The British Invented Concentration Camps
By: Louis Lonsdale
Tags: Britain, History, South Africa, Africa, England

Great Britain’s conquest over the New World was a bloody endeavor, with many countries succumbing to British occupation. Africa was no stranger to the English invaders, most notably in northern Africa where countries like Egypt had British troops stationed for quite some time.

The southern regions of Africa were also occupied by Great Britain, with the former Dutch Cape Colony taking the southern tip of the continent. However, not everyone was happy with the English rule. Two countries bordering the Cape Colony were openly hostile to the British. The South African Republic (Transvaal) and the Orange Free State had both fought the British and won in the First Boer War.

Eighteen years later, however, the Orange Free State and the South African Republic would cross swords with Great Britain again, due to the discovery of gold.

The Second Boer War

Sketch of the failed raid. Courtesy of Wikipedia.org

Diamonds and gold were discovered in the South African Republic and the Orange Free States, and upon hearing of the discovery, the United Kingdom swiftly moved to take the newly established gold mine. The gold mine was located where present-day Johannesburg stands, with the city being rapidly set up by mainly British prospectors during the gold rush. The hope was that upon the arrival of the English army, the British people would rise up and help the soldiers take hold of the gold mine and all surrounding territories; this plan became known as the Jameson Raid. The Transvaal was aware of the British’s plans, however, and had Boer troops encircle the English 600-man column. After a small skirmish, the British men surrendered, having taken sixty-five casualties.

The English had superior numbers, and while they had taken most of the Transvaal and Orange Free State’s land, the Boer troops would still terrorize the British soldiers in a guerilla war. The guerilla war was fierce, and the English needed a way to contain the Boer guerillas. To solve this problem, the officer in charge, Herbert Kitchener, started a ‘Scorched-earth’ campaign to limit both the supply and movement of the Boer troops.

The British forces systematically burned crops, destroyed farms, homesteads, and even raped Boer women and children as young as ten. The raping of women and children was an atrocity. The cruel treatment in the occupied territory was a common occurrence with the British troops doing anything they could to cut the Boer supply lines, oftentimes harming civilians.

However, the Scorched-earth campaign was not the end of the British atrocities in South Africa. The British created the first-ever concentration camps. These camps were set up originally as refugee camps for civilians forced to flee due to the conflict. However, after Kitchener started the Scorched-earth campaign, refugees flocked to the camps in large numbers. In attempts to curb the Boer troops' ability to resupply, Kitchener had systematically forcefully rehomed thousands of civilians into the camps, even going so far as to almost completely depopulate some areas.

The conditions inside of the concentration camps were horrific. Disease and starvation killed thousands of innocent civilians inside the camps, with the British neglecting those trapped inside of them. The lack of food, poor sanitation, and overcrowding lead to malnutrition and multiple outbreaks of diseases; measles and dysentery struck the children worst of all. Around 27,000 women and children died in the British concentration camps.

A malnourished Boer child photographed by Emily Hobhouse. Courtesy of Wikipedia.org

The summary

The British forces had won the war and on the 31st of May 1902. The British Empire added the territories of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State to the Cape Colony’s land as a result of the Treaty of Vereeniging. The English now controlled the gold mines. With that gold funding the modernization of the South African Cape Colony.

However, the war came at a great cost, and not just economically: thousands of innocent human lives were savagely put to an end in the conquest for gold and land. The story of the British concentration camps is rarely told, and at often times forgotten like many other war crimes committed by the first world powers. The sun never sets on the British Empire, and for the expansion of it, no human life is too dear.