TO ALL READERS

This manuscript is being submitted to you in hopes that you will give it your most careful attention. Absolutely everything is up for review: the data from your field of expertise; the language; the customs; the inferences; and above all any general facts which might be in error.

I would appreciate your guidance on even the most minute points, as I always strive to avoid ridiculous error.

A good way to submit your comment is to correct on the page any small item. On larger items, or those deserving an essay-type observation, it is good to mark the offending passage in the left-hand margin with an Arabic 1, 2, 3 etc. not necessarily in order, but starting with 1 on each new page. Then at your typewriter, indicate 1-3 which means Page 1, Item 3, and go ahead.

Thank you for your assistance.

                    James A. Michener

As the Dutchmen from the Cape took their first hesitant steps eastward and northward into the great continent at whose edge they perched, it would be profitable to inspect what kind of land they had inherited and to realize how limited and hostile it was. Settlement could not be extended to the northwest, for there lay the Namibian Desert, a cruel boundary, and it would be difficult to penetrate the vast region of the northeast, because this contained the Kalahari, less formidable than the Namibian, but also a desert. To the east and northeast ran the towering Drakensberg Mountains, many of the peaks over ten thousand feet high, protected by precipitous valleys almost impassable.

But the wasteland of Australia, the Rocky Mountains of North America, and the blizzard weather of Siberia proved no natural impediment could stop men from moving outward if they were determined to go. And in time the adventurous Cape Dutch would conquer their Kalahari and Drakensberg. What really set limits to their population and their economic growth was not the formidable land to the north but the missing land to the south...  Click to read more

The Voortrekkers - Chapter X               ELU/ October 1979

Since the story of the Voortrekkers is regarded as the central point in the story of the Afrikaners, it would seem essential that one offers an account that remains as faithful to history as possible. There are many problems in this chapter, and for this reason it is preferable to deal with them at length.

( 1.1. The first figure is the page number/second is comment reference number)

( C - comment only/ not indicative of an inaccuracy)

1.1.C. The Voortrekkers

The word only came into use 40 years after The Great Trek. Originally, they called themselves 'emigrants'.

1.2. In 1833 Tjaart van Doorn was about as happy as a man could be.

Until now, the Van Doorn family have been at the forefront of the movements that have led to the development of a) free burghers b) trekboers and, consequently, the 'Voortrekkers". In the middle of 1834: the three 'Commissie Treks' - Uys/Johannes Pretorius/Scholtz - set out to investigate lands to the north. This was virtually the final step before the Great Trek. So that, aside from the possible respite offered by Cole and d'Urban's actions (below), minds were made up on the unsuitability of remaining on the frontier. Van Doorn's happiness would be most exceptional. (See problems listed below.)

1.3 frocked coat

Walker/Nathan. Their trousers met the tails of their jackets/ short jackets and flapping trousers of various lengths, some coming down to the insteps, while others were well above the ankles. Wide belt and suspenders.

1.4 last of the trekboers

As explained in last chapter, this is incorrect: the trekboer movement was to continue into this century. At this period, there were many trekboers, especially in the northern regions of Graaff-Reinet district, where the Van Doorns live. The trekboer phenomena and the Great Trek were parallel - both complimentary and apart from each other. For instance, there were by this time numbers of trekboers 'settled' - i.e. using pastures - across the Orange River in the Griqua/Bushman/Basuto lands. Many of these did not join the trek and continued to regard themselves as subjects of the colony.

1.5 the old wandering days of the Boers were past

As above, no. It was the whole concept of wandering, nomadism, of easy land acquisition that was to play such an important role in the Great Trek. It was not simply a 'wanderlust' but a way of life, inbred over generations.

1.6 What Tjaart had done was accumulate much pasturage beyond the hills

This contradicts one of the basic reasons for the trek - if not the reason: land shortage. Some pointers to the background:

Little land had been granted since 1807 when the government was giving consideration to a new system of tenure: loan-place to quit-rent etc."

In 1813 Cradock said that he had at least 3,000 petitions for land.

In 1824 there were over 1,000 petitions for land in the Graaff Reinet district, by the end of that year only 140,352 morgen had been granted in the district.

In Graaff Reinet by the end of 1822, of 392 convertible loan farms 56 had been converted, and a further 301 applications were on file. As their petitions for new land were not dealt with until the titles of converted loan farms had been issued, and as few Boers had titles for their converted loan farms, they were unable legally to occupy new land. There arose 'request' places: land for which petitions had been submitted to the government, with the approval of the landrost, who often registered the claim in his books, although the government condemned the practice. In Graaff Reinet in 1824, there were at least 1,000 request places. (It is interesting to note that of the 19 men from the rural areas of the district who were reported to have joined the Great Trek by early 1837, 15 were described as having no fixed place of residence.)

By 1836, only 706 conversions on loan farms had been made which meant that there were still 1500 loan farms dating back to before 1813.

Meanwhile in 1832 the government, under orders from the Colonial Office, announced that all land applied for after 9 January 1832 would be sold only by public auction. Several historians emphasize this 'auction' decision in grievance list. There is much more material available to show the tremendous pressure that had arisen in the area of land usage/availability. Thus when d'Urban annexed 'Queen Adelaide Province,' the move was greatly welcomed by hundreds of land-hungry Boers who, at last, saw an advance of the frontier and the possibility of new farms. There are records of two, three Boer families at this time being 'forced' to exist on what their forefathers would've regarded as one unit i.e. 6,000 morgen. [approx 12,000 acres.]

The pressure on land had been aggravated by their family system. Though the Van Doorns don't typify it, it's a fact that families of a dozen children were the rule rather than the exception. When a son reached his age of independence, having by that time acquired his own horse, gun and small herd, it was traditional that he set his eyes to the east, to a loan place of his own and there establish his family till the same diffusion process started. (Of course, one sees an identical parallel in what was happening on the other side of the border with the young Xhosa herdsman who set out to establish his own kraal.) Now that the black barrier had stopped such an easy 'inheritance', and that people knew that to the immediate north lay the semi-Karoo and Karoo, there was bound to be a land shortage increased by the hour as Boer babies were born. In contrast to America, the whole impetus up to this generation was 'Go East!' - and thousands had.

  click to read more...