Opine

It started with Pirates ...

Led by the Captain Jan Van Reibeeck of the Dutch East India TRading Company who came across the South African Coast with no intention to colonise, but to create a safe base. He released some of his crew and told them to settle/make farms for them to return... they became the burghers and were mainly of Dutch descent, but also included Germans and a lot of French fleeing religious persecution in 1688...

Charles Bell; Jan Van Reibeek

Jan Van Reibeeck

Inspiration for collar shape and dropped shoulder

The Burghers made no attempt to intigrate with the local tribes Khoikhoi and kept themselves very separate...

Reibeeck also decided to import a large number of slaves, mainly from Indonesia.

These slaves often married the Dutch Settlers and the next generation became known as the Cape Coloures and the Cape Malays.

Most were integrated in to the 'white' south africa population where 'afrikaans' is spoken.
This is were Eugene Terreblanches view comes in that the whites are supreme to the blacks within South Africa....?

The original tribesmen and women were wiped out by introduced diseases etc and great conflict ensued...

The English the stepped in!

Stating racial equality and trying to find peace but instead angerying the Dutsch settlers and farmers who were primarily rascist (Boers) :they had arrived on foreign land, called it their own and hated the native tribespeople who lived there!

Boer Family 1886

Then came the Great Trek as the Boers went off in search of the 'promised land' and start their own establishment.

Military idea of holding bullets like thompson would hold is pen to write his words or gorky his paintbrush....

But they entered the land of the Zulu Warriors... a notoriously aggressive tribe.

So much blood shed ensued that this war became known as the Battle of Blood River and became a national holiday in South Africa in commemoration of the 3,000 Zulu natives that died.
Zulus late 19th C

Present day Zulu's

Style line inspiration for oversized turn up at bottom of shorts and trousers

Again the British stepped in and took the Boer's wind from beneath their wings. Their short lived triumph ended when the British annexed the area (now known as Durban)... setting up sugar plantations and expect the locals to provide labour...they were not so supportive (surprisingly enough!)

If there weren't enough different nationalities mish mashes in to the South African population Indians were now included!

shipped in to make up for the labour shortage 1879

Inspiration for shorts; rolled over waistband and crotch panel

(over the next 150 years Indians outweighed the white population let alone native tribes similar to what Thompson was suggesting in the Americans taking over Cuba and the Spanish islands... i want to create this mixed up clashing idea in my collection )

Another blow came in 1886 when gold was discovered by and australian in the land that the Boers had settled (now Johannesburg)

The Boer Wars ending in 1899 were the icing on the cake

English stepped in AGAIN to get piece of the action with the wealth of the gold mines

The war happened because the Boers did not want to give up 'their' land. Concentration camps were built were thousands of wives and children of the Boer Guerillas were kept ...

Boer camp

this child caught my eye when looking at this photograph. how innocent children are to all the war and racial conflict that was surrounding them. i also liked his sailor like coat!

inspiration for the flap over collar

Boer Geurillas
...who were fighting against the racial equallity that Britain was trying to establish for black men and women! and the right for them to vote.