"A nation without a past is a lost nation,
and a people without a past is a people without a soul."
Sir Seretse Khama, 1921 - 1980,
first President of the Republic of Botswana.
Early British Involvement
Coveted in turn by the early Boer republics, by Cecil Rhodes' British South Africa Company and then by South Africa, Bechuanaland had often trodden a narrow path between its neighbors' political, military and economic ambitions.
As early as 1836 an act was passed extending the jurisdiction of the Cape courts in certain cases as far north as 25°S — a limit which included the southern part of Bechuanaland. Although under strong British influence the country was nevertheless ruled by its own chiefs, among whom the best-known in the middle of the 19th century were Montsioa, chief of the Barolong, and Sechele, chief of the Bakwena and the friend of Livingstone. At this period the Transvaal Boers were in a very unsettled state, and those living in the western districts showed a marked inclination to encroach upon the lands of the Bechuana.
In the late 19th century, hostilities broke out between the Batswana and Boer settlers from the Transvaal. In common with many of their neighbors, the Tswana suffered greatly from Nguni and Afrikaner incursions in the mid 19th century. It was 17 years after Moshoeshoe called for British protection that the Bechuana tribes followed his example. That was in 1855.
In 1852 Great Britain by the Sand river convention acknowledged the independence of the Transvaal. Save the Vaal river no frontier was indicated, and “ boasting” writes Livingstone in his Missionary Travels, “ that the English had given up all the blacks into their power . . . they (the Boers) assaulted the Bakwains ” (Bakwena). With this event the political history of Bechuanaland may be said to have begun.
In 1865 the Boers tried to raise taxes from the Barolong, but without success, a commando sent against them in 1868 being driven off by Montsioa’s brother Molema. This led to a protest (in 1870) from Montsioa, which he lodged with a landdrost at Potchefstroom in the Transvaal, threatening to submit the matter to the British high commissioner if any further attempt at taxation were made on the part of the Boers. The Boers then resorted to cajolery, and at a meeting held in August 1870, at which President Pretorius and Paul Kruger represented the Transvaal, invited the Barolong to join their territories with that of the republic, in order to save them from becoming British. Montsioa’s reply was short: “No one ever spanned-in an ass with an ox in one yoke.”
In 1872 and 1873 the Government of the South African Republic purported to acquire by cession certain portions of the disputed territories from Koranna Chiefs, from the Barolong Chief Moshette, and the Batlapin Chief Gasibone. The Government of the Republic, it seems, tried to raise up a question of paramount Chieftanship among the Barolong Chiefs, and to set up Moshette as paramount against Montsioa, and it was from Moshette, as paramount, that they sought to take the cession of the Barolong territory.
The attacks of the Boers at length became so unbearable that Montsioa in 1874 made a request to the British authorities to be taken under their protection. In formulating this appeal he declared that when the Boers were at war with Mosilikatze, chief of the Matabele, he had aided them on the solemn understanding that they were to respect his boundaries. This promise they had broken. Khama, chief of the Bamangwato in northern Bechuanaland, wrote in August 1876 to Sir Henry Barkly making an appeal similar to that sent by the Barolong. A Dutch clergyman, writing in 1869, described the system of apprenticeship of natives which obtained among the Boers “as slavery in the fullest sense of the word.”
Early in 1877 the South African Republic actually endeavored, by Proclamation, to annex the Bechuana territory. Representations on the part of the Barolong, and the Bamangwato under Khama, supported by the representations of Cape politicians, led in 1878 to the military occupation of southern Bechuanaland by a British force under Colonel (afterwards General Sir Charles) Warren. A cession of their territory was made to the British Government in 1878, and for two years the country was actually administered by English officers, under a provisional Administrator. In 1880, without any intimation to the Chiefs, or any explanation or reason assigned, the provisional Administrator was withdrawn, and Bechuanaland again became de facto as well as de jure an entirely independent country. In the cession of the Transvaal to the Boers, the Natives of Bechuanaland were not consulted. The British had withdrawn under a cloud of promises to the Native Tribes which had never been kept, and which many were strongly inclined to believe never would be kept.
Chief Montsioa was to be punished by the Transvaal Boers for the assistance he had rendered to the English refugees during the Transvaal War, and he had been told the hostilities would be stopped through the intervention of the Government, and that the Natives would, if necessary, receive protection. A small police force continued to occupy the district until April 1881, but, ignoring the wishes of the Bechuana and the recommendations of Sir Bartle Frere (then high commissioner), the home government refused to take the country under British protection.
The British Prime Minister, on 25 July, 1881, insisted on the necessity of protecting the Natives outside as well as inside the Transvaal, and declared that that object would be secured by the retention of the Suzerainty. Shortly after the Convention was signed, attacks were made upon the Chiefs Mankoroane and Montsioa, avowedly because of their loyalty towards the British Government in sheltering the refugees from the Transvaal.
In 1882 the Boers set up the republic of Stellaland, with Vryburg as its capital, and forthwith proceeded to set up the republic of Goshen, farther north, in spite of the protests of Montsioa, and established a small town called Rooi Grond as capital. They then summoned Montsioa to quit the territory. The efforts of the British authorities at this period (1882—1883) to bring about a satisfactory settlement were feeble and futile, and fighting continued until peace was made entirely on Boer lines.
By 1882, the marauding Transvaal Boers, who, assisted by deserters from the British Army, for some time past invaded the territories of Mankaroane and other Bechuana Chiefs.
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