THEWHITEINVADERS
December 1834 and were outraged in 1836, when London reversed the
postwar plans of the governor to annex more land from the Africans and
make it available for white settlement. Many former slave owners were
disappointed financially when they learned that the British government
was providing as compensation only about one-third of the assessed value
of their slaves. Moreover, claims had to be proved in London, with the
result that agents purchased the claims at a reduced rate and the owners
eventually received no more than one-fifth of their slaves' assessed value.
Many of these changes affected farmers in the western as well as the
eastern districts. Indeed, far more slaveswere held in the west than the east.
Nevertheless, although eastern farmers had used far more Khoikhoi than
slave laborers, most of them had possessed at least one slave, and they
rather than the westerners were most deeply affected by the other events.
The west was a more stable region. Its white population was more seden-
tary and more fully integrated into the market economy. Under the British,
many substantial townsmen and wine and grain farmers became involved
in the social life emanating from government house, whereas eastern Af-