British forces attack the Dutch position at Muizenberg

Abraham arrived aboard the Malacca after escaping his enslaver in Batavia. His arrival illustrates that enslaved people were present before the first large VOC slave shipments.

The Amersfoort anchored in Table Bay with 174 surviving captives taken from a Portuguese slave ship. This shipment entrenched chattel slavery in the developing Cape Colony.

The VOC slaver Hasselt arrived with 228 enslaved people taken from the West African coast. Together with the Amersfoort shipment, their arrival expanded forced labour at the Cape.

The colonial administration organized free settlers into an armed commando shortly before open conflict with Khoikhoi communities. The militia strengthened settler control over land and livestock.

Khoikhoi fighters led by Doman raided settler herds in an attempt to recover cattle and land appropriated along the Liesbeeck River. The raids opened the first sustained anti-colonial war at the Cape.

Dutch colonial authorities surrendered the Cape to Britain. Indigenous communities and enslaved people remained subjected to colonial rule under a new imperial power.

The missionary Johannes van der Kemp arrived and later worked with Khoikhoi and Xhosa communities. His activities included criticism of settler abuses, although they also formed part of the missionary...

A British invasion defeated Batavian troops near Cape Town and began the second British occupation. Colonial rule over the Cape's African and enslaved population changed hands again.

More than 300 enslaved people and Khoikhoi labourers, led by Louis of Mauritius and others, attempted to end slavery and marched toward Cape Town. Colonial forces defeated the uprising and executed...

Makhanda led thousands of amaNdlambe fighters in a daylight attack on the British military centre at Grahamstown. The assault was a major attempt to resist British invasion and land dispossession on...