inhabitant. By right of conquest Chaka became undisputed master of the country.
Such was the situation when the first British settlement was made in Natal. In 1823 Francis George Farewell, formerly a lieutenant in the British navy, with other merchants of Cape Town, formed a company to trade with the natives of the south-east coast. In the brig “Salisbury,” commanded by James S. King, who had been a midshipman in the navy, Farewell visited Port Natal, St Lucia and Delagoa Bays. The voyage was not successful as a trading venture, but Farewell was so impressed with the possibilities of Natal both for trade and colonization that he resolved to establish himself at the port. He went thither with ten companions, among them Henry Francis Fynn. All the rest save Farewell and Fynn speedily repented of their adventure and returned to the Cape, but the two who remained were joined by three sailors, John Cane, Henry Ogle and Thomas Holstead, a lad. Farewell, Fynn and the others went to the royal kraal of Chaka, and, having cured him of a wound and made him various presents, obtained a document, dated the 7th of August 1824, ceding to “F. G. Farewell & Company entire and full possession in perpetuity” of a tract of land including “the port or harbour of Natal.” On the 27th of the same month Farewell hoisted the The first British settlement. Union Jack at the port and declared the territory he had acquired a British possession. In 1825 he was joined by King, who had meantime visited England and had obtained from the government a letter of recommendation to Lord Charles Somerset, governor of the Cape, granting King permission to settle at Natal. Farewell, King and Fynn made independent settlements at various parts of the bay, where a few Amatuli still lingered. They lived, practically, as Kaffir chiefs, trading with Chaka and gathering round them many refugees from that monarch’s tyranny. Early in 1828 King, accompanied by two of Chaka’s indunas, voyaged in the “Elizabeth and Susan,” a small schooner built by the settlers, to Port Elizabeth. He appears to have been coldly received by the authorities, who were even unable to ascertain the nature of Chaka’s embassy. Soon after his return to Natal King died, and in the same month (September 1828) Chaka was murdered by his brother Dingaan. In the December following Farewell went in the “Elizabeth and Susan” to Port Elizabeth. On this occasion the authorities were more hostile than before to the Natal pioneers, for they confiscated the schooner on the ground that it was unregistered and that it came from a foreign port. Farewell was not daunted, and in September 1829 set out to return overland to Port Natal. He was, however, murdered in Pondoland by a chief who was at enmity with the Zulus. Fynn thus became leader of the whites at the port, who were much at the mercy of Dingaan. In 1831 that chief raided their settlements, the whites all fleeing south of the Umzimkulu; but at Dingaan’s invitation they soon returned. Dingaan declared Fynn his representative and “great chief of the Natal Kaffirs.” In 1834, however, Fynn accepted a post under the Cape government and did not return to Natal for many years. It was in this year that a petition from Cape Town merchants asking for the creation of a British colony at Natal was met by the statement that the Cape finances would not permit the establishment of a new dependency. The merchants, however, despatched an expedition under Dr Andrew Smith to inquire into the possibilities of the country, and the favourable nature of his report induced a party of Dutch farmers under Piet Uys to go thither also. Both Dr Smith and Uys travelled overland through Kaffraria, and were well received by the English living at the bay. The next step was taken by the settlers at the port, who in 1835 resolved to lay out a town, which they named Durban, after Sir Benjamin d’Urban, then governor of Cape Colony. At the same time the settlers, who numbered about 50, sent a memorial to the governor calling attention to the fact that they were acknowledged rulers over a large tract of territory south of the Tugela, and asking that this territory should be proclaimed a British colony under the name of Victoria and that a governor and council be appointed. To all these requests no official answer was returned. The settlers had been joined in the year named (1835) by Captain Gardiner, a naval officer, whose chief object was the evangelization of the natives. With the support of the traders he founded a mission station on the hill overlooking the bay. In 1837 Gardiner was given authority by the British government to exercise jurisdiction over the traders. They, however, refused to acknowledge Gardiner’s authority, and from the Cape government he received no support.[1] It was not until their hand was forced by the occupation of the interior by Dutch farmers that the Cape authorities at length intervened.
The British settlers had, characteristically, reached Natal mainly by way of the sea; the new tide of immigration was by land—the voortrekkers streamed through the passes of the Drakensberg, bringing with them their wives and children and vast herds of cattle. The reasons which caused the exodus from the Cape are discussed elsewhere Arrival of the Dutch voortrekkers. (see South Africa and Cape Colony), here it is only necessary to point out that those emigrants who entered Natal shared with those who settled elsewhere an intense desire to be free from British control. The first emigrant Boers to enter the country were led by Pieter Retief (c. 1780–1838), a man of Huguenot descent and of marked ability, who had formerly lived on the eastern frontier of Cape Colony and had suffered severely in the Kaffir wars. Passing through the almost deserted upper regions Retief arrived at the bay in October 1837. He went thence to Dingaan’s kraal with the object of securing a formal cession of territory to the Dutch farmers. Dingaan consented on condition that the Boers recovered for him certain cattle stolen by another chief; this task Retief accomplished, and with the help of the Rev. F. Owen, a missionary then living at Dingaan’s kraal, a deed of cession was drawn up in English and signed by Dingaan and Retief on the 4th of February 1838. Two days after the signature of the deed Retief and all of his party, 66 whites, besides Hottentot servants, were treacherously murdered by Dingaan’s orders. The Zulu king then commanded his impis to kill all the Boers who had entered Natal. The Zulu forces crossed the Tugela the same day, and the most advanced parties of the Boers were massacred, many at a spot near where the town of Weenen now stands, its name (meaning wailing or weeping) commemorating the event. Other of the farmers hastily laagered and were able to repulse the Zulu attacks; the assailants suffering serious loss at a fight near the Bushman’s river. Nevertheless in one week after the murder of Retief 600 Boers—men, women and children—had been killed by the Zulus. The English settlers at the bay, hearing of the attack on the Boers, determined to make a diversion in their favour, and some 20 men under the command of R. Biggar and with a following of 700 friendly Zulus crossed the Tugela near its mouth. In a desperate fight (April 17) with a strong force of the enemy the English were overwhelmed and only four Europeans escaped to the bay. Pursued by the Zulus, all the surviving inhabitants of Durban were compelled for a time to take refuge on a ship then in harbour. After the Zulus retired, less than a dozen Englishmen returned to live at the port; the missionaries, hunters and other traders returned to the Cape. Meantime the Boers, who had repelled the Zulu attacks on their laagers, had been joined by others from the Drakensberg, and about 400 men under Hendrik Potgieter and Piet Uys advanced to attack Dingaan. On the 11th of April, however, they fell into a trap laid by the Zulus and with difficulty cut their way out. Among those slain were Piet Uys and his son Dirk, aged 15, who rode by his side. The Boer farmers were now in a miserable plight, but towards the end of the year they received reinforcements, and in December 460 men set out under Andries Pretorius to avenge themselves on the Zulus. On Sunday the 16th of December, while laagered near the Umslatos river, they were attacked by over 10,000 Zulus. The Boers had firearms, the Zulus their assegais only, and after a three hours’ fight the Zulus were totally defeated, losing thousands killed, while the farmers’ casualties were under
- ↑ Captain Allen Francis Gardiner (1794–1851) left Natal in 1838, subsequently devoting himself to missionary work in South America, being known as the missionary to Patagonia. He died of starvation in Tierra del Fuego.
