The English South African, His History, Culture and Achievements
It is also true that during the time of the British Empire, many Englishmen came but did not stay. But of course these never became South Africans, so their brief stay in this country is of no relevance to the matter at hand.
And yes, it must be conceded that there were many people from Britain who emigrated here and stayed the rest of their lives, with their children being born here, and yet who regarded themselves as British and regarded Britain as “home”, and thus never became fully South African; and even many of their children, born and bred in South Africa, were almost as guilty of this as their parents. But there are a few points to be made here:
Although there were those who had this attitude, there were a great many who did not, and who gave themselves fully and completely to their new country; and their children and children’s children were South Africans through and through. And even those who did have this attitude were, for the most part, devoted to South Africa and to making it the great country it became. It must also be borne in mind that when the Dutch (ancestors of the Afrikaners) first arrived at the Cape, they were as devoted to Holland as the early British emigrants were to Britain! It is perfectly natural, and has occurred all over the world. It still occurs today, whenever a man emigrates to a new country. Usually that man, no matter how dearly he comes to love his new country, and no matter how hard he works in it and for it, never fully, in heart or in practice, becomes a citizen solely of that country. He remains in many respects a citizen of two countries, of two worlds in fact. How can it be otherwise? He has lived in two worlds, and the attachments of youth to one’s mother country are usually very strong and last a lifetime.
His children, however, born in the new country, grow up to consider themselves citizens of the country far more than their father ever did. They know no other. But again, because of the many stories they hear from their father about the “old country”, the books in the house which come from there and speak well of that place, family ties with people still living there, etc., they may indeed still feel some kind of attachment to it, even if they have never been there.
By the third or fourth generation, however, these ties are either completely eliminated, or extremely tenuous. By that time the man’s descendants are fully integrated into the country to which he emigrated, and feel no attachment to the one he left so long before.
My own family serves to illustrate this. Some of my great-grandparents emigrated from England and Scotland to South Africa. In so many ways they remained English or Scottish till their deaths. Most of my grandparents, however, were born in South Africa. They were South Africans, and they considered themselves to be South Africans, but even so one could definitely notice the strong ties, in various ways, to Britain, a place none of them ever saw. My parents are South Africans, a fact that was made all too obvious when they visited England. And yet even so, they retain a certain “Englishness” in their outlook, habits, etc. It is faint, but it is there. Even I, a fourth-generation South African, feel, through my wonderful childhood memories of my grandparents and great-grandparents, through the story books of my childhood, etc., some strange familiarity with Britain even though I did not visit it until I was almost forty. It is my ancestral heritage, and I exult in it, for it is a wonderful heritage, a connection to a nation greatly blessed of God in the past, a great nation, which has contributed more to the world than any other nation on earth since Roman times. But am I British? No. I am a South African through and through. This is my home, and I do not in any sense regard Britain as “home”.
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Filed under: History without the humbug