Eleven of the prisoners—apart from the four whose punishment in substitution for death had not been decided upon, and who were therefore not concerned in the petitions—declined to reconsider their decision, and elected rather to serve their term of two years; and they expressed the conviction at the same time that these promises of the President would not be kept any more than others had been. The result justified their judgment. After a postponement of two days on some flimsy pretext the official intimation of the commutations was given to the prisoners on Wednesday, May 20. Instead of the release positively and definitely promised the term of imprisonment was reduced in the following degree: Ten men were released, twenty-four men were condemned to three months', eighteen to five months', and four to one year's imprisonment; and the clemency of the Government towards the four leaders was indicated by a sentence of fifteen years each.
Even a short period of imprisonment under the existing conditions meant certain death to a proportion of the men sentenced, and it is not to be wondered at that the 'magnanimity' displayed by the Government after the disappointments and delays seriously affected the health of a number of the men, following as it did closely upon the tragic affair already alluded to.
With regard to Messrs. Sampson and Davies no decision was announced, it being intimated by Dr. Leyds that, as they had made no petition, their case had not been brought before the Government, and the Executive had therefore no official knowledge of their existence. But the extent of the Government's magnanimity was even then not fully known. On the following day it was announced to the prisoners that they had been misinformed with regard to the five and twelve months' commutations—that the intention and resolution of the Executive was merely to grant these men permission to appeal at the end of the periods named to the aforesaid magnanimity.
Some prominence has been given to the cases of those prisoners who were unable for physical or other special reasons to withstand the strain; and it should therefore be made equally clear that in many cases the men regarded with contemptuous amusement the cat and mouse policy and the stage-managed magnanimity displayed towards them. They were perfectly well able and willing to endure the sentence passed upon them, and they were not misled by Boer promises in which they had never had any faith at all. There are good reasons to be assigned for the willingness of many of the men to make appeals to the Government: sheer hard necessity and the sufferings of those dependent upon them were among these reasons; and it is unfair to consider these appeals to have been due to loss of nerve.
There were among the prisoners twenty-three Englishmen, sixteen South Africans, nine Scotchmen, six Americans, two Welshmen, one Irishman, one Australian, one Hollander, one Bavarian, one German, one Canadian, one Swiss, and one Turk. This variety of nationalities should receive due consideration when questions such as for instance that of the flag are considered. In this matter of petitions it was not to be expected that men whose associations with the country had been limited to a few years should experience the same depth of feeling and bitterness of resentment as the South Africans born who look upon the country as their native land and who view with keen resentment the attitude of the Boers towards them in the Transvaal, so much at variance with their attitude towards the Boers in the neighbouring colonies. Nothing could illustrate this difference in feeling better than the fact that of the eleven men who throughout declined to sign petitions eight were South African born, one Australian, one English, and one Scotch. There is nothing discreditable to others in these figures; they simply indicate the difference of feeling which did and indeed naturally must exist. The South African born men consider themselves to have been robbed of a portion of their birthright; the others have not the same reason for thinking this.
With men of so many nationalities the position of the British Resident would in any case have been one of difficulty, especially after the part played by the High Commissioner. In the case of Sir Jacobus de Wet very little satisfaction was given. What caused the most comment and annoyance among the prisoners was that official representatives of other countries appeared to have unusual facilities offered them to visit the subjects of their Government—at least, they could command the ordinary courtesies—whereas in the case of the British Agent nothing of this sort existed. Frequently he was observed standing outside the gaol in the worst of weather without shelter, patiently waiting until the gaoler would deem fit to see him. In the meantime that official would stroll through the yard, making remarks to his subordinates indicative of the satisfaction he experienced in keeping the representative of Her Majesty outside in the rain and mud. Upon occasions when he was afforded admission he was hustled through the yard by a warder and not allowed to hold private conversation with any of the prisoners. On several occasions he complained that he was refused admission by order of the gaoler, and the spectacle of England's representative being turned away by an ignorant and ill-conditioned official like Du Plessis was not an edifying one. It is only necessary to say that upon an occasion when Du Plessis adopted the same tactics towards the Portuguese Consul that gentleman proceeded at once to the Presidency and demanded as his right free admission to the gaol whenever he chose to go, and the right was promptly recognized although there was no subject of his Government at the time within the precincts. Indeed the Portuguese Consul stated openly that he called for the purpose of visiting as a friend one of the Reform prisoners, giving the name of one of the recalcitrants most objectionable to the Government. The American Consul too carried matters with a high hand on the occasion of his visit to Pretoria, and it seemed as though the Paramount Power was the only one which the Transvaal Government could afford or cared to treat with contempt.
The period of gaol life afforded the Reformers some opportunity of studying a department of the Transvaal Administration which they had not before realized to be so badly in need of reform. The system—if system it can be called—upon which the gaol was conducted may be gathered from the gaoler's own words. When one of the prisoners had inquired of him whether a certain treatment to which a white convict had been subjected was in accordance with the rules of the gaol and had received an answer in the affirmative, he remarked that he did not think many of the Reformers could exist under such conditions. Du Plessis replied: 'Oh no! Not one of you would be alive a month if the rules were enforced. No white man could stand them. Indeed,' he added, 'if the rules were properly enforced, not even a nigger could stand them!'
Some subsequent experience of gaol-life induced the Reformers to accept this view as tolerably correct. It is known for instance that after the Malaboch war sixty-four of the tribe were incarcerated in Pretoria Gaol. Some twenty were subsequently released, but of the remainder twenty-six died within the year. Bad food vile sanitary arrangements and want of clothing and shelter contributed to this end. Malaboch was a petty chief against whom an expedition was organized, ostensibly because he had refused to pay his taxes. The expedition is chiefly notorious on account of the commandeering of British subjects which led to the visit of Sir Henry Loch already described. It resulted—as these expeditions inevitably do—in the worsting of the natives, the capture of the chief and his headmen, and the parcelling out of his tribe as indentured servants among the Boers.
Considerable sympathy was felt with Malaboch among the Uitlanders, not because of his refusal to pay taxes but because the opinion prevailed that this refusal was due only to the tyrannical and improper conduct of the Boer native commissioners; and a number of Johannesburg men resolved in the interests of the native and also of the native labour supply on the Rand to have the matter cleared up at the forthcoming trial of the chief. Funds were provided and counsel employed, nominally to defend Malaboch, but really to impeach the native commissioners, who in many cases were and continue to be a perfect curse to the country. No sooner had this intended course of action become known than the Government decided to treat their prisoners under the provisions of martial law—to treat them, in fact, as prisoners of war, who were liable to be indefinitely detained without further trial. Under these conditions they were placed in the Pretoria Gaol, and with the exception of a few subordinates there they have lived—or died—since. The offences of these natives, for all anyone knows, may have been similar to those of Langalibalele, Dinizulu, Secocoeni, Cetewayo, and other native chiefs whom the British Government have also disposed of without trial. But it is urged that these men are entitled to a trial, because it is well known that the provocation under which they committed their offences against the law—if indeed any were committed—was such as, in the minds of most people, would justify their action.[{36}]
The position of a native in the Pretoria Gaol is indeed an unhappy one. Sleeping accommodation—that is to say, shed accommodation—is provided for about one-quarter of the number confined there. During fine weather it is no hardship upon the natives to sleep in the open yard provided that they have some covering. The blankets doled out to them are however in many cases such as one would not allow to remain in one's kennels; and in wet or cold weather (and the fact is that during at least one quarter of the year the nights are cold, whilst during the five months' wet season rain may fall at any time) the sufferings of these unfortunates many of whom have no blankets at all are very severe. Of course the stronger fight their way into the shed, and even fill the little covered passage-way; the others crouch or lie about in the open yard like wild beasts without a vestige of shelter.