The Zulus and Matabele: Warrior Nations

by Glen Lyndon Dodds

  Raiding and the Bechuanaland Protectorate

  Under Lobengula, the Matabele continued regularly to raid neighbouring black peoples. For example, they strengthened their hold on an area stretching as far northeast as the upper Lundi near present Gweru, and often raided Shona living further afield. Armies also headed west against the Tawana people, beside Lake Ngami in Botswana. In 1883 (the year in which Kanda died in South Africa), the Matabele carried out one such attack. ‘This was a very bold enterprise,’ comments Selous, ‘as the marauders had to traverse nearly four hundred miles of desert country, entirely uninhabited except by Bushmen; a country in which game too was very scarce, and throughout which water was only to be found in pools, often widely separated one from another.’ The Matabele nevertheless succeeded in capturing a considerable number of cattle. But another attack against the Tawana, in 1885, proved disastrous. The Matabele were forced to retire after being subjected to heavy rifle fire in marshy ground beside a river, and the emaciated and demoralised survivors trudged into Bulawayo in June without their shields and spears: in 1881, the Bulawayo founded at the commencement of Lobengula’s reign had been abandoned in favour of a new site some miles to the north, which is now part of today’s city of Bulawayo.

  A number of Europeans witnessed their return. One of them, Lieutenant Edward Maund, wrote as follows: ‘There can be little doubt that the [Matabele] army has much degenerated since the incorporation of the Maholi [Shona] element. They have lost the dash of the old Zulu warriors, and there is not the same discipline.’

  Writers often echo Maund’s sentiments and portray the army of Lobengula’s day as a shadow of its former self. Reverses other than the disastrous Lake Ngami campaign did occur, but so too did Matabele successes. In the 1880s, Lobengula in fact extended his authority into areas seldom if ever subjected to previous Matabele military activity.

  Maund was in Bulawayo for a purpose. In 1885 Britain declared a substantial tract of country the Protectorate of British Bechuanaland, and Maund was part of a mission charged with informing Lobengula of this fact. The protectorate extended north from the Molopo River as far as the twenty-second parallel of latitude. In the northeast, the territory (now part of Botswana) encompassed the Ngwato kingdom, which was ruled by a man called Khama, and had enjoyed peaceful relations with the Matabele since 1875.

  The establishment of the protectorate ended Lobengula’s freedom to send his warriors on raids against the Ngwato and the Tawana, and, instead, in the late 1880s Matabele raids occurred across the Zambezi to the north. Indeed, it was rumoured that Lobengula was intending to abandon Matabeleland and migrate with his people beyond the Zambezi further into the interior.

  Raids in the same direction occurred into the 1890s, and led to the formation of a formidable alliance against the Matabele, consisting of a number of polities on both sides of the river. As a result, in 1892 a Matabele impi was totally routed.

  The formation of the trans-Zambezian alliance was inevitably a cause of concern to Lobengula. So, too, was Portuguese involvement in Shona territory to the east, which added to his fears of encirclement. The Portuguese were the first Europeans to enter what is now Zimbabwe: they had been intermittently present since the early 16th century, having entered the region from their colony of Mozambique. Now, in the wake of the establishment of the British protectorate of Bechuanaland, they made limited attempts to make good their historic claims over Shona territory, fearing British encroachment north of the Limpopo. Efforts were thus made to woo Shona chiefs, and in 1889 several of them were granted guns and ammunition in return for acknowledging the Portuguese. But the threat posed to Lobengula by the Portuguese proved short-lived: it was the British he really had to fear.

  Rhodes and the Rudd Concession

  In 1870 a remarkable young Englishman set foot in South Africa, a man possessed of intelligence, ambition, charm and ruthlessness. His name was Cecil Rhodes. He had been born in 1853 in Bishop’s Stortford, Hertfordshire, the son of a clergyman.

  In 1871, Rhodes made his way to Kimberley and became engaged in the diamond industry. He soon went into partnership with a fellow Englishman, Charles Rudd, and then returned to England to study at Oxford. He gained a degree in 1881, by which time he was a millionaire—a millionaire eager to advance the cause of the Anglo-Saxon race by uniting southern Africa under the British flag. Indeed, he wished to create a broad swathe of British territory as far as the Nile Valley itself.

  Inevitably, this meant outmanoeuvring real or potential rivals, such as the Transvaal, also known as the South African Republic. In 1887 Rhodes was alarmed to hear a report that in July of that year Lobengula had signed a treaty of friendship with the Transvaal, a treaty that made the king an ally of the Boer state and provided for the establishment of a South African Republic consulate at Bulawayo.

  At Rhodes’ urging, Sir Hercules Robinson, the British High Commissioner for South Africa, sent John Moffat, the son of the famous missionary and a member of the British administration in Bechuanaland, to negotiate with Lobengula. He knew the Matabele and their country well, for he himself had lived in Matabeleland as a missionary from 1859 until 1865.

  Consequently, on 11 February 1888, Lobengula put his mark to what has become known as the Moffat Treaty. Among other things, he agreed that ‘peace and amity’ should always exist between the British and the Matabele, and promised to refrain from granting or selling any part of his dominions (which according to the treaty included the territory of the Shona) without the approval of the British High Commissioner. Furthermore, he repudiated the treaty of the previous year with the Transvaal, and the British government soon let it be known that Lobengula’s domain now lay exclusively within the British sphere of influence.

  Within months of the Moffat Treaty, Rhodes sent three men (one of whom was Rudd) to obtain a concession from Lobengula, whose realm he believed contained valuable gold deposits comparable to those of the Witwatersrand in the Transvaal. They arrived at Bulawayo on 20 September 1888, only to hear that Lobengula was resident at a smaller homestead called Umvutcha seven miles to the north. There, they found other speculators and concession-seekers already on the scene, while Maund was soon to appear representing a rival concern.

  At noon on 30 October, following two days of discussions with his izinduna, at which Rudd and his colleagues, James Rochfort Maguire and F.R. (‘Matabele’) Thompson were present, Lobengula set his seal on a document known as the Rudd Concession.

  The king granted Rhodes’ agents permission to dig ‘one hole’ near Tati. This, at least, was his belief. In fact the document to which he put his mark stated something entirely different. Under the Rudd Concession, Lobengula supposedly bestowed upon the grantees ‘complete and exclusive charge over all metals and minerals situated and contained in my kingdom’s principalities and dominions, [with the exception of the Tati area], together with full power to do all things that they may deem necessary to win and procure the same.’ In return, the grantees agreed, among other things, to pay Lobengula and his successors a hundred pounds sterling on the first day of every month and to deliver 1,000 Martini-Henry rifles and 100,000 rounds of suitable ammunition to Bulawayo.

  Lobengula was subsequently told by anti-Rhodes traders at Bulawayo the truth about the Rudd Concession and hence repudiated it in January 1889. Moreover, when cross-examined by Lobengula the following March, a missionary called Charles Helm (who had acted as interpreter during the concession proceedings) confirmed that the king had indeed been greatly deceived.

  Meanwhile, after Lobengula put his mark to the concession, Rudd had hurried off to Kimberley, taking the document with him. Rhodes was overjoyed by what had transpired and sent Rudd on to Cape Town with a copy of the document for Sir Hercules Robinson. On 15 December, the latter forwarded the copy to the Colonial Office, declaring that he hoped that ‘the effect of the concession to a gentleman of character and financial standing will be to check the inroad of adventur
ers as well as to secure the cautious development of the country with a proper consideration for the feelings and prejudices of the natives.’

  The formation of a company to exploit the concession was now Rhodes’ priority. He wished it to be a Chartered Company, in other words, one authorised by the British government to operate and enjoy governmental powers in territory deemed to be within the British sphere of influence: in recent years two such companies had been chartered to operate elsewhere in Africa. For Rhodes, obtaining such a charter would reduce the likelihood of Lobengula revoking the Rudd Concession, while for the British government the granting of a charter would enable Britain’s interests in Lobengula’s territory to be furthered without expense to the British taxpayer.

  In early February 1889, Rhodes became concerned by reports that Lobengula had suspended the concession. He thus persuaded two Kimberley doctors to visit the Matabele king on his behalf. One of them, Dr Leander Jameson, was an ambitious, charming and unscrupulous character, who was to play a major role in subsequent developments, a man of whom Stafford Glass has aptly commented that he ‘disregarded truth if it stood in his way.’

  On 2 April, the doctors arrived at Bulawayo, accompanied by a contractor bringing the first half of the consignment of arms and ammunition promised under the concession. The king was, however, troubled about the best course of action to take. Therefore, instead of formally accepting the consignment, he placed it in charge of a guard of his warriors, a decision that nevertheless led Maguire and Thompson to claim that he had ratified the concession. Lobengula probably also refused to accept the money promised him in the treaty. On 12 April, Jameson set off for Kimberley accompanied by Maguire, having made a strong and favourable impression on Lobengula, partly because he had been able to alleviate a condition from which the king was suffering—gout.

  In August two senior izinduna reappeared at Bulawayo. Lobengula had sent them to Britain the previous November as personal emissaries, accompanied by Maund. They returned with a letter written on Queen Victoria’s behalf on 26 March by the Colonial Secretary, Lord Knutsford. The letter declared that Englishmen who asked permission to dig in Matabeleland were not authorised to do so by Her Majesty, and that it was ‘not wise to put too much power into the hands of the men who come first, and to exclude other deserving men. A King gives a stranger an ox, not his whole herd of cattle, otherwise what would other strangers have to eat?’

  Knutsford’s letter was read out before Lobengula and an assembly that included the two emissaries and all the white men in Bulawayo. Shortly thereafter, in early September, Lobengula summoned a council of chiefs and proceeded to denounce one of them, a rich, elderly and highly influential figure called Lotshe Hlabangana, who had been instrumental in persuading him to sign the Rudd Concession. The exact details of what subsequently befell Lotshe differ, but it is certain he was executed. He was either strangled or his skull was smashed by a knobkerry. His wives, offspring and dependents, some 300 people in all, according to one version, were likewise slaughtered.

  ‘Matabele’ Thompson reappeared at Bulawayo the day after the killings, following a visit to Helm’s mission station. Upon being informed, ‘Tomoson, the King says the killing of yesterday is not over’, and simultaneously catching sight of a body of menacing warriors, he left rapidly, galloping off southward as fast as his horse could carry him.

  Rhodes reacted swiftly upon hearing of Thompson’s flight—Jameson was persuaded to undertake another visit to Bulawayo to renegotiate the concession. He arrived on 17 October, accompanied by an interpreter and Thompson (who had been cajoled into returning), and, in December, Lobengula evidently decided to honour his decision to allow Rudd and his men to mine near Tati.

  By this date Rhodes had finally obtained his charter, for on 29 October 1889, Queen Victoria granted a Royal Charter of Incorporation to the British South Africa Company. Among other things, Rhodes’ new company (which is often simply referred to as the Chartered Company) was authorised to ‘preserve peace and order in such ways and manners’ it considered necessary over a vast area, which included Lobengula’s kingdom. To that end, it could make ordinances and raise its own police force, although if the company failed to respect the customs, religion and laws of peoples brought under its jurisdiction, the word of the Colonial Secretary was to prevail. Furthermore, the authorisation to administer and govern granted to the company by the charter was conditional: the Rudd Concession did not include any such delegation of power by Lobengula. Hence as Claire Palley comments: ‘while the Charter gave the Company legal capacity and conditional permission from the Crown to exercise governing powers that it might in the future acquire, the Company could only seek the source of its actual administration in the grant of governing powers by the sovereign of the country, King Lobengula.’ Such powers, of course, had so far not been granted.

  In late January 1890, Jameson told Lobengula that digging operations near Tati had proved a waste of time. The king thus agreed to allow mining to take place on the extreme southeastern border of his kingdom, near where the Tuli joined the Limpopo. According to Jameson, he also agreed to supply a hundred men to cut a road for the wagons. Having recieved permission to continue operating, Jameson headed south with Thompson, falsely maintaining that Lobengula had also agreed for mining to be undertaken to the north, in Mashonaland, i.e., territory to the east and northeast of Matabeleland over whose Shona inhabitants Lobengula of course claimed sovereignty, and which Rhodes was already preparing to occupy.

  The Pioneer Column

  A key figure in the plans was an energetic, ambitious and egotistical young man named Frank Johnson, who began recruiting men for the task in South Africa on behalf of the Chartered Company. At Rhodes’ insistence, a cross-section of Europeans was chosen, including artisans and Afrikaners—and hence the Pioneer Corps was established. It numbered about 196 men and was divided into three troops. The force was to set out from British Bechuanaland and skirt around the southern and eastern fringes of Lobengula’s kingdom in order to avoid conflict.

  Frederick Courtney Selous, by now a celebrated hunter, was also involved in the plans to occupy Mashonaland, territory with which he was familiar. On 17 March 1890 he appeared at Bulawayo to see Lobengula. Selous describes what occurred: ‘when I told him that I had been sent by Mr Rhodes to make the road round the outskirts of his land to Mashonaland, and wanted him to give me men to open up a waggon track, as he had promised Dr Jameson he would do, he denied ever having given any such promises, and then said plainly that he would not allow such a road to be made.’

  Selous therefore left Matabeleland to report what had happened and, on 27 April, Jameson once again took centre stage after Rhodes persuaded him to revisit Bulawayo. After discussions with Lobengula, he then left for the south on 2 May. Later in the same month, as Cobbing comments: ‘Despite all the evidence to the contrary . . . the Company issued the following laconic and mendacious statement: “Lobengula still remains friendly and cordial to our representatives, and [has not withdrawn] his permission for us to enter Mashonaland.”’ In fact, by this date Lobengula and his people were preparing for war!

  On 27 May, Jameson arrived at Palapye in British Bechuanaland where he was joined the next day by Lieutenant-Colonel E.G. Pennefather of the 6th (Iniskilling) Dragoon Guards, whom Sir Henry Loch—Robinson’s successor as High Commissioner—had persuaded Rhodes to accept as commander of the Pioneer Column.

  By now Johnson and the Pioneer Corps had encamped beside the Limpopo River, while members of the British South Africa Company’s Police, which had been raised to assist them in the occupation of Mashonaland, had assembled not far away beside the Macloutsie, where they were soon to be joined by Johnson and the Pioneers. Also present, beside the Macloutsie, were several companies of the Bechuanaland Border Police which had been moved up to the border area to support the Pioneer Column.

  By 10 June, Selous had overseen the cutting of a road east from the Maclout
sie to the Tuli River, and at the end of the month the Pioneer Corps and four troops of the British South Africa Company’s Police advanced from Macloutsie to the Tuli: it was a well-equipped expedition whose armament included Maxim machine-guns. Beside the Tuli they were met by a delegation from Lobengula bearing a message that the king objected to what was occurring and that if they crossed the river they could expect trouble.

  As Lobengula’s messengers were heading back to Bulawayo, Selous obtained permission from his superiors to cross the Tuli with B troop of the Pioneers and begin creating another stretch of road. Early on 13 July, they reached the Umshabetsi River (about 17 miles east of the Umzingwani, a larger river they had forded), and halted after hacking part of the way through thick woodland.

  On the 18th, the main column arrived after following in their tracks, (two companies of the BSACP had been left to defend a fort erected beside the Tuli), and from the Umshabetsi the column then advanced, moving northeast towards the Lundi River. Selous, who was once again to the fore, this time with A troop of the Pioneer Corps and a contingent of Ngwato, tells us that ‘as the entire column of over eighty waggons . . . in single file, straggled out to a length of sometimes over two miles, it was decided to cut two parallel roads from this point, upon which the column moved in two divisions.’