have been taken either to prevent them from attempting to recover by personal action, or even to supervise them in the process of doing so, with the inevitable consequence that seizures of land and cattle, spasmodic before, became thenceforth systematised. This iniquitous order was forced upon the Dependency by the vested interests concerned despite the Governor's protest.
It was the final provocation. Profiting by the Governor's absence in the south in connection with one of the perennial Hottentot troubles and believing the report of his death, spread by the settlers by whom he was hated, for their own purposes, the Hereros, led by Maherero, rose in a body and fell upon the officials and settlers, killing as many as they could reach. In a letter to Governor Leutwein, replying to the latter's remonstrance, Maherero wrote:
I and my headmen reply to you as follows: I did not commence the war this year; it has been started by the white people; for as you know how many Hereros have been killed by white people, particularly traders, with rifles and in the prisons. And always when I brought these cases to Windhuk the blood of the people was valued at no more than a few head of small stock, namely, from fifty to fifteen. The traders increased the troubles also in this way, that they voluntarily gave credit to my people. After doing so they robbed us; they went so far as to pay themselves by, for instance, taking away by force two or three head of cattle to cover a debt of one pound sterling. It is these things which have caused war in this land. And in these times the white people said to us you (i.e. Leutwein) who were peacefully disposed and liked us, were no longer here. They said to us, the Governor who loves you has gone to a difficult war; he is dead, and as he is dead you also (the Hereros) must die.
Reinforcements were sent out under General von Trotha, a perfect type of the ruthless Prussian soldier. Until recalled, owing to the indignation aroused by his brutalities, von Trotha carried out for twelve months a war of expulsion and extermination against the Hereros, who, encumbered by their women, children, and cattle, driven from place to place, were killed in great numbers, or perished in the desert regions into which they were mercilessly hunted. Peace could have been made with them after their signal defeat in August, 1904. But von Trotha would not hear of peace. The war degenerated into wholesale, retail, and indiscriminate daughter of both man and beast.
