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From: "sharon marshall" <>
Subject: Re: [ZA] 1820 Settler Questions
Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 21:19:09 +0200
References: <005501c4bf8d$c128ff80$c84827c4@chrish> <003701c4c0b5$123fc840$2300a8c0@mshome.net>


Hi Brian,

Again from Nash:
It doesn't say anything about how it was advertised...but on selection: "The CD confined most of its dealings to the heads of parties only, and did not concern itself with service contracts, articles of agreemnet or other internal arrangements made between the settlers themselves. The actual selection of parties was based in almost every case on the recommendation of influential friends or patrons of the directors. In an age when influence frequently counted more than ability, and patronage was the key to entry and promotion in most professions, it was to be expected that the choice of emigrants would depend on whom they knew or were known to. (Does anyone know if there is there any evidence of people/parties who applied but were never considered - where/what was the cut-off point?)
Thomas Willson's application was accepted in error when he was confused with another man of the same name who had been influentially recommended; the CD suffered William Parker's importunities because of its reluctance to offend his powerful friends. The Dept's staff had no firsthand knowledge of the party leaders on which to base their selection; the Under-secretary, Henry Goulburn, admitted to a friend, 'I know of no person whom I could call responsible that is going to the Cape. Many indeed have offered and have engaged parties to accompany them but they are unknown to me except for their correspondence.' (!!)

Goes on to say heads of party had to fill in application list with names, ages of members which were amended as changes took place and sent to the Cape (they're kept at Cape Archives and PRO, London). However, "from the time the first lists were submitted to the CD in Aug 1819 until the transports finally sailed...many put off at last minute by radical propaganda against emigration and fears of ferocious wild beasts and bloodthirsty savages...many decided to withdraw rather than risk homelessness...as many only heard in October or November that they had been accepted. An attempt to reconcile the names that appear in colonial records with the names on the official party that many of the people on the lists did not emigrate, and those who did were not always under their own names." Also many were illiterate, many falsified ages to reduce deposits etc.

Nash uses "the most reliable of the official available lists as basic source of information...amended in light of voluminous correspondence relating to the Cape emigration scheme preserved in the PRO, London (available on microfilm at Cape Archives) and colonial records of early years of settlement...the Cape records have been used whenever possible that the men listed reached the Cape." I think Sheffield is the earliest set of lists and differs quite a lot from both Nash and Hockly - Hockly's a bit older than Nash, compiled from various sources.

Holder's party (from Bristol, Gloucestershire, across the channel from Wales) demonstrates the above pretty well, so am sending to list as well - hope that's OK with everyone,
Sharon






----- Original Message -----
From: Brian Harpur
To: sharon marshall ;
Sent: Tuesday, November 02, 2004 1:21 AM
Subject: Re: [ZA] 1820 Settler Questions


Hello Sharon,
Thanks for your interesting reply. I now have some of the answer.

However, I would like to get more specifics as to how the "Scheme" was
advertised in the UK.
How did a soldier in Wellington's army, demobbed for three years, and
recently married in 1816, get to know of the scheme?
Were there advertisements placed in the press by the Colonial Office? If so,
do copies of the adverts still exist?

Ships left from many ports in the UK, so I presume that it was widely
publicised. Particularly since it was 22 times oversubscribed.
Can you imagine the amount of BS that was spread about to get that degree of
oversubscription!

Then once you had heard about it, how did you set about applying?

I'm particularly interested in learning more about William Holder and his
party that sailed from Bristol. I suspect that the party must have been
mostly Welshmen?

Kind regards,
Brian

----- Original Message -----
From: "sharon marshall" <>
To: <>
Sent: Sunday, October 31, 2004 11:06 PM
Subject: Re: [ZA] 1820 Settler Questions


> Hi Brian,
> According to MD Nash, The Settler Handbook:
> "The Cape emigration scheme for which the British government voted 50 000
pounds in July 1819 had a three-fold purpose. In the first place it was
intended to settle the disputed eastern frontier of the Cape of Good Hope
with an agrarian farming community whose presence would discourage Xhosa
pastoralists and cattle raiders from crossing the colonial boundary.
> Secondly, it was intended to increase the English-speaking population of a
recently acquired colony that was still predominantly Dutch in its language
and customs. Thirdly, it was an expedient gesture on the part of a shaky
government to ease political tensions in Britain that had been stretched to
snapping-point by post-war unemployment, 'the distress of the times and the
badness of trade'.
> The last object was the most urgent of the three; faced with mass protest
meetings, strikes and threats of riots, the government was anxious to make
'a show of doing something for the people.' Emigration was seen by many as
their chance for a better life, although Radical critics of the government
argued that political reform, not emigration, was what Britain needed.
> As soon as the scheme was announced, the Colonial department in Downing
Street was inundated with applications, most of them from individuals from
the middle and lower middle classes of society. These individual
applications, however, feel outside the terms of the emigration scheme,
which was restricted to organised groups or 'parties' of 10 or more men. To
reduce the administrative load for the organisers of the scheme and for the
colonial authorities, and to ensure that land at the Cape would be granted
only to settlers with the capital and labour to develop it, the Colonial
Department decreed that selection was to be limited to men who could afford
to engage and maintain a party of at least 10 able-bodied labourers over the
age of 18, with or without families.
> Heads of approved parties would receive free sea passages and victuals
during the voyage for themselves and their servants, and be granted land at
the Cape in the proportion of 100 acres for each man they took out. Full
title to their lands would be given them after their land had been occupied
and cultivated for three years."
>
> In effect though, "less than a third were men of capital...the leaders of
the 'proprietary parties' were officers of the army or navy on half-pay,
gentleman farmers or respectable merchants who saw themselves becoming the
landed gentry of the new settlement. Their labourers were contracted to
serve them for a number of years, and in most cases were promised a few
acres of land at the expiry of their service contracts so that they could
become smallholders in their own right. The majority of the emigrants,
however, consisted of men who were not wealthy enough to head their won
proprietary parties, but not so poor or low in the social scale as to hire
themselves as labourers...Most of these groups were organised on a basis of
mutual assistance, shared labour and a jointly-owned stock of tools and
implements. Although the nominal head of such a 'joint-stock party' would
eventually receive title to the party's grant of land in his own name, it
was to be divided as soon as possib!
> le into agreed shares among all the members. Included were several
parish-aided groups..."
>
> Hope this captures the essence...please shout if you would like more
specifics,
> Kind regards
> Sharon
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Brian Harpur
> To:
> Sent: Sunday, October 31, 2004 6:32 PM
> Subject: [ZA] 1820 Settler Questions
>
>
> Hello all,
> Can anyone tell me how the British Government's "Government Settler
Scheme"
> worked.
>
> The book 'The Story of the Settlement: Grahamstown As It Was,
Grahamstown As
> It Is' by T. Sheffield makes mention of a Parliamentary motion to make
the
> funds available for the project of sending 4000 souls to the Cape/Albany
> Colony as settlers.
>
> Does anyone know how the applications were sought?
> What were the criteria by which the applicants were deemed suitable?
> What were the responsibilities of the party leaders?
> If anyone has the tiniest clue to the above, please let me know.
>
> Kind regards,
> Brian
>
>
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