Gunboat Diplomacy

It is hard to imagine that an earthquake in 1755 would effect the course of a war at the dawn of the twentieth century but, in this case, it is more true than not. On All Saint’s Day, in 1755, the small nation of Portugal was rocked by a major earthquake that destroyed the capital city of Lisbon and left the country destitute and broke. Before that time, Portugal had been a major commercial power at the heart of one of Europe’s premier empires. The quake reduced the nation to the status of what has been sometimes described as an “unofficial British Colony.”

The predicament of Portugal is debatable but, there are few who deny that Britain had a great deal of influence over the former powerhouse. It was this reason alone that kept Portugal from declaring war on Britain and her allies in December of 1899 and January of 1900. The reason for this was the violation of their territory, specifically, their colony of Mozambique. Since just before the war, France and the US had been using the colony to supply their Boer allies in South Africa. Britain used it’s influence on Portugal in an attempt to shut down this supply line and Lisbon might have gladly complied with the demands except for one problem. Portugal had even less control of Mozambique than the British.

For some time, including right up to Christmas Day of 1899, the British were content to accept Portuguese excuses. Lord Salisbury realized he had far more pressing matters to deal with and shutting down the Boer supply line was, at this point, more trouble than it was worth. Lord Kitchener saw the situation a little differently and that is why, without consulting anyone, he changed British policy, on Christmas Day, when he invaded Mozambique. Kitchener has been widely criticized for his actions, going all the way back to the war. It is a wonder that he was not relieved of command and even given a court martial.

When you take a careful look at the situation faced by Kitchener, his actions make a great deal of sense. The force that Kitchener left Egypt with was hardly a grand army. He had less than two thousand effective ground combatants, most of whom were sailors. His troops hailed from no less than seven different nations and spoke at least nine different languages. The only good news, and one that was more important than anyone seemed to realize, but Kitchener, was that all of his troops were professional soldiers, no matter where they came from.

Still, this ragtag army had it’s limits and Kitchener seemed to be keenly aware of this as well. He knew that he was sailing to the relief of South Africa but, the real question that he faced was how best to employ his troops in this capacity. If he sailed and landed at Natal then his only real option, at that point, would be too march north and attempt to raise the siege of the nearest British border post. This was not a very attractive option in that Kitchener simply lacked the forces to make much of a difference there. He had little cavalry and lacked the numbers to turn the tide at any one siege, let alone all of them.

Kitchener needed to find a master stroke and, he realized, the most effect he could get with the forces on hand was to smash the Boer supply line, permanently, and if possible threaten the Boer rear area. Kitchener realized that his operation was little more than a raid. He did not have what he needed in order to launch a sustained campaign. It was summer in southern Africa and, at best, he would have to pack up and leave before winter set in. To put it bluntly, most of Kitchener’s troops were “on loan.” To sum it up, this operation would require that he both think and bluff very big.

When Kitchener’s international fleet showed up in the channel just off of southern Mozambique’s most heavily trafficked port, Inhambane, the local officials thought it was anything but a bluff. At the time, the colony was under the control of a private corporation, The Mozambique Company, with a royal Portuguese charter. They had been the ones most responsible for facilitating the French and American shipments to the Boer Republics. They had also, eventually, expected a British response and they took Kitchener’s arrival to be just that. Still, the company had no intentions of fighting Kitchener and no means to do so, even if they had chosen too. The Portuguese officials had formulated a plan to handle what they saw as an eventuality and their plans for the British were not that different from how they had handled the French and Americans. 

It all started with Kitchener sending a small detachment of Confederate Sailors ashore, under the direct command of Commodore Brumby. They delivered Kitchener’s demands and the Portuguese were a bit disturbed at the site of a detachment of heavily armed black men, who were marching under a Confederate flag no less. In fact, they were somewhat confused by this and it took Brumby, through an interpreter, nearly an hour to explain exactly who he was. After this issue was settled, the Portuguese issued the reply that they would have given no matter what Kitchener demanded.

The demands of the multi-national, allied, forces was the unconditional surrender of the port and town. The Portuguese did not even address this issue. They simply stated that they were neutral, welcomed the British fleet, granted Kitchener rights of passage, and demanded a large sum of money for the honor. Kitchener’s reply to the Portuguese counter offer came when the CSS Gulfport and the SMS Hertha moved into the channel proper and began blasting the city, at point blank range, with five inch guns.

When the barrage was halted, just over two hours from its commencement, Kitchener did not bother with any more communications from the city. His troopships moved close to shore and began unloading the bulk of the Confederate Naval brigade, including all of it’s black sailors and white marines. Their immediate objectives were to secure the docks and surrounding environs. Kitchener also had the sailors begin moving further inland with special orders which were too arrest any white man that was stupid enough to still be there. 

The Confederate sailors rounded up over thirty, many of whom were not even Portuguese. Several French military officers and one US mercenary was found in the prisoners. None of these men were in uniform but, they made no secret of who they were. They also demanded full rights as prisoners of war and acted none too happy about their treatment at the hands of the black sailors. Kitchener had them shot as spies.

As the rest of this international, and multi ethnic, force began to unload, the Confederate naval brigade was encountering even more disturbing sights as they expanded their perimeter. These black sailors had come from a nation where they were not even citizens, many of their relatives were still enslaved, and most of them had joined the navy because they could not find work as free men. Even they were shocked by what they found at Inhambane. They slowly began to encounter more and more people, who shared their skin color, and looked like what Winston Churchill would later pen as, “walking death.”

The Mozambique Company had been charged with many duties in their royal charter. They were given the power to tax and, in exchange they were required to economically improve the colony as well as provide for it’s defense. In exchange, the Portuguese crown received a percentage of profits from the company. None the obligations were ever really met by the company and most of it’s officials and employees got rich from private ventures and tax revenues. They also practiced what was called, in the later 19th century, contract labor. It was really nothing less than a form of slavery and, unlike it’s equivalent institution in the Confederacy, it did not come with any of the responsibilities that were imposed by law on Confederate slave holders. No such laws would have had much of an effect in Mozambique, anyway, since the company had shown a history of ignoring any that they did not like.

Winston Churchill went on at length about the conditions of many of the laborers that they found at the nearby plantations. He also noted that many of the officers from the multinational force toured the area over the next few days. Tirpitz, normally a very hard fellow, cut his inspection short and told his chief of staff, “I do not care to see any more.” 

What Kitchener thought of the deplorable conditions was anyone’s guess. As usual, he played his cards close to his chest and did not comment to anyone about any personal feelings that he might have had. What is clear is that he was certainly not above using it to his advantage. I am of the unswerving opinion that his actions between Christmas and new years were precisely for that reason and not because he was appalled by what was found. 

When the property of the Mozambique company and the homes of it’s company officials were put to the torch, I do not believe that Kitchener was sending a message to the Portuguese. Kitchener was quite used to being raked over the coals by British newspapers and, I suppose, he had already invaded a neutral nation so why not go all the way? I do not believe that he tasked the burning of the private property to the Confederate Sailors so that he could have a scapegoat as many have suggested. I think Kitchener was more interested in sending a message to someone else and that man’s name was Paul Kruger.

Kitchener had established a reputation of questionable sanity back in the Sudan, when he drank from the skull of a long dead enemy. Kruger, like anyone who read the newspapers, was well aware of this and when news reached Pretoria, of Kitchener’s latest atrocity, there was no way that Kruger could not respond. Not only had Kitchener pillaged the city of a neutral state but, by letting Confederate sailors destroy the property of the Mozambique company, Kitchener had commanded blacks to destroy the property of whites and terrorize them.

Kruger was, by no stretch of the imagination, naïve. He had to know that this action was simply a ploy but, to Kruger’s political supporters this was an intolerable sin. They were already growing restless with the war and the Orange Free State was even talking of suing for peace. Kruger had to realize that to quit the war would be the end of Boer independence and now he had evidence to show his people what the British had in store for them. They would allow the blacks to burn Boer farms, pillage their cities, and rape their wives and daughters.

This might have been a boost to Boer morale but, it also gave Kitchener what he most needed. While his forces were secure from any attack while protected by the guns of his small flotilla, the fact was that he did not have the resources to mount any serious overland campaign. He certainly did not have the logistical reach to mount an attack on the Transvaal. This was an impediment to Kitchener’s plans because, in order for his overall goals to be met, he needed a battle. The only way for that to happen was to get Kruger to come to him. In this respect, his ploy worked superbly.

The Boer states had gone well beyond their ability to raise any more commando’s. Kruger was faced with hard choices because if he diverted troops from the sieges then the entire front would be compromised. The even bigger problem was that Kruger was not really sure of exact disposition of Kitchener’s army. Kruger simply assumed the worst and said as much in his war council of January 2nd, 1900. He seemed to really believe that Kitchener was in command of a superior force. 

Jan Smuts would later record that the mood of the Commando leaders was very solemn and one of no great surprise. All of them had secretly harbored fears that the British would eventually show up in force and, now, it seemed as though they had. At the same time, the Boer troops were restless and weary of the daily life that came with fighting from a trench and for what seemed to be no gain at all. This seemed to be the overall mood and, so, the decision was made to pull most of their forces back into the Transvaal where, hopefully, they could engage the British in an open battle where their mobility would actually count. At the same time, forces could be dispatched to Mozambique to block Kitchener from moving overland and invading from the east. None of them could have known that this was exactly what Kitchener had hoped for.