History of the Zulu war and its originColenso, Frances E. (Frances Ellen)
History
History of the Zulu war and its origin
Colenso, Frances E. (Frances Ellen)
Zulu War, 1879
2. _The Natal Government Gazette_, December 9th, 1873, contains the
following enactment: “All officers and other persons who have acted
under the authority of Sir Benjamin Chillay Campbell Pine, K.C.M.G.,
as Lieut.-Governor of the colony of Natal, or as Supreme Chief over
the native population, or have acted _bonâ fide_ for the purposes
and during the time aforesaid, whether such acts were done in any
district, county, or division of the colony in which martial law was
proclaimed or not, are hereby indemnified in respect of all acts,
matters, and things done, in order to suppress the rebellion and
prevent the spread thereof; and such acts so done are hereby made and
declared to be lawful, and are confirmed.”
[19] It is hard to understand why these people should yet be detained
and their harmless old chief still kept prisoner at Capetown. The
common saying that they are all content and the chief better off than
he ever was before in his life, is an entirely and cruelly false one.
Langalibalele is wearying for his freedom and his own people; the few
women with him are tired of their loneliness, and longing to be with
their children in Natal. The present writer paid the chief a visit in
September of this year (1879), and found him very sad. “I am weary;
when will they let me go?” was his continual question.
[20] Not including those individual acts of cruelty which no one
could defend, although many speak of them as unavoidable.
[21] The Lieut.-Governor of the colony.
[22] Kafir law, under which Langalibalele was tried, because most
of the offences with which he was charged were not recognisable by
English law.
[23] Ordinance No. 3, 1849.
[24] The italics are the Author’s own in this and following charge.
[25] The other rebel chiefs of the Cape Colony here alluded to,
however, were not “banished,” but merely imprisoned in a portion of
their own Supreme Chiefs territory, where, at proper times, they
could be visited by members of their families and tribes; moreover,
they were duly tried and convicted before the ordinary courts of
serious crimes committed by themselves individually, and they had
actually resisted by force their Supreme Chief within his territory;
whereas Langalibalele had made no resistance—he was a runaway, but
no rebel; he had not been tried and condemned for any crime in the
Colonial Court, and banishment for life to Robben Island, away from
all his people, was a fate worse than death in his and their eyes.
[26] The same Magema, the Bishop’s printer, before mentioned.
[27] Although Mawiza’s lies were plainly exposed, he was never
punished, but remains to this day in charge of a large tribe, over
which he has been placed by the Government.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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