DEATH OF GENERAL SCHALK BURGER

Evening Star, Issue 16991, 13 March 1919, Page 6

DEATH OF GENERAL SCHALK BURGER

General William. Schalk Burger, Acting President of the Transvaal after the flight of Kruger in iSeptembcr, 1900, and one of the most prominent members of the National Convention which drafted the Constitution of the Union of South Africa, died in Johannesburg in December last. 'Jlie grandson of one of the voortrokkers on whose head a price of £3OO was set by the British Government in consequence of participation in a rebellion in Natal, ho was horn at Lvdenburg, which for many years ha represented in the Volksraad. In the War of Independence which ended with Majuba he gained the rank of field cornet, but in spite of his active service then and years after in the South African War, in which he held a high command in the Boer forces, ho was a politician rather than a soldier. A man or ability, he was never a strong man At the Presidential election of 1893 Kruger’s partisans manipulated the voting, and there was danger of civil war between them and the supporters of General Joubert. General Schalk Burger, a confessed adherent of Joubert, presided over the committee of investigation, and, his reive failing. g;lvc his cast ing voto in favor of Kruger. Had it been given the other way Joubert would have become President, and probably neither the Jameson Raid nor the South African War would have occurred He was the leading member of the Industrial Commission which inquired into the grievances of the Uitlandtrs after the Raid, and came to the conclusion that those grievances were well founded He was declared a.traitor by Kruger for putting his name to the report. As Vice-President of the Transvaal Republic, he opposed the South African Whir, and warned Kruger of the calamities which would follow ; but on the outbreak of hostilities he joined his compatriots, and had a hand in planning not & few of the Beer successes in Natal.