CHAPTER II. 



CAPTAIN STRUBEN AND THE NATAL 

 MAGISTRACY. 



During the period 1851-54 the witch doctors in 

 Zululand were " smelling out " native kraals whole- 

 sale, and the slaughter of men, women and children 

 was dreadful. Thousands were drowned in the 

 Tugela, and stabbed on its banks, while trying to 

 cross into Natal, but yet many succeeded in reaching 

 safety there. My father did not think it advisable 

 to augment the existing Natal tribes living in 

 locations, so apportioned these refugees, (who had 

 nothing to live on,) in families among the Dutch 

 farmers for a term of years, on most favourable 

 conditions, food and land being found them and their 

 families, while the men did a certain amount of farm 

 work for the owner. The Governor approved of the 

 scheme, and the Natives and Boers were both 

 satisfied. These Zulus are now well-to-do and have 

 increased alarmingly. It was the best that could be 

 done at the time, the poor creatures could not be 

 driven back over the Tugela to be butchered, and 

 they were starving. Nevertheless, a missionary 

 wrote to the authorities in England, that Captain 

 Struben had handed over these people to the Boers 

 as slaves, and one of the Natal papers which has 

 always been a thorn in the side of the Colony, took 

 up the cry and heaped abuse on my father and 

 condemned everything he did. At another time a 

 tribe under Gado-gado living in the Drakensburg 

 used systematically to steal the Natal farmers' cattle, 

 exchanging them with the Basutos for cattle stolen 



