Content deleted Content added
Denisarona (talk | contribs) |
Denisarona (talk | contribs) |
||
Line 295:
Kruger left the Transvaal by rail on 11 September 1900—he wept as the train crossed into Mozambique. He planned to board the first outgoing steamer, the ''Herzog'' of the [[Deutsche Ost-Afrika Linie|German East Africa Line]], but was prevented from doing so when, at the behest of the local British Consul, the Portuguese Governor insisted that Kruger stay in port under [[house arrest]].{{#tag:ref|Kruger did not comment on this treatment by the Portuguese, but his secretary Madie Bredell noticed that he never again wore his Portuguese decoration.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|pp=247–250}}|group = "n"|name = "portuguese"}} About a month later [[Wilhelmina of the Netherlands|Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands]] concluded a deal with Britain to extricate Kruger on a Dutch warship, [[HNLMS Gelderland (1898)|HNLMS ''Gelderland'']], and convey him through non-British waters to [[Marseille]]. Kruger was delighted to hear of this but dismayed that Gezina, still in Pretoria, was not well enough to accompany him. ''Gelderland'' departed on 20 October 1900.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|pp = 247–250}}
He received a rapturous welcome in Marseille on 22 November—60,000 people turned out to see him disembark.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|pp = 250–252}} Accompanied by Leyds, he went on to an exuberant reception in Paris, then continued to [[Cologne]] on 1 December. Here the public greeted him with similar excitement, but Kaiser Wilhelm II refused to receive him in Berlin. Having apparently still harboured hopes of German assistance in the war, Kruger was deeply shocked. "The Kaiser has betrayed us", he told Leyds.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|pp = 252–254}} They went on to the Netherlands, which was strictly neutral and could not assist militarily, but would feel more like home. After another buoyant reception from the general public, Kruger was cordially received by Wilhelmina and her family in [[The Hague]], but it soon became clear to Leyds that it embarrassed the Dutch authorities to have them
Gezina, with whom Kruger had had 16 children—nine sons, seven daughters (of whom some died young){{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 22}}—had eight sickly grandchildren transferred to her from the concentration camp at [[Krugersdorp]], where their mother had died, in July 1901. Five of the eight children died within nine days, and two weeks later Gezina also died.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 256}}{{#tag:ref|It was said by this time that the Kruger children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren together totalled over 200.{{sfn|McKenzie|Du Plessis|Bunce|1900|p=36}}|group = "n"|name = "childrengrandchildren"}} Meintjes writes that a "strange silence" enveloped Kruger thereafter.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 256}} By now partially blind and almost totally deaf, he dictated his memoirs to his secretary Hermanus Christiaan "Madie" Bredell and Pieter Grobler during the latter part of 1901,{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|pp = 256–257}} and the following year they were published.{{sfn|Kruger|1902|pp = v–vi}}{{#tag:ref|The original text was in Dutch, but the first edition of the memoirs to appear was that in German, edited by the Reverend Dr A Schowalter. The Dutch version and an English translation by [[Alexander Teixeira de Mattos]] shortly followed.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p=18}}|group = "n"|name = "memoirs"}} Kruger and his entourage relocated in December 1901 to [[Utrecht]], where he took a comfortable villa called "Oranjelust" and was joined by his daughter Elsje Eloff and her family.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 258}}
Line 305:
Kruger would not countenance the idea of returning home, partly because of personal reluctance to become a British subject again, and partly because he thought he could better serve his people by remaining in exile.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 260}} Steyn similarly refused to accept the Boer defeat and joined Kruger in Europe, though he did later return to [[Southern Africa]].{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 264}} Botha, De Wet and De la Rey visited Oranjelust in August 1902 and, according to hearsay, were berated by Kruger for "signing away independence"—rumours of such a scene were widespread enough that the generals issued a statement denying them.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 261}}
After passing from October 1902 to May 1903 at [[Menton]] on the [[French Riviera]],{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 262}} Kruger moved back to Hilversum, then returned to Menton in October 1903. In early 1904 he moved to [[Clarens, Switzerland|Clarens]], a small village in the canton of [[Vaud]] in western Switzerland where he spent the rest of his days looking over [[Lake Geneva]] and the Alps from his balcony.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 265}} "He who wishes to create a future must not lose track of the past", he wrote in his final letter, addressed to the people of the Transvaal. "Thus; seek all that is to be found good and fair in the past, shape your ideal accordingly and try to realise that ideal for the future. It is true: much that has been built is now destroyed, damaged, and levelled. But with unity of purpose and unity of strength that which has been pulled down can be built again."{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 266}} After contracting pneumonia, Paul Kruger died in Clarens on 14 July 1904 at the age of 78. His Bible lay open on a table beside him.{{sfn|Meintjes|1974|p = 267}}
Kruger's body was initially buried in The Hague
==Appraisal and legacy==
| |||