose of several opponents.
Pretorius now sought a confrontation with Dingane’s army. Heading towards Mgungundlovu, the Boers, taking strength from worship and prayer, had been in the act of fording the Ncome River, fifty miles from the king’s capital, when scouts reported that a massive Zulu army was fast approaching. Pretorius hurried all his wagons back over the river and, on the west bank of the Ncome, between the river and a deep donga (ravine), he formed a laager, the natural barriers forming a moat on two sides. He had stumbled upon what was probably the best natural defensive position in all Zululand.
The Boers sat out the night well aware that a mighty enemy host was close at hand and when in the morning the early mist began to clear, they found the opposing army, 10,000 strong, watching and waiting 450 yards away. The battle that followed was a triumphant victory for the Boers in which they saw the hand of God. In attempting to storm the Boer defences by crossing the Ncome River, hundreds of warriors were shot to death, their blood so discolouring the water that the clash became known as ‘The Battle of Blood River’. So numerous were those killed in the pursuit that followed by the mounted Boers, that one of the victors, describing the scene in farming language that his kin would find no difficulty in understanding, stated: ‘They [the Zulu dead] lay on the ground like pumpkins on a rich soil that had borne a large crop.’
The Boers turned their victory into a rout, pursuing the defeated warriors for miles, so it is said, shooting them down from the saddle in their hundreds; indeed such was the slaughter that the plain across which the warriors fled became known as the Intambu – The Plain of Bones. From the back of a galloping horse, it can be no easy matter to reload an ungainly musket with powder, shot and ramrod, thus the number of Zulu casualties may well be exaggerated.
Several of the combatants recorded the day:
Of that fight nothing remains in my memory except shouting and tumult and lamentations, and a sea of black faces and a dense smoke that rose straight as a plumb-line upwards from the ground. We had scarcely time to throw a handful of powder into the gun and slip a bullet down the barrel, without a moment even to drive it home with the ramrod.
Of the fighting along the donga, Chaplain Cilliers recalled:
A severe fire was opened on them. More than 400 fell in the attack on the ravine [donga]. Then the word of the Lord was fulfilled: ‘By one way shall your enemies come, but by the blessings of the Lord shall they fly before your face.’ They now offered no further resistance. We were on the right and left, and they were huddled together. We were animated by great courage . . .
Some 3,000 warriors were slain, or so the Boers claimed, to only three wounded on the Boer side, one of whom was Pretorius himself, wounded in the hand. The story goes that Pretorius gave his gun-trained horse to another man and, in firing at the enemy from a substitute horse it threw him. As he rose to his feet the warrior thrust at him, the blade going right through Pretorius’ hand; he was saved by a comrade who shot the warrior dead. Exaggerated enemy casualties make good propaganda, but there is no doubt about who actually won.
Wishing to follow up their success, the Boers pressed on towards Mgungundlovu with the intention of taking the capital and torching it. But Dingane forestalled them. He burnt it down himself and moved his capital a hundred miles further north amongst terrain less suitable for horses and wheeled transport.
Across from the smoking capital and the ruins of Owen’s mission, stood the hill of slaughter, kwaMatiwane, and there the Boers found the bleached remains of their kin who had been slain ten months before. They also found Retief’s leather hunting wallet, still attached to his skeleton, and within it, in a miraculous state of preservation, the document ceding Natal to the Boer emigrants. Now there was proof that Natal was theirs not only by right of conquest but lawfully as well.
They buried the bones of their kin in a communal grave (where they lie to this day) and then set off in pursuit of Dingane. Near the White Umfolozi River they encountered the rear guard of the Zulu army and in the ensuing engagement Alexander Biggar was killed along with several of his Port Natal Volunteers and five Boers. Dismayed by so many casualties, but with 5,000 head of captured cattle, the pursuers decided to call it a day. On their way back they elected to pay homage to the Englishman, Alexander Biggar, who had fought at their side, and solemnly named a range of mountains, the Biggarsberg, in his honour.
Unbeknown to Pretorius, much was afoot at Port Natal. The British had landed. The first of the red soldiers, true to Jacobs’ prophecy, had arrived.