The German Legion.
A Military Colony.

Another matter on which Grey came into collision with the Imperial Government was closely connected with the colonisation of British Kafraria. He asked the British Government to send him out 1,000 military pensioners for settlement on the frontiers of Cape Colony and in Kafraria, where they could at once lead the lives of farmers and be a bulwark of the settlers. It seemed a well-conceived scheme. Colonies of veterans had been planted by Imperial Rome in many of the countries of the Empire and by Napoleon in Northern Italy, and within a decade they were to be planted by Grey himself in the North Island of New Zealand. The Roman military settlements, at all events, were a success; could not Imperial England tread in the footsteps of her ancient homologue? He could not know that the New Zealand pensioner-settlements, like the Napoleonic, were to prove failures. The War Office announced the scheme, but South Africa was so little known in those days that few applications were received, and the matter was allowed to drop. Many of Grey's schemes, though beneficent in themselves, were in advance of his time.

Then it occurred to the War Office in 1856, when the Crimean war was over, that this would be a convenient way of disposing of the German Legion which the refusal of the British populace to enter the army had obliged the Government to enlist for the war in German cities. Grey was attracted by the proposal and induced the Cape Parliament to aid in carrying it out by contributing a sum of £40,000, or £5 a head. Then the first page 107hitch was felt. Grey understood that the whole 8,000 legionaries would be sent out and accompanied (as he phrased it) by "a fair proportion" of marriageable women. His expectations were woefully disappointed. Only 1,930 agreed to emigrate, and with these were only 330 females. Grey had some excuse for maintaining that the War Office had not kept faith with him, but, after all, it could not compel the legionaries to South Africa, and nearly 2,000 military settlers should have been hardly less welcome than 8,000.

Grey's Insubordination.

Still less did Grey keep faith with the War Office. On the plea or pretence that he could not settle in Kafraria men who had no families (as if, in all countries, most emigrants had not been males, unaccompanied by females!), he kept them under arms and on full pay. This was a manifest breach of the understanding with the War Office. That department had stipulated that, if the legionaries were employed in active service, they should receive full pay, but if not so employed, they should be struck off the pay-list. Having ascertained that the Legion was not acting against an enemy in the field, the War Office directed the Lieutenant-General commanding the forces in South Africa to strike off the legionaries. Grey there-upon directed the Lieutenant-General to keep them on the pay-list "until we can hear again from Her Majesty's Government." It was his stereotyped formula in carrying on his rebellions. The War Office persisted in its demand, and the Governor persisted in his refusal, winding up and declaring, in a style he was to repeat in New Zealand, that the censures of the War Office had only made him more resolved to persevere in his resistance. He added that he would follow this line without regarding the cost or the sacrifice that such a course would entail on him. He had grown reckless, and then he was astounded when the necessary consequences of his acts burst upon him.

Grey was no less imperious in his way of clothing his Legion. He coolly ordered the necessary clothes and boots page 108from the military department and sent the bill to the astonished War Office. The War Office was furious, and reiterated its instructions (as he admitted) in "peremptory and positive terms." Grey remained deaf to the official thunder and loftily left it to be settled by the Imperial Government which department should bear the cost. Once more the rebel was victorious. The Lords of the Treasury decided that the War Office should foot the bill.

His Rebellion.

The Governor was not yet done with the German Legion. Having humanely provided it with boots and clothes, he now, with equal benevolence, proposed to supply the legionaries with German wives. He first sought to attain his object by constitutional means, and he proposed to the Colonial Office that it should despatch to Capetown a number of German families, from which the legionaries might select help-meets. The Secretary of State made the obvious criticism that, if the young women of these families were old enough to marry, their parents would be almost past the age of suitable emigrants; and he suggested that some Irish girls of good family should be assisted (apparently by the High Commissioner) to emigrate. It is in connection with this affair that Grey's insubordination, now amounting to positive rebellion can, as at first appears, be most definitely sheeted home to him.

For the despatch of Mr. Labouchere was received by Grey on July 27, 1857, and acknowledged by him on August 22. Yet we are informed that on August 19 he took the extraordinary step of entering into negotiations with a German trading firm, Goddefroy and Co., of Hamburg, and on August 25 he signed the contract. Four thousand Germans were to be sent out; the cost was to be £50,000; and it was to be met by bonds on the revenues of British Kafraria. The arrangement, doubtless through the British Consul at Hamburg, got to the ears of Lord Stanley, the new Secretary of State, who took prompt measures to arrest the proceedings of the page 109Hamburg firm. He informed them of the true nature of the security, and instructed them to abandon their plans. This, they explained, they could not at once do, seeing that emigrants had been already selected. Lord Stanley was constrained to assent to the despatch of 1,600 emigrants, and to pay down £5,000 to compensate them for the breach of further undertakings. He then called Grey sharply to account for acting in defiance of the instructions he had received. Grey replied that he was unaware that the Secretary for the Colonies disapproved of his action. Stanley reminded him of the despatch of June 5.

The facts are not quite conclusive nor the dates quite damning. We are told that he received the inhibitory despatch on July 27. If he then entered into negotiations with the Hamburg firm on August 19, he committed an act of insubordination of the most definite character. But we are also told that he signed the contract six days later.^* How could he have conducted such negotiations to a conclusion in six days with persons in a country situated at a distance of 7,000 miles? Evidently, these negotiations had been going on for some months and cannot have been initiated on August 19. The carriage of a mail from England then consumed, as it appears, 52 days, and between Capetown and Hamburg the distance was greater. Allow fifteen weeks for the double journey and as many days for the drawing up of the contract, and it is plain that Grey must have instructed Goddefroy and Co. as early as the previous April. By that time, as he quite truly said, the Secretary of State had expressed no opinion on the subject, nor, we may add, could he possibly have done so. He was in total ignorance of the matter. Grey therefore stands partially acquitted of the major charge of flying in the face of a prohibition issued by the Colonial Office. But he is not wholly acquitted even of that. For he signed the contract 29 days after he had received a despatch that practically forbade him. to take such action. And he is not even page 110partially acquitted of the charge of taking such action as no subordinate had a right to take. Nor was it other than a blunder to send for German emigrants when English emigrants were available. Did he not believe in the mixture of races—he who advocated a blend between the Maoris and the English?

The matter did not end there. The German firm pressing him for money on account of the emigrants sent, he had personally to meet the expenditure incurred. Some banking relatives of his own, according to his own account, temporarily met his liabilities. Of course, they had ultimately to be discharged by the Imperial Government.