Introduction
Glossed over by historians as mere skirmishes on the northern border and regarded by the Colonial Government as an increasingly expensive embarrassment, the two Korana wars were never taken seriously. Yet they caused an entire tribe to disperse into oblivion.
From the beginning, the wars were inevitable. The Korana were semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers, owning stock and settling for long stretches where the grazing was good. But, with the advent of the colonial stock farmers with far superior weapons, the Korana were driven from their lands and forced into an increasingly limited range. Their free souls rebelled. From having the run of mile upon mile of open land, they were now restricted to the banks of the Gariep, the northern border of the Colony. Further north lay the uninhabitable Kalahari Desert.
They quickly learned that if they asserted their position, they would lose what livestock they had and be lucky to escape with their lives.
The Korana were not held in high esteem by the Europeans, being regarded from earliest times as beasts in the skin of men (Journal, Rev. Edward Terry, 1615). Terry related that they were exceedingly dirty and carried the entrails of animals around their necks to eat later and bowing and bringing their mouths to their hands almost as low as their knees, would gnaw and eat the raw guts like hungry dogs. Their heads and faces were smeared with a mixture of cow dung and fat so upwind they would look and smell horrible.
This view prevailed into the nineteenth century. In 1822 J. Campbell (Travels in South Africa) described the Korana as lazy beings who only hunted, slept and danced. In the mornings, he said, they slept very late, smoked for a while and then crawled to the nearest shade to sleep some more. In 1871 when the Rev. Christiaan Schröder founded a mission in Korana domain, he described them as very lazy. Their most taxing exercise is sleep. They sleep until they’re tired of sleeping.
Small wonder then that they were viewed by the white settlers as barbaric heathens fit only to be shot.
The First Korana War, 1868—1869
Nobody knows what triggered off the first Korana War, but it is accepted that several factors contributed, one of which must have been the prevailing drought. As always this caused increased cattle raiding, putting the smaller clans at a disadvantage. Their herds were stolen and they had no choice but to throw in their lot with the more powerful kapteins. Piet Rooi and Jan Kivido became two such chiefs and with followers now counting in the hundreds, they became more and more daring in their raids, increasingly also of the colonists’ livestock. Heavily armed, they rode in broad daylight and drove the farmers off their land.
Meanwhile upriver, the other chieftains prepared themselves - it was becoming a contest for power with Rooi pushing for sovereignty over all the clans.
The relentless plundering of the marauding Korana emptied the backveld south of the Orange River from Calvinia to Fraserburg. The farmers trekked further south, but the Korana followed and because the farms were deserted, nothing stood between them and the villages.
In response to demands from the besieged farmers, the Cape Parliament in August 1868 passed the Northern Border Protection Act. Kenhardt was to be the seat of a Special Magistrate, to which post was appointed Major M.J. Jackson, assisted by Inspector W. Wright. He was granted a force of fifty mounted policemen, which set out for Kenhardt in October 1868.
Before they became effective, however, immediate action was required to punish a gang of Korana which had been terrorising the Calvinia district for some time. A certain Louw with a commando of about 300 mounted burghers tracked and found the Korana entrenched on one of the islands. The Commando attacked on the 3rd October and during the ensuing fight 13 Korana were killed, as well as one member of the Commando. The burghers retreated to their camp and Commandant Louw sent for Cupido Pofadder to negotiate a treaty. They agreed that Pofadder would protect his part of the river which bordered on the district of Calvinia in exchange for ammunition to enable him to do so. He would also be recognised as chief of all the Korana living in the region.
Unfortunately neither the Commando nor the treaty had any effect on the marauding Korana. The plundering went on as before and the raiders penetrated ever deeper into the farming districts.
In February 1869 Inspector Wright of the Northern Border Police and a patrol pursued a gang of Piet Rooi’s after a raid on Witteputs, where they had stolen sheep. They planned to intercept them at Ougrabie, about sixty miles from Kenhardt, but when they arrived there found that the Korana had already taken cover behind a hillock. Unknown to the patrol, however, some twenty Baster farmers from Witteputs had also followed the raiders, and when both parties attacked that night they unwittingly fired at each other as well as at the Korana. One of the farmers and one of Wright’s men were killed and two more men died later from their wounds. Of the Korana eleven were killed and thirty-two taken prisoner, among them Piet Rooi’s son.
Piet Rooi and Jan Kivido indubitably were the worst of the robber chiefs and an exasperated Jackson called on Pofadder to honour the treaty and stop Rooi’s plundering. Pofadder did his best. Secure in the knowledge that the government had promised him safe passage into the Colony if necessary, he and his men pursued the rebel Korana. When Willem Ruiters joined Rooi, Pofadder captured him and in March 1869 handed him to Jackson. Greatly encouraged by this success, he continued to harass the marauding gangs and recapture the stock they had stolen. But it was not enough. In April Jackson reported that within seven weeks four raids had been made into the Colony so far distant from the camp at Kenhardt that he had only heard of them after the thieves had long reached their strongholds.
Late in May 1869 Wright heard of a large Korana presence in the Colony and sent some men to the Orange River to intercept them. The next day five Baster farmers who had stopped to rest at the abandoned De Tuin Mission on their way home from Kenhardt, suddenly found themselves surrounded by a gang of Korana. One of them managed to get away and fled back to Kenhardt to alarm the police. Wright and twenty-one men rode to join the first patrol and together they attacked De Tuin, but the Korana were heavily armed and far greater in number. By noon they were joined by yet some forty more and Wright was forced to withdraw, with two men dead and leaving all their rifles, waggons and stock behind. They later learnt that the reinforcements had come from Boschduif below De Tuin, where a hundred Korana had the day before stolen horses, cattle and sheep from Field Cornet Coetzee.
The four farmers and a Hottentot servant were found murdered.
By this time the police horses were so weak with starvation they could not be used in pursuit and Jackson urgently requested help. The government would have to make some show of strength or lose all credibility and so, on the last day of May, Sir Walter Currie and one hundred and fifty Frontier Armed and Mounted Police rode into Kenhardt, with orders to capture the rebel chiefs and disperse the bands. He made a careful study of the terrain along the Gariep and established his headquarters in the clearing where Klaas Pampier’s werf had been. From there he planned his campaign.
With a mixed force of Frontier Police, Northern Border Police, Pofadder and his men, a volunteer burgher commando under Field Cornet Hendrik Blauw, a division of the Royal Artillery and an Armstrong cannon, Currie routed the Korana from three of the islands. Thirty six were killed and many women and children captured, among them Rooi’s wife and family. The colonial forces lost one man and some were wounded.
Realising that in fact he had accomplished very little, however, Currie’s report suggested a different strategy. The islands, he claimed, were virtually impregnable and the only way to drive out the Korana would be to starve them. A law should be passed, forcing the farmers to protect the border and then, a year long, two hundred colonists at a time could be called up for duty. They should help Jackson’s Police guard the watering holes, forcing the Korana deep into the Colony where they could be cut off from their escape route to the islands and captured. This, he felt, would break the back of the resistance.
Jackson tried, and from August until October patrolled the border and stopped all supplies coming from the Colony. Then, getting impatient because nothing happened, he decided to attack Kivido’s stronghold and drive them off their island, but found that his force couldn’t cross the river. He had to return to camp without having fired a single shot.
Currie’s plan wasn’t working and Jackson fell back on what Louw had done - he sent for Klaas Lukas. Unaware that Lukas was still at war with Rooi and his cronies, Jackson threatened to attack his werf if he didn’t cooperate in stopping the gangs and capturing their chiefs. Lukas readily agreed - it suited him well - and sent messages to Rooi, Kivido and Karel Ruiters, chief of the Smalwange clan while Willem was in gaol, to meet him in order to discuss peace between themselves and the government. They met on the 26th October and Lukas took them prisoner. Ruiters escaped, but Rooi and Kivido were delivered to Jackson at Kenhardt from where, with about a hundred other prisoners, they were sent to Victoria West to be tried.
Jackson and his men, with Lukas and Pofadder, continued to patrol the border.
Lukas received £525 and Pofadder £75 for their help in capturing the chiefs and effectively ending the hostilities. On the 26th January 1870 Jackson reconciled the two old enemies long enough to sign a treaty appointing them sovereign chiefs of that territory north of the Orange river which became known as Korana Land. Klaas Lukas was to be chief of Upper Korana Land which stretched along the Gariep from Currie’s Camp eastwards to the border of Griqualand West and Cupido Pofadder of Lower Korana Land, west of Currie’s Camp downriver to the Great Falls. The interior of Korana Land would be their common property but the northern border was not defined. The islands on the southern bank were excluded from the chiefs’ domain.
The colonial government further promised them that they would not be disturbed by British subjects and that each would receive 100 pounds of lead and 400 pounds of gunpowder annually to maintain order. It was hoped that in this way the Korana would stabilise and that by denying them the islands, they would be without cover should they ever resort to cattle raiding again.
Karel Ruiters and his people were reduced to destitution. Most of them moved to other clans further along the Gariep and the Vaal River or simply surrendered.
In February 1870 a desperate Ruiters and twenty five men arrived at Pofadder’s werf hoping for clemency, claiming kinship as Pofadder was also of the Smalwange, but to no avail. They were all taken prisoner.
Ruiters, Rooi and Kivido were convicted and imprisoned on Robben Island and the remnants of their clans taken over by Pofadder and Lukas.
The war was over and the northern border lands would be empty for some time.
The Second Korana War, 1878—1879
Ten years later, it seemed as if peace had never been.
The year 1877 was marked by severe drought and the Korana were destitute. Once again they resorted to stock raiding and stealing whatever they could until open confrontation with the colonial settlers was inevitable. The intrinsic cause of this war, however, was much more complex and serious than the previous one’s and the war itself involved not only the Korana, but also Griqua Basters, Blacks and, ultimately, Nama.
In 1878 trouble brewed between the Griqua of Griqua Land West and the Colonial government over land claims. John Adams, a Griqua Korana who often served as interpreter when Lukas dealt with officials, had gone to Griqualand West early in the year and come back in April when, he had told Lukas, war had broken out. It seems as if he influenced Lukas to accept that the Korana should join the Griqua in their fight. As the Korana themselves held deep-seated grievances against the government this was not too hard a task. Lukas and the other chiefs retired to the virtually impregnable islands and from there conducted a reign of terror in the backveld south of the Orange.
And yet, despite the murderous sorties of the Gariep clans, Major Nesbitt and his troops were called from Kenhardt to the border of the eastern Cape to help the British army fight the Xhosa people. Hare, Nesbitt’s young clerk, was sworn in as Acting Special Magistrate, and proved hopelessly inadequate at correctly assessing the dangerous situation.
Reports of the unrest on the border and in Griqualand West at last reached Cape Town and Nesbitt and his Frontier Armed and Mounted Police were ordered back to Kenhardt. Instead of going to Olijvenhouts Drift, however, he crossed into Griqualand West to assist Colonels Lanyon and Warren of the local forces there, leaving the river bank bordering Korana Land to smoulder.
Twice in early June Nesbitt, Warren and Lanyon attacked the strongholds of the Griqua rebels. Donker Malgas, one of the leaders, was ousted from the Langeberge after severe fighting and, suffering heavy losses, the insurgents were chased towards the east.
Colonel Lanyon, thinking the rebellion crushed, returned to Kimberley, leaving it to Warren to pursue and capture the fugitives. Neither Malgas nor Pienaar, another leader, were taken, however, and the soldiers only succeeded in driving the Griqua and disgruntled Blacks into Korana Land. They joined Lukas on the islands and there became the backbone of his fighting army.
Once again the troops whiled away the time at Kenhardt without seeing action. Conditions were, by all accounts, appalling, with no fresh supplies, no feed for the horses and above all, no payroll.
When Nesbitt, wounded during the Griqualand West campaign, was sent on sick leave, opinion among the ranks as to who would replace him was summed up by the trooper who said, who cares, as long as he pays us. As it turned out, however, he did care. In fact, they all cared, because by general agreement Colonel Zachariah Bayly was a singularly pompous ass.
Shortly after his arrival he sent for a burgher officer to discuss a strategy for getting the rebels off the islands, and was calmly informed that the volunteers had no intention of crossing the river until they had received all the back pay they were entitled to. Bayly was furious and sent a report to Cape Town informing the authorities that the local civil volunteers were highly unreliable, and demanded they be replaced with Cape Town Volunteers. The government refused and after only a few weeks Bayly resigned in a huff.
Nesbitt returned, feeling much better after his rest and even more so when shortly afterwards, on the 19th October, he received the cannon he had long requested.
At last it seemed as if the troops would see action. The residents of the mission at Olijvenhouts Drift had been evacuated after several attacks and Nesbitt wanted to occupy the ford and cut off the islands from the north bank and Korana Land.
Two days after their arrival at the Drift they found a group of Blacks and Griqua a few miles north of the mission trying to reach Lukas on the islands. They fled before a shot could be fired, but the next day, reinforced by Korana, they attacked Nesbitt’s force and crossed the river to the islands. Furious, Nesbitt ordered his cannon and the soldiers who were still at Kaboes to the Drift.
They had taken a few prisoners and from them Nesbitt learned that there were over a thousand men in the rebel army. After the interrogation Nesbitt ordered the prisoners back to Kenhardt, from where they would be taken to Kimberley.
Nesbitt’s nerve didn’t extend to attacking such an army of heavily armed rebels. To the disappointment of his men he returned to Kenhardt, leaving the protection of the border to two detachments of a hundred men each - one at the police camp of Rietfontein under Captain Jones and one of Orange River Rangers at Schanskop Island.
Back at base he sent a message to Lukas to surrender unconditionally and sat back to wait for the reply, which of course never came.
A few weeks later a band of Griqua, Blacks and Korana raided the Rietfontein camp and over a hundred head of cattle and some horses were stolen. Shortly afterwards Lieutenant Frier’s camp at Schanskop came under attack of about four hundred rebels led by Lukas, Pienaar and Malgas and after a six hour long battle all their cattle and horses were taken. The colonial forces along the Gariep were once again immobilised.
Nesbitt had to make a plan. He scraped together three hundred mounted men - a miscellany of Cape Mounted Riflemen (mainly Blacks), conscripted Hottentot from Clanwilliam, a small detachment of Cape Volunteer Artillery, and even some white and Baster volunteers. These, together with his two cannon, Nesbitt assembled at Rietfontein and prepared for an attack on the rebels’ own ground. Unfortunately for him, however, the Gariep was in flood and only a ferryboat would have gotten them to the other side.
Taken seriously ill, Major Nesbitt left his men to Captain Jones and returned to Kenhardt, where, on the advice of his doctor, he wrote out his letter of resignation. This was in December of 1878, leaving the Korana the undisputed victors for the time being.
Once again Major M.J. Jackson was put in charge of the northern border. According to his reports he found Kenhardt in chaos and the whole of the defence organisation in a state of complete collapse. The volunteer system was in shambles as Act No. 7 of 1878 was invalid and burghers could not be forced to do military duty. Most had gone home.
Jackson spent three months rallying forces and building a boat. He intended crossing the river and driving the enemy before him towards Griqualand West, where they would run into seventy men and a gun sent by Major C.B. Marshall, Civil Commissioner of Griqualand West.
Klaas Pofadder, who had succeeded his brother Cupido as chief, had meanwhile come across the river into the Colony to distance himself from the rebels. The terms of the treaty 1870 were still being met and although a number of Pofadder’s men had joined Lukas on the islands, in January of 1879 Jackson gave Pofadder 20 lbs lead, 5 lbs gunpowder and 4 guns. Unfortunately for Jackson, two days after this Pofadder also absconded to the rebel side.
Meanwhile, the war was costing the government about £10 000 a month and in March 1879 Thomas Upington, Attorney General, accompanied by J.H. Scott, came to the northern border to take charge of the forces and put an end to the hostilities.
Jackson was planning to cross the river that same month and was waiting for Captain McTaggart and his Southey’s Rangers who were coming from Cape Town to reinforce his troops. Early in April most of the troops had crossed the river, but Upington was not satisfied with the progress Jackson had made. His outspoken views that Jackson could have ended the war much earlier already, as well as the contempt with which he treated him, made the situation unbearable for Jackson and he resigned on the 5th of April. Upington accused Jackson of cowardice and subversive actions against the government and when Jackson demanded a commission of enquiry to clear his name, it was refused. Jackson was appointed Acting Civil Commissioner to Fraserburg and replaced with McTaggart.
McTaggart finished what Jackson had begun and by 6th April was secure on the northern bank of the river. From there he attacked the islands and scored several victories, capturing large numbers of the rebels. On the 10th April the historical battles of Dyasonsklip and Kanon Island were fought. At Dyasonsklip three rebels were killed as well as Field Adjutant W. Dyason of the Northern Border Horse. Shortly afterwards the attack on Kanon Island started, resulting in several of the enemy being killed, among them Rooi Thys, chief adviser to Donker Malgas, Pieter Lynx and Atief, two of the rebel leaders.
After a fight at Melkstroom the rebels disbanded, with Lukas staying on Keveis Island. On the 27th and 28th April Lukas was again attacked and twenty eight of his followers killed. By the end of April McTaggart had taken over four hundred prisoners and driven the leaders from their strongholds. Upington was satisfied that the enemy’s back was broken, but in fact none of the leaders had been captured and the war continued unabated.
By this time two new groups had entered the fray, viz. the Afrikaners and the Bondelswarts, Nama clans from Greater Namaqua Land. Their chiefs, Jacobus and Willem Christiaan respectively, had hitherto been loyal to the government, but their followers were increasingly siding with the Korana. In fact, in March already a group of Afrikaners had crossed into the Colony on a cattle raid and so openly joined in the rebellion. Since the land occupied by the Afrikaners belonged to the Bondelswarts, the onus of punishing the raiders was put on Willem Christiaan. However, he explained to the resident Magistrate of Namaqua Land that he could do little about it as he had no authority over the Afrikaners and furthermore lacked ammunition. J.H. Scott, recently appointed Special Magistrate, promised him the assistance of Captain Green of the Lillyfontein Volunteers as well as food and ammunition and on the 21st May Christiaan sent a hundred and fifty men to the Afrikaners, who by this time had been joined by Pofadder and his men. Unfortunately all attempts at bringing them to heel failed.
Meanwhile McTaggart was informed that Malgas and some Korana were still on Keveis Island and he consigned half his men to Captain Maclean while he commanded the others. Throughout the last days of May, McTaggart, Maclean and Green who had joined them, bombarded the islands with cannon fire, without any visible results. Since they had no boats, they could only try to contain the enemy by patrolling the banks and a large number of rebels still evaded the colonial troops. Lukas and his men had joined Pofadder, while Malgas had been instructed to hold the islands for as long as he could and then join them at the Afrikaners’ camp in the mountains below the waterfalls. By June McTaggart decided to clear out the Afrikaner stronghold and on the 22nd surrounded the camp. The rebels surrendered without a fight and three hundred Afrikaners and one hundred and fourteen of Pofadder’s followers were taken prisoner. Pofadder himself and seven of his men escaped.
Large numbers of the rebels had been killed or taken captive, but Malgas, Pofadder and Lukas were still at large. They and a number of their men had escaped to the Kalahari, confident that the troops would not follow them into the desert. However, on the 24th June McTaggart handed over command of the forces to Captain Maclean with orders to pursue the rebels.
After a gruelling search, at dawn of the 2nd July Pofadder and seventy one Korana were taken by surprise and captured without any resistance. Several others were caught shortly afterwards.
Maclean received information that Lukas and Malgas were holed up at a small watering place in the desert about sixty five miles from Kakamas. On July 19th Maclean left Kakamas with one hundred and nineteen men, attacking the camp at dawn. Malgas and eleven others were killed and one hundred and seventy five prisoners taken.
Lukas escaped but was later taken captive by a Baster, Gert Louw.
It was all over for the once great Korana tribe.
Afterwards
Korana Land, empty of its former inhabitants, was renamed Baster Land and occupied by the Baster farmers. Later, in 1891, it became the District of Gordonia, in honour of Sir Gordon Sprigg, premier of the Cape Colony.
In 1883 the rebel chiefs who had been sentenced to serve time on Robben island were released on several conditions, viz. that they would not be recognised as chiefs by the government, that they would not be allowed to establish themselves near or within colonial borders and that they would not rally round them any followers. Despite this, they tried to resume their former positions as soon as they reached the northern border. Regarding themselves still as chiefs, they demanded a location where they could regroup their people.
Most of them were old men by this time. Piet Rooi and Carel Ruiters were between sixty five and seventy years, while Klaas Pofadder was near fifty. Jan Kivido spent most of his prison time in the infirmary with a chronic illness and on his release was a blind old man.
Klaas Lukas had died on Robben Island in January 1880.
The attempts at reestablishing themselves were doomed to failure. The government refused to acknowledge their claims and even though the Korana who had been sent into servitude returned to squat on the Orange River banks, they had no means of resurrecting the old traditions. Living off the veld and from whatever they could steal, they descended further and further into the abyss of destitution.
Unwilling to adjust to the Europeans’ ways, in the end they perished.