History of the Zulu war and its origin

by Frances Ellen Colenso

But indeed, after the decision in favour of the Zulus was given, Sir Bartle Frere entirely changed the complacent tone in which he had spoken of the Commission beforehand. To all appearance his careful schemes for subjugating the Zulu nation were thrown away—the war and the South African Empire were on the point of eluding his grasp. He had sent to England for reinforcements—in direct opposition to the home policy, which for some years had been gradually teaching the colonies to depend upon themselves for protection, and therefore to refrain from rushing headlong into needless and dangerous wars, which might be avoided by a little exercise of tact and forbearance. He and his friend General Thesiger had laid out their campaign and had sent men-of-war to investigate the landing capabilities of the Zulu coast, and he had recommended Sir Henry Bulwer to inform the Zulu king—when the latter expressed his disquietude on the subject of these men-of-war—that the ships he saw were “for the most part English merchant vessels, but that the war-vessels of the English Government are quite sufficient to protect his (Cetshwayo’s) coast from any descent by any other power” (October 6th, 1878, 2220, p. 307).

Sir Henry Bulwer was too honest to carry out this recommendation, even had he not had the sense to know that Cetshwayo was accustomed to the passing of merchantmen, and was not to be thus taken in (supposing him to be likely to fear attacks from “foreign foes”). But the fact remains that, an English official of Sir Bartle Frere’s rank has put on record, in an official despatch under his own hand, a deliberate proposal that the Zulu king should be tranquillised, and his well-founded suspicions allayed by—a “figure of speech,” shall we say?

Every possible objection was made by Sir Bartle Frere to the decision of the Commissioners, and it was with the utmost difficulty that he was at last persuaded to ratify it, after a considerable period employed in preparing for a campaign, the idea of which he appears never for a minute to have relinquished. Sir T. Shepstone protested against the decision, which, however, Sir Henry Bulwer upheld; while Sir Bartle Frere finally decides that “Sir H. Bulwer and I, approaching the question by somewhat different roads, agree in the conclusion that we must accept the Commissioners’ verdict.” Their report was made on June 20th, 1878, but it was not until November 16th that Sir H. Bulwer sent to Cetshwayo to say that “the Lieut.-Governor is now in a position to inform Cetshwayo that His Excellency the High Commissioner has pronounced his award, etc.,” and to fix twenty days from the date of the departure of the messengers carrying this message from Pietermaritzburg, as a convenient time for a meeting on the borders of the two countries at the Lower Tugela Drift, at which the decision should be delivered to the king’s indunas by officers of the Government appointed for the purpose.

But before this conclusion was arrived at another attempt had been made to bring accusations against Cetshwayo, who said himself at the time (June 27th, 1878): “The name of Cetshwayo is always used amongst the Boers as being the first to wish to quarrel.” Alarming accounts reached the Natal Government of a fresh military kraal having been built by the king, and notices to quit being served by him upon Boers within the disputed territory, in spite of his engagement to await the decision of the Commissioners. The farmers complained of being obliged to fly, “leaving homes, homesteads, and improvements to be destroyed by a savage, unbridled, revengeful nation.”[84] Sir T. Shepstone re-echoed their complaint (2220, p. 27), and Sir Bartle Frere comments severely upon the alleged Zulu aggressions.

The matter, however, when sifted, sinks into insignificance. Some squabbles had taken place between individual Boers and Zulus, such as were only natural in the unsettled state of things; and Cetshwayo’s explanation of the so-called “notices to quit” placed them in a very different light.

Sir Henry Bulwer writes to Sir Bartle Frere as follows on this point (July 16th): “The Zulu king says that all the message he sent was a request that the Boers should be warned not to return to the disputed country, as he was informed they were doing since the meeting of the Commission. We know that some of the Boers did return to the disputed territory after the Commission broke up;[85] and this, no doubt, was looked upon by the Zulus as an attempt on the part of the Boers to anticipate the result of the inquiry, and led to the giving those notices.... The fault has been, no doubt, on both sides.”

The military kraal, also, turned out to be no more of the nature ascribed to it than was its predecessor: “An ordinary private Zulu kraal”—see report of Mr. Kudolph (2144, p. 186)—“built simply to have a kraal in that locality, where many of Cetshwayo’s people are residing without a head or kraal representing the king ... the king having given instructions that neither the white nor the native subjects of the Transvaal were in any way to be molested or disturbed by the Zulus;” and having sent a small force to do the work, because the large one he had sent on a previous occasion had frightened the white people.

Colonel Pearson, commanding the troops in Natal and the Transvaal, writes, June 8th, 1878 (2144, p. 236):

“The Landrost of Utrecht I know to be somewhat of an alarmist, and the border farmers have all along been in a great fright, and much given to false reports. I allude more particularly to the Boers. I enclose Lieut.-Colonel Durnford’s views of the kraal question. He is an officer who knows South Africa intimately, and his opinion I consider always sound and intelligent.”