THE EXPULSION OF "KING POTT.”

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1511, 14 February 1901, Page 17

THE EXPULSION OF "KING POTT.”

— — H*

PRO-BOER AND CONSUL AT LOiRENCO MARQUEZ:

(By One Who Knows Him, in ‘■‘Daily

Mail-”)

The -expulsion of “King Pott” from his hitherto undisputed uprem&cy at Lorenco Marquez has aroused: a keen interest in the personality of the “ Contraband King,” as he was dubbed by the English colony at Delagoa Bay during the war. Mr Pott was, until English pressure made itself felt at Lisbon, a Pooh-ba-h who held unlimited sway in his own little happy huntingkground. In the public mind only his cynical indifference to the social convenances made the comprehensive'"Pott notorious; but people who saw under the fringe of things recognised in Pott the most important Boer factor on the East Coast.

Twenty years ago Mr Gerard. Pott was a smart ‘‘Amsterdammer,” who sought his fortune in the mysterious South, He soon obtained employment with, the Dost Afrikaansche Maat-schappy (East AMcan Company), a wealthy Hutch concern. trading in the Mozambique provinces. Quickly. dwarfing meaner and' more scrupulous men, he secured the management of various obscure factories in the Portuguese East African provinces. GEOGRAPHY HELPS ]UR POTT, -Those were the days; when dhows and slave-raids still flourished ; the days be- ■ fore the* discovery of golcl and the rush to the Rand. So it was that until very recently the Harbour of Lorenco Max-.. quez,- the finest natural port in fixe world after Sydney and Rio do Janeiro, was neglected by British merchants with goods to send to the Transvaal, partly because its administration was slipshod and unhygienic in many.- senses, . partly because they-were more materially ; and politically interested in encouraging the rival ports of Durban. 1 East London, Port Elizabeth, and Capetown; but • chiefly because the tariffs of the Boer' concessionary- [railways „ . exploiting: the line from, Pretoria to- KoniaTi Poort- were 1 extortionate.; : ‘

Loreneo Marquez remained, however, geographioa-lly,- - the natural port - '6f; the jv Transvaal, just as Beira is - and remains ‘ of the Rhodesian 'hinterland. But ; its political and commercial politics .have ‘ hitherto ad ways/been largely influenced by Oom Paul’s myrmidons; They were; ’ ’entirely dominated by the railway line,) which Mr Kruger often described ■ asT “myn spoorweg” .(“my line”)., ' ; i; The “key to the sea” and naval . de- ' yelopment, as/ Oom Paul fondly imagined it might ultimately become- was, however, soon . snatched from Mr Era-) ger’s grasp by Mr Rhodes, who secured, dominant interest in the McMurclo con- .' cession—-the concession upon which the;' Berne Arbitrators grew fat and old. ‘ Looked ont from the sea as Mr Kruger was, Mil Chamberlain went one better. His subtle diplomacy seized the famous , Amatongalancl strip, , winch shut out the otiier outlet to the ocean, Kosi Bay,, from Dutch . Swaziland and Hr Leyd’s. maws. -

MR KRUGER AND HIS PHANTOM FLEET.

Had 1 it not been for this adroit move,

which caused a storm of consternation in Pretoria at the time, another irritating factor might have been added to the Boer War. In his more ambitious flights, Mr Kruger used to tell the receptive rustics of Kcsi Bay of the vast maritime possibilities it opened up. Oiom Paul’s phantom ironclads could not, of course, have prevailed, against the might of the British Navy, but Kosi Bay would have been an additional inlet for the arsenals and armouries of munition that were shipped into the Republic for yearn before and during the war.

Shut out from Kosi Bay by the merciless Mr Chamberlain, Messrs Kruger and Co. sought a substitute by way of Delagoa-Bay. This they found in “King Pott” and the Portuguese functionaries under hi s thumb. With the more important dignitaries; in the 'Mozambique province Dr Loyds started an elaborate scheme of coqiietry; they were ilivited to Pretoria and-feted, the Kruger journals were ordered to gush, and the visits of the wily doctor to Lorenco Marquez were many and frequent. A CONSUL THREE DEEP. King Pott, who already exercised much influence at the port, by reason of his wealth, was invested with triple Consular powers—those of Holland, the Free State, and the Transvaal—together. .with, unlimited financial resources and a Pretoria backing. He was thus afforded official facilities unobtainable by the mere civilian importer. Let us see how he used them.

His triple Consular signature, his sign-manual as managing director of the East, African Company, as agent of the ■N.Z.A.S.M., as Mr Pott, merchant, as forwarding agent of the Union Steamship Company (a post that he subsequently lost), and in various other of his comprehensive capacities, secured the safe landing at the port and transit to the frontier at IComati Peort of suc-cess-ive shiploads of “pianos” and other musical instruments that have played so tragic a tune in recent history. “King Pott’s” signature appeared to be the “open sesame” to the Transvaal; to have, questioned it. would have been to invite a diplomatic rupture with the Plague, or to strike a blow at the many German interests Mr Pott was ostensibly guarding. Regiments of “ambulance, men” came to Mr Pott, whose coupons conducted them, a la Cook, to t-he nearest battlefields. Pott’s offices . were the headquarters. of Beer spies, Boer secret service men, and Boer agents with Pretoria missions. The Loterijmans, the Gillinghams, the Erasmuses, and the other 'wealthy hangers-on of the Kruger •regime found in Pott an active and enthusiastic confederate, whose acts, by reason of hi.s ela-stic exequaturs from three Governments, dared not be qises-

turned. CONTRABAND ADVENTURERS

Through Mr Pott mountains of merchandise were forced through and tons of munitions. . When boatloads of Iri-sh-Americans,. French franc-tireurs, . and Continental adventurers swarmed into the Bay, King Pott took these worthies under his. royal aegis. As an empty formula, they were asked to subscribe an oath, by which- they promised to preserve the strictest neutrality and ''abstain from all belligerent acts. This was the only stipulation Mr Carnegie Ross, the British Consul; and .D owningstreet were able to impose.

The mercenaries, were, however, told in the same breath that the oath would not be binding. . When they reached Koxaati Poort the Lord would look leniently upon them, for Mr Pott’s God was with the Boers. ; I have seen hundreds or these blasphemous screeds lying in the refuse dust-bins of Koniati Poort iS-tatdon.

' ' They still believe in their Pott at the Hague, where they decorated him some years ago with the Order of Orange-Nas-sau.