The Silk Road detour

The 'Silver Mine' above Pniel in the Cape was driven into the Simonsberg in the 1740's. At that time the Dutch East India Company was running short of gold and silver, the only thing the traders of the Spice Islands or India would accept. After all, apart from wool, maybe, they produced better quality materials and goods, silks and pottery, for example, than the west could provide. That way of doing business predated even the Portuguese. Initially, the Arab traders had set up a triangle of trade which included gold from Greater Zimbabwe, in itself a trading post for gold and, reportedly, tin and copper, from sub Saharan Africa. Following the details of that trade led me to East Africa and a place called Kilwa in Tanganyika.

The picture is of the Simonsberg with its Cape finebos cover and the views of the Dwarse River Valley from there are magnificent.

www.sullatoberdalton.com

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.

www.sullatoberdalton.com/books/king-kaiser

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.
www.sullatoberdalton.com/books