Native Merchants

The story of black businesses in South Africa remains underwritten. This book profiles the biographies of black people and communities who demonstrated impressive entrepreneurial and trading abilities both in the pre-colonial period and during the most difficult times of colonialism and apartheid.

The wealth built in Kimberley set many white people on a trajectory to prosperity. It was a springboard that created a base for further investments and enrichment when more gold deposits were found on the Witwatersrand. The glittering stones buried under the soil created individuals with long-lasting legacies. After 150 years, their surnames are deeply engraved in South Africa, appearing in names of universities, scholarships, towns and a collection of artifacts related to literature, arts and culture. Unfortunately, the generations of those ancestors deprived of mining licenses more than a century ago, had not much to show their labour.

In the conferences that he had with his people about his experiences in London, the Khoe learned that in England brass was but a cheap commodity. Xhore’s deliberations with his people led the Khoe to some key resolutions that would affect trade with the English. An impromptu decision was taken to start increasing the prices for cattle and sheep for barter. The Khoe were no longer interested in smaller prices of copper. ‘They demanded unreasonably for their cattle, which we thought proceeded from Corie (Xhore) who had been in England and, as we supposed, acquainted them with our little esteem of iron and copper, asking pieces as bis as their cloaks…’, John Milward, an English merchant who arrived at the Cape, noted.

An event that accelerated plans by the VOC to build a refreshment station in Cape Town was the shipwreck of the company vessel Haarlem at Table Bay in the afternoon of March 25 1647. Some 62 men who remained to salvage the cargo from the crash built a small fortress and interacted with the Khoe, establishing bartering relations, including learning each other’s languages.

Gogosoa reportedly had fifteen huts and at least 1600 cattle and sheep. He had shown these to some Dutch men sent by the commander to trade copper wire in exchange for a calf and a cow. Autshumato served as interpreter in the trade. Later, the Dutch found it difficult to trade their copper and tobacco with Gogosoa, blaming the impasse on Autshumato. Due to this deadlock, there were even thoughts of sending Autshumato and his family to Robben Island, as the Dutch thought this would unlock bartering with Gogosoa people. Subsequent trades became even more difficult, with Autshumato accused of advising Saldanha Khoe to demand more copper for livestock. At the end of November, in Autshumato’s absence, the company bought nineteen sheep from the Khoe from Saldanha in exchange for copper wire and tobacco. A sheep cost about six to seven stuivers.

Van Riebeeck would comment that ‘these rogues are not at all keen to part with their cattle and sheep, although they have an abundance of fine stock’. To add to their diet, the Dutch experimented with the fertile soil and started planting wheat and growing watermelons and other vegetables, in addition to the sheep bred on Robben Island.

One of the overtly under-told stories of the Cape of Good Hope is that of descendants of manumitted slaves who despite their roots also participated in slavery. Simon van der Stel himself came into the world from the womb of a women with a history of enslavement. Van der Stel’s mother was Marie Lievens, a daughter of Monyca da Costa from the Coromandel Coast of South India and Heyndrick Levensz, a Dutch captain in Batavia. Da Costa is associated with a group of enslaved women who were bought by the VOC in South India.

One of the fascinating stories of formerly enslaved people who started trading on their own and building wealth is that of a woman called Angela from Bengal in India. Angela was also known as Angila, Ansiela, Ansla and Hansela. She had arrived in the Cape together with her husband and three children, shipped to the Cape by a Batavian landdrost, Pieter Kemp. He then sold the family to Van Riebeeck. In 1662, Van Riebeeck sold Angela to Abraham Gabbema was promoted to a post in Batavia. He then liberated Angela and her three children. No mention is made of her husband from India. After she was freed, Angela was given land in Heerestraat with a title deed signed by one Cornelis van Quaelbergen. Part of the conditions for liberation included understanding and speaking the Dutch language, being a confirmed Christian and a member of a church.

In 1671 and 1685, there were moves to ensure that enslaved children with European fathers should be released from slavery. In 1671, three-quarters of the children born to the company enslaved women had European fathers. In 1685, a census was carried out and it revealed that out of the 92 enslaved children under the age of twelve years, 44 had European fathers.

Before the turn of the eighteenth century, the status of a Free Black in society was often influenced by the abilities of the individual rather than purely the colour of their skin. There is the story of the two formerly enslaved men, Anthony and Manuel from Angola, who had a white worker as their employee. Despite the upward mobility of a select few Free Black people, the vast majority were not in the same position. By the eighteenth century, poverty was a common feature for Free Blacks.

Louis from Bengal had arrived at the cape from present-day Bangladesh as a teenager. He is estimated to have been about nineteen or twenty years old when he had saved enough money to buy himself out of slavery. The piece of land he received in 1675 at Table Valley is now located in the Gardens Shopping Centre precinct. This specific garden spot was apparently given to him so that he could produce fruits and vegetables. In 1676, Louis was granted an erf in town, in Hout Street, at what is now the corner of the St George’s Mall. On Hout Street, Louis from Bengal bult a house with living accommodation which he let. He had enslaved people staying on that property too.

The most fascinating black female entrepreneur in the early colonial era in the Cape was arguably Maria Everts, known as ‘Swarte Maria’. She was the daughter of an enslaved couple from Guinea, Evert and Hoena (Anna). Born in 1662, Maria grew up enslaved and in her life rose to become enormously wealthy. Among her assets was the farm that became what is now known as the affluent Camps Bay in Cape Town. Maria Everts also owned De Mosselbank farm in Klipheuwel, Kalwervlei in Darling, and grazing and hunting rights in the Sonquasfonteyn field and in the Drooge Valley next to Groen Cloof.

By 1835, when the city of Port Elizabeth handled £80 000 of export produce, it is estimated that about £50 000 to £60 000 of the goods were obtained by Xhosa people.

Bundy’s research notes that the suppression of the black commercial agriculture went beyond the raid on the land. Custom duties were stacked against black farmers, thus reducing the margin on their earnings. Purchase of land by black people was also made to be very difficult. But did these black commercial farmers have names and who were they? The rest of this chapter selects some individuals to provide visibility to those who prospered during changing socio-economic circumstances.

Black people could buy land at £1 an acre and they could buy farms from white farmers. Many Africans had adopted the plough and advanced methods of cultivation that missionaries wanted to instil. Tini Maqoma, the son of the Xhosa warrior Maqoma, outperformed his white neighbours in cultivation. He produced maize and grain that was in contrast to the ‘white man’s weed’. In 1876, one of the sons of Chief Stokwe bought a farm containing Fort Willshire for £1 800 as part of a strategy to get back the land.

Regardless of how liquid a black man was, the discriminatory laws made it difficult for him to purchase land freely. A laborious bureaucratic process had to be followed and permission sought, as natives were not allowed freely to acquire property in certain areas. This was due to the segregationist Native Trust and Land Act of 1936. In crude terms what this meant was that natives had to get the permission of a white man on how to spend their hard-owned pounds. Wealth did not equate to freedom.

In the late 1860s, many Africans in Natal were in a position to produce agricultural surplus for trade and to withhold their labour.

The legislation discouraged the black entrepreneurs from pursuing their own business interests. Instead, it focused on meeting the labour needs of white farmers and the mining industry. Consequently, white farmers had less competition in the market as their former competitors’ appetite to pursue business has been thwarted. The dispossession through the Native Land Act not only converted the African industrialists into a proletariat, but also shifted the focus of the black entrepreneurs towards activities of protest and resistance. A great deal of energy that could have been used for growing black industry was now channelled towards the struggle against domination and discrimination.