Du Preez, busily collecting the baggage, glanced out the window and said, “Forget it, President. We have arrived.”
But Steyn sat in his seat as though stunned. “Now I have seen one —a concentration camp. It is ... terrible!”
By train and on horseback they arrived at Vereeniging: sixty delegates, thirty each from the Orange Free State and the Transvaal, and, in addition, the political leaders (neither Steyn nor Schalk Burger was an official delegate). They had had little contact with one another—more than a thousand miles had separated the burghers and rebels fighting in Cape Colony from the commandos in the northern Transvaal—and the contrasts in their appearance and physical condition indicated the varying fortunes of their cause in the different sectors of the theatre of war. Those from the well-fed forces in the Cape were shocked by the appearance of the men from the eastern Transvaal—“these starving, ragged men, clad in skins and sacking, their bodies covered with sores from lack of salt and food.”2
The British had erected two camps, one for each set of representatives, and between them a large marquee to be used as a meeting hall. There on the cold, crisp autumn morning of 15 May 1902, after two years and seven months of war, the Boer delegates met. C. F. Beyers from Waterberg was elected chairman, and the great debate began.
From the beginning the difference in the composition of the delegates from the two republics was apparent: all the Free Staters were generals or commandants; the Transvaal delegation, while including all the principal commanders, also had six field cornets, four rank-and-file burghers, and even two noncombatants (the landdrosts of Wakkerstroom and Zoutpansberg). Most important of all, the Free Staters, at the instigation of Steyn and De Wet, had pledged before they left their commandos not to vote for any peace terms that involved the surrender of their independence; Botha and other leaders anxious for peace saw at once that the pledges of the Free Staters made the meeting pointless, for they had already faced the fact that they would have to give up their cherished independence, that their real purpose was simply to wring from the British all the concessions they could. The situation was saved by J. B. M. Hertzog, the judge turned general, who addressed the meeting and assured the Free Staters that it was a principle of law that a delegate could not be a mere mouthpiece but had to vote as he thought best. Smuts rose and reaffirmed this. The Boers, always respectful of legal learning, accepted these assurances from the two intellectual giants among them and the point was never seriously raised again, although many Free Staters remained uneasy about their pledges. Peace was now possible, but it was still far away.
The rest of this first day was taken up with reports of conditions in the various sectors. In some areas supplies could still be found; others were simply blackened wildernesses. Some of the speakers talked bravely of continuing the war; others spoke of the hopelessness of trying to carry on. All larded their talks with quotations from the Bible. For three days the Boers wrestled with their dilemma. Reason and sentiment contended in an atmosphere charged with emotion. Deneys Reitz wrote: “Even in adversity the Boer instinct for speeches and wordy wrangling asserted itself, and the time was passed in oratory.”3
Kemp, still the fiery young general, gave a bellicose speech ending with, “As far as I am concerned, unless relief comes, I will fight on till I die.” J. G. Celliers, who commanded the best-equipped commando in the field, also spoke in favour of continuing the war. But the commandants from the eastern Transvaal pointed out the futility of it all, saying that if the meeting did not result in peace many of the burghers would surrender anyway. C. Birkenstock, a burgher from Vryheid, told how “the presence of women and children causes great difficulty” and spoke of the shortage of food and of the increasing hostility of the Bantu tribesmen: “That peace must be made at all costs is the opinion of all the families in my district, and I feel it my duty to bring this opinion before you.”4
There was not much in the way of positive proposals, although Francis Reitz, Deneys’s father, suggested that they offer to give up the gold fields, which, he said, had caused the war in the first place. Their enemy was already in possession of the gold fields, of course, but some burghers snatched at this straw, hoping the British might be satisfied if all the gold was voluntarily yielded to them. A commission was elected to meet with Schalk Burger and Steyn and draw up a proposal to be presented to the delegates. The debate went on.
The men whose words carried the most weight at Vereeniging were the three great military leaders: Botha, De la Rey, and De Wet. The delegates would follow these men through the moral thicket in which they found themselves, but the three were themselves divided: Botha was for peace, De Wet was for war, and De la Rey wavered uncertainly between the two.
Botha spoke at length, stressing the hopelessness of their position: the destruction of crops and the slaughter of animals had cut off all supplies of food in some districts; the “Kaffir question,” he said, grew more serious every day and attacks on burghers by Bantu were increasing; the condition of the women was pitiable; the number of men on commando grew fewer and fewer; and their horses were giving out. “We must face the fact that things are not at a standstill; we are slipping back every moment.”
Then De la Rey, who remained silent until the second day, rose to speak. Some had spoken of foreign intervention, he said, but he himself had never believed in this possibility; he felt that this was the time to negotiate with the British. On the main issue his message was contradictory, reflecting his own indecision. In his own area he could and would continue to fight: “So far as I myself am concerned, I cannot think of laying down my arms.” Now, however, he had heard of the piteous conditions elsewhere and he was not certain the war could be continued: “There has been talk of fighting to the bitter end. But has the bitter end already come? Each man must answer that question for himself. You must remember that everything has been sacrificed—cattle, goods, money, wife and child. Our men are going about naked and our women have nothing but clothes made of skins to wear. Is not this the bitter end?”
De Wet followed De la Rey. There were no doubts in his mind: he was for war. His theme was: “Persevere. We have everything to lose, but we have not yet lost it.” He would not agree to giving up any part of their territory, not even the gold fields. He called on the delegates to keep their faith in God, for the conflict, he said, was really a war of religion. “At all costs let us continue the fighting.”
On Saturday the draft of the proposed terms drawn up by the commission was read and it was agreed to accept a position as a protectorate, to let Britain handle all foreign relations, and “to conclude a defensive alliance with Great Britain in regard to South Africa,” but not to sacrifice complete independence. Then a committee was appointed to treat with Milner and Kitchener. This group, consisting of Botha, De la Rey, De Wet, Hertzog, and Smuts, went to Pretoria and on 19 May began talks with the British.
The meeting did not begin well. The Boers laid before Milner and Kitchener the list of those things they were willing to give up if they could still retain their right to govern themselves. Milner rejected their proposal out of hand. He would not even consider it as a basis for negotiations. He took the position that the Middelburg proposal contained “the utmost concessions that the British Government is able to grant.” Milner entertained peculiar notions regarding the nature of the negotiating process: as usual, he wanted to begin with his final offer and not budge from it.
From 19 May until 28 May the Boer leaders argued and pleaded. At last, in spite of Milner’s arrogance and intransigence, a draft document was drawn up stating that the burghers would lay down their arms and acknowledge King Edward VII as their lawful sovereign. In return the British agreed that none of the burghers would lose his freedom or his property, that Dutch as well as English would be taught in the schools, that “as soon as circumstances permit it a representative system tending towards autonomy would be introduced,” that no special taxes would be levied to pay for the war, that the British would contribute
£3,000,000 towards rehabilitating the country, and that all prisoners of war who took the oath of allegiance would be speedily returned. It was also agreed that there would be no vote for the Bantu or Coloureds until there was representative government—in effect, never—a concession Milner later characterised as the greatest mistake of his life.
It was a curious surrender document. There was, of course, the agreement on the part of the Boers to lay down their arms, but the bulk of the document consisted of political agreements applicable to the postwar period. It was unique in that it was an agreement between a people, not a nation, and a conqueror who claimed these people as his subjects. No thought was given as to how in future the Boers were to be represented; no guarantees other than the document itself were given by the conquerors that they would abide by the agreement; no system was envisaged for the arbitration of misunderstandings or disputes regarding the terms. There was a considerable amount of trust on both sides; trust that was not misplaced. The importance of the document lay not in the concessions themselves, which were slight, but by all that was implied in the British acceptance of any concessions. There was, for example, the implied threat that if the British did not abide by the agreement the Boers would and could again take the field; and this, in turn, implied acceptance on the part of the British of the fact that the Boers had not been completely subjugated, that their morale, their martial spirit, their will to resist, had not been completely crushed; although the Boers had been forced to agree to things they did not want to agree to, the British had been manoeuvred into making promises they would rather not have made. It was also implied that the Boers, as represented by the fighting burghers, were still, and would remain, a political force to be reckoned with in the future; and this was the most important implication of all.
The Natal and Cape rebels were dealt with in a separate document. They were to be disenfranchised for life (although this was later reduced to five years and eventually to less than four); rebel officers and officials were to stand trial for high treason, but it was promised that none would be executed.
That the British agreed to anything, to make even minor concessions, was due to Kitchener. “He does not care what he gives away,” wailed Milner. It was also in large measure through Kitchener’s efforts that the Boer stance was softened. Perhaps his most important contribution to the conference was a stroll he took with Smuts. In the course of one meeting, when Smuts was trying unsuccessfully to reason with Milner, Kitchener touched his arm and said, “Come out, come out for a little,” and he led Smuts out of the room. They walked up and down in silence for a minute and then Kitchener said, “Look here, Smuts, there is something on my mind that I want to tell you. I can only give it to you as my opinion, but I believe that in two years’ time a Liberal government will be in power. And if a Liberal government comes into power it will grant you a constitution for South Africa.”
“This is a very important pronouncement,” said Smuts. “If one could be sure of this it would make a great difference.”
“As I say, it is only my opinion. But I honestly do believe that will happen.”5
Smuts, of course, passed on this opinion to his colleagues, as Kitchener intended he should, and it had a decided influence on them. It was the first, the only, hope the Boers were given that they might have some form of independence in the near future.
Milner, who had fought every concession, now demanded that the Boer leaders return to Vereeniging, present the proposal to the delegates, and bring back a yes or no answer. The delegates would have to take the terms or leave them as a whole. They were nonnegotiable. Milner further demanded that they give their answer within two days, by the evening of 31 May.
At seven o’clock on the evening of 28 May the Boer negotiators sadly boarded the special train for Vereeniging, and the following day they laid the terms, the best they had been able to obtain, before the delegates. The burghers were now faced with three choices: they could refuse to sign the peace terms and simply surrender unconditionally (this was discussed but never seriously considered); they could continue to fight; or they could accept the British terms. There was much heated debate, much soul searching, much emotional oratory. There were also many small meetings outside the convention marquee; both Botha and De la Rey argued and pleaded with De Wet to accept the terms. On the afternoon of 31 May 1902 they proceeded to the voting. The vote was 54 in favour of accepting the terms and 6 against. All the important leaders, even the fiery De Wet, who until the last moment had argued for the continuation of the war, voted to accept the unpalatable terms.
Now it was over. The bitter end had come at last. Schalk Burger rose and said, “We are standing here at the grave of the two republics.” Gloom hung thick in the marquee where they had sat for so long with their aching consciences and heavy hearts. They were visionaries, these men, and they had dreamed a great dream, had striven mightily for it, and failed. They were strong, proud men, and they were tasting now the bitterness of defeat, the wrenching agony of failure. Withal, they were practical men, farmers most of them, who knew that dream’s end left practical problems, and so Commandant F. P. Jacobsz of Harrismith was able to rouse them from their sad, bitter mood by a practical proposal. He suggested that a committee be appointed to provide for “the suffering women and children, widows and orphans, and other destitute persons” and that De Wet, Botha, and De la Rey go abroad to raise funds for this purpose. After this was agreed to, the last meeting of the two republics closed with a prayer.
The painful deliberations of the delegates were secret—neither officers nor government officials attempted to spy on them—but all the world awaited the decision. An enterprising reporter named Edgar Wallace, later to win fame as a novelist, arranged to be the first with the news by bribing one of the guards stationed at the big marquee and supplying him with three handkerchiefs, each of a different colour, with which to signal the progress of the meeting: blue if the talks were going satisfactorily, red if some difficulty had occurred, and white if peace had definitely been accepted. Wallace sat in a carriage some distance away, smoking and reading and watching. When the guard produced the white handkerchief, he raced to Johannesburg, and that evening he cabled the news to the Daily Mail, which had it nearly twenty-four hours before the official announcement was made. Wallace had made the scoop of the decade—or so it ought to have been. It was unfortunate for him and his paper, however, that 31 May 1902 was a Saturday, Wallace’s message arrived that night, and the Daily Mail had no Sunday edition.
Late that Saturday afternoon those deputed to sign the peace terms (it had no formal title) left by special train for Pretoria, and the actual signing took place in the dining room of Melrose House shortly after eleven o’clock that night, less than an hour before Milner’s deadline. The document itself was typed on parchment, and there were four copies. The Reverend J. D. Kestell, who was present, wrote: “The document has been signed. Everything has fallen silent in this room where so much was said. They remain motionless for yet another moment. A shattering feeling of loss overwhelms our men. The members of the Government rise, as if bewildered, to leave the hall. Speak they cannot.”6
Kitchener tried to break the mood of depression, to cut through the gloom; he went from one to the other, shaking the hand of each and saying, “We are good friends now.” He spoke as a soldier to brave and honourable foes who had earned his respect and admiration. The Boers tried to accept his words in this spirit, but they were brokenhearted men.
“I have just come from signing the terms of surrender—surely one of the strangest documents in history,” Milner wrote to a friend. “If anything could make me relent towards Boers, it was the faces of the men who sat around the table tonight....”
It was De la Rey who broke the funereal atmosphere. Looking around at the long faces of his colleagues and, speaking slowly in broken, accented English, he said, “We are a bloody cheerful-looking lot of British subjects!”
Back in Vereeniging a group of delegates
gathered in a tent where a small grave had been dug. Solemnly they folded and buried a Transvaal Vierkleur, and Francis Reitz, his voice quivering with emotion, recited a poem he had written for the occasion.
On 2 June Kitchener went to Vereeniging and addressed the delegates. He congratulated them upon the gallant fight they had made; he told them they should be proud of their record and that it was no disgrace to be defeated by such overwhelming numbers; he said that he wanted them to be his friends and he asked for their cooperation.
When the first rumours of peace reached the women’s laager with De la Rey’s forces, it was thought that the republics had retained their independence; there were joyous shouts and children danced on the veld waving a Vierkleur. Nonnie de la Rey quickly loaded her wagon, gathered up her children, and started for Lichtenburg, where she hoped to meet up with her husband and her son Koos. On the road she learned the real terms of the peace agreement. The children wept and Nonnie de la Rey exclaimed bitterly, “Why was all the bloodshed, the suffering? What was the purpose of it all?”
Marthinus Theunis Steyn, who had proved one of the most fervid bitter-enders, had been able to exert little influence over the convention, for he was a very sick man. He had insisted on going to Vereeniging, even though his doctor had advised against it, but the exertions of the journey left him too weak to leave his tent, and only occasionally was he able to talk with De Wet and the other Free State generals or with the Transvaal leaders. He had worn himself out in the cause and had contracted a baffling disease.t Among other symptoms, he suffered from double vision and his legs pained him so severely that walking was impossible. Many years later his son Colin said in a radio interview: “Had he remained well, I doubt if the peace terms of Vereeniging would have been accepted.” This might well have been the case.
Great Boer War Page 65