CO885-5 — Page 43

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference -

[ ་ “ 「 」 C.O. 885

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-

COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

5PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

24

No. 35.

Governor Sir H. B. Frere, G.C.B., G.C.S.I., to the Right Hon. the Earl of Kimberley.— (Received July 5.)

(Confidential.) My Lord,

Government House, Cape Town, June 8, 1880. IN continuation of my despatch No. 128 of this date, I have the honour to beg the early attention of Her Majesty's Government to the general question of the permanent garrison of Her Majesty's regular forces to be kept up in the Cape Peninsula.

Previous to the late war the usual garrison of Cape Town was a full battalion of infantry, of which one company was detached (not, without inconvenience) to St. Helena.

During the pressure of war, all the infantry fit for service were, as a temporary measure, withdrawn, and their guards and duties taken by colonial volunteers.

The aid thus given was highly appreciated by Her Majesty's Government, and was not rendered without substantial and often serious sacrifice on the part of the colonists. A large proportion of the volunteers in Cape Town are men in business, and the time occupied by furnishing the ordinary guards of Castle, barracks, arsenal, and batteries, was a considerable tax on the town,

Nor, I submit, can the arrangement which leaves the defence of the Cape Peninsula entirely to colonial forces be recommended on any ground of policy.

It has always been admitted that, whatever might be done with regard to internal territorial defence, the national interests at stake in the command of the Cape Peninsula were too considerable to be entrusted as a permanent arrangement to any but the regular troops of Her Majesty's army; and I can imagine few measures more calculated to check progress towards the provision of colonial self-defence against internal enemics-few more detrimental in every way to the union of these Colonies with each other and the British Crown-few more opposed to the interests and avowed policy of Her Majesty's Govern- ment in regard to South Africa, than any deliberate departure from this principle.

I cannot believe that there is any intention to encourage ideas of a complete severance But I would submit that such of all ties between this Colony and Great Britain. impressions must be the inevitable result of deliberate departure from the principle that the safe keeping of the Cape Peninsula and of its anchorages, which command the Southern Ocean, would under any circumstances remain a matter of national, and not merely colonial,

concern.

Any suspicion of a change of policy in this respect must give a severe blow to the honest efforts of my present responsible advisers to provide for colonial self-defence against internal enemies.

What these efforts have been, and how far they have succeeded, will be best under- stood if Her Majesty's Government will institute the following comparisons:

1. Between the extent of the colonial responsibilities, in the way of territories and tribes to be kept in order, when Sir George Grey kept the frontier Kaffirs from breaking out, during the cattle-killing mania, or at any period before responsible government was granted to the Colony, as compared with what those responsibilitics are now.

2. Between the force of Her Majesty's troops which Sir George Grey had then to support him, as compared with the force of such troops now in this Colony and its dependencies.

3. Between the numbers and cost of colonial forces available for purposes of internal defence three years ago, as compared with the numbers and cost of such forces at present.

If Her Majesty's Government will institute such comparisons, they will be able in some degree to estimate how effectively my present advisers, supported by a great majority of Her Majesty's loyal colonists, have addressed themselves to the task of taking on themselves the responsibilities of self-defence against internal African enemies.

But the work is as yet only just seriously begun. It has hitherto had little of the aid from officers of Her Majesty's regular forces which is essential to consolidate and perfect it, and some years must elapse before it can be considered beyond the risk of failure from premature exposure to strains which can only be resisted by the robust strength of a well- established system.

What, then, would be the effect of telling the Colony that they must not only be prepared to face, with only colonial resources, responsibilities much greater than those which tasked the talents and energies of Sir George Grey with so many thousand regular British troops at his back, but that they must undertake the unexpected duty of defending the Cape Peninsula, the harbour of refuge and citadel of the Southern Oceans, with all their contingent responsibilities, military, naval, and political?

*Not printed.

25

Whatever my present advisers might think of such a task, I believe it would unhesi- tatingly he declined by any party, or combination of parties, which might succeed my present Ministers in the government of the Colony; and, if undertaken prematurely and with inefficient means, the only result I can anticipate would be a failure, leading to the task being surrendered back into the hands of the British Government, or of some other great military and naval Power,

The mere suspicion of such a task being imposed on the Colony would, I am con- vinced, lead a great majority of colonists at once to declare against any plan for a Union or Confederation of South African Colonies; nor can I imagine any other Colony having the courage to think of union with the Cape Colony so burdened

I can assure your Lordship that I am not now expressing merely my own apprehen- sions. The course of measures and events to which I have stated my objections may be found not obseurely indicated as the somewhat dreamy hope of a small Republican minority in this Colony-chiefly Hollanders or other foreigners--who talk complacently of the British Government becoming tired of the burden of defending South Africa, and who appear to consider Germany as the Great Power under whose ægis their hopes of a South African Republic may be realized.

I would add that I have not consulted my Ministers before thus expressing myself, for this simple reason, that I fear the discussion of the question might seriously affect the confidence with which they would advocate those measures of self-defence which they have already brought before their Parliament. They have already done so in the full confidence that, if carried, those measures would meet all the reasonable present wishes, as they understand them, of Her Majesty's Government. They have always believed that the defence of this peninsula by a sufficient garrison of Her Majesty's troops was a fixed element in all their calculations. I cannot myself believe that any change of policy in this respect is seriously intended; but whenever my Ministers realize that reductions in the garrison have been ordered, which would bring down the strength of the garrison, for all duties in this Cape Peninsula, to 141 infantry soldiers, and that colonial forces may be required any day to take permanently the ordinary duties of the garrison, I feel assured they will at once become uncasy as to the long continuance of any such an arrangement, and will ask me to give them satisfactory assurances on the subject.

I have already recorded my opinion that there should be at least 1,000 infantry, with a due proportion of engineers and artillery soldiers, for the ordinary garrison duties of Simon's Bay and Cape Town in peace time, and as a nucleus whereon to form the colonial forces required for a sufficient garrison in war time. This is a great reduction as compared with what has been the ordinary strength of Her Majesty's forces in this Colony at any former period.

I believe that this estimate is not at all in excess of what the best military and naval judges, who have studied the question, and who know the wants and resources of the peninsula, have recommended.

I would further submit that, to frame a reliable estimate of such wants, something more is needed than a hasty visit to the locality; and that it is necessary to know and appreciate the moral forces involved in the calculation-such, for instance, as the sources and force of colonial feeling on the subject.

Sir,

No. 36.

I have, &c. (Signed) H. B. E. FRERE.

Colonial Office to War Office.

Downing Street, July 6, 1880.

I AM directed by the Earl of Kimberley to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 19th June,* intimating Mr. Secretary Childers' opinion that it is desirable that a Com- mittee should be formed at Singapore for the purpose of considering and reporting upon the best means of providing for the defence of that place, and inviting his Lordship's concurrence in the proposal.

In reply, I am to request that you will acquaint Mr. Childers that Lord Kimberley concurs in the desirableness of a Committee being appointed to report upon the defence of Singapore, for the future consideration of the Royal Commission on the Defence of British Possessions and Commerce Abroad. His Lordship is, however, disposed to think that, instead of the Committee being appointed by the General Officer Commanding in China and the Straits Settlements, it would be desirable that it should be appointed by the

[508]

• No. 22.

Η