The Cape of Good Hope, also known as the Cape
Colony (Dutch: Kaapkolonie), was a British
colony in present-day South Africa, named
after the Cape of Good Hope. The British colony
was preceded by an earlier Dutch colony of
the same name, the Kaap de Goede Hoop, established
in 1652 by the Dutch East India Company. The
Cape was under Dutch rule from 1652 to 1795
and again from 1803 to 1806. The Dutch lost
the colony to Great Britain following the
1795 Battle of Muizenberg, but had it returned
following the 1802 Peace of Amiens. It was
re-occupied by the UK following the Battle
of Blaauwberg in 1806, and British possession
affirmed with the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814.
The Cape of Good Hope then remained in the
British Empire, becoming self-governing in
1872, and uniting with three other colonies
to form the Union of South Africa in 1910.
It then was renamed the Province of the Cape
of Good Hope. South Africa became a sovereign
state in 1931 by the Statute of Westminster.
In 1961 it became the Republic of South Africa
and obtained its own monetary unit called
the Rand. Following the 1994 creation of the
present-day South African provinces, the Cape
Province was partitioned into the Eastern
Cape, Northern Cape, and Western Cape, with
smaller parts in North West province.
The Cape of Good Hope was coextensive with
the later Cape Province, stretching from the
Atlantic coast inland and eastward along the
southern coast, constituting about half of
modern South Africa: the final eastern boundary,
after several wars against the Xhosa, stood
at the Fish River. In the north, the Orange
River, also known as the Gariep River, served
as the boundary for some time, although some
land between the river and the southern boundary
of Botswana was later added to it. From 1878,
the colony also included the enclave of Walvis
Bay and the Penguin Islands, both in what
is now Namibia.
== History ==
=== Dutch settlement ===
An expedition of the Dutch East India Company
(VOC) led by Jan van Riebeeck established
a trading post and naval victualing station
at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652. Van Riebeeck's
objective was to secure a harbour of refuge
for Dutch ships during the long voyages between
Europe and Asia. Within about three decades,
the Cape had become home to a large community
of "vrijlieden", also known as "vrijburgers"
(free citizens), former VOC employees who
settled in Dutch colonies overseas after completing
their service contracts. Vrijburgers were
mostly married Dutch citizens who undertook
to spend at least twenty years farming the
land within the fledgling colony's borders;
in exchange they received tax exempt status
and were loaned tools and seeds. Reflecting
the multi-national nature of the early trading
companies, the Dutch also granted vrijburger
status to a number of former Scandinavian
and German employees as well. In 1688 they
also sponsored the immigration of nearly two
hundred French Huguenot refugees who had fled
to the Netherlands upon the Edict of Fontainebleau.
There was a degree of cultural assimilation
due to intermarriage, and the almost universal
adoption of the Dutch language.Many of the
colonists who settled directly on the frontier
became increasingly independent and localised
in their loyalties. Known as Boers, they migrated
westwards beyond the Cape Colony's initial
borders and had soon penetrated almost a thousand
kilometres inland. Some Boers even adopted
a nomadic lifestyle permanently and were denoted
as trekboers. The Dutch colonial period was
marred by a number of bitter conflicts between
the colonists and the Khoisan, followed by
the Xhosa, both of which they perceived as
unwanted competitors for prime farmland.Dutch
traders imported thousands of slaves to the
Cape of Good Hope from the Dutch East Indies
and other parts of Africa. By the end of the
eighteenth century the Cape's population swelled
to about 26,000 people of European descent
and 30,000 slaves.
=== British conquest ===
In 1795, France occupied the Seven Provinces
of the Netherlands, the mother country of
the Dutch East India Company. This prompted
Great Britain to occupy the territory in 1795
as a way to better control the seas in order
to stop any potential French attempt to reach
India. The British sent a fleet of nine warships
which anchored at Simon's Town and, following
the defeat of the Dutch militia at the Battle
of Muizenberg, took control of the territory.
The Dutch East India Company transferred its
territories and claims to the Batavian Republic
(the Revolutionary period Dutch state) in
1798, and ceased to exist in 1799. Improving
relations between Britain and Napoleonic France,
and its vassal state the Batavian Republic,
led the British to hand the Cape of Good Hope
over to the Batavian Republic in 1803, under
the terms of the Treaty of Amiens.
In 1806, the Cape, now nominally controlled
by the Batavian Republic, was occupied again
by the British after their victory in the
Battle of Blaauwberg. The temporary peace
between Britain and Napoleonic France had
crumbled into open hostilities, whilst Napoleon
had been strengthening his influence on the
Batavian Republic (which Napoleon would subsequently
abolish later the same year). The British,
who set up a colony on 8 January 1806, hoped
to keep Napoleon out of the Cape, and to control
the Far East trade routes. In 1814 the Dutch
government formally ceded sovereignty over
the Cape to the British, under the terms of
the Convention of London.
=== British Colonisation ===
The British started to settle the eastern
border of the colony, with the arrival in
Port Elizabeth of the 1820 Settlers. They
also began to introduce the first rudimentary
rights for the Cape's black African population
and, in 1834, abolished slavery. The resentment
that the Dutch farmers felt against this social
change, as well as the imposition of English
language and culture, caused them to trek
inland en masse. This was known as the Great
Trek, and the migrating Boers settled inland,
forming the "Boer republics" of Transvaal
and the Orange Free State.
British immigration continued in the Cape,
even as many of the Boers continued to trek
inland, and the ending of the British East
India Company's monopoly on trade led to economic
growth.
At the same time, the long series of border
wars fought against the Xhosa people of the
Cape's eastern frontier finally died down
when the Xhosa partook in a mass destruction
of their own crops and cattle, in the belief
that this would cause their spirits to appear
and defeat the whites. The resulting famine
crippled Xhosa resistance and ushered in a
long period of stability on the border.
Peace and prosperity led to a desire for political
independence. In 1853, the Cape Colony became
a British Crown colony. In 1854, the Cape
of Good Hope elected its first parliament,
on the basis of the multi-racial Cape Qualified
Franchise. Cape residents qualified as voters
based on a universal minimum level of property
ownership, regardless of race.
The fact that executive power remained completely
in the authority of the British governor did
not relieve tensions in the colony between
its eastern and western sections.
=== Responsible Government ===
In 1872, after a long political battle, the
Cape of Good Hope achieved "Responsible Government"
under its first Prime Minister, John Molteno.
Henceforth, an elected Prime Minister and
his cabinet had total responsibility for the
affairs of the country. A period of strong
economic growth and social development ensued,
and the eastern-western division was largely
laid to rest. The system of multi-racial franchise
also began a slow and fragile growth in political
inclusiveness, and ethnic tensions subsided.
In 1877, the state expanded by annexing Griqualand
West and Griqualand East.However, the discovery
of diamonds around Kimberley and gold in the
Transvaal led to a return to instability,
particularly because they fuelled the rise
to power of the ambitious imperialist Cecil
Rhodes. On becoming the Cape's Prime Minister,
he instigated a rapid expansion of British
influence into the hinterland. In particular,
he sought to engineer the conquest of the
Transvaal, and although his ill-fated Jameson
Raid failed and brought down his government,
it led to the Second Boer War and British
conquest at the turn of the century. The politics
of the colony consequently came to be increasingly
dominated by tensions between the British
colonists and the Boers. Rhodes also brought
in the first formal restrictions on the political
rights of the Cape of Good Hope's black African
citizens.The Cape of Good Hope remained nominally
under British rule until the formation of
the Union of South Africa in 1910, when it
became the Province of the Cape of Good Hope,
better known as the Cape Province.
== Governors of the Cape of Good Hope (1797–1910)
==
=== British occupation (1st, 1797–1804)
===
George Macartney, 1st Earl Macartney (1797–1798)
Francis Dundas (1st time) (acting) (1798–1799)
Sir George Yonge (1799–1801)
Francis Dundas (2nd time) (acting) (1801–1803)
=== Batavian Republic (Dutch colony) (1803–1806)
===
Jacob Abraham Uitenhage de Mist (1803–1804)
Jan Willem Janssens (1803–1806)
=== British occupation (2nd, 1806–1814)
===
Sir David Baird (acting) (1806–1807)
Henry George Grey (1st time) (acting) (1807)
Du Pre Alexander, 2nd Earl of Caledon (1807–1811)
Henry George Grey (2nd time) (acting) (1811)
Sir John Francis Cradock (1811–1814)
Hon. Robert Meade (acting for Cradock) (1813–1814),
(son of Theodosia, Countess of Clanwilliam),
=== British colony (1814–1910) ===
Lord Charles Somerset (1814–1826)
Sir Rufane Shaw Donkin (acting for Somerset)
(1820–1821)
Sir Richard Bourke (acting) (1826–1828)
Sir Galbraith Lowry Cole (1828–1833)
Sir Thomas Francis Wade (acting for D'Urban
from 10 January 1834) (1833–1834)
Sir Benjamin d'Urban (1834–1838)
Sir George Thomas Napier (1838–1844)
Sir Peregrine Maitland (1844–1847)
Sir Henry Pottinger (1847)
Sir Harry Smith (Sir Henry George Wakelyn
Smith) (1847–1852)
Sir George Cathcart (1852–1854)
Sir Charles Henry Darling (acting) (1854)
Sir George Grey (1854–1861)
Sir Robert Henry Wynyard (1st time) (acting
for Grey) (1859–1860)
Sir Robert Henry Wynyard (2nd time) (acting)
(1861–1862)
Sir Philip Edmond Wodehouse (1862–1870)
Charles Craufurd Hay (acting) (1870)
Sir Henry Barkly (1870–1877)
Henry Bartle Frere (1877–1880)
Henry Hugh Clifford (acting) (1880)
Sir George Cumine Strahan (acting) (1880–1881)
Hercules Robinson (1st time) (1881–1889)
Sir Leicester Smyth (1st time) (acting for
Robinson) (1881)
Sir Leicester Smyth (2nd time) (acting for
Robinson) (1883–1884)
Sir Henry D'Oyley Torrens (acting for Robinson)
(1886)
Henry Augustus Smyth (acting) (1889)
Henry Brougham Loch (1889–1895)
Sir William Gordon Cameron (1st time) (acting
for Loch) (1891–1892)
Sir William Gordon Cameron (2nd time) (acting
for Loch) (1894)
Hercules Robinson (2nd time) (1895–1897)
Sir William Howley Goodenough (acting) (1897)
Sir Alfred Milner (1897–1901)
Sir William Francis Butler (acting for Milner)
(1898–1899)
Sir Walter Hely-Hutchinson (1901–1910)
Sir Henry Jenner Scobell (acting for Hely-Hutchinson)
(1909)The post of High Commissioner for Southern
Africa was also held from 27 January 1847
to 6 March 1901 by the Governor of the Cape
of Good Hope. The post of Governor of the
Cape of Good Hope became extinct on 31 May
1910, when it joined the Union of South Africa.
== Prime Ministers of the Cape of Good Hope
(1872–1910) ==
The post of prime minister of the Cape of
Good Hope also became extinct on 31 May 1910,
when it joined the Union of South Africa.
== Demographics ==
=== 1904 Census ===
Population Figures for the 1904 Census. Source:
== See also ==
Parliament of the Cape of Good Hope
Cape Colonial Forces
Cape Government Railways
Cape Qualified Franchise
== References ==
=== Sources ===
Beck, Roger B. (2000). The History of South
Africa. Westport, CT: Greenwood. ISBN 0-313-30730-X.
Davenport, T. R. H., and Christopher Saunders
(2000). South Africa: A Modern History, 5th
ed. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-23376-0.
Elbourne, Elizabeth (2002). Blood Ground:
Colonialism, Missions, and the Contest for
Christianity in the Cape Colony 
and Britain, 1799–1853. McGill-Queen's University
Press. ISBN 0-7735-2229-8.
Le Cordeur, Basil Alexander (1981). The War
of the Axe, 1847: Correspondence between the
governor of the Cape Colony, Sir Henry Pottinger,
and the commander of the British forces at
the Cape, Sire George Berkeley, and others.
Brenthurst Press. ISBN 0-909079-14-5.
Mabin, Alan (1983). Recession and its aftermath:
The Cape Colony in the eighteen eighties.
University of the Witwatersrand, African Studies
Institute.
Ross, Robert, and David Anderson (1999). Status
and Respectability in the Cape Colony, 1750–1870
: A Tragedy of Manners. Cambridge University
Press. ISBN 0-521-62122-4.
Theal, George McCall (1970). History of the
Boers in South Africa; Or, the Wanderings
and Wars of the Emigrant Farmers from Their
Leaving the Cape Colony to the Acknowledgment
of Their Independence by Great Britain. Greenwood
Press. ISBN 0-8371-1661-9.
Van Der Merwe, P.J., Roger B. Beck (1995).
The Migrant Farmer in the History of the Cape
Colony. Ohio University Press. ISBN 0-8214-1090-3.
Worden, Nigel, Elizabeth van Heyningen, and
Vivian Bickford-Smith (1998). Cape Town: The
Making of a City. Cape Town: David Philip.
ISBN 0-86486-435-3.
== External links ==
