Editing Second Boer War (section)

== Historical background ==
[[File:Foto van oorlog.jpg|thumb|Boer victory over the British at the [[Battle of Majuba Hill]], [[First Boer War]], 1881]]

The southern part of the African continent was dominated in the 19th century by a set of struggles to create within it a single unified state. In 1868, Britain annexed [[History of Lesotho|Basutoland]] in the [[Drakensberg]] Mountains, following an appeal from [[Moshoeshoe I]], the king of the [[Sotho people]], who sought British protection against the Boers. While the [[Berlin Conference]] of 1884–1885 sought to draw boundaries between the European powers' African possessions, it also set the stage for further scrambles. Britain attempted to annex first the South African Republic in 1880, and then, in 1899, both the South African Republic and the Orange Free State.

In the 1880s, [[Bechuanaland Protectorate|Bechuanaland]] (modern [[Botswana]]) became the object of a dispute between the Germans to the west, the Boers to the east, and Britain's Cape Colony to the south. Although Bechuanaland had no economic value, the "[[London Missionary Society|Missionaries Road]]" passed through it towards territory farther north. After the Germans annexed [[Damaraland]] and Namaqualand (modern [[Namibia]]) in 1884, Britain annexed Bechuanaland in 1885.

In the [[First Boer War]] of 1880–1881 the Boers of the Transvaal Republic proved skilful fighters in resisting Britain's attempt at annexation, causing a series of British defeats. The British government of [[William Ewart Gladstone]] was unwilling to become mired in a distant war, requiring substantial troop reinforcement and expense, for what was perceived at the time to be a minimal return. An armistice ended the war, and subsequently a peace treaty was signed with the Transvaal President Paul Kruger.

In June 1884, British imperial interests were ignited in the discovery by Jan Gerrit Bantjes of what would prove to be the world's largest deposit of gold-bearing ore at an outcrop on a large ridge some {{convert|69|km|mi|abbr=on}} south of the Boer capital at Pretoria. The ridge was known locally as the "Witwatersrand" (white water ridge, a watershed). A [[gold rush]] to the Transvaal brought thousands of British and other prospectors and settlers from around the globe and over the border from the Cape Colony, which had been under British control since 1806.

{| class="wikitable" style="float:right; margin:0 0 1.0em 1.0em; text-align:right; font-size:95%;"
|-
! colspan="5" style="background:#ccf;"| Gold Production on the Witwatersrand {{br}} 1898 to 1910{{sfn|Yap|Leong Man|1996 |p=134}}
|-
| '''Year''' || '''No. of {{br}}Mines''' || '''Gold output{{br}}(fine ounces)''' || '''Value ([[Pound sterling|£]])''' || '''Relative 2010{{br}} value ([[Pound sterling|£]])<ref>{{harvnb|Measuringworth|2015}}, Relative Value of a UK Pound Amount – average earnings, retrieved on 27 January 2011</ref>'''
|-
| 1898 || 77 || 4,295,608 || £15,141,376 || £6,910,000,000
|-
| 1899{{br}} (Jan–Oct) || 85 || 3,946,545 || £14,046,686 || £6,300,000,000
|-
| 1899{{br}} (Nov) – 1901 (Apr) || 12 || 574,043 || £2,024,278 || £908,000,000
|-
| 1901{{br}} (May–Dec) || 12 || 238,994 || £1,014,687 || £441,000,000
|-
| 1902 || 45 || 1,690,100 || £7,179,074 || £3,090,000,000
|-
| 1903 || 56 || 2,859,482 || £12,146,307 || £5,220,000,000
|-
| 1904 || 62 || 3,658,241 || £15,539,219 || £6,640,000,000
|-
| 1905 || 68 || 4,706,433 || £19,991,658 || £8,490,000,000
|-
! scope="row" colspan="5" style="color:#900;"|
|}

The city of Johannesburg sprang up nearly overnight as a [[shanty town]]. ''[[Uitlanders]]'' (foreigners, white outsiders) poured in and settled around the mines. The influx was so rapid that uitlanders quickly outnumbered the Boers in Johannesburg and along the Rand, although they remained a minority in the Transvaal. The Boers, nervous and resentful of the uitlanders' growing presence, sought to contain their influence through requiring lengthy residential qualifying periods before voting rights could be obtained; by imposing taxes on the gold industry; and by introducing controls through licensing, tariffs and administrative requirements. Among the issues giving rise to tension between the Transvaal government on the one hand and the uitlanders and British interests on the other, were:
* Established uitlanders, including the mining magnates, wanted political, social, and economic control over their lives. These rights included a stable constitution, a fair franchise law, an independent judiciary and a better educational system. The Boers, for their part, recognised that the more concessions they made to the uitlanders the greater the likelihood—with approximately 30,000 white male Boer voters and potentially 60,000 white male uitlanders—that their independent control of the Transvaal would be lost, and the territory absorbed into the British Empire.
* The uitlanders resented the taxes levied by the Transvaal government, particularly when this money was not spent on Johannesburg or uitlander interests but diverted to projects elsewhere in the Transvaal. For example, as the gold-bearing ore sloped away from the outcrop underground to the south, more and more blasting was necessary to extract it, and mines consumed vast quantities of explosives. A box of dynamite costing five pounds included five shillings tax. Not only was this tax perceived as exorbitant, but British interests were offended when President [[Paul Kruger]] gave monopoly rights for the manufacture of the explosive to a non-British branch of the Nobel company, which infuriated Britain.{{sfn|Cartwright|1964|p={{Page needed|date=July 2010}} }} The so-called "dynamite monopoly" became a [[casus belli]].

British imperial interests were alarmed when in 1894–1895 Kruger proposed building a railway through [[Portuguese East Africa]] to [[Maputo Bay|Delagoa Bay]], bypassing British-controlled ports in Natal and Cape Town and avoiding British tariffs.{{sfn|Nathan|1941|p={{page needed|date=February 2017}} }} At the time, the Prime Minister of the Cape Colony was [[Cecil Rhodes]], a man driven by a vision of a British-controlled Africa extending from the [[Cape to Cairo Road|Cape to Cairo]]. Certain self-appointed ''uitlanders''' representatives and British mine owners became increasingly frustrated and angered by their dealings with the Transvaal government. A Reform Committee (Transvaal) was formed to represent the uitlanders.

=== Jameson Raid ===
{{Main|Jameson Raid}}

[[File:Leander Starr Jameson00.jpg|thumb|A sketch showing the arrest of [[Jameson Raid|Jameson]] after the failed raid, in 1896]]

In 1895, a plan to take Johannesburg and end the control of the Transvaal government was hatched with the connivance of the Cape Prime Minister Rhodes and Johannesburg gold magnate [[Alfred Beit]]. A column of 600 armed men was led over the border from Bechuanaland towards Johannesburg by Jameson, the [[Company rule in Rhodesia|Administrator in Rhodesia]] of the [[British South Africa Company]], of which Cecil Rhodes was the chairman. The column, mainly made up of [[Rhodesia (name)|Rhodesian]] and [[Bechuanaland]] [[British South Africa Police]]men, was equipped with [[Maxim machine gun]]s and some artillery pieces.

The plan was to make a three-day dash to Johannesburg and trigger an uprising by the primarily British expatriate uitlanders, organised by the [[Johannesburg Reform Committee]], before the [[Boer commando]]s could mobilise. However, the Transvaal authorities had advance warning of the Jameson Raid and tracked it from the moment it crossed the border. Four days later, the weary and dispirited column was surrounded near [[Krugersdorp]], within sight of Johannesburg. After a brief skirmish in which the column lost 65 killed and wounded—while the Boers lost but one man—Jameson's men surrendered and were arrested by the Boers.<ref name="Pakenham1979" />{{rp|1–5}}

The botched raid had repercussions throughout southern Africa and in Europe. In Rhodesia, the departure of so many policemen enabled the [[Northern Ndebele people|Matabele]] and [[Shona people|Mashona]] peoples' rising against the British South Africa Company. The rebellion, known as the [[Second Matabele War]], was suppressed only at a great cost.

A few days after the raid, the [[German Emperor|German Kaiser]] sent a telegram—known to history as "the [[Kruger telegram]]"—congratulating President Kruger and the government of the South African Republic on their success. When the text of this telegram was disclosed in the British press, it generated a storm of anti-German feeling. In the baggage of the raiding column, to the great embarrassment of Britain, the Boers found telegrams from Cecil Rhodes and the other plotters in Johannesburg. Chamberlain had approved Rhodes' plans to send armed assistance in the case of a Johannesburg uprising, but he quickly moved to condemn the raid. Rhodes was severely censured at the Cape inquiry and the London parliamentary inquiry and was forced to resign as Prime Minister of the Cape and as Chairman of the British South Africa Company, for having sponsored the failed ''coup d'état''.

The Boer government handed their prisoners over to the British for trial. Jameson was tried in England, where the British press and London society, inflamed by anti-Boer and anti-German feeling and in a frenzy of jingoism, lionised him and treated him as a hero. Although sentenced to 15 months imprisonment (which he served in [[Holloway (HM Prison)|Holloway]]), Jameson was later rewarded by being named Prime Minister of the Cape Colony (1904–1908) and was ultimately anointed as one of the founders of the Union of South Africa. For conspiring with Jameson, the uitlander members of the Reform Committee (Transvaal) were tried in the Transvaal courts and found guilty of high treason. The four leaders were sentenced to death by hanging, but the next day this sentence was commuted to 15 years' imprisonment. In June 1896, the other members of the committee were released on payment of £2,000 each in fines, all of which were paid by Cecil Rhodes. One Reform Committee member, Frederick Gray, committed suicide while in Pretoria [[gaol]], on 16 May. His death was a factor in softening the Transvaal government's attitude to the surviving prisoners.

Jan C. Smuts wrote, in 1906:

{{blockquote|The Jameson Raid was the real declaration of war&nbsp;... And that is so in spite of the four years of truce that followed&nbsp;... [the] aggressors consolidated their alliance&nbsp;... the defenders on the other hand silently and grimly prepared for the inevitable".<ref name="Pakenham1979" />{{rp|9}} }}

=== Escalation ===

The Jameson Raid alienated many Cape Afrikaners from Britain and united the Transvaal Boers behind President Kruger and his government. It also had the effect of drawing the Transvaal and the Orange Free State (led by President [[Martinus Theunis Steyn]]) together in opposition to British imperialism. In 1897, the two republics concluded a military pact.

=== Arming the Boers ===
[[File:KrugerPaulusJohannes.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Paul Kruger]], leader of the [[South African Republic]] (Transvaal)]]

In earlier conflicts, the Boers' most common weapon was the British [[Westley Richards]] falling-block breech-loader. In his book ''The First Boer War'', Joseph Lehmann offers this comment: "Employing chiefly the very fine breech-loading Westley Richards – calibre 45; paper cartridge; percussion-cap replaced on the nipple manually—they made it exceedingly dangerous for the British to expose themselves on the skyline".<ref>{{cite web | last=Machanik | first=Felix | title=Firearms and Firepower – First War of Independence, 1880–1881 – Journal | website=South African Military History Society | url=http://samilitaryhistory.org/vol052fm.html | access-date=2019-08-28}}</ref>

[[File:Rifle, bolt action (AM 1930.61-17).jpg|thumb|Mauser 1895 bolt-action rifle (at the Auckland Museum)]]

Kruger re-equipped the Transvaal army, importing 37,000 of the latest 7x57 mm [[Mauser Model 1895]] rifles supplied by Germany,<ref name="Smith-Christmas-2016">{{cite web|url=https://www.americanrifleman.org/articles/2016/6/1/the-guns-of-the-boer-commandos/|title=The Guns of the Boer Commandos|last=Smith-Christmas|first=Kenneth L.|date=2016-06-01|website=American Rifleman|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200314072227/https://www.americanrifleman.org/articles/2016/6/1/the-guns-of-the-boer-commandos/|archive-date=14 March 2020|access-date=2019-08-28}}</ref> and some 40 to 50&nbsp;million rounds of ammunition.<ref>{{harvnb|Bester|1994|p={{page needed|date=February 2017}} }}</ref><ref name="Wessels2000" />{{rp|80}} Some commandos used the [[Martini-Henry]] Mark III, because thousands of these had been purchased. Unfortunately, the large puff of white smoke after firing gave away the shooter's position.<ref name="Scarlata-2017">{{cite web | last=Scarlata | first=Paul | title=6 Rifles Used by the Afrikaners During the Second Boer War | website=Tactical Life Gun Magazine | date=2017-04-17 | url=https://www.tactical-life.com/firearms/second-boer-war-rifles/ | access-date=2019-08-28}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Pretorius|first=Fransjohan|title=Life on Commando during the Anglo–Boer War 1899–1902|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WfovAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA81|year=1999|publisher=Human & Rousseau|isbn=978-0-7981-3808-6|page=81}}</ref> Roughly 7,000 Guedes 1885 rifles had also been purchased a few years earlier, and these were also used during the hostilities.<ref name="Scarlata-2017" />

As the war went on, some commandos relied on captured British rifles, such as the [[Lee-Metford]] and the [[Lee–Enfield|Enfield]].<ref name="Smith-Christmas-2016" /><ref name=bbc01 /> Indeed, when the ammunition for the Mausers ran out, the Boers relied primarily on the captured Lee-Metfords.<ref>{{cite book|last=Muller|first=C. F. J.|title=Five Hundred Years: A History of South Africa|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0dlBAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA330|year=1986|publisher=Academica|isbn=978-0-86874-271-7|page=330}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Grant|first=Neil|title=Mauser Military Rifles|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xbKdCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA39|year=2015|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing|isbn=978-1-4728-0595-9|page=39}}</ref>

Regardless of the rifle, few of the Boers used bayonets.<ref>{{cite book|last=Gooch|first=John|title=The Boer War: Direction, Experience and Image|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CVy4AQAAQBAJ&pg=PT98|year= 2013|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-1-135-27181-7|page=98}}</ref><ref name="Grant-2015">{{cite book|last=Grant|first=Neil|title=Mauser Military Rifles|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xbKdCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA37|year=2015|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing|isbn=978-1-4728-0595-9|page=37}}</ref>

The Boers also purchased the best modern European German Krupp artillery. By October 1899, the Transvaal State Artillery had 73 heavy guns, including four 155&nbsp;mm [[155 mm Creusot Long Tom|Creusot fortress guns]]<ref>{{cite book|last=Lunderstedt|first=Steve|title=From Belmont to Bloemfontein: the western campaign of the Anglo–Boer War, February 1899 to April 1900|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cgMwAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA22|year=2000|publisher=Diamond Fields Advertiser|page=22|isbn=978-0-620-26099-2}}</ref> and 25 of the 37&nbsp;mm [[QF 1 pounder pom-pom|Maxim Nordenfeldt guns]].<ref name="Wessels2000" />{{rp|80}}
The Boers' Maxim, larger than the British Maxims,<ref>{{cite book|last=Horn|first=Bernd|title=Doing Canada Proud: The Second Boer War and the Battle of Paardeberg|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cNnSDFv7J1IC&pg=PA56|year=2012|publisher=Dundurn|isbn=978-1-4597-0578-4|page=56}}</ref> was a large calibre, belt-fed, water-cooled "auto cannon" that fired explosive rounds (smokeless ammunition) at 450 rounds per minute. It became known as the "Pom Pom".<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.smallarmsreview.com/display.article.cfm?idarticles=2490|title=South Africa's National Museum of Military History|last=Krott|first=Rob|date=14 March 2014|website=SmallArmsReview.com|orig-year=2002|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200320075558/https://www.smallarmsreview.com/display.article.cfm?idarticles=2490|archive-date=20 March 2020|access-date=2019-08-28}}</ref>

Aside from weaponry, the tactics used by the Boers were significant. As one modern source states, "Boer soldiers ... were adept at guerrilla warfare—something the British had difficulty countering".<ref>{{cite news|url=https://legionmagazine.com/en/2017/05/canadas-first-foreign-war/|title=Canada's first foreign war|last=Zuehlke|first=Mark|date=2017-05-15|website=Legion Magazine|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200211140928/https://legionmagazine.com/en/2017/05/canadas-first-foreign-war/|archive-date=11 February 2020|access-date=2019-08-28}}</ref>

The Transvaal army was transformed: Approximately 25,000 men equipped with modern rifles and artillery could mobilise within two weeks. However, President Kruger's victory in the Jameson Raid incident did nothing to resolve the fundamental problem of finding a formula to conciliate the uitlanders, without surrendering the independence of the Transvaal.

=== British case for war ===
[[File:Lee-Metford Mk II - AM.032034.jpg|thumb|A British [[Lee–Metford]] rifle used by British troops during the Second Boer War]]
The failure to gain improved rights for uitlanders (notably the goldfields dynamite tax) became a pretext for war and a justification for a big military build-up in Cape Colony. The case for war was developed and espoused as far away as the Australian colonies.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Connolly|first=C. N.|date=1978-04-01|title=Manufacturing 'spontaneity': The Australian offers of troops for the Boer War|journal=Historical Studies|volume=18|issue=70|pages=106–117|doi=10.1080/10314617808595579|issn=0018-2559}}</ref> Cape Colony Governor Sir [[Alfred Milner]]; Rhodes; Chamberlain; and [[Randlord|mining syndicate owners]] such as Beit, [[Barney Barnato]], and [[Lionel Phillips]], favoured annexation of the Boer republics. Confident that the Boers would be quickly defeated, they planned and organised a short war, citing the uitlanders' grievances as the motivation for the conflict. In contrast, the influence of the war party within the British government was limited. UK Prime Minister, [[Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury|Lord Salisbury]], despised [[jingoism]] and jingoists.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.britishempire.me.uk/lordsalisbury.html|title=Lord Salisbury|last=Crowhurst|first=Peter|website=britishempire.me.uk|access-date=2020-04-08}}</ref> He was also uncertain of the abilities of the British Army. Despite both his moral and practical reservations, Salisbury led the United Kingdom to war in order to preserve the British Empire's prestige and feeling a sense of obligation to British South Africans.{{efn| Salisbury felt that the Transvaal, the Orange Free State, and Cape Boers aspired to a "Dutch South Africa". The achievement of such a state would damage British imperial prestige}} Salisbury also detested the Boers treatment of native Africans, referring to the [[London Convention (1884)|London Convention of 1884]], (following Britain's defeat in the first war), as an agreement "really in the interest of slavery".<ref name="Steele2000">{{Cite book|last=Steele |first=David |year=2000 |chapter=Salisbury and the Soldiers |editor-first=John |editor-last=Gooch |title=The Boer War: Direction, Experience and Image|location=London|publisher=Cass}}</ref>{{rp|7}}<ref name="Steele2000" />{{rp|6}} Salisbury was not alone in this concern. [[Roger Casement]], already well on the way to becoming an Irish Nationalist, was nevertheless happy to gather intelligence for the British against the Boers because of their cruelty to Africans.<ref>{{harvnb|Jeffery|2000|p=145}} cites {{harvnb|Inglis|1974|pp=53–55}}</ref>
[[File:England und der Krieg in Südafrika - Rata Langa 1899 (rotated).jpg|thumb|1899 German political cartoon: "War and Capitalism, or the transformation of human blood into gold"]]
The British government went against the advice of its generals (including Wolseley) and declined to send substantial reinforcements to South Africa before war broke out. Secretary of State for War Lansdowne did not believe the Boers were preparing for war and that if Britain were to send large numbers of troops to the region it would strike too aggressive a posture and possibly derail a negotiated settlement—or even encourage a Boer attack.{{sfn|Surridge|2000|p=24}}

=== Negotiations fail ===

Steyn of the Orange Free State invited Milner and Kruger to attend a conference in [[Bloemfontein]]. The conference started on 30 May 1899, but negotiations quickly broke down, as Kruger had no intention of granting meaningful concessions,<ref>{{cite book|last1=Guyot|title=Boer Politics}}</ref>{{rp|91}} and Milner had no intention of accepting his normal delaying tactics.<ref>Walker, ''A History of Southern Africa'', p. 480</ref>

=== Kruger's ultimatum and war ===

On 9 October 1899, after convincing the Orange Free State to join him and mobilising their forces, Kruger issued an ultimatum giving Britain 48 hours to withdraw all their troops from the border of Transvaal (despite the fact that the only regular British army troops anywhere near the border of either republic were 4 companies of the [[Loyal Regiment (North Lancashire)|Loyal North Lancs]], who had been deployed to defend Kimberley.<ref name="Ash2020" />{{rp|14}}) Otherwise, the Transvaal, allied with the Orange Free State, would declare war.

News of the ultimatum reached London on the day it expired. Outrage and laughter were the main responses. The editor of the ''Times'' purportedly laughed out loud when he read it, saying 'an official document is seldom amusing and useful yet this was both'. ''The Times'' denounced the ultimatum as an 'extravagant farce' and ''The Globe'' denounced this 'trumpery little state'. Most editorials were similar to the ''Daily Telegraph's'', which declared: 'of course there can only be one answer to this grotesque challenge. Kruger has asked for war and war he must have!'{{sfn|Cloete|2000|p=34}}

Such views were far from those of the British government and from those in the army. To most sensible observers, army reform had been a matter of pressing concern since the 1870s, constantly put off because the British public did not want the expense of a larger, more professional army and because a large home army was not politically welcome. Lord Salisbury, the Prime Minister, had to tell a surprised [[Queen Victoria]] that 'We have no army capable of meeting even a second-class Continental Power'.<ref name="Steele2000" />{{rp|4}}