Smuts rifles

When it looked like there would be a bit of shooting over the decision to fight with the Empire in 1914, the first thing Jannie Smuts had to deal with was the rifles he had issued to farmers when he had been worried the gold miners in Johannesburg would go on strike; they went on strike once and the government had to back off and he was not going to have that happen again. Now it looked as if those rifles would be used against those who, like him, supported the decision to take out the radio mast at Windhoek. During my research, I was impressed with how quickly and efficiently Smuts recovered most of those weapons, not only weapons but horses as well, the transport system of the Boer Commando. What I enjoyed about the research was that the information was in personal notes and about people and their thoughts, not great issues that overshadowed people. 

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Dead cats at meetings

Further research into Smuts and 1914 revealed that at the start of WW1 the Germans in Namibia, German South West Africa as it was then called, had erected an enormous radio mast at Windhoek, which, on a good day could transmit directly to Berlin. The Royal Navy were concerned that they would send details of the shipping around the Cape and the submarines would close in on the ships in that congested area. Churchill was at the Admiralty and had become friendly with Smuts and suggested approaching the South Africans for help. Smuts and the then President Louis Botha, who had become friendly with Kitchener, agreed. It split the government,some wanting to fight for the Kaiser, and acrimonious meetings were held all over the country at which dead cats were thrown at the platform. Don't ask a South African about this, it is well buried.

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Boer War legacy

In my study of the History of the Cape Corps I was surprised to find the general commanding the British (Empire) forces in East Africa was Jannie Smuts from South Africa. What intrigued me was that, WW1 started in 1914, and thirteen years previously, Jannie Smuts had been ambushing and killing Redcoats with gusto. What had happened in the meantime? It turned out that, because of the generosity of the Brits at the negotiating table, a section of the Boers felt they had been given their land back, not just their land, the Orange Free State and the Transvaal Republics, but the thing they had dreamed of, a united South Africa from the Limpopo to the Cape and they felt an obligation to support their benefactors.

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Soldier of the King

Linda, in Pniel, showed me a book her father, Davids, had been given, or acquired about the history of his regiment. It was called simply The History of the Cape Corps and traced the origins of the involvement of the men of mixed race in the various struggles in South Africa, up to and including WW1. I must, unfortunately, summarise but the book followed the Cape Corps from South Africa to German East Africa, Tanganyika, and from there to Palestine and finally to police duties in the Middle East when demonstrations and strikes broke out. There were pages missing but I found a copy in the Cape Town archive and copied the pages for Linda to make her copy complete. One comment I remember from the East Africa campaign after some gruelling fighting and slogging it out among the heat and insects was a senior officer commenting that the only soldiers who could sing as they marched were the Cape Corps. I'll tell of what triggered them, but the two books, King or Kaiser and Shadows in the Veldt were to lead up to the creation of the Cape Corps and their WW1 experience. It's on the list, Linda. The picture shows the Pniel church with the grave of the predicant wwho whipped the drunkards in the foreground and the slave bell they erected to remind them of their heritage.
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