The Establishment Of The Protectorate (Part 21) � �The 4 Dikgosi Embark For Britain�

Jeff Ramsay | Monday October 26, 2015 15:11

In the afternoon the Bechuanaland delegation finally boarded the passenger steamship RMS Tantallon Castle at Cape Town’s Victoria basin docks bound for Plymouth England. With the belated arrival of the Barolong booRatshidi Crown Prince Besele to join Bathoen, Khama and Sebele, there were now four royals at the head of a united delegation.

Each of the kgosi was further accompanied by a their respective tribal secretaries, all of whom were fluent in English, namely David Sebonego of the Bangwaketse, Simeon Seisa of the Bangwato, Kehutile Gohiwamang of the Bakwena and, senior among them, Stephen Lefenya of the Barolong, who by then had very ably served Kgosi Montshiwa for some four decades. Also on board for the mission was Bathoen’s brother Kwenaetsile.

The delegation was further accompanied by two missionaries. The Rev. “W.C.” (William Charles) Willoughby of the London Missionary Society (LMS), who had up until then played a leading role in the travel arrangements, was joined by the Rev. Alfred Spring Sharp of the Wesleyan Missionary Society, who was assisting the Barolong.

If the participation of the Barolong comes as a surprise to some, it may be noted that it has been overlooked in historical as well as popular accounts of the period, with some, including S.M. Molema’s otherwise well-documented “Montshiwa, Barolong Chief and Patriot” maintaining that Besele and Lefenya were prevented from departing by Shippard and Robinson (a version once echoed by this author).

The myth that Kgosi Besele missed the boat to some extent dovetails with the more widespread myth that Bathoen, Khama and Sebele went to Britain to ask Mmamosadinyana, Queen Victoria, for protection from the Boers. As we have seen, the Dikgosi left Cape Town for Britain a full 10 years and seven months after the January 1885 Order-in-Council that first established the British Protectorate in Botswana.

The threat in 1895, moreover, did not come from the Boers, but rather from the most powerful man in the British Empire, Cecil Rhodes, whose British South Africa Company’s claims over Botswana, as well as what are now Zambia and Zimbabwe, was provided for by an 1889 Royal Charter issued by “the Great White Queen” herself.

What is true, and perhaps helps to account for the contrasting myths, is that whereas Bathoen, Khama and Sebele achieved relative success in their mission, Besele ultimately did not. The objectives of the Barolong mission were laid out in 16th August 1895 letter signed by Kgosi Montshiwa and addressed “To the Queen of England and her Ministers”:

“We send greetings and pray that you are all living nicely. You will know us; we are not strangers. We have been your children since 1885. Your Government has been good, and under it we have received much blessing, prosperity and peace.

“We are sorry you have [now] taken our land from us and given it to the Cape Government. We do not know their ways or laws. Please make it very just that the Cape shall not have the power to take away the piece of land you gave us in the Land Settlement of 1886.

“Again we Barolong are very astonished because we hear that the Queen’s Government wants to give away our country in the Protectorate to the Chartered Company; we mean the B.S.A. Company. Our land there is good land, our fathers lived in it and are buried in it, and we keep all our cattle in it. What will we do if you give our land away? My people are increasing very fast and are filling our land.

“We keep all the laws of the great Queen; we have fought for her; we have always been friends of her people; we are not idle; we build houses; we plough many gardens; we sow lots of mealies, kaffir-corn, wheat and forage. Our people work in the gold fields.

“Why are you tired of ruling us? Why do you want to throw us away? We do not fight against your laws. We keep them and are living nicely. Our word are No; No. The Queen’s Government must not give my people’s land in the Protectorate to the Chartered Company.

“I have given that land in farms to some of my headmen. The farms [i.e. the Barolong Farms] have been measured a long time ago, and the Administration has promised to register the title. The land is my people’s and we are just sitting quiet until we get the Registered Title Deeds of those farms as promised by the Administration.

“Besele my son and heir; and Stephen Lefenya, one of my sub-chiefs who carry this letter will speak our words to the Queen. Peace to you all, we greet you all; please send a good word back. I am etc. Montshiwa.”