Six Burghers Were
Killed And Three Thousand Zulus.
Had such a formation been used
forty years afterwards against these very Zulus, we should not have
had to mourn the disaster of Isandhlwana.
And now at the end of their great journey, after overcoming the
difficulties of distance, of nature, and of savage enemies, the
Boers saw at the end of their travels the very thing which they
desired least - that which they had come so far to avoid - the flag
of Great Britain. The Boers had occupied Natal from within, but
England had previously done the same by sea, and a small colony of
Englishmen had settled at Port Natal, now known as Durban. The home
Government, however, had acted in a vacillating way, and it was
only the conquest of Natal by the Boers which caused them to claim
it as a British colony. At the same time they asserted the
unwelcome doctrine that a British subject could not at will throw
off his allegiance, and that, go where they might, the wandering
farmers were still only the pioneers of British colonies. To
emphasise the fact three companies of soldiers were sent in 1842 to
what is now Durban - the usual Corporal's guard with which Great
Britain starts a new empire. This handful of men was waylaid by the
Boers and cut up, as their successors have been so often since. The
survivors, however, fortified themselves, and held a defensive
position - as also their successors have done so many times
since - until reinforcements arrived and the farmers dispersed. It
is singular how in history the same factors will always give the
same result. Here in this first skirmish is an epitome of all our
military relations with these people. The blundering headstrong
attack, the defeat, the powerlessness of the farmer against the
weakest fortifications - it is the same tale over and over again in
different scales of importance. Natal from this time onward became
a British colony, and the majority of the Boers trekked north and
east with bitter hearts to tell their wrongs to their brethren of
the Orange Free State and of the Transvaal.
Had they any wrongs to tell? It is difficult to reach that height
of philosophic detachment which enables the historian to deal
absolutely impartially where his own country is a party to the
quarrel. But at least we may allow that there is a case for our
adversary. Our annexation of Natal had been by no means definite,
and it was they and not we who first broke that bloodthirsty Zulu
power which threw its shadow across the country. It was hard after
such trials and such exploits to turn their back upon the fertile
land which they had conquered, and to return to the bare pastures
of the upland veld. They carried out of Natal a heavy sense of
injury, which has helped to poison our relations with them ever
since. It was, in a way, a momentous episode, this little skirmish
of soldiers and emigrants, for it was the heading off of the Boer
from the sea and the confinement of his ambition to the land.
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