The Fate of a Namibian People

WHO are the richest people in Namibia? The !Aman community from Bethanie ought to be the answer, but it isn’t.

In August 1884, a young German entrepreneur named Heinrich Vogelsang paid a visit to Joseph Fredericks, the chief of Bethanie. The gaudy looking German came to make wa deal.He wanted to negotiate a purchase on behalf of his boss Adolph Luederitz.The deal concerned a stretch of desert, reaching some 20 miles inland from the coast.It was the most hostile and seemingly worthless part of the !Aman lands.Offered the princely sum of £500 and 60 Wesley-Richards rifles, Fredericks was quick to accept the seemingly moronic transaction.Little did he realise that Vogelsang and Luederitz had conned him.The sale concerned 20 Geographical miles – an obsolete and fairly unknown measuring unit that equalled five English miles.Instead of a few acres of sand, Fredericks had unwittingly forked over the majority of his people’s ancestral lands.Even by the standards of the time, Luederitz’s deal was fraudulent.And, to make matters worse, Fredericks never even received the £500 he had been promised.A year later, nature conspired against the sly prospector Adolph Luederitz, who drowned off the coast of the Orange River.But, his fake claim had already passed into the hands of the German Empire.The !Aman lands had become a beachhead for the foundation of Germany’s second largest colony, descriptively named German South West Africa.For the next decade, the !Aman simply ignored the inconsequential German presence.The handful of Europeans in the country posed no real threat.They consisted mostly of traders, the odd prospector or self-important colonial officials like Heinrich Goering who held no actual power in the large territory.The memory of Luederitz, Vogelsang and their land deal slowly faded.This all changed at the turn of the century, when the German Empire finally decided to make use of the vast tracts of land that it nominally laid claim to.In the next couple of years the territory was turned on its head.The violent colonial excesses that the arid territory had been spared for most of the 19th Century arrived with a vengeance.From Grootfontein to Bethanie indigenous Namibians were caught in a terrific and bloody fight for land and political autonomy.The !Aman resistance was led by Cornelius Fredericks, who traversed the vast open steppe of southern Namibia with several hundred fighters.For once, most of the south stood together.Using guerrilla tactics, they would appear like ghosts out of the heat haze and like ghosts they would again disappear.The usually young, inexperienced German soldiers who had flooded to the irksome colony in their thousands found the harsh terrain and the daring Nama a difficult prospect.Said one soldier: ‘The sun was burning ever stronger.Many soldiers began to hallucinate and wanted to charge [the enemy] on their own.The thirst cannot be explained in words.’ The 18 months resistance came to a tragic end, however.Those Nama who had survived the protracted war were sent off to German concentration camps where up to 80 per cent would die of maltreatment, hunger, exposure and disease.Among them were Cornelius Fredericks.On 16 February 1907, he succumbed to the terrible conditions on Shark Island off Luederitz.A German soldier, witnessed his funeral: “In the afternoon of February 16th we saw the funeral of deceased Nama Kaptein Cornelius Fredericks.During his imprisonment [on shark Island] he had quickly deteriorated and was now buried with a considerable procession of mourners.’ Cornelius’ death marked a low point for the !Aman.they had not only lost their leader, but also their independence and their land.The few who survived the concentration camps were reduced to a life of slavery on German farms.Ironically diamonds were discovered in Luederitz not long after Cornelius’ death.It turned out that one the largest deposits of alluvial diamonds lay scattered across the !Aman’s ancestral lands.Untold riches that would have made Bethanie one of the richest towns on earth, but it was not to be.The money went into German pockets.The closest the !Aman would ever get to ‘their’ diamonds was as labourers on the mines, crawling on all fours through the sand under a relentless sun.Decades would pass and still not as much as single pfennig, pence or cent would reach Bethanie.Today the town remains among the poorest in the country; bleak and forgotten like the people and their history.But, there is hope.Friday, February 16 2007, marks the centenary of Cornelius Frederick’s death.The day will be marked with a commemorative event on Shark Island.With generous help from the German Embassy and local businesses, the !Aman community will invite the Namibian people to pay their respects in remembrance of the thousands of people who died in the Luederitz concentration camps.High on the agenda is a memorial service for the human bones that lie huddled together in mass graves a few kilometres outside Luederitz.”Let their spirits and their remains be put to rest in peace,” says Izak Fredericks, the great grandson of Cornelius Fredericks.* For more information on the centenary commemoration contact Pastor Izak Fredericks at 081 315 4118 or Pastor Dr Henrik Frederik at 0811 290 367.The gaudy looking German came to make wa deal.He wanted to negotiate a purchase on behalf of his boss Adolph Luederitz.The deal concerned a stretch of desert, reaching some 20 miles inland from the coast.It was the most hostile and seemingly worthless part of the !Aman lands.Offered the princely sum of £500 and 60 Wesley-Richards rifles, Fredericks was quick to accept the seemingly moronic transaction.Little did he realise that Vogelsang and Luederitz had conned him.The sale concerned 20 Geographical miles – an obsolete and fairly unknown measuring unit that equalled five English miles.Instead of a few acres of sand, Fredericks had unwittingly forked over the majority of his people’s ancestral lands.Even by the standards of the time, Luederitz’s deal was fraudulent.And, to make matters worse, Fredericks never even received the £500 he had been promised.A year later, nature conspired against the sly prospector Adolph Luederitz, who drowned off the coast of the Orange River.But, his fake claim had already passed into the hands of the German Empire.The !Aman lands had become a beachhead for the foundation of Germany’s second largest colony, descriptively named German South West Africa.For the next decade, the !Aman simply ignored the inconsequential German presence.The handful of Europeans in the country posed no real threat.They consisted mostly of traders, the odd prospector or self-important colonial officials like Heinrich Goering who held no actual power in the large territory.The memory of Luederitz, Vogelsang and their land deal slowly faded.This all changed at the turn of the century, when the German Empire finally decided to make use of the vast tracts of land that it nominally laid claim to.In the next couple of years the territory was turned on its head.The violent colonial excesses that the arid territory had been spared for most of the 19th Century arrived with a vengeance.From Grootfontein to Bethanie indigenous Namibians were caught in a terrific and bloody fight for land and political autonomy.The !Aman resistance was led by Cornelius Fredericks, who traversed the vast open steppe of southern Namibia with several hundred fighters.For once, most of the south stood together.Using guerrilla tactics, they would appear like ghosts out of the heat haze and like ghosts they would again disappear.The usually young, inexperienced German soldiers who had flooded to the irksome colony in their thousands found the harsh terrain and the daring Nama a difficult prospect.Said one soldier: ‘The sun was burning ever stronger.Many soldiers began to hallucinate and wanted to charge [the enemy] on their own.The thirst cannot be explained in words.’ The 18 months resistance came to a tragic end, however.Those Nama who had survived the protracted war were sent off to German concentration camps where up to 80 per
cent would die of maltreatment, hunger, exposure and disease.Among them were Cornelius Fredericks.On 16 February 1907, he succumbed to the terrible conditions on Shark Island off Luederitz.A German soldier, witnessed his funeral: “In the afternoon of February 16th we saw the funeral of deceased Nama Kaptein Cornelius Fredericks.During his imprisonment [on shark Island] he had quickly deteriorated and was now buried with a considerable procession of mourners.’ Cornelius’ death marked a low point for the !Aman.they had not only lost their leader, but also their independence and their land.The few who survived the concentration camps were reduced to a life of slavery on German farms.Ironically diamonds were discovered in Luederitz not long after Cornelius’ death.It turned out that one the largest deposits of alluvial diamonds lay scattered across the !Aman’s ancestral lands.Untold riches that would have made Bethanie one of the richest towns on earth, but it was not to be.The money went into German pockets.The closest the !Aman would ever get to ‘their’ diamonds was as labourers on the mines, crawling on all fours through the sand under a relentless sun.Decades would pass and still not as much as single pfennig, pence or cent would reach Bethanie.Today the town remains among the poorest in the country; bleak and forgotten like the people and their history.But, there is hope.Friday, February 16 2007, marks the centenary of Cornelius Frederick’s death.The day will be marked with a commemorative event on Shark Island.With generous help from the German Embassy and local businesses, the !Aman community will invite the Namibian people to pay their respects in remembrance of the thousands of people who died in the Luederitz concentration camps.High on the agenda is a memorial service for the human bones that lie huddled together in mass graves a few kilometres outside Luederitz.”Let their spirits and their remains be put to rest in peace,” says Izak Fredericks, the great grandson of Cornelius Fredericks.* For more information on the centenary commemoration contact Pastor Izak Fredericks at 081 315 4118 or Pastor Dr Henrik Frederik at 0811 290 367.