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Just a quick thank you to AJL, as well as Jacque and Nkosinathi for your kind comments and emails - this series is nothing without my wonderful audience.
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\nGangans \u2014 which is Khoesan for thank you.
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\nVoortrekker leader Piet Retief knew that he had to negotiate for any land in Natal with the Zulu king Dingane. So with that in mind, he left his family on the top of the escarpment as you heard at the end of last episode, taking four of the wagons and a small party of 15 men over the side of the Drakensburg by way of what we now call Retief\u2019s Pass in October 1837.
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\nHe was still hopeful that Gerrit Maritz would join up with him so he loitered for a while at the base of the Drakensburg. Realising after almost two weeks that it was a futile to continue to delay, he turned for Port Natal, or what was now called Durban.
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\nThe first negotiations he needed to conduct were not with the AmaZulu, but the fractious and rebellious Durban traders. If any land was going to be seconded to the Voortrekkers, he needed to clear any plans with the semi-desperate crew living around the fledgling port.
\nIt took 90 hours to ride from the base of the Drakensburg mountains to Durban - and the exhausted group of trekkers rode into the harbour town on 20th October. Like other visitors, Retief was shocked to note that there were \u201c53 Englishmen, no white women, only black ones\u2026\u201d
\nDingane was also acutely aware that in military matters, he was in a somewhat weakened position. All the reports he\u2019d heard about the British and how they\u2019d defeated the amaXhosa with their firearms and horses had shaken the Zulu king. He\u2019d also heard about the attack on Mosega, and was about to hear about how Potgieter and Uys had driven Mzilikazi from eGabeni forever.
\nBack in Cape Town, British officials were growing concerned. They heard about the amaNdebele\u2019s fate, and how the Voortrekkers were now heading to Natal. Instead of stabilising things, the Boers appeared to be causing one war after another.
\nShortly afterwards the Boers saddled up for a much more difficult mission - to approach Dingane to try and get the king\u2019s permission to settle within his land. They couldn\u2019t just ride in, first they sent a message to one of the most important characters of this part of our story, a missionary called Reverend Francis Owen of the Church Missionary Society.
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\nImportant because he was going to be an eyewitness to brutal events.
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\nOwen and his wife were not alone at emGungundlovu.
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\nHis sister was there too, and an interpreter, an artisan builder and mechanic Richard Hulley, Hulley\u2019s wife and three children as well as Jane Williams, his Khoesan servant. They\u2019d rolled up to Dingane\u2019s great place in the second week of October 1837.
\nThis less than a month before Retief was going to show up.