William E. Gladstone Quotes

When the British first colonized South Africa, the area they used was akmost uninhabited or very sparcely so. However, some Black tribes (including the Zulus) were moving from the north and themselves were colonizing or annexing the areas to their kingdom. The British were most interested in Trading so did not have large land asperations. The Dutch white Boer Africanners, in contrast, wanted to farm the lands and use the range for their cattle. They wanted the land. The English policy was that there would be friendly relations with the Black tribes surrounding their Cape Colony and no one should take their land. However the Boers started attacking the Black areas and seizing their farms and villages. At first, the English assumed that the Blacks would easily be able to ward off the invasion as the Afrikanners had no professional troops like the British. However, the neighboring tribes were not very warlike or good fighters. They were being overrun by the Zulus coming from the North and the Boers from the South. The British Government had a real problem in that they would have to have British soldiers fight the white Afrikanners if they wanted to stop the illegal white invasions. This was the root of the Boer War where the British would be fully at war with the Africanners.

There was continuing tension between England, the Colonial Governors of South Africa and the Boers. Immigrant settlers to South Africa from Holland. The Boers were very uneducated and not steeped in democratic government. They wanted to enslave and sieze the land of the Black residents. Under English law, the Blacks were also English subjects. The Boers insisted that any interference in their persecution and enslavery of the Blacks was oppression just as the Southern American Whites saw Reconstruction defense of the Blacks as oppression to them. The classic question is: “Is it oppression to stop people from opressiong others?”

1st Viscount Millner

Henry Bartle Edwards

White Africaners were slaughtering Blacks to appropriate their land in violation of English law. See {583901} for a related quotation.

When the British first colonized South Africa, the area they used was not inhabited or very sparcely so. However, some Black tribes (including the Zulus) were moving from the north and themselves were colonizing or annexing the sparcely populated areas to their kingdom. The British were most interested in Trading so did not have large land asperations. The Dutch white Boer Africanners, in contrast, wanted to farm the lands and use the range for their cattle. They wanted the land. The English policy was that there would be friendly relations with the Black tribes surrounding their Cape Colony and no one should take their land. However the Boers started attacking the Black areas and seizing their farms and villages. At first, the English assumed that the Blacks would easily be able to ward off the invasion as the Afrikanners had no professional troops like the British. However, the neighboring native tribes were not very warlike or good fighters. They were being overrun by the Zulus coming from the North and the Boers from the South. The British Government had a real problem in that they would have to have British soldiers fight the white Afrikanners if they wanted to stop the illegal white invasions. This was the root of the Boer War where the British would be fully at war with the Africanners.

The whites had come to South Africa by sea—English and Dutch. Many settled at the Southern Shore—Capetown area. The Dutch Boers however were more interested in farming and commerce and moved North taking land from the natives who sparsely populated the interior of the land. At the same time the aggressive and sophisticated Zulus came from the North. Like the Boers, they were after land and seized it from the natives. It was inevitable that the two conquering, land grabbing groups would run into each other. The English had had a number of wars with the Zulus, but the English were not real competitors with the Zulu for land. So when England annexed the Tranvaal area, the Zulus were pleased as the English would control the Boers and the Zulus did not have to be contesting every bit of ground. However, the Boers and the English split over the English restricting the Boers from seizing native and Zulu land (which the Zulus had seized just like the Boers). The Boer War resulted, and to this day the Zulus and the native Black tribes are more comfortable with the South Africans of English extraction than those who are in the Boer community.

The Union was ratified by the Nobles of Scotland despite widespread public opposition. There were substantial financial incentives in the terms of the Union for the leading nobles and members of Parliament.

The nobles of the city were in rebellion and fought the English Prince of Wales. When the city was taken, the poor people as well as the nobles were executed for their part in the “rebellion.” However, the poor had no say in the matter, and it was not they who ordered the city gates shut and decided to undergo a siege, which in this case was not successful. Limoges was a heavily walled city, well provisioned for a siege, but the English had miners who undermined part of the city walls and crashed them into the moat and allowed the English to walk in easily.

Barre, who had served as an officer in North American fighting with the Americans against the French, was a major opponent of the Stamp Act and other efforts to tax the American colonies. In the debate one of his opponents referred the American colonies as “planted by the care of England” and “nourished” by the mother country’s care. Barre was imprisoned in the Tower of London for a while for his vigorous defense of the American colonists.

At that time, Russia and Germany were autocracy, and the ruler could simply take the English money and force the soldiers to fight in a war they had not stake in nor understood.