Volume 1

Travels into the interior of Southern Africa / [Sir John Barrow].

  • John Barrow
Date:
1806
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Travels into the interior of Southern Africa / [Sir John Barrow]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    to have once been in his service, and recollecting he was now standing before them in the shape of an enemy, and defence- less, fired at once with rage and revenge, snatched up his musquet in his hand, and shot him dead upon the spot. In- telligence of this atrocious act was speedily conveyed, by the companion of the deceased, to the Kaffers and Hottentots ; and it was reported, and believed, that they had in conse- quence put all the women and children to death. And un- der this impression, as I have just observed, the husbands and fathers of these women and children broke open Mr. Callender’s house, and were dancing, ina state of intoxica- tion, upon the green. The prisoners, however, were given up, notwithstanding the murder of the messenger; for they disdained, as they told them, to take away the lives of the innocent; but that they should soon find an opportunity of avenging the death of their countryman upon their husbands, together with the many injuries and oppressions under which they had so long been laboring. It is painful to dwell on subjects that disgrace human na- ture, but as the atrocities of the African colonists have hitherto escaped the punishment of the law, all that can be done is to expose them to the horror and detestation of man- kind. The following act stated officially to government by Mr. Vander Kemp, a missionary in Graaf Reynet, is enough to make one shudder at the name of a Cape boor. ‘This zealous and intelligent man, on finding the Kaffers were not disposed to profit by his instructions, established himself under the sanction of government near the Sunday River, in order to try his success with the more tractable Hottentots.
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