Benjamin d ' Urban Lieutenant - General Sir Benjamin d ' Urban , GCB , KCH , KCTS , FRS ( 1777 – 25 May 1849 ) was a British general and colonial administrator , who is best known for his frontier policy when he was the Governor in the Cape Colony ( now in South Africa ) . Early career . D ' Urban was born in Halesworth , and joined the British Army in 1793 , enlisting as a cornet in the Queen ' s Bays at the age of sixteen . He made rapid progress in the Army and distinguished himself in the Peninsular War . Assigned to the Portuguese army , he was quartermaster general and chief - of - staff to William Carr Beresford , 1st Viscount Beresford . He served in all the principal sieges and battles , never asked to go on leave and was laden with honors including Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath , Knight Commander of the Royal Guelphic Order and Commander of the Portuguese Order of the Tower and Sword . He received the Army Gold Cross and five clasps for the battles of Busaco , Albuera , Badajoz , Salamanca , Vitoria , the Pyrenees , Nivelle , the Nive , and Toulouse . Brigadier General d ' Urban was given command of a Portuguese cavalry brigade consisting of the 1st , 11th and 12th Dragoons . At the Battle of Salamanca on 22 July 1812 , d ' Urban ' s troopers performed well while assisting the 3rd Division ' s attack on the French left flank . During the Siege of Burgos campaign , d ' Urban ' s horsemen were routed in an action at Majadahonda ( Las Rozas ) on 11 August , losing 108 men . His brigade was present but not engaged at the Battle of Vitoria in June 1813 . Foreign service . In 1819 , d ' Urban was made Governor of Antigua . In 1824 he became lieutenant governor of Demerara - Essequibo , where in 1831 he carried out the amalgamation with Berbice to form British Guiana , of which he was its first governor ( 1831 – 33 ) . Three years later he was appointed to the post of Governor of the Cape Colony . In January 1834 in South Africa d ' Urban took office as governor and commander in chief of the Cape Colony . His administration was complicated by the exodus of Dutch farmers to the far north and east ( known as the Great Trek ) and the outbreak of the Cape Frontier Wars of ( 1834 – 1835 ) created by incursions of Bantu - speaking Xhosa peoples . He drove back the invaders and annexed the territory between the Keiskamma and Great Kei ( Groot - Kei ) rivers . He was in office when Britain abolished slavery , established municipal and legislative councils , occupied Natal , now KwaZulu - Natal , and named it as a new colony for the British Empire . To commemorate this the name of the principal port was changed in 1835 from Port Natal to Durban . Trouble . Although d ' Urban was popular with the white colonists , his treatment of the Africans disturbed John Philip who went to England to give evidence before a parliamentary committee and aroused public opinion against d ' Urban . The public outcry influenced Charles Grant , 1st Baron Glenelg , the colonial secretary . In a despatch dated 1 May 1837 , Glenelg dismissed D ' Urban , who remained governor until the arrival of his successor in January 1838 and continued in his military capacity in South Africa until 1846 . Later career . In 1842 d ' Urban declined a high military appointment in British Raj India offered him by Sir Robert Peel . In January 1847 he accepted appointment as commander of Her Majesty ' s forces in British North America . There were border disputes and a threat of invasion by the United States into Canada near Montreal . Early in 1847 he set up his headquarters in Montreal . He remained in Montreal until his death in 1849 . He was originally buried at the Papineau military cemetery in Montreal . However , the graves had to be moved because they were in the way of building a new access ramp to the Jacques - Cartier bridge . Sir Benjamin d ' Urban ' s remains now rest at the Last Post Fund National Field of Honour , a military cemetery owned by the Last Post Fund in Pointe - Claire where there is an obelisk to his memory . On the obelisk , there are four plaques : a memorial plaque from the officers of the British Army serving in Canada , a second memorial plaque donated by the City of Durban , one explaining the exhumation and reburial by the Last Post Fund , and one explaining the reburial of the other remains in D ' Urban Circle .