Cecil Rhodes
An Introduction
Cecil Rhodes, in his brief life, was an industrialist, a politician, a colonial administrator, a soldier and a diplomat. He lived at a time when Britain was a real global power having mastery of the world’s seas and an empire that stretched to almost 13 million square miles. Rhodes was himself responsible for the addition of over 700,000 square miles of territory in South Africa, something for which he was personally thanked by Queen Victoria.
The impact of his death
Rhodes died in 1902 aged just 49. He had suffered from ill health all his life having had his first heart attack at the age of 19 and soon after been told that he had just six months to live. He believed for much of his life he was living on borrowed time and this made him impatient to achieve his goals in life and also impatient with other people.
The day following his death, the whole British Empire was in mourning. Telegrams and cables of condolence flooded into Cape Town from all parts of the world. Flags were flown at half-mast and businesses closed for the day. The Kaiser sent a telegram of condolence to King Edward VII and the American newspapers wrote obituaries larger than for any person since the death of Victoria and the death of President McKinley. Queen Alexandra, King Edward’s wife, sent a telegram to Cape Town with instructions for flowers to be put on his coffin.
In London a memorial service was held at St Paul's attended by the Mayor and Corporation and throughout South Africa cities and towns closed down. 30,000 people filed past his home where the coffin lay and in a private service in Cape Town Kipling read out a poem which would be repeated at Rhodes' burial at the Matopos Hills in Rhodesia.
At the time of his death, Rhodes was regarded by Britons as the embodiment of Empire and thought of as a latter-day Drake or Raleigh. He believed that Britain had a mission to civilise the world and that the more of the world the British inhabited the better it would be for the human race. When others were doubting the importance of empire at the beginning of the 20th century, he was for many the justification for empire having single-handedly brought empire and civilisation to southern Africa.
What he had done excited people, but more than that, he had created a myth. Rhodes said what the British wanted to hear, and he was a man of action. He gave the British people back their self-belief. His early biographies were written using the testimony of his closest friends and tended to be eulogies, which sustained this view of Rhodes as a man of Empire.
Few at the beginning of the 20th century would have disagreed with this view of Rhodes but slowly people's view of him did change, especially after all the emotion of the Boer War died down. Rhodes had been a major cause of the Boer War but this war showed up the weaknesses of the British Empire.
Olive Schreiner was for a short time a friend of Rhodes, the only woman who was able to get close to him. Schreiner wrote of him in 1890 that Rhodes was the only great man that South Africa possesses but within five years she changed her view completely writing of him as a man of ambition and greed, unrestrained by conscience. Once people began to find out about his methods, they began to reassess their views of him.
The funeral of Rhodes in Cape Town
His achievements
Rhodes was a millionaire by the age of 30, having built up a huge diamond empire and founded the De Beers Mining Company which came to control 90% of the world’s production of diamonds, and the supply and price of world diamonds. He founded and was Chair of Gold Fields Consolidated which in 1895 earnt £2.1 million in profits, the largest ever by a limited liability company in London.
He was a Member of the Cape Colony Parliament by the time he was 28 and between 1890 and 1895 was Prime Minister of the Cape Colony. During his premiership he moved the Cape Colony away from the relatively liberal colony it had been, towards a system of segregating the races and laying the ground for apartheid. He also introduced a number of agricultural reforms which saw the development of the wine and fruit industry in South Africa.
He created the chartered company, the British South Africa Company (BSAC), a private company which was given the power to build road and railways, negotiate treaties, make laws, and raise military forces. The Company governed land from the Vaal River to the great lakes, adding 700,000 square miles of land to the British Empire.
Impact on South Africa
Rhodes had a huge and lasting impact on South Africa and so we cannot ignore him. The South Africa of today would have been different without Cecil Rhodes. In our fascination with history, we concentrate on the personalities of the past, but Rhodes's story goes largely ignored because we have become embarrassed to talk about him. He brought about enormous political change in his short lifetime, but the changes did not improve the condition of the majority of people affected by them. He treated Africans appallingly. He was not responsible for introducing compounds for African labour working within the diamond industry in Kimberley, but he extended their use, and used his time as an MP and then Prime Minister to introduce pass laws, segregation and reduce the participation of blacks in the political system. He can be regarded as the father of apartheid.
Workers on the De Beers Mining Company
He was no imperialist
As a businessman Rhodes was shrewd, had great powers of persuasion, was loyal to those who were close to him but expected total loyalty to himself. If a young man close to him wanted to marry, he was instantly got rid of. He could be ruthless in search of what he wanted and was not averse to resorting to illegal methods to get his way. However, he could be kind and gracious to business opponents, but he expected to eventually get his way. He believed that everyman had his price and he expected to get what he wanted by dispensing money or shares.
He was no imperialist or patriot. This may seem odd given his place in history but when he wanted the expansion of the British Empire, he wanted to be able to control these lands himself. He was against lands in South Africa becoming colonies run by men appointed by London. He regarded the Imperial government as too weak, not standing up to the Boers or native Africans. He spent as little time as possible in Britain - in fact, he showed contempt for his homeland. He was not an imperialist, this was just part of the myth he helped to create. He was at best a colonialist and at worst a power seeker for his own personal ends. Rhodes' life revolved around accumulating as much money as he could to realize a dream that haunted him all his life - a dream that was largely about creating a legacy for himself and a sense of immortality.
Rhodes’s life was dominated by his search for a dream, an adolescent dream to produce a secret elite of white Anglo-Saxon men who would dedicate their lives to extending the British Empire around the world and by so doing bring order and civilisation to the world. This was the divine duty of the British for which he set aside in his will a large amount of money.
Supported by Queen Victoria and John Ruskin
With the decolonisation of the British Empire from the 1960s, Rhodes was increasingly seen as depicting everything that was wrong with Empire. He became the scapegoat for the violence, racism and repression that existed within the empire. He became Mr Nasty and in recent years there has been a call for the removal of his statues around the world. His views and actions though were supported by many, including Queen Victoria and John Ruskin, however he also encountered widespread opposition. He was a complex character, a flawed colossus holding contemporary views but using corrupt methods to get what he wanted. We cannot understand Africa without knowing about Rhodes, and it is important that we study him to understand why he thought and acted as he did.
Early Life
Cecil Rhodes was born in 1853 and brought up in the market town of Bishop Stortford, thirty miles north of London. His father was the local vicar and Cecil was one of six children. He went to the local grammar school but at 16 was tutored by his father for entrance to Oxford. Before he had had time to apply, the family doctor, following a brief illness, told Cecil he had consumption and prescribed a period away from the damp climate of England. So it was then that Cecil travelled to South Africa to join his brother on his cotton plantation.South Africa
When he arrived (in September 1870), the diamond rush to Kimberley had just begun and Cecil's brother Herbert had left for the diamond fields, leaving Cecil, at the age of 17 to run the cotton farm. The farm was a disaster and although Cecil managed to improve production, it was not long before he decided to join his brother in KimberleyDiamonds and Gold
Herbert had three claims in the New Rush claim and Cecil got into the hard and dangerous work of diamond mining. As well as working his claims Cecil began to buy claims when they became available and began to form partnerships with people that were to last a lifetime. In 1872, at the age of 19 Rhodes suffered his first heart attack and had to leave Kimberley and travel north with his brother. It was on this journey that he first came across the lands of present Zimbabwe.
The big hole at Kimberley
View on Empire developing
Throughout this time, Rhodes had been periodically returning to England to complete the degree from Oxford which he felt was important for his future success. At Oxford Rhodes had the opportunity to mix with the country's future leaders, young men from titled and landed families. He also came under the influence of John Ruskin who in his inaugural lecture at Oxford in 1870 had spoken about how Britain needed to found colonies as far and as fast as she was able and then teach the colonists that their first duty was fidelity to Britain and their first aim was to advance the power of Britain by land and sea.
It was a Ruskin lecture at Oxford that shaped Rhodes' views on empire
In the 1870s attitudes to Africa and the Empire were changing. For 40 years or more the British had been recoiling from the crimes which had been associated with slavery and which had been made public during the debates over the abolition of slavery and the slave trade. Following the abolition of slavery in 1833, a new contract with the African people was called for by Thomas Buxton. He wanted to establish industry, agriculture and commerce and claim the African continent for Christ. He wanted the bible and the plough to regenerate Africa. He believed Britain should be a temporary protector and not the exploiter of native peoples who should be taught how to improve their land and introduce modern technology. This attitude had an influence on the governors of the Cape Colony.
Racist Attitudes
By the 1870s though, these attitudes were changing and in the Cape there was an increasing tendency to regard Africans as an inferior species incapable of attaining the same standards as whites. These new attitudes happened as diamonds and later gold was being discovered and mined.
Rhodes' Confession of Faith
These new racist attitudes were justified by the new economic situation and given ideological justification by the work of Herbert Spencer who in 1864 coined the term 'survival of the fittest' in his book, Principles of Biology. Rhodes would have been subjected to both views at Oxford. He was to enunciate his own views in his 'Confession of Faith' in 1876: Why should we not form a secret society with but one object, the furtherance of the British Empire and the bringing of the whole uncivilised world under British rule, for the recovery of the US, for making the Anglo Saxon race but one empire? In a later addition to this will, he stated: Whites have clearly come out on top in the struggle for existence and achieved the highest standard of human existence. Therefore I shall devote the rest of my life to God's purpose and help him make the world English. Such views were useful to have to justify the actions that Rhodes worked to achieve whilst an MP in the Cape Parliament. In 1882, for example the Cape Parliament passed an act legitimising the compound system for Africans and in 1887 Rhodes made a blatantly racist speech in supporting the Voter Registration Act which had the effect of reducing the black franchise. In Parliament Rhodes said: Does this House think it is right that men in a state of pure barbarism should have the franchise and the vote? Treat the natives as a subject people...Be the lords over them...The native is to be treated as a child and denied the franchise...We must adopt a system of despotism in our relations with the barbarians of South Africa.
Matabeleland and Mashonaland
Matabeleland had long been the target of prospectors but it was Rhodes who managed to gain a mining concession from Lobengula, the king of the Matabele, and then he petitioned the London Parliament for a royal charter. To achieve this he travelled to London and through his charm and bribery (he believed every man had his price) persuaded the House of Commons South Africa Committee of the merits of a private company. He was granted a charter to set up his South Africa Company which was given powers of government and also had the right to raise armed forces. With his concession to mine in Matabeleland and his armed forces it wasn't long before an excuse was manufactured to justify the conquest not just of Matabeleland but also of Mashonaland. In 1893, Jameson, at the head of a company army armed with maxim guns and field guns, destroyed the Matabele forces. Total Matabele losses were 3.000 to one white person killed. The following year HM government confirmed the jurisdiction of the Chartered Company over what became the new state of Southern Rhodesia.
In the short period of five and a half years between July 1890 and January 1896 Rhodes had established the International Diamond Syndicate that fixed prices and controlled the world's supply. He had consolidated his interests in the Wtwatersrand and built a second fortune in gold. He had occupied Mashonaland, waged war against the Portuguese and secured two of the three territories they had originally claimed as theirs. He had destroyed Matabele military power, added Barotsland (Zambia) to his company's possessions, gained exclusive mineral rights throughout Bechuanaland and effectively secured Nyasaland for Britain. He had linked his and Britain's African possessions by telegraph, pushed the railway line north from Cape Town to the Matabele frontier.
Prime Minister
Between 17 July 1890 and 12 January 1896 Cecil Rhodes was also running a country for he was Prime Minister of Cape Colony. Rhodes had long been committed to the idea of an African union of southern African states but the whole saga of deals and interconnected interests was designed to help further his business interests. Those business interests though were to be threatened by the government of Paul Kruger in the Transvaal.
A map showing the territories of the British South Africa Company.
The Scramble for Africa
European powers were engaged in a scramble to acquire new colonies, many of which were in Africa. One of Britain's main rivals in this competition to enlarge the Empire was Germany who already possessed South West Africa. Given the historical links between Germany and the Boers, there was concern in Britain that Germany might seek to establish friendly relations with the Transvaal, especially as by 1895 there were over 5,000 Germans living in the Transvaal who formed a well-established and prosperous pro-Kruger community. A strong Transvaal with the support of Germany might come to dominate south Africa and become a threat to Britain's strategic position at the Cape.
Tensions between the Transvaal and the Cape Colony grow
With the failure of Rhodes' scheme to find sufficient quantities of gold in Matabeleland and Mashonaland, Rhodes knew that his scheme for a Cairo to Cape Town railway as the precursor to a British dominated eastern and southern Africa depended on the destruction of the Boer republics. The Transvaal under Kruger was becoming more and more economically and politically independent. A railway to Delagoa Bay was opened up in 1894 obviating the need to use Cape Town for imports and exports. To make it more difficult for the Cape Colony, Kruger imposed steep haulage tariffs on the railway between Transvaal and Cape Colony and then blocked the use of the drifts which gave access to Transvaal territory.
The Jameson Raid
To try to bring about the destruction of the Transvaal, Rhodes planned an overthrow of Kruger's regime. Rhodes got enough assurances from uitlanders to convince himself that it was possible to organise the overthrow of Kruger and then invite Britain to provide protection.
The involvement of Rhodes in the Jameson Raid saw an end to his effective political life
Rhodes believed he had sufficient support within south Africa - he was after all the Prime Minister of the Cape and had the support of the moderate Cape Afrikaner party. He thought that the English community in Natal would be behind him and that he had the support of the British government. Led by Dr Leander Starr Jameson, a raid into the Transvaal of 500 men of the British South Africa Police, began on 31 December 1895. It was a fiasco from the beginning. The men were not equipped at all for the type of enterprise that they were engaged in and the hoped for uprising in Johannesburg did not materialise. Rhodes realised the raid was doomed but his telegram urging Jameson to postpone the mission was ignored. Jameson and his men were rounded up and sent back to Britain for trial.
The Road to War
The spectre of a German dominated Transvaal occupied the minds of the Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury and Joseph Chamberlain the Colonial Secretary in 1895, and following the Jameson Raid, the possibility of a German involvement in the Transvaal came a little closer. The failure of the uprising had huge implications for all those involved. Rhodes was forced to resign as Prime Minister of the Cape and had to give up his position in the Chartered Company which controlled Rhodesia. Jameson was eventually tried in England and sentenced to 15 months imprisonment. In England there was outrage at what people believed was Britain's involvement and a Committee of Inquiry was set up but the British establishment closed ranks and the involvement of Chamberlain was suspected but never proved. The raid had international repercussions at a time when Britain was diplomatically isolated. She was heavily criticised by her imperial rivals France and Russia, and the Kaiser sent a telegram to Kruger congratulating him on the success with which they had dealt with the threat to their independence.
His death
Rhodes spent the first part of theAnglo-Boer War beseiged in Kimberley. The war he had wanted dragged on with the British needing 450,000 troops to defeat 35,000 Boer guerillas. By 1902 the public had turned against the war and Rhodes's perceived part in bringing it about. His health deteriorated in early 1902, and he was finding it very difficult to breathe. He was moved to Muizenburg but the sea brezees were of little help. He died on March 26, 1902, to be mourned by thousands in Cape Town and many more around the world.
Rhodes fell ill in February 1902 following a voyage back from England to attend the trial of Princess Radziwill. His condition worsened and he died on 26 March 1902.
Related Pages
