Podcast
History of South Africa podcast
Episodes — page 6
- Episode 190 - The Birkenhead Drill 'Women and Children First’ tragedy and amaXhosa messages moving at the speed of light
Episode 190 is about the ocean, and a staggering event. The sinking of the HMS Birkenhead off Gansbaai, south of Cape Town - and event which led to the famous phrase women and…
- Episode 189 - Karl Marx at the Great Exhibition, Eyre's Great Cattle Patrol and Smith gets the boot
1851 it is, and the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, also known as the Great Exhibition or the Crystal Palace Exhibition took place in Hyde Park, London, f…
- Episode 188 - Hymns echo in the Waterkloof ravines as Khoekhoe snipers take aim at British officers
We’re into an extremely tough time in our past, 1851, and about to hear about the struggle for control of an area of the Amatolas that the Boers had named Waterkloof - better known…
- Episode 187 - The Albany Rangers and Mantsopa the soothsayer emerges amongst the BaSotho
This is episode 187 - it’s 1851. Time to take stock of what’s going on across southern Africa which as you know was in the throes of the 8th Frontier War. A significant war. After…
- Episode 186 - Cognate Epistemology, TikTok and Nkosi Sandile assaults Alice
Episode 186 it is - we’re taking a closer look at theological suppositions, ecclesiastical superstitions, magic and myth. Some housekeeping - first thanks to John for taking th…
- Episode 185 - The Kat River Rebellion and the Mistress of Southern Africa is threatened
Cape Governor Harry Smith had made his escape from Fort Cox to King Williams’ Town, and was now hoping for help in the form of 3000 Zulu warriors. The British had mucked things…
- Episode 184 - A Fort Hare rout, “Vieux d’Afrique” Somerset and a British rethink about the role of chiefs in Africa
This is episode 184 and we’re picking up our story on old year’s eve 1850. Last episode, we heard how Cape Governor Harry Smith was holed up in Fort Cox, and the amaXhosa were in c…
- Episode 183 - Maqoma lectures lecherous missionary Brown and the pendulating Hermanus Matroos
Episode 183 it is, and we’re going to take stock as we enter 1851. In war, truth is the first casualty. It’s a military maxim attributed to Aeschylus, the father of Greek trage…
- Episode 182 - The English Column’s Desperate March to Fort White
Welcome to the History of South Africa podcast with me your host, Des Latham, this is episode 182. 182 is a triangular number meaning it can be arranged in an equilateral trian…
- Episode 181 - The amaXhosa ambush Mackinnon’s column and a quick introduction to Tiyo Soga
Shots fired! We’re with the amaXhosa under Maqoma and Sandile, and the British soldiers under Lieutenanat Colonel George Mackinnon, fighting on the steep cliffs of Boma Pass. Wh…
- Episode 180 - Missionary Browns’ philanderings and the Redcoats face Christmas armageddon in the Boma Pass
Episode 180 it is then so let’s get cracking. Or crackling, which was the atmosphere in late 1850 as Xhosaland and British Kaffraria was seized by the exploits of prophet Mlanj…
- Episode 179 - A messianic prophet emerges in 1850: Mlanjeni the Wardoctor
This is episode 179 and the prophet Mlanjeni is about to emerge. His story is one of the phenomenal tales of our land, he joined an already fairly long list of colonial era fighter…
- Episode 178 - A string of forts and Captain Maclean’s amaXhosa police recruits take revenge
The mid-nineteenth Century was like the calm before the storm with the discovery of diamonds a decade away, and then the wars between the Boers and Brits, and the Brits and amaZulu…
- Episode 177 - The Missionaries position on sex and British administrators refuse to learn
We’re plunging into the developments of the 1850s now and this is episode 177. In numerology the digits 1 and 7 are significant,1 represents new beginnings and leadership, while 7…
- Episode 176 - Cape Conservatives vs Radicals in 1850, a synopsis of souls and climate dystopia
This is the period of the utilitarian liberal, not of the democrat, it’s 1850 and in the Cape, a newly ninted constitution had been drafted by the attorney general, William Porter.…
- Episode 175 - A whip around the world in 1849 and a wide-angle view of Cape Society
This is episode 175 - and we’re back in the Cape circa 1849 and thereabouts. Before we dive into the latest incidents and events, let’s take a look at what was going on globall…
- Episode 174 - The 1848 British defeat of the Boers at the Battle of Boomplaats near Bloemfontein
This is episode 174. First off, a big thank you to all the folks who’ve supported me and for sharing so many personal stories of your ancestry. Particularly Jane who is a font…
- Episode 173 - Boer women fight off the Bapedi, Mpande interferes in Swazi business and Potgieter’s last trek
This is episode 173 and we’re in what was called the north eastern transvaal, modern day Mpumalanga and Limpopo. Last we heard how Hendrick Potgieter’s Voortrekkers had camped…
- Episode 172 - The Republic of Potchefstroom, Potgieter treks into Bapedi country and Mswati faces rebellion
This is episode 172 and we’re galloping back to cover the effect of the Boers 33 Articles, approved by the Volksraad on April 9th 1844, and thus installing the little Republic of P…
- Episode 171 - Zwangendaba’s exodus from Pongola to Lake Tanganyika and the story of the Ngoni
This is episode 171 and now its time to swing around southern Africa again, because as Geoffrey Chaucer wrote in Canterbury Tales in 1395, “Time and Tide wait for no man”. It’s…
