The Micro-History of a South African Murder

This article explores a murder that took place on a Transvaal farm in the early 20th century. By subjecting it to the techniques of micro-history, it demonstrates that the killing, far from having merely a narrow personal or criminal significance, casts a powerful if lurid light on important historical processes and phenomena. Central among these are the following: the social power of Boer landowners over an impoverished white tenantry; the intimacy and violence of master-servant relations between the races in the countryside; the new mode of policing in the wake of the South African War; and the fact that black action in that conflict continued to affright Boer/Afrikaner consciousness. In short, the article offers a study of how a wider history is embedded in, and illuminated by, a single criminal case. The startling evidence of the trial is also used to convey the relationships of power on a particular agrarian estate, and how these were challenged as the state enlisted servants as witnesses against their masters. Nicholas van Rensburg was killed like a sheep. Of that there is no doubt. His throat may have appeared to one policeman to have merely been slit 'from ear to ear', but evidence arising from the autopsy disclosed something more practised: 'two incisions had been made on the throat, and both carotid arteries and [the] jugular vein [had been] severed'.11 Testimonies of Sgt-Major Whelan and Captain Fell, cited in Rand Daily Mail, 21 October 1904, p. 5, 'The Volksrust Murder' View all notes Exploration of the wound found that the way in which 'the throat had been stuck' was 'exactly the same' as a slaughtered sheep.22 No. X (Detective Sergeant Bullock: see note 77 below) to Lieut. McKensie, 24 July 1904 (citing findings of one who had explored the wound) in File Y/489/8: SAC (Archives of the Chief Staff Officer, South African Constabulary, 1900?1908), General Correspondence, Vol. 279. The SAC papers are part of the TAB (Transvaal Argief Bewaarplek/Transvaal Archives Depot) of the National Archives of South Africa, Pretoria/Tshwane. The dozens of SAC files referred to in this article are all from the General Correspondence section of the archive and part of its Vol. 279, which contains documentation from the period 1903?1905. In referring to these General Correspondence files hereafter, I will provide their reference numbers and dates and follow this simply with the designation 'SAC'.View all notes But whoever murdered Van Rensburg had tried to make his death look like suicide: his own knife had been used in the deed and it had been placed in his lifeless hand.33 For the fact of the knife being Van Rensburg's and Visagie placing it in the dead man's hand, see Isaac's testimony in The Star(Third Edition), 8 May 1905, p. 7, 'The Wakkerstroom Tragedy'; and Copy of sworn affidavit of 'ISAAC[,] a Native', 18 August 1904, p. 2 in File Y/489/17 dated 20 August 1904: SAC. (Hereafter Isaac's affidavit - which is referred to frequently in this article - will be referred to without the details regarding the archival source.) Van Rensburg's wife confirmed that the knife was her husband?s: see evidence of Mrs van Rensburg in Rand Daily Mail, 27 October 1904, p. 5, 'Volksrust Murder'.View all notes But there were problems with the notion of suicide. First, how could a man slit his throat, sever one after another the giant blood vessels of the neck, and not only not lie in a pool of blood but apparently have no blood on his clothes at all? How is it that the only blood stains where the body lay were on the blade of the knife and on the hand that clutched it? And why is it that there were 'traces of fresh blood ... about 500 yards from where the body was found' and that they 'extended about 50 yards in a straight line, in patches, at intervals of about a yard'.44 For evidence relating to the blood, see testimony of Hans, servant of Koos van der Merwe (one of Visagie's tenants) in Rand Daily Mail, 28 October 1904, p. 5, 'Volksrust Murder'; testimony of Sgt-Major Whelan in Rand Daily Mail, 21 October 1904, p. 5, 'The Volksrust Murder'; testimony of Sgt-Major Whelan in The Star (First Edition), 5 May 1905, p. 8, 'The Wakkerstroom Tragedy'. Quotations from Whelan's evidence in the Rand Daily Mail.View all notes Finally, how could a man have the equanimity to place his hat over his face after cutting his throat?