AFRICANWARSAND WHITEINVADERS
the British navy was unchallenged
and British commerce was capable of
dominating
competitors
in foreign markets.
Moreover, Southern Africa,
with its small white population
and its powerful African kingdoms, still
had few attractions
for British enterprise. Before Afrikaners began to emi-
grate from the Cape Colony the British government had rejected several
requests from Natal traders
and Cape merchants
to annex Natal.
The
initial activities of the emigrants did not alter the government's
mind.
Events in Natal did eventually lead to a change, however. Chief Faku of
the Mpondo,
threatened
by Pretorius's southern sweep, appealed through
his Wesleyan missionary
for British protection;
and the British colonial
secretary came to the conclusion
that if the emigrants
were not brought
under control, they might acquire protection
from a rival European state
and cause widespread
disorder
among the African population,
thereby
destroying
the prospect
of stability on the eastern frontier of the Cape
Colony. That strategic impulse coincided with pressures from commercial
and evangelical organizations.J?
Accordingly, in 1842 a small British force
occupied
the harbor,
and in the following year a special commissioner
exacted a submission
from members
of the Volksraad