DIAMONDS. GOLD.AND BRITISHIMPERIALISM
the mining companies, swelling the ranks of the poor Whites, as well as the
poor Blacks. The arrival of railroads from the Cape colonial ports in 1892,
Delagoa Bay in 1894, and Durban
in 1895 terminated
the role of the
Afrikaner transport riders, who had originally provided a vital service to
the mining industry and the Witwatersrand population.!?
The Conquest Completed
Accelerated by the growth of the mining industries, two major political
processes transformed
Southern Africa in the last three decades of the
nineteenth century. British regiments, colonial militia, and Afrikaner com-
mandos completed the conquest of the African inhabitants, and, in a major
war, the British army conquered the Afrikaner republics.
The African societies of Southern Africa experienced intensified pres-
sures after 1870. Although they differed in many other respects, white
farmers and businesspeople,
traders and missionaries, and government
officials had a common interest in subjecting the Africans, appropriating
their land, harnessing their labor, dominating their markets, and winning
their hearts and minds. By the end of the century, they had completed the
process of conquest that had begun in the time of van Riebeeck. All the