Missionaries Settle at Warm Bath
Missionaries settle at Warm Bath — The people of their charge — Africaner joins the mission — Death of A. Alhrecht — Pleasing prospects blasted — Murder of Hans Drayer — Painful dilemma — Trying alternative — A curious exhumation — Warm Bath destroyed — Hints to new missionaries — Death of Mrs. Albrecht — Light at even-tide.
From the preceding description — though a mere glance at Africaner’s character, or like a single leaf from which a volume might be produced — it may be seen that it was a most desirable object for the mission¬ aries to make him and his people the centre of their labours; or otherwise to obtain a sphere sufficiently distant to prevent any thing like collision between the people of their charge, and so formidable a neighbour. Humanly speaking, had the former plan been adopted, the evils which succeeded might have been prevented. The latter, for reasons obvious to the missionaries, was unfortunately chosen, and they removed to the Warm Bath, about 100 miles west of the neighbourhood of Africaner.
Taking up this place, as likely to become a permanent abode, they pitched their tent, though there was nothing lovely in its appearance, the neighbourhood being bare and sterile; and the small portion of ground capable of being irrigated by the hot spring so salt, that little could be expected to grow. People and water were, however, the objects of the missionaries’ pursuit; and of all places they had seen or heard of, this was the most likely in which to congregate a tolerable, though at most a small, community. Here they resumed their labours of love, casting the heavenly seed in the hearts of their hearers. These were composed of a mixed multitude of Namaquas, and Bastards from the Colony, (called on that account Oorlams,) whom they, as well as other missionaries, found it difficult to manage. Originating in the Colony, proud of their superior know¬ ledge, and having a smattering of the Dutch language, they stood high in their own estimation, and despised the aborigines. This, in many instances, gave rise to dissension, discord, and war, so as even to overthrow the labours of the missionaries, and turn a thriving settlement into desolation.
For a season the prospects of the brethren continued cheering, their labours being blessed. They were “instant in season and out of season” to advance the temporal and spiritual interests of the natives, though labouring in a debilitating climate, and in want of the common necessaries of life. Their table, for a long time, the lid of a wagon-chest, was covered with the most scanty fare. One feels at a loss, while reading their journals and letters at this season, which most to admire, their zeal, their self-denial, or their resignation to a life of hardship. While labouring here, their congregation was increased even by that desperado Afri¬ caner, who, with part of Ins people, drew near, and attended occasionally the instructions of the mission¬ aries, who visited bis place in return. It was here, and at this time, that Jager, afterwards Christian Africaner,
listened with attention to the first principles of the doctrine of Christ; and it was to this period that he frequently referred in his communications with me, that he saw “men as trees walking.” But this was only a transient glimpse; for a degree of jealousy, and perhaps alarm, was excited in the minds of the inhabitants on the station, which influenced Africaner to retire to his wonted distance, with the full consent of the mission¬ aries, who, had it been in their power, would gladly have prevented the separation. Abraham Albrecht soon after married; but, ere long, he was compelled by ill health to leave the station, and proceed to the Colony, where he hoped that, by medical advice, and attention to regimen, his system might be restored. His frame was not naturally strong, and his constitution ill able to weather the hardships which had marked his short career. On the 14th of May, 1810, he took an affectionate and touching farewell of the flock at Warm Bath, and, accompanied by his brother Christian, left Mr. Tromp to carry on the work of the mission. After a journey, trying and tedious in the extreme to a sick man, he reached the hospitable mansion of Mr. and Mrs. Botma, the faithful and devoted friends of missionaries, at Honing Berg, near Tulbagh, where he finished his earthly course on the 30th of July. Shortly before he fell asleep in Jesus, he read a chapter, and conversed on its contents. To the inquiry how he felt, he replied, “I go to Jesus; I am a member of his body.” The writer has stood by his grave with his widow (now Mrs. Ebner) who, pointing to it with much feeling, referred to his tranquil passage into eternity, his deep anxiety for the heathen flock he had left, and the charge he gave his attendants, entreating them to “cleave unto the Lord.” Immediately after this event, Christian Albrecht, who had proceeded to Cape Town, was married to Miss Burgman, a lady of superior education and promise, who had long burned with a holy zeal to encounter the perils of the wilderness, to make known the savour of a Redeemer’s name among the perishing sons and daughters of Africa. For this purpose, as her biographer states, “she cheerfully relinquished all the gratifications that a pleasing connexion with her pious and respectable friends at Rotterdam afforded, ready to encounter the privations and hardships which she fully expected.” Eminently qualified for her intended station, and fondly anticipating many successful years in the work which had so long been the cherished purpose of her soul, she left with her husband for the scene of her labours in Great Namaqua-land, taking with them the widow and child of their departed brother. On their arrival she entered on her long-anticipated labour with the utmost ardour; but, alas! a heavy cloud was gathering, which in a few months darkened their cheering prospects, and burst on the mission, which had just begun to bid fair for permanent success.
An event so painful and destructive to the mission cause, requires that some notice be taken of its origin; which I shall do nearly in the language of the late Rev. J. Campbell, in his tract, ‘‘The Life of Africaner,” with slight corrections and additions.
“Africaner being an outlaw, could not visit the Colony or Cape Town, and in order to procure supplies, employed others. He en¬ trusted Hans Draycr with three teams of thirty oxen, commission¬ ing him to purchase a wagon for Africaner with the tw’enty, and with the remainiuiy ten to hrini? it home: and at the same time allowing an ample reward for Hans. He had not gone far into the
ColoDy before he met a farmer to whom he owed a large debt, and who very naturally seized the whole. Hans returned chop-fallen to Seidenfaden’s missionary station at Kamiesberg, of which he had the charge during Mr. S.’s absence. Africaner hearing of what had happened, went in quest of Hans, whom he expected to find humble, but who was insolent to the last degree. On their punish¬ ing him with a shambock, he seized a gun, and levelled it at Afri¬ caner, but he was instantly despatched.”
Mr. Seidenfaden having left debts behind him, among the Great Namaquas, and some of the Afri¬ caners, a portion of his property was seized. After this the friends of Hans, with the assistance of the Namaquas, sought revenge on the people of Afri¬ caner, but not succeeding, obtained assistance from the people of Warm Bath. This, with a false report that they had taken some of his cattle, and that the missionaries were their abettors, dreadfully enraged Africaner, who vowed vengeance on the mission.
The situation of the missionaries and their wives was now most distressing. Among a feeble and timid people, with scarcely any means of defence, a bare country around, no mountain-glen or cave in which they could take refuge, a burning sun, and a glowing plain; 200 miles from the abodes of civilized men, between which lay a waste, howling wilderness, and the Orange River, seldom fordable by wagons. Such was their position, with the human lion in his lair ready to rouse himself up to deeds of rapine and blood. This is no coloured picture, for the writer has with his family been placed in circumstances not dissimilar: experience is requisite to aid in just conceptions of so trying a moment. For a whole month they were in constant terror, hourly expecting the threatened attack. The hearts of the missionaries were riven with anguish; their souls revolted at the idea of abandoning the people, who were now suffer¬ ing from want, to become a prey to one from whom they could expect no quarter. On one occasion they dug square holes in the ground, about six feet deep, that in case of an attack they might escape the halls; there they remained buried alive for the space of a week, having the tilt sail of a wagon thrown over the month of the pit, to keep off the burning rays of an almost vertical sun. As one of the sufferers told me, she scarcely knew whether they had to suffer most by day or by night, for the heat sometimes amounted nearly to suffocation. From this place they removed, at the suggestion of Fledermuis, a chief, northward to the base of the Karas mountains; hut finding it impossible to settle, they retired to the Colony to seek counsel and assistance.
But to return to Africaner. He spread devastation around him, attacked the Namaquas, and proceeded to Warm Bath. Finding it abandoned, his followers commenced a rigid search for any articles which might have been concealed for safety in the earth, and were but too successful. While the plunderers were engaged in their destructive operations, an incident occurred, almost too ludicrous for so melancholy a recital. As the triumphant chief and his adherents were revelling in their ill-gotten spoils, not without some qualms of conscience, derived from the light, however little, which they had received, especially as they now stood upon holy ground, which recalled the scenes of hy-gone days, one of the chieftain’s attendants strayed into the burying-ground, where
already a few mounds distinguished it from the surrounding waste as the place of the dead. Stepping over what he supposed a newly closed grave, he heard, to his surprise, soft notes of music vibrate beneath. He stood motionless, gazing over his shoulder, with mouth and eyes dilated, hesitating whether to stand still, and see the dead arise, which he had heard the missionaries preach about, or take to his heels. After no little palpitation of heart, in order to assure himself, he mustered courage to make another trial, for the tones he had heard had died away. His second leap again roused the sepulchral harp, which now fell in soft but awful cadence on his ear. Without casting an eye behind, he darted off to the camp, and, with breathless amazement, announced to Africaner the startling discovery he had made of life and music in the grave. The appearance of the man convinced Africaner that he was in earnest, for reason seldom reels in that country. The chief, fearless of the living or the dead, was not to be scared even by the supposed spectre of the tomb, arose, and ordered his men to follow him to the spot. One jumped, and another jumped, and at each succeeding leap, succeeding notes of the softest music vibrated on the ear from beneath. Recourse was had instantly to exhumation. The mysterious musician was soon brought to light. It proved to be Mrs. Albrecht’s piano-forte, which she had taken with her
from London, and which was the first ever conveyed
into the Transgariepine regions. Being too cumbrous to be taken in a hasty flight, it had been buried in a soil where, from the entire absence of moisture, it might, but for this circumstance, have remained unscathed. Africaner, whose martial spirit made him a fitter associate for Mars than for the Muses, allowed the instrument to be dissected, parts of which I have seen, from which those fingers now silent in the grave had called forth divine harmony.
To finish the varied hut sorrowful detail, one of the men of Africaner, on seeing him depart, took a fire¬ brand, and set fire to the houses and huts, which were soon reduced to ashes, and thus the light of Divine truth, which had just been enkindled in those gloomy regions, was extinguished for a season, and a peaceful Zion reduced to a heap of ruins. I have walked over them in pensive sorrow, and slumbered among them, when the owl only, with its melancholy note, broke the death-like silence which reigned, or the gaunt hyena howled in quest of prey. It might be profitable to improve this event, by tracing to their source the succession of evils which befell that mission. It might afford instructive lessons to those who may be similarly situated. It is, however, not my object to preach, but faithfully to narrate past events; leaving my readers, especially such as have entered into the labours of others, of whose sufferings it is scarcely possible for them to form an adequate conception, to make the improvement. I have known a newly arrived missionary listen to the apparently romantic tale of a veteran of the above order, with the conviction, that the exaggerated picture he drew of past trials must have been the effect of an intellect partially weakened. It is impossible to take a minute
survey of the lives and labours of some of our miS’ %/
sionaries, whose names have become, like their voices, silent in death, without concluding that “there were
giants in those days,” like Christian Alhrecht; a glance at whose concluding days, and those of his beloved partner, must close the present chapter.
Driven by necessity, as we have previously shown, to the Colony, a visit to Cape Town cheered their drooping spirits a little, though still feeling the effects of previous suffering; for Mrs. A. writes, just on the eve of again returning, in December 1811, ad¬ dressing the Directors, Yes, dear brethren, we have suffered much in every respect, and my soul and body are very much dejected.” After a most distressing journey, sometimes under apprehension of perishing in the wilderness, they reached Silver Fountain, the residence of Cornelius Kok, who again rendered signal service to the weary, worn-out travellers. Here Mrs. Albrecht breathed her last, on the 13th of April, just five days after their arrival; and when she anticipated some repose, she was re¬ moved to an eternal rest; to the last her heart was fixed on her Master’s work. The Namaqua mission was resumed at Pella, south of the river, which was so called from its becoming the place of refuge; there they were joined by about 500 of the Warm Bath people. Mr. C. Albrecht having occasion again to go to the Cape for medical advice, as his health had been for some time declining, while there engaged in his Master’s business, suddenly expired, leaving behind him a bright testimony of zeal, love, and self-denial seldom equalled. His labours follow him, while his remains slumber beside those of Dr. Vanderkemp, on a foreign shore, waiting the sound of the last trump. But before he was called, like a faithful servant, to the “joy of his Lord,” a delightful realization of the faithfulness and mercy of Jehovah was permitted to enlighten and cheer his latter days. Many and fervent were the prayers which he and his coadjutors had offered up to the throne of God for the poor Namaquas, and for Afri¬ caner too. These prayers were heard; and before leaving the country, he had the ineffable joy, which it would require an angel’s tongue to describe, of making peace with Africaner, and seeing the standard of the Prince of Peace reared in the very village of the man who once “breathed out threatenings and slaughter” against not only his fellow heathen but against the saints of the Most High.