Zulu War, 1879; Zululand (South Africa) -- History -- To 1879
responsible for it! Sir Bartle Frere is to be converted into Sir
Benjamin D'Urban! and a new edition of the Glenelg policy must be
adopted by her Majesty's Government!—_April 25, 1879._
III.
Lord Glenelg emphatically stated that the Kafirs had perfect
justification for the war of 1835, and this affirmation was the
foundation of his entire policy. He identified himself with the
pseudo-philanthropists who looked upon the white inhabitants of
the Eastern districts as usurpers and persecutors. The ideas of
1836 remain substantially the ideas of 1879, the only difference
being that the _venue_ is changed and that the tide of savagery
has been pushed further eastward. The settlers of 1820 were placed
by the British Government on the frontier of the Cape Colony, and
on their part and that of their descendants there was certainly no
usurpation, while it positively seems to be the result of monomania
to speak of their having persecuted the Kafirs. The incontestable
facts of history prove exactly the opposite: it was the Kafirs that
harassed and persecuted them. A comparatively small, struggling,
and sparsely settled community was persistently tormented and
impoverished by most cruel thefts and constant aggressions, which
at last culminated in wars of defence most disastrous to the
farmers and the principal portion of the settlers. The stock,
dwellings, etc., of the poor border population destroyed in the
war of 1835 alone were valued at upwards of £280,000! This was
a cruel, terrible infliction on those poor settlers, but it was
not considered enough by the Exeter Hall party. Christianity
was blasphemed by a policy of the grossest injustice adopted in
its name. Those who were bound by every tie of justice—putting
aside charity—to defend their own countrymen turned against them
most virulently, and did everything in their power to cause the
re-enactment of the bloody scenes in which British settlers in this
distant land had suffered so much.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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