Transvaal

The first permanent white settlement north of the Vaal was made in Nov. 1838 by Potgieter and some followers who settled on the banks of the Mooi river and founded the town of Potchef stroom. The next settlement appears to have been in the Magalis berg, where Rustenburg was founded. At that time the emigrant farmers had set up the republic of Natal; in 1840 Potgieter's party entered into a loose alliance with the Natal Boers and with those at Winburg, north of the Orange. In this alliance Natal had the leadership; but in 1843 the British annexed Natal and in the following years many burghers left that country, recrossed the Drakensberg, and set up an independent Government in the Transvaal. Dissensions among the immigrants broke out almost at once and in 1845 Potgieter, with a considerable number of Potchefstroom burghers and some from Winburg migrated north east towards Delagoa bay, where Potgieter made a treaty with the Portuguese. A spot on the inner slopes of the Drakensberg was chosen as headquarters and there was built the village of Andries Ohrigstad. It proved fever-ridden and was abandoned, a new village being laid out on higher ground and named Lyden burg by the farmers in memory of their sufferings at Ohrigstad. Other emigrants settled in the Potchefstroom district and in 1848 Andries Pretorius (q.v.) became their leader. Pretorius, in the middle of that year, had fought unavailingly against the establish ment of British sovereignty by Sir Harry Smith (q.v.) between the Orange and the Vaal. The Transvaal thus became the refuge of the most irreconcilable to British rule of the Dutch farmers— who were, however, much more pastoralists than agriculturalists.

Sand River Convention.

Pretorius persuaded the more re sponsible farmers to agree to one volksraad for the whole country, but Potgieter, by nature a dictator, would not agree and he and his friends removed from Lydenburg farther north to the Zoutpans berg. However the British Government abandoned its claim to regard all the emigrant farmers beyond the Vaal as British subjects. Commissioners sent to the Orange Sovereignty opened negotiations with Pretorius and on Jan. 17, 1852, a convention was signed at a farm by the Sand river, in the Orange Sovereignty, acknowledging the independence of the Transvaal without regard to the divisions among the Boers. The first article of the Sand River Convention was as follows : The assistant commissioners guarantee in the fullest manner, on the part of the British Government, to the emigrant farmers beyond the Vaal river, the right to manage their own affairs, and to govern themselves according to their own laws, without any interference on the part of the British Government, and that no encroachment shall be made by the said Government on the territory beyond to the north of the Vaal river, with the further assurance that the warmest wish of the British Government is to promote peace, free trade, and friendly intercourse with the emigrant farmers now inhabiting, or who hereafter may inhabit, that country ; it being understood that this system of non-interference is binding upon both parties.

At this time there were settled north of the Vaal about 5,000 families of European extraction. They had obtained independence, but as has been shown they were far from being a united people. When Pretorius conducted the negotiations which led to the sign ing of the Sand River Convention, though he had the support of the Rustenburg and Lydenburg districts, he did so without con sulting the volksraad, and Potgieter's party accused him of usurp ing power and aiming at domination over the whole country. How ever, the volksraad, at a meeting held at Rustenburg on March 16, 1852, ratified the convention, Potgieter and Pretorius having been publicly reconciled on the morning of the same day. Both leaders were near the end of their careers ; Potgieter died in March and Pretorius in July 1853.

The Constitution.

Upon the death of Andries Pretorius his son Marthinius was (Aug. 1853) elected commandant-general of the Potchefstroom and Rustenburg districts ; he had been in of fice little more than six months when the Orange Sovereignty was abandoned by the British and the Orange Free State as an inde pendent republic took its place. Martinius Pretorius was a man

of large ideas and he worked for the union of the Boer States. First he had to start with his own country. In 1855 the town of Pretoria was founded and the Pretoria district created; in 1856 the burghers of Potchefstroom, Rustenburg and Pretoria united to form "the South African Republic." The title was chosen, a national flag (the Vierk[eur) adopted and the constitution (grond wet) elaborated at a special session of delegates held in December at Potchefstroom. It was decided that Pretoria should be the capital of the State. The legislative power was given to a volks raad, elected by the burghers (that is the franchise was confined to white men) ; the administration was entrusted to a president aided by an executive council which included a popularly elected commandant-general. Members both of the volksraad and council were to be of European blood and members of the Dutch Re formed Church. A high court of justice separate from the yolks read was instituted. The constitution further expressly declared that no equality of coloured people with the white inhabitants would be tolerated either in Church or State. Paul Kruger, then a man oaf 3o and leader of the Rustenburg burghers, took a leading part in framing the constitution.

The Civil "War."—At the time both Lydenburg and Zout pansberg repudiated the authority of the South African Repub lic of which, as a matter of course, Pretorius was elected president (Jan. 1857). The same year Pretorius, with Kruger's aid, tried unsuccessfully, by means of an armed raid, to compel the Free State to join the S.A.R. Pretorius nevertheless retained many supporters in that State. Not long afterwards the efforts of the British high commissioner, Sir George Grey, for a federation of all the South African states came to nothing. Pretorius now secured the incorporation of Lydenburg and Zoutpansberg in the S.A.R. A vacancy occurring in the presidency of the Free State, Pretorius was elected. He went to Bloemfontein with the fixed object of uniting the two Boer republics. He found, however, dis content in the Free State, a depleted treasury and much trouble with the Basutos. Moreover the British authorities frowned on proposals for the union of the O.F.S. and the S.A.R. Old rivalries broke out in the Transvaal, and the country presented the spec tacle of two rival presidents, or acting presidents, and two rival Governments. This in turn led to a sort of civil war, though with out actual fighting. There was a "bombardment" of Potchefstroom —with one gun—by Paul Kruger and on that occasion three lives were lost and a few burghers wounded. In this conflict Kruger supported the side which he held to be the legal government and called his force the army of the State (staatsleger). Pretorius intervened more than once; at last in April 1863 he resigned his presidency of the Free State, but in the Transvaal a new election resulted (Oct. 1863) in the return of W. J. C. van Rensburg as president (Rensburg had been one of the acting presidents since April 1862 ; his rival being Stephanus Schoeman, the Zoutpansberg commandant-general, a son-in-law of Potgieter). The Pretorius party declared van Rensburg improperly elected and brought their volksleger (people's army) into the field under Corn. J. Viljoen. Kruger called out his staatsleger and see ing that he was being outmanoeuvred determined to fight in earnest. "He shot to kill and ended the civil war" (Walker's History of South Africa). The parties now in fact came to terms; a new election was held and this time Pretorius was returned at the head of the poll, while Kruger became commandant-general. On May 1 o, 1864, Pretorius took up the presidency again. In February John Brand had become president of the Free State and he succeeded in making it a model commonwealth. Pretorius lacked the ability and solidity which distinguished Brand and he had even more intractable human material with which to deal.