Great Trek
Around 12,000 people took part in the Great Trek migration, which was about one-fifth of the colony's Dutch-speaking white population at the time. As a rule, members of the largely urban, relatively affluent Cape Dutch community remained. They were less likely to feel oppressed by British policies because, economically and culturally, they were not affected by them in the way the rural, farming-dependent Boers were. They were more likely to have made their peace with British rule; indeed, many of them considered themselves loyal British subjects and had a special affection for English culture. However, many Boers also chose to remain in the Cape rather than participate in the Great Trek, despite their dislike of British rule, and the Dutch Reformed Church, to which most of the Boers belonged, explicitly refused to endorse the Great Trek.