South Africa, Republic of

South Africa, Republic of Former British dominion. During the French Revolutionary War, British troops seized the Dutch settlement at the Cape of Good Hope. Handed back in 1802, the Cape was again captured in 1806 and became Cape Colony. Many Afrikaners (Boers) were irked by British rule and migrated eastward and northward to found the self‐governing republics of Transvaal and the Orange Free State.

Diamonds were discovered at Kimberley in 1868 and Cape Colony quickly claimed ownership of the district. When gold was found in the Transvaal in the 1880s there was no doubt about the ownership of the land but the exploitation of the discovery depended heavily upon outside capital. This became the excuse for British intervention in the Transvaal which led to war between British and Afrikaners from 1899 to 1902. After the war the republics became British colonies and were joined with the older colonies in the Union of South Africa in 1910.

The majority of white South Africans supported Britain during the First World War, but with Afrikaners in the majority among the white population there was growing opposition to membership of the British empire. South Africa's participation in the Second World War was less enthusiastically received by many whites. A policy of white domination had always been accepted by both British and Afrikaners, but the victory of the National Party in the 1948 elections saw the policy carried to such extremes as to arouse international condemnation, resulting in South Africa's quitting the British Commonwealth in 1961 and becoming a republic.