15/08/2022
King Sekhukhune was born from King Sekoati and Mankopoli in 1814. His parents named him Matsebe before he later in life earned the name “Sekhukhune”. He led the tribe of the Bapeli tribe which originated from the Bakhatla of the Western former Transvaal. He became King upon his father’s death in September 1861, married Legoadi in 1862 and lived at a mountain, known as Thaba’ Leolo, which he fortified.
As the Bapeli paramount leader he was faced with political challenges, both inside and outside, from the Boer, the independent South African Republic (ZAR) and the British Empire, with considerable social change caused by Christian missionaries. And the faction led by Mampuru who was fighting to reclaim his throne from King Sekhukhune. Sekhukhune, like King Moshoeshoe of the Basotho people, was an illegitimate ruler who came to power by military force. As a result, his half brother, and legitimate heir, Mampuru was forced to flee from the Kingdom. As a result of lack of legitimacy, he built his power by entering into diplomatic marriages with various royal dynasties, by incorporating other societies into his empire, and by military conquest. This increased his support base and gave him legitimacy.
Under his leadership the tribe fought two main battles: first successfully in 1876 against the ZAR and their Swazi allies, then unsuccessfully against the British and Swazi in 1879 during the Sekhukhuni Wars, where he was defeated and captured at Tjate Mountains.
But the history of the Bapeli nation has been of battles and conflicts. The Swazi tribe conducted campaigns against the Bapeli, but could not take their mountain strongholds. After many battles and scatterings, Bapedi fugitives were able to regroup themselves. By 1800, Chief Thulare had established an empire with a capital, Manganeng, on the Steelpoort River and the Bapeli became a ruling caste. His death was followed by the usual succession disputes until in about 1826 Mzilikazi’s Ndebele attacked and overthrew the Pedi regime and killed a number of Thulare’s sons.
This onslaught caused the Bapedi to flee northwards with Sekwati, one of Thulare’s surviving sons. Sekwati later returned with his followers and, choosing a mountain stronghold at Phiring as his base, he became paramount chief over an accretion of chiefdoms and reunited his peoples. The Bapeli were establishing a kingdom when white expansion in southern Africa checked their independent progress.
When Hendrick Potgieter and the Voortrekkers arrived in the Marota Empire in the middle of the 19th century, Sekhukhune’s father, Sekoati (1775-1861), resisted them. In a famous battle at Phiring in 1838 Sekoati defeated the Voortrekkers by the simple tactic of establishing his stronghold on an impenetrable hill. But Phiring was insecure and so Sekoati moved his headquarters to Thaba Moseha (the fighting koppie) in the Lulu Mountains of the Eastern Transvaal from which his people were dislodged only by a series of bitter wars ending in December 1879.
By maintaining diplomatic ties with the Boers, the Swazi, and the Zulu, Sekoati established peace and prosperity. By 1852, relations had deteriorated and Hendrik Potgieter led a commando out against King Sekwati. The Boers besieged the Pedi stronghold, hoping they would run out of food and water. For several years Sekwati succumbed to the external forces for the sake of rebuilding his nation after heavy loss of life from Mzilkikazi defeat.
But they managed to maintain themselves by sending young warriors to steal through the Boer lines at night. On the twenty-fourth day, the Boers departed with the Pedi cattle. Sekoati realized the value of an abundant water supply and moved his capital to Thaba Moseha (Moseha Kop). He signed a treaty with the Boers declaring the Steelpoort River the boundary between the lands of the Bapedi and the Lydenburg Republic and allowed Alexander Merensky to begin evangelical work in his territory.
King Sekoati in 1861, his sons Mampuru and Sekhukhune both became rivals for the succession.
In 1863 Sekhukhune summoned all royal councilors, advisors and lieutenants to the head quarters. He ordered them that since his great-grand father and his father had succumbed to foreign pressure for so long, he would not do so. He announced that he is prepared to end all peace treaties his father had signed with the Boers, Zulus and Swazis and declare war on all sides. Sekhukhune ordered everyone to bow for him at once. After Mampuru and his councilors refused to bow down to him, he executed all Mampuru’s councillors and declared himself ruler. But he spared Mampuru’s life saying he should take the throne if he wants but not the military control. Mampuru swore vengeance, although his life had been spared.
Sekhukhune realized that he needed sophisticated weapons like the ones used by the Europeans; to defend his empire from the encroaching European colonization, Sekhukhune sent young men under the authority of ‘appointed’ headmen to work in white farms and diamonds mines. The money they earned in these employments was taxed and used to buy guns from the Portuguese in Delegoa Bay and cattle to increase the wealth of the Bapedi (Marota people). By 1873 the Marota empire had grown to unite all the disparate people in the area under a common Royalty.
The Bapedi nation under King Sekhukhune lived in the land between the Vaal and Limpopo rivers. They regarded this territory as their country and admitted or excluded all corners to it.
Wars of Resistance
In 1846, the Boers, claiming to have purchased the land from the Swazis, sought to expel the Bapedi tribe from the land east of the Tubatse, the so-called Steelpoort River today. They were rebuffed. In 1865, Rev. Dr. Alexander Merensky Superintendent of the Berlin Missionary Society and who had been welcomed among the Bapedi first by Sekwati and later by Sekhukhune, was expelled for activities that were deemed to be subversive of Sekhukhune’s authority and favourable to the Pretoria Boers. He took refuge in Botshabelo, near Middleburg where he established a Mission station and a school of that name. Merensky continued to play a double game, hunting with the hounds and running with the hares, until Sekhukhune disappeared from the scene in 1879 when the Boers rewarded him (Merensky) by granting him land in Maandagshoek from which he carried on his dubious activities under the cloak of religion.
Johannes Dinkoanyane, Sekhukhune’s half-brother, at first supported Merensky and became a Lutheran convert. His stay in Botshabelo was short-lived and soon he was back with his followers in Spekboom Hills, in the Tubatse Valley. He assumed a very independent demeanor, which Sekhukhune by no means discouraged. On March 7, 1876, Linkoanyane detained a wagonload of wood belonging to one Jankowitz, a Boer farmer who had trespassed on Linkoanyane’s land to cut wood. At the same time false rumours of cattle theft spread – also false rumours to the effect that Linkoanyane had burnt down Rev. Nachtigal’s German mission.
When the news reached Pretoria, an enraged President Thomas Francois Burgers decided to set out “to deal with the Sekhukhune menace” himself. Burgers quickly assembled a largest army not seeing before in the Republic. Armed with 7 pounder Krupp guns they marched to Thaba Mosega, which he reached on August 1, 1876. He was supported by African troops hoping the land under Sekhukhune would be given to them after Sekhukhune was defeated. Sekhukhune came to Linkoanyane’s rescue and, although Linkoanyane himself was killed in action, Sekhukhune inflicted a humiliating defeat on the Boers and President Burgers.
