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The Voortrekkers (Afrikaans for
pioneers, literally "those who move ahead") were white Afrikaner
farmers, then known as Boers, who in the 1830s and 1840s emigrated in what is called the Great Trekk from the British controlled Cape Colony into
the erstwhile black-populated (depopulated from the Difaqane said to have originated from Shaka the Zulu King) areas north of the Orange River in what is
now South Africa.
The Voortrekkers were mainly of Trek-Boer (migrating farmer) descent living in the eastern frontiers of the Cape. A contingent
of Voortrekkers migrated into Natal and negotiated a land treaty with the Zulu King Dingaan. Upon reconsideration, Dingaan
doublecrossed the Voortrekkers, killing their leaders Piet Retief and Gerhard Maritz along with half of the Voortrekker settlers
who had followed them to Natal.
Andries Pretorius filled the leadership vacuum and sought revenge at a battle at Nacome River on 16 December 1838 where the vastly outnumbered Voortrekker contingent defeated the Zulu impis (warriors). This
date has hence been known as the `Day of the Vow' as the Voortrekkers made a vow to God that they would honour the date if He
were to deliver them from what they viewed as almost insurmountable odds. The Natalia Republic was set up in 1839 but was annexed by Britain in 1843.
Armed conflict, first with the Ndebele under Mzilikazi, then against the Zulus under Dingane, went the Voortrekkers' way, mostly
because of the technological superiority of their muzzle-loading
rifles. This success led to the establishment of a number of small Boer republics, which
slowly coalesced into the Orange Free State and the South African Republic. These two states would survive until
their annexation (1900) by Britain during the Boer War.
The Voortrekkers are commemorated with the Voortrekker Monument located on Monument Hill overlooking Pretoria, the erstwile
capital of the Transvaal Republic, the South African
Republic and the current and historic administrative capital of the Republic of South Africa. Pretoria was named after the
Voortrekker leader Andries Pretorius.
The Voortrekkers is also an Afrikaner youth movement founded in South Africa in 1931 as an Afrikaans-language
alternative to the English-speaking Boy Scout movement. The Voortrekkers developed their own identity, represented in what they called their
ABC: Afrikanerskap; Burgerskap; Christenskap (Afrikanership; citizenship; Christianity).
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