The
Great Trek was an eastward and north-eastward migration away from British control in the
Cape ColonyThe Cape Colony, part of modern South Africa, was established by the Dutch East India Company in 1652, with the founding of Cape Town. It was subsequently occupied by the British in 1795 when the Netherlands were occupied by revolutionary France, so that the French revolutionaries could not take...
during the 1830s and 1840s by Boers (
DutchDutch is a West Germanic language spoken by over 22 million people as a native language, and over 5 million people as a second language.
"1% of the EU population claims to speak Dutch well enough in order to have a conversation." Outside the European Union the number of second language...
/Afrikaans for "farmers"). The migrants were descended from settlers from western mainland
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
, most notably from the Netherlands.
The Great Trek itself led to the founding of three Afrikaner nations, Natalia, the
Orange Free StateThe Republic of the Orange Free State was an independent Boer republic in southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century, and later a British colony and a province of the Union of South Africa. It is the historical precursor to the present-day Free State province...
and the
TransvaalThe South African Republic , often informally known as the Transvaal Republic, was an independent Boer-ruled country in Southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century. Not to be confused with the present-day Republic of South Africa, it occupied the area later known as the South African...
.
The Voortrekkers comprised two groups from the eastern frontier region of the
Cape ColonyThe Cape Colony, part of modern South Africa, was established by the Dutch East India Company in 1652, with the founding of Cape Town. It was subsequently occupied by the British in 1795 when the Netherlands were occupied by revolutionary France, so that the French revolutionaries could not take...
, semi-nomadic pastoralists known as
Trekboers, and established farmers and artisans known as
Grensboere, or Border Farmers.
The
Great Trek was an eastward and north-eastward migration away from British control in the
Cape ColonyThe Cape Colony, part of modern South Africa, was established by the Dutch East India Company in 1652, with the founding of Cape Town. It was subsequently occupied by the British in 1795 when the Netherlands were occupied by revolutionary France, so that the French revolutionaries could not take...
during the 1830s and 1840s by Boers (
DutchDutch is a West Germanic language spoken by over 22 million people as a native language, and over 5 million people as a second language.
"1% of the EU population claims to speak Dutch well enough in order to have a conversation." Outside the European Union the number of second language...
/Afrikaans for "farmers"). The migrants were descended from settlers from western mainland
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
, most notably from the Netherlands.
The Great Trek itself led to the founding of three Afrikaner nations, Natalia, the
Orange Free StateThe Republic of the Orange Free State was an independent Boer republic in southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century, and later a British colony and a province of the Union of South Africa. It is the historical precursor to the present-day Free State province...
and the
TransvaalThe South African Republic , often informally known as the Transvaal Republic, was an independent Boer-ruled country in Southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century. Not to be confused with the present-day Republic of South Africa, it occupied the area later known as the South African...
.
History
The Voortrekkers comprised two groups from the eastern frontier region of the
Cape ColonyThe Cape Colony, part of modern South Africa, was established by the Dutch East India Company in 1652, with the founding of Cape Town. It was subsequently occupied by the British in 1795 when the Netherlands were occupied by revolutionary France, so that the French revolutionaries could not take...
, semi-nomadic pastoralists known as
Trekboers, and established farmers and artisans known as
Grensboere, or Border Farmers. Together these groups were later called Voortrekkers Pioneers. While most settlers who lived in the western Cape later known as the Cape Dutch did not trek eastward, a small number did.
The first colonists were of Dutch stock, but many settlers of German origin had joined them, and after the revocation of the
Edict of NantesThe Edict of Nantes was issued on April 13, 1598. by Henry IV of France to grant the Calvinist Protestants of France substantial rights in a nation still considered essentially Catholic...
in 1685, the Cape had accepted a considerable influx of French
HuguenotThe Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries. Since the eighteenth century, Huguenots have been commonly designated "French Protestants", the title being suggested by their German co-religionists or "Calvinists"...
refugees. By 1800, white colonists numbered rather less than 40,000, and were so connected by marriage that they represented a giant family rather than a new polygot community. The community was also mastered by The Council of Seventeen in Amsterdam, who governed the far reaching empire of The Dutch East India Company.
Historians have identified various contributing factors to the migrations of an estimated 12,000 Voortrekkers to the future Natal, Orange Free State and Transvaal regions. The primary motivations included discontent with the recently imposed United Kingdom British rule, its Anglicisation policies, restrictive laws on slavery and its eventual abolition, arrangements to compensate former slave owners, and the perceived indifference of British authorities to border conflicts along the Cape Colony's eastern frontier. That Ordinance 50 (1828), which guaranteed equal legal rights to all free persons of colour, and prohibitions on inhumane treatment of workers, did spur on Boer migrations is documented by numerous contemporary sources. However, some scholars argue that most Trekboers did not own slaves, unlike the more affluent Cape Dutch who did not migrate from the western Cape. The three republics founded by the Voortrekkers prohibited slavery itself, but enshrined racial separatism in their constitutions. Despite Ordinance 50, racial separatism also persisted in other British colonies in Southern Africa.
Other possible factors included the desire to escape from relentless
border warsThe Xhosa Wars, also known as the Kaffir Wars or Cape Frontier Wars, were a series of nine wars between the amaXhosa people and European settlers from 1779 to 1879 in what is now the Eastern Cape in South Africa...
with the Xhosa-speaking groups along the eastern frontier of the Cape colony. The migrants also sought fertile farmland, as good land was becoming scarce within the colony's frontier. The Great Trek also resulted from increasing population pressures, as Trekboer migrations eastward had come to a virtual stop for at least three decades though some Trekboers did migrate beyond the
Orange RiverThe Orange River , Gariep River, Groote River or Senqu River is the longest river in South Africa. It rises in the Drakensberg mountains in Lesotho, flowing westwards through South Africa to the Atlantic Ocean...
prior to the Great Trek.
Natal conflicts
During the Great Trek the Voortrekkers engaged in conflict with the
ZuluThe Zulu are the largest South African ethnic group of an estimated 10–11 million people who live mainly in the province of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Small numbers also live in Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Mozambique. Their language, Zulu, is a Bantu language; more specifically, part of the Nguni...
of Natal. The Zulu launched large-scale hostilities after a delegation under the Trek leader
Piet RetiefPieter Mauritz Retief , was a South African Boer leader. Settling in the Cape Colony's strife ridden frontier region in 1814, he assumed command of punitive expeditions and acted as spokesperson for the frontier farmers...
was massacred by their chief, Dingane kaSenzangakhona on February 6, 1838.
Various interpretations of what exactly transpired exist, as only the missionary Francis Owen's written eye-witness account survived. Retief's written request for land contained veiled threats by referring to the Voortrekker's defeat of indigenous groups encountered along their journey. The Voortrekker demand for a written contract guaranteeing private property ownership was incompatible with the contemporaneous Zulu oral culture which prescribed that a chief could only temporarily dispense land, which was communally owned.
Most versions agree that the following happened. Dingane's authority extended over some of the land in which the Boers wanted to settle. As prerequisite to granting the Voortrekker request, Dingane demanded that the Voortrekkers return some cattle stolen by Sekonyela, a rival chief. Dingane then invited Retief to his residence at
UmgungundlovuThe name Mgungundlovu stems from the Zulu word or phrase ungungu we ndlovu which means "the secret conclave of the elephant". Some sources also refer to Mgungundlovu as "the place of the elephant". The word indlovu refers to the king....
to finalise the treaty, having either planned the massacre in advance, or deciding to do so after Retief and his men arrived. Perhaps an earlier display of arms from horseback by Retief's men provoked the massacre. In any case, Dingane's reputed instruction to his warriors, ""Bulalani abathakathi!" (Zulu for "kill the wizards") showed that he may have considered the Boers to wield evil supernatural powers. After murdering
Piet RetiefPieter Mauritz Retief , was a South African Boer leader. Settling in the Cape Colony's strife ridden frontier region in 1814, he assumed command of punitive expeditions and acted as spokesperson for the frontier farmers...
's delegation, the Zulu
impiAn impi is an isiZulu word for any armed body of men. However, in English it is often used to refer to a Zulu regiment, which is called an ibutho in Zulu...
s (battalions) immediately attacked Boer encampments in the
DrakensbergThe Drakensberg is the highest mountain range in Southern Africa, rising to in height. In Zulu, it is referred to as uKhahlamba , and in Sesotho as Maluti . Its geological history lends it a distinctive character amongst the mountain ranges of the world...
foothills at what later was called Blaauwkrans and Weenen. By contrast to earlier conflicts with the
XhosaThe Xhosa ) people are speakers of Bantu languages living in south-east South Africa, and in the last two centuries throughout the southern and central-southern parts of the country....
on the eastern Cape frontier, the Zulu during these attacks killed women and children along with men, wiping out half of the Natal contingent of Voortrekkers.
On April 6, 1838 the Voortrekkers retaliated with a 347-strong punitive raid against the Zulu (later known as the Flight Commando), supported by new arrivals from the Orange Free State. They were roundly defeated by about 7,000 warriors at
IthaleniThe Battle of Italeni was a battle that took place at in what is now KwaZulu Natal province, South Africa, between the Voortrekkers and the Zulus during the period of the Great Trek.-Background:...
, southwest of uMgungundlovu. The well-known reluctance of Afrikaner leaders to submit to one another's leadership, which later so hindered sustained success in the Anglo-Boer wars, was largely to blame.
http://rapidttp.com/milhist/vol045iu.html
On December 16, 1838 a 470-strong force of Andries Pretorius confronted about 12,000 Zulu at prepared positions.
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9015703/Battle-of-Blood-River The Boers reputedly suffered only 3 injuries without any fatalities, while the blood of 3,000 slain Zulu turned the river red with blood, so that the conflict afterwards became known as the
Battle of Blood RiverThe Battle of Blood River on 16 December 1838 was fought between 470 Voortrekkers, led by Andries Pretorius, and an estimated 10,000 Zulu attackers on the banks of the Ncome River at in what is today KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa...
. The Boers' guns offered them an obvious technological advantage over the Zulu's traditional weaponry of short stabbing spears, fighting sticks, and cattle-hide shields. The Boers attributed their victory to a vow they made to God before the battle: if victorious, they and future generations would commemorate the day as a Sabbath. Thus 16 December was celebrated by Boers as a public holiday, first called "Dingane's Day," later changed to the
Day of the VowThe Day of the Vow is the name of a religious public holiday in South Africa until 1994, when it was renamed the Day of Reconciliation. The holiday is December 16...
. It is still a public holiday, but the name was changed to the
Day of ReconciliationThe Day of Reconciliation is a public holiday in South Africa held annually on 16 December. The intention is to foster reconciliation between different racial groups. The holiday came into effect in 1994 after the end of Apartheid....
by the post-apartheid ANC government, in order to foster reconciliation between all South Africans. However, the
Day of the VowThe Day of the Vow is the name of a religious public holiday in South Africa until 1994, when it was renamed the Day of Reconciliation. The holiday is December 16...
is still celebrated by Boers today.
After the defeat of the Zulu forces and the recovery of the treaty between Dingane and Retief from the latter's skeleton, the Voortrekkers proclaimed the
Natalia RepublicThe Natalia Republic was a short-lived Boer republic, established in 1839 by local Afrikaans-speaking Voortrekkers shortly after the Battle of Blood River. The republic was located on the coast of the Indian Ocean beyond the Eastern Cape, and was previously named Natalia by Portuguese sailors. The...
. This Boer state was annexed by British forces in 1843.
Due to the return of British rule, emphasis moved from occupying lands in
NatalThe Colony of Natal was a British colony in south-eastern Africa. It was proclaimed a British colony on May 4, 1843 after the British government had annexed the Boer Republic of Natalia, and on 31 May1910 combined with three other colonies to form the Union of South Africa...
, east of the
DrakensbergThe Drakensberg is the highest mountain range in Southern Africa, rising to in height. In Zulu, it is referred to as uKhahlamba , and in Sesotho as Maluti . Its geological history lends it a distinctive character amongst the mountain ranges of the world...
mountains, to the west of them and onto the high veld of the
TransvaalThe Transvaal is the name of an area of northern South Africa. Originally the bulk of the independent Boer South African Republic, after the Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902 it became the Transvaal Colony, and one of the founding provinces of the Union of South Africa, with its regional capital in...
and
Orange Free StateThe Republic of the Orange Free State was an independent Boer republic in southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century, and later a British colony and a province of the Union of South Africa. It is the historical precursor to the present-day Free State province...
, which were unoccupied due to the devastation of the
MfecaneMfecane , is an African expression which means something like "the crushing" or "scattering"...
.