History
Between the years 1874 and 1880, farmers migrated from the Transvaal to what was then southern Angola. There, they came into conflict with the Portuguese colonial authorities, and some of their number decided to return to the Transvaal, while others migrated further south. [1]
In 1885, William Worthington Jordan bought a tract (fifty thousand square kilometers) of land from the Ovambo chief Kambonde for three hundred pounds, paid as twenty-five firearms, one salted horse, and a cask of brandy. [2] This land stretched almost 170 kilometres (110 mi) from Okaukuejo in the west to Fischer's Pan in the east. [3] Chief Kambonde relied on the help of Jordan to defeat his rival for power, Nehale.
Between 1876 and 1879, at the time of the Dorsland Trek, Boers had crossed the area, heading for Angola. In 1885 some of these trekkers returned and settled at Grootfontein on land given to them free of charge by Jordan. The Republic of Upingtonia was declared on 20 October 1885. [1] At that time, the population of Upingtonia was around five hundred settlers. The state was named after Thomas Upington, prime minister of the Cape Colony, from whom the new state was hoping for support. However, little was forthcoming. [4] In 1886, under the influence of the Boers returning to the Transvaal from southern Angola, the name was changed from Upingtonia to Lijdensrust or Lydensrust.
The short-lived republic's capital was Grootfontein, and its head of state was President George Diederik P. Prinsloo. The new state fought the Herero and became dependent on German protection. In 1886 Jordan was killed by Nehale Mpingana, and the republic collapsed. The next year the area it had covered was incorporated into German South-West Africa. [5]
Boers is the term used for the descendants of the Dutch-speaking Free Burghers of the eastern Cape frontier in Southern Africa during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. From 1652 to 1795, the Dutch East India Company controlled this area, but the United Kingdom incorporated it into the British Empire in 1806. The name of the group is derived from "boer", which means "farmer" in Dutch and Afrikaans.
The South African Republic, also known as the Transvaal Republic, was an independent Boer republic in Southern Africa which existed from 1852 to 1902, when it was annexed into the British Empire as a result of the Second Boer War.
The first modern humans are believed to have inhabited South Africa more than 100,000 years ago. South Africa's prehistory has been divided into two phases based on broad patterns of technology: the Stone Age and Iron Age. Australopithecine fossils have been discovered at Taung and in limestone caves at Sterkfontein, Swartkrans and Kromdraai. In 1999, Unesco designated the region the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage site.
The First Boer War, was fought from 16 December 1880 until 23 March 1881 between the United Kingdom and Boers of the Transvaal. The war resulted in a Boer victory and eventual independence of the South African Republic. The war is also known as the First Anglo–Boer War, the Transvaal War or the Transvaal Rebellion.
The Boer republics were independent, self-governing republics formed by Dutch-speaking inhabitants of the Cape Colony and their descendants. The founders – variously named Trekboers, Boers and Voortrekkers – settled mainly in the middle, northern, north-eastern and eastern parts of present-day South Africa. Two of the Boer Republics achieved international recognition and complete independence: the South African Republic and the Orange Free State. The republics did not provide for the separation of church and state, initially allowing only the Dutch Reformed Church, and later also other Protestant churches in the Calvinist tradition. The republics came to an end after the Second Boer War of 1899–1902, which resulted in British annexation and later incorporation of their lands into the Union of South Africa.
Etosha National Park is a national park in northwestern Namibia and one of the largest national parks in Africa. It was proclaimed a game reserve in March 1907 in Ordinance 88 by the Governor of German South West Africa, Friedrich von Lindequist. It was designated as Wildschutzgebiet in 1958, and was elevated to the status of a national park in 1967 by an act of parliament of the Republic of South Africa. It spans an area of 22,270 km2 (8,600 sq mi) and gets its name from the large Etosha pan which is almost entirely within the park. With an area of 4,760 km2 (1,840 sq mi), the Etosha pan covers 23% of the total area of the national park. The area is home to hundreds of species of mammals, birds and reptiles, including several threatened and endangered species such as the black rhinoceros. Sixty-one black rhinoceros were killed during poaching in Namibia during 2022, 46 of whom were killed in Etosha.
Grootfontein is a city of 23,793 inhabitants in the Otjozondjupa Region of central Namibia. It is one of the three towns in the Otavi Triangle, situated on the B8 national road that leads from Otavi to the Caprivi Strip.
Ondangwa is a town in the Oshana Region of northern Namibia, bordering the Oshikoto Region. Ondangwa was first established as a mission station of the Finnish Missionary Society in 1890. In 1914, it became a local seat of government.
Franz Adolf Eduard Lüderitz was a German merchant and the founder of German South West Africa, Imperial Germany's first colony. The coastal town of Lüderitz, located in the ǁKaras Region of southern Namibia, is named after him.
White Africans of European ancestry refers to people in Africa who can trace full or partial ancestry to Europe. In 1989, there were an estimated 4.6 million white people with European ancestry on the African continent. Most are of Dutch, Portuguese, British, German and French origin; and to a lesser extent there are also those who descended from Italians, Spaniards, Greeks, and Scandinavians. The majority once lived along the Mediterranean coast or in Southern Africa.
Afrikaners are a South African ethnic group descended from predominantly Dutch settlers first arriving at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652. Until 1994 they dominated South Africa's politics as well as the country's commercial agricultural sector. Afrikaners make up approximately 5.2% of the total South African population, based upon the number of White South Africans who speak Afrikaans as a first language in the South African National Census of 2011. Afrikaans, South Africa's third most widely spoken home language, evolved as the mother tongue of Afrikaners and most Cape Coloureds. It originated from the Dutch vernacular of South Holland, incorporating words brought from the Dutch East Indies and Madagascar by slaves.
The South African Wars, including the Confederation Wars, were a series of wars that occurred in the southern portion of the African continent between 1879 and 1915. Ethnic, political, and social tensions between European colonial powers and indigenous Africans led to increasing hostilities, culminating in a series of wars and revolts, which had lasting repercussions on the entire region. A key factor behind the growth of these tensions was the pursuit of commerce and resources, both by countries and individuals, especially following the discoveries of diamonds in the region in 1867 and gold in 1862.
Axel Wilhelm Eriksson was a Swedish ornithologist, settler and trader in what is now Namibia. He was born in Vänersborg, in Sweden.
Dorsland Trek is the collective name of a series of explorations undertaken by Boer settlers from South Africa from 1874 to 1881, in search of political independence and better living conditions. The participants, Trekboers from the Orange Free State and Transvaal, are called Dorslandtrekkers.
Rail service in Namibia is provided by TransNamib. The Namibian rail network consists of 2,687 route-km of tracks (2017).
Nehale lya Mpingana was Omukwaniilwa of Ondonga, a subtribe of the Owambo, in German South West Africa. Their tribal area is situated around Namutoni on the eastern edge of Etosha pan in today's northern Namibia. He reigned over the eastern part of the Ondonga area from 1884 until his death; Kambonde II kaMpingana was chief of the western part.
William Worthington Jordan (1849–1886) was a hunter, trader, and writer in Southern Africa.
The Reformed Churches in Namibia is a confessional Reformed church in Namibia. Reformed people come from Angola to Namibia in 1929. The Dorslandtrekkers were mostly Reformed people who had settled in Angola but later moved to Namibia. The Dorslandtrekkers were originally from Transvaal, South Africa, and migrated northwestward starting in 1874 in two large and one smaller group, starting the Humpata Reformed Church under the Rev. Jan Lion Cachet. Later in 1930 3 congregations were established. More farmers came and the church grew. Missionary work was started in 1969 under the Bushmans of the Gobabis region, Botswana. It has 2,757 members and 14 congregations, and adheres to the Apostles Creed, Nicene Creed, Heidelberg Catechism, Belgic Confession and the Canons of Dort.There's no women ordination. Official languages are Afrikaans, Bushman, Gobabis-Kung.
The Battle of Namutoni fought between the militaries of the Ondonga kingdoms and German South West Africa on 28 January 1904 was part of an uprising against German Colonial expansion catalysed by the Herero Uprising to the south that started a few weeks earlier. It was fought at the site of Fort Namutoni in northern Namibia.
The Grootfontein Reformed Church is a congregation affiliated with the Reformed Churches in South Africa (GKSA) and located in Grootfontein, Namibia. It was officially founded on May 29, 1943, and celebrated its 75th anniversary the weekend of May 26–27, 2018.
Founding of Upingtonia 
