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The British South Africa Company (BSAC) was established by Cecil Rhodes through the amalgamation of the Central Search Association and the Exploring Company Ltd., receiving a royal charter
Royal Charter

A royal charter is a charter granted by a Monarch to create institutions or other forms of incorporated bodies . In the United Kingdom legal tradition a royal charter is in the form of letters patent....
 in 1889. Modelling the BSAC on the British East India Company
British East India Company

The East India Company was an early England joint-stock company that was formed initially for pursuing trade with the Indies, but that ended up trading with the Indian subcontinent and China....
, Rhodes hoped it would enable colonisation and economic exploitation across much of south-central Africa, as part of the "Scramble for Africa
Scramble for Africa

The Scramble for Africa, also known as the Race for Africa, was the proliferation of conflicting European claims to African territory during the New Imperialism period, between the 1880s and the World War I in 1914....
". The company's directors included the Duke of Abercorn
James Hamilton, 2nd Duke of Abercorn

James Hamilton, 2nd Duke of Abercorn, Knight of the Garter, Companion of the Bath, Privy Council of Ireland was a United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland nobleman and diplomat....
, Rhodes himself and the financier Alfred Beit
Alfred Beit

Alfred Beit was a British Empire Cape Colony gold and diamond magnate, a supporter of British imperialism in Southern Africa and a major donor towards infrastructure development in central and Southern Africa, and to university education and research in several countries....
.

company was empowered to trade with African rulers such as King Lobengula
Lobengula

Lobengula Kumalo was the second and last king of the Ndebele people people, usually pronounced Matabele in English. Both names, in the Sindebele language, mean "The men of the long shields", a reference to the Matabele warriors' use of the Zulu shield and spear....
; to form banks; to own, manage and grant or distribute land, and to raise a police force (the British South Africa Police
British South Africa Police

The British South Africa Police was the police force of the British South Africa Company of Cecil Rhodes which became the national police force of Southern Rhodesia and its successor after 1965, Rhodesia ....
.) In return, the company agreed to develop the territory it controlled; to respect existing African laws; to allow free trade within its territory and to respect all religions.






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The British South Africa Company (BSAC) was established by Cecil Rhodes through the amalgamation of the Central Search Association and the Exploring Company Ltd., receiving a royal charter
Royal Charter

A royal charter is a charter granted by a Monarch to create institutions or other forms of incorporated bodies . In the United Kingdom legal tradition a royal charter is in the form of letters patent....
 in 1889. Modelling the BSAC on the British East India Company
British East India Company

The East India Company was an early England joint-stock company that was formed initially for pursuing trade with the Indies, but that ended up trading with the Indian subcontinent and China....
, Rhodes hoped it would enable colonisation and economic exploitation across much of south-central Africa, as part of the "Scramble for Africa
Scramble for Africa

The Scramble for Africa, also known as the Race for Africa, was the proliferation of conflicting European claims to African territory during the New Imperialism period, between the 1880s and the World War I in 1914....
". The company's directors included the Duke of Abercorn
James Hamilton, 2nd Duke of Abercorn

James Hamilton, 2nd Duke of Abercorn, Knight of the Garter, Companion of the Bath, Privy Council of Ireland was a United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland nobleman and diplomat....
, Rhodes himself and the financier Alfred Beit
Alfred Beit

Alfred Beit was a British Empire Cape Colony gold and diamond magnate, a supporter of British imperialism in Southern Africa and a major donor towards infrastructure development in central and Southern Africa, and to university education and research in several countries....
.

Trading

The company was empowered to trade with African rulers such as King Lobengula
Lobengula

Lobengula Kumalo was the second and last king of the Ndebele people people, usually pronounced Matabele in English. Both names, in the Sindebele language, mean "The men of the long shields", a reference to the Matabele warriors' use of the Zulu shield and spear....
; to form banks; to own, manage and grant or distribute land, and to raise a police force (the British South Africa Police
British South Africa Police

The British South Africa Police was the police force of the British South Africa Company of Cecil Rhodes which became the national police force of Southern Rhodesia and its successor after 1965, Rhodesia ....
.) In return, the company agreed to develop the territory it controlled; to respect existing African laws; to allow free trade within its territory and to respect all religions. However, Rhodes and the white settlers attracted to the company's territory set their sights for ever more mineral rights and more territorial concessions from the African peoples, establishing their own governments, and introducing laws with little concern or respect for African law.

Security

The company recruited its own army, which allowed it to defeat and replace the Matabele
Ndebele people (Zimbabwe)

The Ndebele are a branch of the Zulus who split from Shaka in the early 1820s under the leadership of Mzilikazi, a former general in Shaka's army....
 kingdom and then overcome resistance of the Shona
Shona people

Shona is the name collectively given to several groups of people in Zimbabwe and southern Mozambique. Numbering about nine million people, who speak a range of related dialects whose standardized form is also known as Shona language ....
 north of the Limpopo river
Limpopo River

The Limpopo River rises in central southern Africa, and flows generally eastwards to the Indian Ocean. It is around long, with a drainage basin in size....
 in the First Matabele War
First Matabele War

The First Matabele War was fought in 1893 between the British South Africa Company military forces and the Ndebele people people. Lobengula, king of the Ndebele, avoided outright war with the British settlers because he and his advisors were mindful of the destructive power of the European weapons on traditional Matabele impis attacking i...
 and Second Matabele War
Second Matabele War

The Second Matabele War, also known as the Matabeleland Rebellion and in Zimbabwe as the First Chimurenga, took place from 1896?97....
. It was the first British use of the Maxim gun
Maxim gun

The Maxim gun was the first self-powered machine gun, invented by the American-born United Kingdom Sir Hiram Maxim in 1884....
 in combat (causing five thousand Ndebele casualties). The company carved out and administered a territory which it named Zambezia, and later, Rhodesia
Rhodesia (disambiguation)

Rhodesia refers primarily to a country formed by two land-locked territories in southern Africa named, by British colonisers, after Cecil Rhodes, separated by a natural border provided by the Zambezi River....
, and which now covers the area occupied by the republics of Zambia
Zambia

The Republic of Zambia is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. The neighbouring countries are the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, Tanzania to the north-east, Malawi to the east, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Namibia to the south, and Angola to the west....
 and Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe , is a landlocked country located in the southern part of the continent of Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo River rivers. It is bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the southwest, Zambia to the northwest and Mozambique to the east....
.

Medal


In 1896, Queen Victoria sanctioned the issue by the British South Africa Company of a medal to troops who had been engaged in the First Matabele War
First Matabele War

The First Matabele War was fought in 1893 between the British South Africa Company military forces and the Ndebele people people. Lobengula, king of the Ndebele, avoided outright war with the British settlers because he and his advisors were mindful of the destructive power of the European weapons on traditional Matabele impis attacking i...
. In 1897, the Queen sanctioned another medal for those engaged in the two campaigns of the Second Matabele War: Rhodesia (1896) and Mashonaland (1897). The government of Southern Rhodesia
Southern Rhodesia

Southern Rhodesia was the name of the British colony situated north of the Limpopo River and the Union of South Africa, and known today as Zimbabwe....
 re-issued the medal to commemorate the earlier 1890 Pioneer Column
Pioneer Column

The Pioneer Column was a force raised by Cecil Rhodes and his British South Africa Company in 1890 and used in his efforts to annex the territory of Mashonaland, later part of Southern Rhodesia ....
, in 1927.
Bsac Arms

Politics

In 1914, the royal charter was renewed, on condition that settlers in Rhodesia were given increased political rights. In 1922, the company entered negotiations with the government of the Union of South Africa
South Africa

The Republic of South Africa, also known by Official names of South Africa, is a country located at the southern tip of the continent of Africa....
, which was keen to incorporate Southern Rhodesia
Southern Rhodesia

Southern Rhodesia was the name of the British colony situated north of the Limpopo River and the Union of South Africa, and known today as Zimbabwe....
 - a plan foiled by the colony's settlers, who voted in favour of self-government.

In 1923, the British government chose not to renew the Company's charter, and instead accorded 'self-governing' colony
Colony

In politics and in history, a colony is a Territory under the immediate political control of a state. For colonies in antiquity, city-states would often found their own colonies....
 status to Southern Rhodesia
Southern Rhodesia

Southern Rhodesia was the name of the British colony situated north of the Limpopo River and the Union of South Africa, and known today as Zimbabwe....
 (present day Zimbabwe) and protectorate
Protectorate

A protectorate, in international law, is an autonomous territory that is protected diplomatically or militarily against third parties by a stronger state or entity, in exchange for which the protectorate usually accepts specified obligations, which may vary greatly, depending on the real nature of their relationship....
 status to Northern Rhodesia
Northern Rhodesia

Northern Rhodesia was a territory in southern Africa initially administered under charter by the British South Africa Company and formed by it in 1911 by Amalgamation North-Western Rhodesia and North-Eastern Rhodesia....
 (present day Zambia).

Profits

The BSAC was not able to generate enough profit to pay its shareholders dividends until after it lost direct administrative control over Rhodesia in 1923. In 1933, the BSAC sold its mineral exploration rights south of the Zambezi to the Southern Rhodesian government, but retained rights over Northern Rhodesian mineral rights, as well as the company's vast interests in mining, railways, real estate and agriculture across southern Africa
Southern Africa

Southern Africa is the southernmost region of the African continent, variably defined by geography or geopolitics, consisting of numerous territories....
.

Merger

In 1964, the company was forced to hand over its mineral rights to the government of Zambia, and the following year, the British South Africa Company merged with the Central Mining & Investment Corporation Ltd and The Consolidated Mines Selection Company Ltd to form a mining and industrial company known as Charter Consolidated Ltd, of which slightly over one-third of the shares were owned by the British/South African mining company Anglo American plc.

See also

  • Cecil Rhodes
  • Chartered companies
  • Cape to Cairo
    Cape To Cairo

    Cape to Cairo may refer to:* the Cape to Cairo Railway* the Cape to Cairo Red Line, the 19th century concept of a British-dominated Africa, promoted by Cecil Rhodes...
    • Cape to Cairo Railway
    • Cape to Cairo Red Line
    • Cape to Cairo Road
      Cape to Cairo Road

      The Cape to Cairo Road or 'Pan-African Highway', sometimes called the Great North Road in sub-Saharan Africa, was an imperial dream envisioned by the British Empire that would see a road stretch the length of Africa, from Cape Town to Cairo, similar to the Pan-American Highway....
  • Pioneer Column
    Pioneer Column

    The Pioneer Column was a force raised by Cecil Rhodes and his British South Africa Company in 1890 and used in his efforts to annex the territory of Mashonaland, later part of Southern Rhodesia ....
  • Shangani Patrol
    Shangani Patrol

    The Shangani Patrol was a group of white Rhodesian settlers killed in battle on the Shangani River in Matabeleland in 1893. The incident achieved a lasting, prominent place in Rhodesian colonial history and is roughly the British equivalent to Custer's Last Stand....