Diamonds, Gold, and War: The British, the Boers, and the Making of South AfricaSOUTHERN AFRICA was once regarded as a worthless jumble of British colonies, Boer republics, and African chiefdoms, a troublesome region of little interest to the outside world. But then prospectors chanced upon the world's richest deposits of diamonds and gold, setting off a titanic struggle between the British and the Boers for control of the region. It culminated in the costliest, bloodiest, and most humiliating war that Britain had waged in nearly a century, and left the Boer republics devastated. In this gripping history of the turbulent years leading up to the founding of the modern state of South Africa in 1910, Martin Meredith portrays the great wealth and raw power, the deceit, corruption, and racism that lay behind Britain's empire-building in southern Africa. Diamonds, Gold, and War is a tale of high adventure, high fi nance, and high politics that also shows the massive impact of white expansion on indigenous African societies. And it explains the rise of the virulent Afrikaner nationalism that eventually took hold, with repercussions lasting nearly a century. |
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Contents
DIAMOND 2 BLUE | 16 |
THE DIGGERS 5 ENTER | 44 |
THE IMPERIAL | 77 |
THE WASHING | 111 |
THE DIAMOND | 147 |
THE STRIPPING 12 DREAMS | 156 |
THE MOST POWERFUL COMPANY IN THE WORLD | 218 |
PART | 231 |
A CHOSEN | 237 |
A MARRIAGE | 279 |
PART | 288 |
THE PLACE | 299 |
AFRICA | 334 |
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Common terms and phrases
Afrikaner Bond annexation arrived asked Barkly Barnato became Bechuanaland Beer’s Beers Beit black labour Boer Britain British government British officials Bulawayo Bultfontein burghers camp Cape Colony Cape Town Cape’s capital Carnarvon Cecil Rhodes Cetshwayo Charles Rudd claim-holders claims Colesberg Kopje colonial secretary commando concession despatched diamond fields diggers diggings Dutch Dutoitspan eastern Transvaal English farm farmers favour force Frere German gold Griqualand Groote Schuur Hofmeyr imperial independent interest Jameson Jules Porges Kimberley Kimberley’s king Kruger land Lobengula London Mackenzie Mashonaland Matabeleland ment Merriman miles mining companies missionaries Moffat months Natal native Ndebele offered Orange Free parliament population Pretoria Queen railway reef republic Rhodes and Rudd River Robinson Sauer Sekhukhune Selous shares Shepstone Shippard South Africa southern Africa Stellaland Swazi Swaziland tent territory Thompson tion told took trade Transvaal Tswana Vaal Volksraad Witwatersrand Wolseley wrote Xhosa Zambesia Zulu