Episode 61 - Drinking coffee in Dewetsdorp while President Kruger arrives in Marseilles

In episode 61 we traverse the width of South Africa to head back to the Free State after following the Canadians through the Eastern Transvaal last week. It’s in the Free State where General Christiaan de Wet remains at large. His plan is to head south through the Free State and into the Cape - although he did consider Natal as an option as well. The Boers wanted to incite the Cape Afrikaners to rise up against the British by an insurgency they believed had a good chance of success. It was an idea General Jan Smuts had put to the gathered Boer leaders at a meeting in October 1900 at Cypherfontein farm west of Johannesburg. But we also know that de Wet distrusted many of his fellow commanders, and would not support the first part of Smuts’ plan which was an audacious plot to send a combined commando unit to blow up Johannesburg gold Mines, before dispersing to launch invasions of both the Natal and Cape Colonies. Also this week, we hear how Transvaal President Paul Kruger arrives in Marseilles, France, to a rapturous welcome by 60 000 people. But the ageing Boer leader is doomed never to return to Africa again.