Afrikaners had been doing to them. White morale collapsed. The comman-
dos disbanded, leaving Moshoeshoe the victor.
When war broke out again in 1865, the relative strengths of the contes-
tants had changed. Moshoeshoe, nearly eighty years old, was losing con-
trol over his sons, who were intriguing for the succession and indulging in
uncoordinated
raids. The Orange Free State, meanwhile, had grown in
population and had acquired an able president in J.H. Brand. This time,
the Free State commandos destroyed Sotho property so relentlessly that
Molapo, Moshoeshoe's second son, whom Moshoeshoe had placed as his
chief in the northern part of the kingdom, surrendered, and Moshoeshoe
himself signed a treaty ceding much of the kingdom. But hostilities con-
tinued. The Free State was on the verge of achieving a complete victory over
a demoralized and famished enemy when, dramatically, Sir Philip Wode-
house, governor of the Cape Colony and British high commissioner for
South Africa, annexed Lesotho.s?
Moshoeshoe had been appealing for British protection since the early
I860s, in the belief that Britain had less interest than his aggressive neigh-
bors in exploiting his people. For their part, British officials doubted the