The South Rises Again

This was not the first time that the Zulu issue had come up and, in fact, it had been going on since practically the start of the war. Botha and Dinazulu’s calls for aide largely fell on deaf ears. Boulanger had no interest at all and Root was typically laconic about the situation, often paying lip service but, not prepared to act. This was most likely due to the resistance coming from Kruger, of whom, both Presidents considered to be the final say in all matters concerning South Africa. Now there were some new players in the game and they were not prepared to settle for the old rules.

Botha had friends in Washington and, oddly enough, Dinazulu had some of the most unlikely of allies in France. This odd situation was also due to a death and, in an of itself, was ironic. A member of the house of Bonaparte actually participated in the Zulu campaign of 1879. His name was Eugene Louis Jean Joseph and he was the son of Louis Napoleon. Eugene was considered the air apparent to the empire but, due to the abdication of his father, found himself living in London at the time of the Zulu War. He went to South Africa, carrying the sword worn by Napoleon I at the battle of Austerlitz. Eugene was killed with the sword on his person and it would be taken by a Zulu warrior named Zabanga.

This might sound like the odd sort of way to start a relationship but, Eugene’s mother traveled to Zululand after the war. She actually met with Zabanga and was much taken with both him and the Zulu’s in general. This rubbed off on many of the Bonaparte family and now, suddenly, with Napoleon V being announced as the heir apparent to a new French Constitutional Monarchy, many of Napoleon’s descendants were returning to Paris. They had no real power but, they did have influence. The combination of this and Clemenceau, who was holding the real power, was enough to get the Zulu’s what they were asking for.

French and American Cruisers began showing up along the Zulu coast as early as April of 1901. By the Springtime, not only did Dinazulu have a usable military force but, he had managed to either sway or force most of his internal opposition to capitulate. Naturally, the British were alarmed by this sudden uprising in Natal but, found that there was very little they could do about it. The new commander in South Africa, the 4^th Earl of Grey was, not surprisingly, alarmed by the new forces on the board and he did wire Pall Mall, asking for more reinforcements from India but, very little aide reached Durban.

The fact was that Chamberlin expressly forbid it. He also had much support in his adamant demands on Pall Mall. It was felt that altering the situation in India, either by sending British regulars or even native Indian troops, might help the situation in South Africa but, it would kick over an ant hill in India. If India descended into revolution then South Africa would be meaningless. Grey would simply have to use the resources on hand in dealing with the uprising. That word, “uprising,” was also the exact word being tossed around in London and it goes a long ways toward explaining their lack of concern over the matter. What Grey had failed to impress upon the cabinet was that this was no uprising, this was an all out invasion and, his troops were being hard pressed to hold it back.

Of course, Grey’s failure to communicate was not entirely his fault. The situation in South Africa had been complicated since the very first days of the war and, more importantly, the nature of the fighting had taken on a very distinctive flavor that was quite contrary to other fronts in the conflict. The 1901 offensive was no exception and, while Grey might come to see it as an all out attack, to those in London it looked to be nothing more than the raids that had been going on in that theater since day one.

Given the official wires from Durban, it is understandable how this might have looked too Wolseley and the cabinet. Contrary to many pop culture tales that followed the war, the Zulu had not joined together in a grand army as in the days of Shaka. This was not some clever tactic on the part of Dinazulu, but rather, the result of the fact that he simply lacked the political clout to unify his people in such a grand scheme. Either way, it worked in the Zulu’s favor and, given their past reputation along with their current desperation, the impression they made far outweighed anything that they did on the actual battlefield. This also led to the first big mistake made by Grey.

The Zulu resurgence had an even larger effect on the black population of South Africa than it did on the white Europeans. If one is not that familiar with the complicated politics of this very large melting pot of ethnicity, things might seem as they did to Grey in 1901. The fact is that South Africa is not very black and white, which is why it is with some sense of irony that the man who took over command in the region was named Grey. The simple fact is, most blacks in south Africa are not Zulu, nor are they even Bantu which is the group that the Zulu split off from. Most of the local ethnicities consider the Zulu’s as great enemies and fear them. While the whites had armies to defend them, the blacks did not quite see those armies as their own. What they felt like in this new wave of Zulu attack was, in a word, defenseless.

Grey found himself deluged with more than just requests, for troops, from white settlements. Those coming in from black settlements were even greater and, there were many young men of color who were rushing to the British Standard, volunteering their services, or asking for guns. Grey took in a few of the volunteers, most of whom would be used for manual labor until they realized this did nothing to help their situation and deserted. The calls for protection did not go entirely unheeded but, given that Allied forces were already hard pressed, not much came of this effort. The request for guns was rejected without even a second thought. This might sound rather ridiculous to the modern observer but, at the time, Grey’s decisions on these matters were not questioned nor were they even considered controversial in either South Africa or back home. They were considered nothing more than plain and simple common sense.

Since the war, much has been made about the ferocity of the Zulu raids. Much of this has been attributed to the war like nature of the Zulu but, a much closer look shows an entirely different picture. This was not the time of Shaka nor was it even 1879. While the Zulu had not given up their ceremonial traditions they had also been living peacefully enough for the past two decades. In 1901, very few Zulu had actually ever seen battle and there are many instances that show this to be the case. They made mistakes like anyone else but, they also had a drive that their enemies had failed to consider. I believe this had a lot to do with their over eager campaign against British outposts and supply lines. The fact was, the men waging this war were hungry, not for power or violence but, for nothing more than food. The Boer cavalry who were assisting in these large raids were not far behind them either.

At first, these attacks did not even alarm Grey. Raids were extremely common and one more group of them was nothing exceptional. It wasn’t until the attack on Kimberly, located not that far from the old battlefield of Rourke’s Drift, that Grey became alarmed. The longer these raids continued, the more alarmed Grey became. He was smart enough to see a pattern developing and realized something. He was not wrong. What the Zulu were doing was using these raids to gain experience. Subsequently, Dinazulu was also using these cheap and easy victories as a means of consolidating his power. There might not be a combined Boer-Zulu army just yet but, the threat of one was becoming very real.

This is what led Grey to make his second biggest mistake. In order to defend against such an eventuality, he would have to have a force large enough to meet that army on the field. At the time, his forces were spread out all over South Africa, defending heavily fortified camps, or patrolling and raiding, which, was not that different from what his enemy was doing. He would use his advantage in this situation, along with his control of the railroads, to slowly begin concentrating a force that he hoped would be large enough to contend with this new threat. This concentration would naturally be in the area where the threat was most viable, and that would be from the central to eastern part of the theater. What Grey’s enemies knew, and he was completely unaware of was, this is exactly what they were hoping he would do. The real threat to the Allies, in South Africa, had yet to show up but, it was coming.