Paul Kruger

Paul Kruger, full name Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kruger (1825-1904), South African statesman, leader of the Afrikaners, or Boers, in their fight against Britain.

Kruger was born in Colesburg, in what was then called the Cape Colony. He went with his parents on the Great Trek, a migration (1835-1843?) of Boer settlers from the Cape to the territory of the Transvaal, north of the Orange River. Britain first recognized the independence of the Transvaal territories in 1852. In the late 1850s these territories united to form the South African Republic. Kruger's early experiences fighting against the Zulu and other Africans who opposed the Afrikaner settlers contributed to his election as commandant general of the Transvaal forces in 1864. After the British annexed the South African Republic in 1877, Kruger continued in office under the British government, but he was dismissed the following year because of his agitation for the independence of the republic. When the Boer Rebellion broke out in 1880, Kruger was one of the military leaders of his people and, in 1881, helped negotiate the peace agreement with Britain. In 1883 Kruger was elected president of the South African Republic. In 1886 gold was discovered in the Transvaal, and the British flooded into the area. The Afrikaners resented the intrusion, and the government, headed by Kruger, passed severe voting restrictions and imposed high railway tariffs. This biased treatment led to an unsuccessful raid by the British, the Jameson Raid of 1895, and then to the Boer War in 1899. During the Boer War, Kruger, who was too old to take the field with his compatriots, went to Europe, where he attempted to convince various Continental powers to aid the South African Republic. After the defeat of the Afrikaners in South Africa, Kruger lived in Europe, where he dictated The Memoirs of Paul Kruger (1902).