THEY LEFT DURBAN on April 16, 1893. The country soon steepened. They had to walk and only made fifteen miles per day, but expected that to rise to twenty once the terrain flattened. At night they made fires from dried manure collected from the treeless landscape, and went to bed at dark. They began trekking each morning at seven, outspanned at eleven for three hours during the heat, then trekked again from two to seven. Six-year-old Roderick reveled in all of it—the burros, the anthills taller than he, the strange rocks and birds, the probability of lions and other marvelous wild creatures just beyond their campfire. Supper was sometimes cold, sometimes cooked—boiled potatoes, bacon and pan-fried bread, sometimes roasted ears of corn.
They spent the evenings planning and dreaming about the life ahead. They weren’t clear about the British South Africa Company’s rules for homesteading, but rumor said they could get 3,000 acres. After years in the arid Southwest, they pictured a green expanse with a stream that could be dammed for a pond. They didn’t know much about the climate or landscape at Fort Salisbury, or whether it was in the fever belt. They weren’t even sure of the settlement’s exact location, but it was the capital of their imaginations.
The landscape en route to Johannesburg enamored them. “And only a handful of blacks to enjoy it all,” wrote Burnham to his mother, adding that it was “a young paradise.” Blanche wrote home, “In fact we are regaining our youth.” The farther Burnham traveled into Africa, the more certain he became. “So there is no question of my ever returning from Africa farther than to Paris or Rome,” he wrote.
They occasionally passed the isolated farms of Boers, with houses made of stone and iron. The stolid farmers looked amused or askance at the Burnhams’ light wagon, and often warned them to turn back.
After about a month, they reached the boomtown of Johannesburg and camped outside it. Only seven years old, Johannesburg already had 40,000 inhabitants, plus thousands of black laborers on the gold reefs. The city swarmed with the usual collection of miners, gamblers, liquor merchants, speculators, prostitutes, and ruffians. The Burnhams marveled at its raucous energy and the inescapable thunder of giant stamp mills crushing ore.
“I have known nothing like this place in all the world,” wrote Burnham. “Boer government, English capital, and black labour by hundreds of thousands under the management of American engineers, using their superior methods of mining, formed a combination that had never before been brought about.” It was a volatile combination awaiting a spark. Burnham turned thirty-two there, “the happiest [birthday] of his life,” wrote Blanche.
They reprovisioned and resumed the trek on May 26. They expected to cover the 800 miles to Fort Salisbury in two months. “How I hope that we shall like it,” wrote Blanche, “. . . and if we are only successful you shall all come and we will end our days in the new Utopia in the heart of Africa.”
In Pretoria they bought two more burros, a sawed-off shotgun, “and pounds of lead to keep the lions from eating up Roderick or the stock.” They saw thousands of natives walking south to work in the gold mines of the Rand and the diamond mines of De Beers. A few days later they reached the bush veldt and could make fires with wood instead of dried manure. From here on Burnham’s gun provided meat, at first mostly birds such as pigeons, partridges, and guinea fowl. He couldn’t bear to shoot monkeys because they looked too human. All three Burnhams had enormous appetites from the rigors of walking. Blanche’s letters described their recent menus: for breakfast, fried quail, fried pan bread, and coffee; for supper, birds filled with a mint-sage stuffing then roasted in the reflector oven, or pot pies (“Had one a few days ago made with a parrot, pigeon, and plover”). For dessert, pie, pudding, or cake. They missed California’s fruits, especially grapes, peaches, and apricots.
Burnham assessed the country with his prospector’s eye and saw signs of minerals everywhere, plus other opportunities of all kinds. He noticed that lumber was expensive, so he asked his uncle to send a catalogue of portable sawmills; owning one would bring a small fortune.
In mid-June they hooked up with twelve Boer wagons for mutual protection on “the lion road” that threaded the thorn and fever-tree country to the Limpopo (Crocodile) River. The men carried guns at the ready to shoot any lions or hyenas that attacked the livestock. Roderick was confined to the buckboard. At dusk they laagered the wagons in a protective circle and kept the fires burning all night.
Burnham studied the Boers, as he always did a new people. He admired them for daring to plunge into wild Africa and for proving that whites could thrive there. He noted their blind hatred of blacks, but approved their refusal to mix their blood with the natives’, a mistake made by the Portuguese. Fiercely independent, the Boers resented any government interference and were “lovers of freedom and haters of British oppression and kings in general.” Every Boer carved his own little cattle kingdom out of the wilderness—two or three thousand acres of high veldt for summer residence, six or seven thousand acres of bush veldt for winter. In between, he yoked a great team of oxen to a heavy house-wagon and took his family on a three-month hunting trek. In many ways the Boers’ pioneer way of life reminded him of old days in the West, and strongly appealed to him. He sympathized with the Boers’ suspicion of newcomers who threatened to spoil the frontier with towns, mines, railroads, rules.
On the other hand, Burnham saw that cheap black labor had made the Boers lazy. They were also illiterate, sluggish, and hidebound. “The English are slow enough especially the colonial English,” he wrote to his uncle, “but they are lightning compared to the Boers.” He foresaw that the Boers’ ponderous refusal to budge would doom them. They would be washed away by the incoming tide of prospectors and go-getters. Like the Spanish and the Indians in America, the Boers had made a fatal mistake: they were “sleeping on the greatest gold field in the world and allowing to lay idle splendid veins of coal and other minerals.” People sleeping in the path of progress, or doing anything else there, whether they were white, black, or red, were destined to get flattened. As Kipling wrote of the Boers in “The Voortrekker,”
He shall desire loneliness and his desire shall bring,
Hard on his heels, a thousand wheels, a People and a King.
To illustrate the Boer’s “dread of innovation,” Burnham mentioned a settler who told him to forget about crossing the Limpopo River for another two months. Puzzled, Burnham asked why. Because it can’t be forded until then, said the Boer. Then I’ll swim it, said Burnham. But what about your wagon? asked the Boer. I’ll make a raft, said Burnham. But there’s no timber within fifteen miles, said the Boer. So I’ll go get it with a wagon, said Burnham, and then I’ll turn my wagon’s sideboard into a sweep and use my empty water casks as buoys for the running gears, “and cross I would.”
By the end of June they were deep into the wilds and wouldn’t pass another white man’s home or a “winkle” (store) for 250 miles. Blanche complained that she constantly had to darn her dress because of thorn bushes. The natives no longer wore colorful miscellanies of cast-off white clothing; instead, wrote Burnham, “a string of beads and a patch of leather the size of an old stove lid (and that is not size enough) suffice for most of them.”
The Limpopo River marked the boundary of Matabeleland and Mashonaland. The wagon train reached it in early July. Burnham shot into the water a few times, scattering the crocodiles so the burros could swim across. Everything and everyone else floated over to Lobengula’s kingdom.
The wagon train paused for ten days to rest and provision itself with fresh meat. Burnham got his first close look at Boer marksmanship, which reflected much about them. Like the old buffalo hunters of the West, they excelled at deliberate long-range shooting. Some Boers, firing a rifle from a standing position without supports, could hit a hen’s egg three times out of five at 100 yards, which Burnham considered a marvelous feat. They thought nothing of hitting standing prey at 200 yards, a skill that would devastate the British in the Boer War. Burnham, by contrast, had trained himself to be an expert at snap shooting, whether mounted or on foot, advantageous for hitting running prey in brushy country. In ten days of hunting he brought in a bigger bag than the party’s two best Boer hunters combined, and could have done better with his old Winchester repeater; he was now using the heavier nine-pound Martini–Henry common in Africa.
They were less than 400 miles from Fort Salisbury, at the edge of what they hoped would be their promised land and final home, in the bosom of Rhodes’s British South Africa Company. Burnham deeply admired Rhodes but had no illusions about his machinations. In a letter to his uncle, he astutely summarized the politics that Rhodes had exploited. The stakes were as vast as the area above the Limpopo River, now covered by Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique—a territory bigger than California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado combined.
The southern portion belonged to Chief Lobengula of the Ndebeles. The Boers claimed part of it. So did Portugal, from its fragile perch on the Indian Ocean. Germany, entrenched directly west on the Atlantic coast, clearly had cross-continental ambitions. Britain didn’t want any of them to have the area, but also didn’t want the expense of possessing it. “In the struggle between financial economy and political greed,” wrote Burnham, “the brilliant mind of Cecil Rhodes saw a great opportunity to satisfy British land hunger and still allow them to hold tight the purse strings of the imperial treasure.”
To finesse all of the players, Rhodes envisioned a multi-part plan. First he finagled a royal concession for the British South Africa Company that covered part of the territory, “another of those liberal concessions which England often makes of other peoples’ possessions to her own titled citizens,” noted Burnham. This arrangement put the Boers and the Europeans on notice about Britain’s imperial aims while leaving the financial risk and administrative responsibility to the BSAC. In return the BSAC got nearly free rein and the protection implied by the British flag.
Rhodes’s second move was to make a deal with Chief Lobengula for mineral rights, which allowed peaceful entry into Mashonaland, the eastern part of Lobengula’s kingdom. Burnham understood that Lobengula’s days were numbered: “he inside of 2 years will have to do as thousands of other fierce chiefs have done, come under the Union Jack and the empire of the Matabele will be open for all white races.” Meanwhile, by populating the concession with adventurous prospectors and settlers who had been drawn by generous offers of land and mineral rights, Rhodes not only avoided the expense of a large police force, he ensured that Britain would have to intercede to protect its citizens in the event of aggression by Lobengula, the Boers, or any other colonial power. “One can not but admire Rhodes,” wrote Burnham, “yet [it] feels a little hostile to be under the government of what is practically a British syndicate.”
The immediate hostilities, however, came from another quarter. On July 24, as the trekkers headed north, they met wagons coming from Fort Victoria, less than 100 miles ahead. They carried disturbing news. Lobengula’s warriors had entered the settlement and, in front of the shocked settlers, had murdered 200 defenseless Shonas, including women and children, mutilating some by cutting off tongues and other body parts. A police force from Victoria had followed the Ndebeles and killed thirty of them. War seemed certain. Since Lobengula reportedly had 80,000 warriors (a gross exaggeration) to send against the concession’s population of 3,000, some settlers were clearing out. A number of wagons from the Burnhams’ group turned back.
The Burnhams never considered it. They had come too far. Burnham wrote a will and sent it to his uncle. He relished the prospect of war. “We are having exciting times,” he wrote to his mother, “and I enjoy it.” Blanche made cartridge belts for herself and Roderick to carry. Because of her familiarity with firearms, she wrote, “They count me as a man if any trouble comes, and it makes me quite proud.”
The scraps of news brought by the retreating settlers were the upshot of a knotty situation. Almost immediately after making the mineral deal with the BSAC, Lobengula had developed seller’s remorse. He tried to back out in letters to Queen Victoria and other British officials, which were ignored, yet he also accepted the BSAC’s monthly stipend, rifles, and ammunition. Lobengula, a regal man who stood six feet tall and weighed 300 pounds, received visitors on his throne of elephant tusks and lion skins. By all accounts he was intelligent and open to negotiation with whites. His tragedy was to understand his impossible quandary, caught between the white colonials and the traditions of his own people.
The Ndebeles were an offshoot of the mighty Zulu tribe that had fiercely resisted Boers and Brits in South Africa earlier in the century. After those wars the Ndebeles had spread north, easily conquering the Shonas, Karangas, and Makalagas, who became their subjects. Like the Apaches, the Ndebeles had a warrior culture. Unlike the Apaches, they also had a military structure. It was organized around indunas (commander-chiefs) and their troops, who lived in stockaded regimental towns (kraals) around Matabeleland. Lobengula’s army totaled about 20,000 warriors. Males trained rigorously for combat and liked to keep their spears wet with blood. To satisfy that desire and to accrue wealth, the Ndebeles went raiding and also collected tribute from subservient tribes. They did not have the disposition to accept trespassers or insubordinates of any color.
Lobengula understood that white trespassers were inevitable, and tried to control both them and his warriors. In Lobengula’s view, he had given the BSAC only a license to dig mines, and only in Mashonaland. He believed he retained his ownership of the territory as well as his authority over the Shona people who lived there and tended his royal herds. If the Shonas disobeyed or refused to send tribute or stole his cattle, he regularly exercised his kingly right to punish them. His justice was not gentle. He unleashed his warriors, who wet their spears.
The white settlers didn’t act like renters. They often referred to a boundary line between Matabeleland and Mashonaland, as if Lobengula didn’t own it all. Nor did they limit themselves to digging mines. They built permanent towns and strung telegraph wires. They set up farms as if they owned the land. They hired Shonas as their workers.
Some Shonas began to believe that the whites would protect them from the Ndebeles’ depredations. A few Shonas dared to stop sending tribute or to presume that they owned the royal cattle in their care. When Lobengula sent warriors to burn their kraals and kill them, or to bring them to his capital of Bulawayo for skinning alive, the whites acted as if the Ndebeles were the trespassers in their own kingdom. The warriors chafed at this arrogance.
In late June of 1893 Lobengula sent courteous messages to the leaders in Fort Salisbury and Fort Victoria informing them that he was sending an impi (regiment) to punish Shona cattle thieves near Fort Victoria. The warriors would not harm whites, said Lobengula, but he also reminded them that this matter was none of their business, and if the thieves sought refuge, they must be turned over.
News of the impi traveled before it. Frightened Shonas began crowding into Fort Victoria, hoping for protection. On July 9, before Lobengula’s explanatory letter arrived, the Ndebele warriors entered the town, rattling their long shields and shaking their spears. The killing began. The warriors didn’t touch the horrified whites. Eventually the impi withdrew.
In the following days, warriors burned nearby kraals and granaries, seizing cattle and killing Shonas. A Commission of Inquiry later determined that about 400 Shona men, women, and children had been massacred and often mutilated. Some of the cattle and property belonged to whites.
On July 17 the BSAC’s administrator for Mashonaland reached Victoria from Salisbury. This was Dr. Leander Starr Jameson, Rhodes’s most trusted associate. Doctor Jim, as he was called, found Victoria in uproar. Settlers from the region, including ninety women and children, had come to the fort for security. They were frightened and angry. Lobengula had kept the peace with whites, as promised, but his warriors were terrifying the region, and who knew when the spears would be turned on the settlers? Further, whenever the Ndebeles raided, the Shonas disappeared into the area’s rocky kopjes (hills), leaving the settlers without laborers. They wanted retaliation and they wanted things resolved. Some threatened to leave.
Lobengula still preferred peace, because he knew it delayed the inevitable. Rhodes also preferred peace, because a war now would be financially inconvenient—the BSAC’s coffers were empty. On the other hand, he needed to protect the settlers, and he had always intended to annex Matabeleland eventually. Though the timing wasn’t perfect, this was an opportunity, and he rarely let those slip by. He instructed Jameson to use his judgment, but “if you do strike, strike hard.” That suited Jameson’s impetuous temperament.
On July 18 Jameson and fifty Ndebele commanders held an indaba, or conference, at the gates of the fort. Jameson gave them an ultimatum: start retreating toward the border of Matabeleland, thirty miles away, within one hour. Jameson waited two hours, then sent out Captain Lendy and fifty men, with instructions to drive the Ndebeles toward the border and, if they resisted or attacked, to shoot them. When Lendy caught up to the Ndebeles, they had barely moved and were burning Shona kraals. Lendy later reported to Jameson that the Ndebeles had fired first, but a subsequent investigation made clear that Lendy simply ordered his men to attack. They killed somewhere between ten and thirty warriors. The Ndebeles didn’t fight back because their king had commanded them not to harm whites, and they knew how he dealt with disobedience.
Lobengula wrote outraged letters of protest to Jameson and British officials. In reply, Jameson asked for compensation for the settlers’ property losses. Lobengula retorted that he must first recover his Shona slaves and cattle. He also expressed bafflement. What had he done wrong? His warriors had not harmed any whites. Why were the whites protecting slaves who belonged to him and stole from him? Lobengula didn’t want war, but his wiles could no longer slow the momentum of events.
This was where matters stood on August 7 as the Burnhams, after four months of trekking, reached the gates of Fort Victoria.
Victoria was crowded. War hadn’t been declared, but the place was wound tight with the expectation of it. A woman there later wrote about the Burnhams’ arrival:
We had been in Victoria only two days, when I was amazed at a peculiar equipage that came ambling into the town, drawn by mules. When the dust subsided, somebody told me that it was a real American buckboard, and that the driver was Frederick Burnham, the famous American Indian scout . . . It seemed incredible that Major Burnham, his wife and his little seven year old son could have made the trip across the veldt, through forests and over flooded rivers in so flimsy appearing a conveyance,—but there they were. They were a remarkable trio, the first American family I had known,—Major Burnham, with his strong, handsome tanned face, his alert gaze, and his quick, noiseless movements, reminded me of a leopard;—his wife was young, and very attractive, the most astonishingly practical person I had ever met. I could scarcely believe my eyes when in the midst of all the excitement and confusion, she insisted that Frederick unpack her sewing machine because she needed a new dress, and the boy simply had to have some shirts,—he had grown so fast that his arms were positively sticking out of his old ones. Thinking of the Kimberley women, and those I had known in Jo’burg, I suspected at first that she was posing, but her husband took her demands seriously enough to delay his own urgent business, and in a few minutes she was serenely whirring away on lengths of gingham and denim, quite oblivious of the circle of black faces pressing close to witness the new “magic.”
The fort offered no shade, no provisions, no feed for animals, so after two days the Burnhams headed east to find forage. They ended up camped at the ruins of Great Zimbabwe, a magnificent ancient citadel of labyrinthine stone walls and immense boulders that sprawls across 1,700 acres on a commanding hilltop. Europeans first heard of Great Zimbabwe when the German explorer Karl Mauch saw it in 1871. Mauch had been searching for the lost biblical city of Ophir, the supposed location of Solomon’s mines, and he believed he had found it at Great Zimbabwe. He also believed it could not have been built by black Africans. In 1891 Rhodes financed a thorough investigation of the ruins by the archeologist James Theodore Bent (in a sense Bent was the first Rhodes Scholar, though Rhodes didn’t establish the Oxford scholarships that carry his name until 1902). In The Ruined Cities of Mashonaland (1892), Bent speculated that the complex had been built by Phoenicians, a racial assumption typical of the era. (The complex was constructed from the eleventh century to the fourteenth century by ancestors of the Shona people who still populate Mashonaland.)
In his youth Burnham had been fascinated by the cliff dwellings in Arizona and New Mexico. At Great Zimbabwe he tried to imagine the people who had built such an astonishing structure entirely without mortar. Like his peers, he could not imagine them as black. Burnham knew that Great Zimbabwe had been a center for gold, and since a little stream ran through it, he tried his luck. In a few hours he panned out more than a hundred small, ancient gold beads and trinkets, all twenty-four-carat. He gave some to Blanche and sent a few to his mother. The beads affirmed his belief that this was a land of gold and treasure.
It would have to be, based on recent news from home. Soon after the Burnhams left for Africa, financial bubbles started popping all over the United States. The causes were bad high-risk loans to overextended railroad companies and other speculative ventures, a credit crunch, and a liquidity crisis caused by a run on gold. People rushed to withdraw money from banks, worsening the panic. Several railroads collapsed and hundreds of banks failed. Thousands of companies and farms went under. The unemployment rate spiked, as did hunger and homelessness. There were food riots. In New York City, the anarchist Emma Goldman was arrested for inciting a crowd by urging them to go to the “palaces of the rich” and demand work. If the rich wouldn’t give work, she said, then demand bread, and if they wouldn’t give bread, then take it. The Panic of 1893 was the worst financial disaster in U.S. history to date.
The Burnhams, living in a native hut outside Fort Victoria and expecting war at any moment, got word that their savings were gone. They still owned some property, but values were depressed and loans impossible. “Fearing things have gone wrong and my luck has changed,” wrote Burnham to his uncle in September, “I shall take military service with the Chartered Co. and go into war.”