The South African War, also known as the Boer War (or Second Boer War), was a colonial war fought between the British army and the Boers in South Africa between 1899 and 1902. The Boers were descended from Europeans who had settled in South Africa from the 1600s onwards.
Britain’s aim was to unite the British South African territories of Cape Colony and Natal with the Boer republics (the Orange Free State and the South African Republic – also known as the Transvaal). The Boers initially won several victories against the British, leading to the mobilisation of additional forces from across the Empire to serve in South Africa. As the war progressed, the British began to recruit Black Africans to serve in the army as scouts and sentries. By the end of May 1900, the Orange Free State was overrun by the British, and by October of the same year the Transvaal had been annexed. A period of guerrilla warfare followed, during which the British burnt farms and crops, and forced Boer families and Black Africans into concentration camps, leading to the deaths of around 28,000 Boers and around 14,000 Black Africans. In 1902 the Treaty of Vereeniging was signed, whereby the Boers accepted British sovereignty but with limited self government. By 1910 the Boers were “fully integrated into the Union of South Africa”.
The South African War was the first conflict in which Volunteer and Yeomanry units served overseas: some 54,000 British volunteers fought in the Boer War, which had a significant impact at home as more than 22,000 men died. The Imperial War Museum’s War Memorials Register records nearly 2,000 Boer War memorials, many of which are tablets and plaques put up to individual combatants, but include Regimental monuments, and memorials raised by towns and counties to their lost citizens.
Sources: National Army Museum: Boer War; Wikipedia: Second Boer War
This is part of the Series: RAW01/02 Negatives and prints of English locations; within the Collection: RAW01 S W Rawlings Collection
© Historic England Archive
Photographer: Rawlings, Stanley William
Victorian Drill Hall, Military, People Posed, Colonialism
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