The King's Afrikaners? Enlistment and Ethnic Identity in the Union of South Africa's Defence Force during the Second World War, 1939-45

The King's Afrikaners? Enlistment and Ethnic Identity in the Union of South Africa'sDefence Force during the Second World War, 1939-45Author(s): Albert GrundlinghSource: The Journal of African History, Vol. 40, No. 3 (1999), pp. 351-365Published by: Cambridge University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/183618 .

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Yournal of African History, 40 (1999), pp. 351-365. Printed in the United Kingdom 35 I (? I999 Cambridge University Press

THE KING'S AFRIKANERS? ENLISTMENT AND ETHNIC IDENTITY IN THE UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA'S DEFENCE FORCE DURING THE SECOND

WORLD WAR, 1939-45

BY ALBERT GRUNDLINGH

University of South Africa

I N contrast to the situation in Commonwealth countries such as Canada and Australia, South Africa's participation in the Second World War has not been accorded a particularly significant place in the country's historiography. In part at least, this is the result of historiographical traditions which, although divergent in many ways, have a common denominator in that their various compelling imperatives have despatched the Second World War to the periphery of their respective scholarly discourses.

Afrikaner historians have concentrated on wars on their 'own' soil - the South African War of I899-I902 in particular -and beyond that through detailed analyses of white politics have been at pains to demonstrate the inexorable march of Afrikanerdom to power.' The Second World War only featured insofar as it related to internal Afrikaner political developments. Neither was the war per se of much concern to English-speaking academic historians, either of the so-called liberal or radical persuasion. For more than two decades, the interests of English-speaking professional historians have been dominated by issues of race and class, social structure, consciousness and the social effects of capitalism. While the South African War did receive some attention in terms of capitalist imperialist expansion, the Second World War was left mostly to historians of the 'drum-and-trumpet' variety. In general, the First and Second World Wars did not appear a likely context in which to investigate wider societal issues in South Africa.

It is instructive, however, to note what E. J. Hobsbawn has to say on the matter of war and society:

I think the profitability of the studies of social conflict requires more careful assessment... That they always dramatize crucial aspects of social structure because they are here strained to the breaking point is not in doubt. Moreover, certain problems cannot be studied at all except in and through such moments of eruption, which do not merely bring into the open so much that is normally latent, but also concentrate and magnify phenomena for the benefit of the student, while - not the least of their advantages - normally multiplying our documentation about them.2

Hobsbawm's injection has been heeded in particular by numerous British, American and Australian scholars. There is a well developed literature

1 For example, A. Wessels, Suid-Afrikaanse Verhandelinge en Proefskrifte oor die Geskiedenis van die Anglo-Boereoorlog (Pretoria, I987); G. D. Scholtz, Die Ontwikkeling van die Politieke Denke van die Afrikaner, VIII, 1939-1948 (Johannesburg, I984); J. H. le Roux and P. W. Coetzer, Die Nasionale Party, IV and V (Bloemfontein, I986 and I990). 2 E. J. Hobsbawm, On History (London, I998), ii8.



352 ALBERT GRUNDLINGH

dealing with what can broadly be termed 'war and society' studies, emphasising the impact of war on social change and the realignment of power blocs within society.3 In comparison, the work of only a few South Africanists on the First and Second World War falls into this category.4

Research into unexplored aspects of white social history is not unrelated to recent sea changes in South Africa. With the demise of official apartheid in South Africa and the disintegration of Afrikaner nationalism, the social and political context in which history is being conceived, has broadened. Some topics that might have had little intellectual purchase I 5 to 20 years ago, are now being re-evaluated. This development is reflected in the recent pro- liferation of studies on General Jan Smuts, the noted South African politician and statesman-soldier in two world wars. Regarded as a 'traitor' by many 'true' Afrikaners because of what they considered to be his pro- British stance, Afrikaner nationalist historians de-emphasized his role; anti- apartheid historians on the other hand, regarded him as little more than a white supremacist. However, as Saul Dubow and Shula Marks, reflecting on the work of Sir Keith Hancock in general, and his acclaimed two-volume biography of Smuts in particular, have recently remarked, fashions seem to have changed. 'Renewed interest via - his theories of holism, his en- vironmental and scientific concerns and his exemplification of a particular tradition of white South African identity - suggest that Hancock's Smuts will continue to be studied with profit'.' Indeed, and to this can be added that with South Africa once again part of the Commonwealth and the wider world after years of isolation, the political role of Smuts on the world stage has again been highlighted. There is even talk of a 'Smuts renaissance' in South African studies.6

The discursive space that has opened up with wider societal developments has implications which go beyond a rekindled interest in elite figures like Smuts; it alerts historians to social and cultural groupings which have been bypassed because of the emphases of recent historiographies. Those Afrikaners who participated in the Second World War constitute one such

3 See, for instance, M. R. D. Foot (ed.), War and Society (London, I973); A. Marwick, War and Social Change in the Twentieth Century: A Comparative Study of Britain, France, Germany, Russia and the United States (London, I974); A. Marwick, Women at War, I9I4-I9I8 (London, I977); M. A. Nettleship, R. D. Givens and A. Nettleship (eds.), War, Its Causes and Correlates (London, I975); R. F. Weigley (ed.), New Dimensions in Military History (The Hague, I975); B. Bond and I. Roy (eds.), War and Society, I and II (London, I975 and I977); M. Howard, War in European History (Oxford, I976); C. H. Enloe, Ethnic Soldiers: State Security in Divided Societies (New York, I980); V. G. Kiernan, European Empires from Conquest to Collapse, 1815-1960 (London, I982); B. Oliver, War and Peace in Western Australia: The Social and Political Impact of the Great War, 1914-1926 (Perth, I995); J. Damousi and M. Lake (eds.), Gender and War: Australians at War in the Twentieth Century (Cambridge, I995).

4 L. W. F. Grundlingh, 'The participation of South African Blacks in the Second World War' (D.Phil. thesis, Rand Afrikaans University, I987); W. Nasson, 'War opinion in South Africa in I9I4', Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 23 (I995), 89-iI2; B. P. Willan, 'The South African Native Labour Contingent, I9I6-I9I8', Journal of African History, I9 (978), 6I-86.

5 S. Dubow and S. Marks, 'Patriotism of place and race: Keith Hancock on South Africa' (Unpublished seminar paper, University of South Africa, I998), I5.

6 M. H. Meurs, 'De Smuts-Renaissance in Zuid-Afrika', Zuid-Afrika, 72 (995), 57; Meurs, Y. C. Smuts: Staatsman, holist, generaal (Amsterdam, I997), vi-Vii.



THE KING S AFRIKANERS? 353

group. Much has been written on rampant Afrikaner nationalism but far less on Afrikaans-speakers who outwardly did not measure up to the ideal stereotype of what constituted a 'real' Afrikaner. Although the raging torrent of contemporary Afrikaner nationalism which also subsequently carried many Afrikaner historians in its wake, may have all but drowned out other tributaries of thought in Afrikaner ranks, remaining traces of such streams are certainly worth recording on the historiographical map.

In a wider conceptual sense, then, this article explores the seemingly contradictory impact of the war on what was regarded as Afrikaner identity. It attempts to go beyond a narrow political understanding of identity to incorporate cultural dimensions as essential elements in defining and refracting the experiences of certain Afrikaans-speakers during the war.

DIVISIONS AND AFRIKANER RESPONSES AT THE OUTBREAK OF THE

WAR

South Africa went into the war as a divided country; apart from ongoing black-white antagonisms, considerable tensions existed among whites themselves. The all-white parliament decided by a narrow margin of only I 3 votes (8o for and 67 against) that South Africa should participate in the war. The decision to take the country into the war had some immediate repercussions. Smuts became prime minister and leader of the ruling United Party, and in the opposition ranks the National Party under D. F. Malan formed the main parliamentary home of those who considered themselves to be 'true' Afrikaners. In white South African society, attitudes towards South Africa's participation in the war, particularly during the early phases, became a litmus test for ethnic self-identity. Besides the National Party, extra- parliamentary organizations such as the Ossewabrandwag (Oxwagon-sentinel) with their own culture-political agendas also appealed strongly to Afrikaners to eschew what was considered to be yet another war on behalf of the British Empire. Akin to the Ossewabrandwag, but underpinned by a more explicit Nazi-ideology, were organizations such as the Greyshirts and the New Order. Although these organizations were often at loggerheads with one another as to the future direction of Afrikanerdom, their singular defining characteristic was that they represented anti-war Afrikaner opinion.

Anti-war opinion was a corollary of the general thrust of Afrikaner nationalism at the time. Central to Afrikaner nationalism was an emphasis on what was perceived to be a common past, in which the excesses of 'perfidious Albion' - from the time of the Great Trek in the I83os and heightened by the war of I899-I902 against Britain through to the continuing British imperial influence in South Africa in the I940S - loomed large.7 The past had an immediate impact on the present, as is evident in the staging of the commemorative centenary festival of the Great Trek in I938, which harnessed and directed Afrikaner cultural energies into a more robust sense

7 The standard books on Afrikaner nationalism are: D. Moodie, The Rise of Afrikanerdom: Power, Apartheid and the Afrikaner Civil Religion (Berkeley, 1975); H. Adam and H. Giliomee, The Rise of Afrikaner Power (Cape Town, I979); D. O'Meara, Volkskapitalisme : Class, Capital and Ideology in the Development of Afrikaner Nationalism, 1934-1948 (Johannesburg, I983); D. O'Meara, Forty Lost Years: The Apartheid State and the Politics of the National Party, I948-I994 (Johannesburg, I996).




of self-identity.8 It was an identity which professed an antagonism towards all things British and which did not hesitate to express itself forcibly. At the outbreak of war, Smuts had to tread warily not to antagonize and inflame the sentiments of Afrikaners in the anti-war camp. Throughout the ensuing hostilities, Smuts had to perform a difficult balancing act. He had to oversee South Africa's war effort outside of the country, and at the same time had to ensure that his position at home was not undermined by disaffected groups.

Mindful of these considerations and of the divisions in white society, Smuts decided against conscription and relied solely on volunteers to fill the ranks of a defence force which was badly understaffed at the outbreak of hostilities. Still, despite political friction and organisation problems, some I90,000 of a possible total of 570,000 white males of military age enlisted for war service.9 In South African terms it was a fair response, but in other Commonwealth countries, like Australia, with more homogeneous popu- lations and fewer ethnic tensions, substantially more men flocked to the colours.

Determining the exact number of Afrikaans-speakers in the defence force is fraught with a variety of problems. One of them is that an Afrikaans surname is not always a reliable indication of mother-tongue language. Moreover, the government wished to present the force as a united front where differences between Afrikaans- and English-speakers had no place. In official returns, therefore, there was no differentiation on the basis of language. This complicates matters for the historian and the issue is further compounded by the fact that the estimates of Afrikaans-speakers in the defence force during the war vary considerably. Nevertheless, informed observations by E. G. Malherbe, Director of Military Intelligence, who was in a knowledgeable position, suggest that Afrikaans-speakers constituted at least 50 per cent of the force.10

Given the political divisions and anti-war sentiments in many Afrikaner circles, the number of Afrikaans-speakers who volunteered seems surprisingly high. This raises the question of why Afrikaners were prepared to serve in a war which, in its early stages, was widely condemned in Afrikaner circles as an affair of Britain's own making and which should be of no concern to 'true' Afrikaner patriots. An explanation for this apparent anomaly is to be found, firstly, in an analysis of the nature of the recruitment campaign and then in an assessment of the reasons why Afrikaans-speakers enlisted.

RECRUITMENT

There was an awareness amongst government and military officials in charge of the recruiting campaign that as far as the Afrikaans-speaking section of the white population was concerned, a vague generalized appeal to help in the

8 A. Grundlingh and H. Sapire, 'From feverish festival to repetitive ritual: the changing fortunes of Great Trek mythology in an industrialising South Africa, I938- I 988', South African Historical journal, 2I (I989), I9-37.

9 Official Yearbook of the Union of South Africa, I946, 20.

10 E. G. Malherbe, The Bilingual School: A Study of Bilingualism in South Africa (Cape Town, I943), ioi. Other estimates are 'well over half' by S. Patterson, The Last Trek: a Study of the Boer People and the Afrikaner Nation (London, I967), 88, and '70 per cent' by L. Marquard, The Peoples and Policies of South Africa (London, I952), 208.




fight against Nazism abroad might not produce the desired effect; local concerns and sensibilities had to be taken into account. Ideally, the call to arms had to be presented in such a way that it could be construed not as oppositional but as complementary to Afrikaner political and cultural interests.

The way to do this was to link the recruiting campaign, at least outwardly, to the prevailing upsurge of nationalist sentiment as refracted through the commemorative centenary celebration of the Great Trek in I938. The celebrations were unprecedented cultural and political theatre: nine ox- wagons slowly wound their way from Cape Town to the north and crowds dressed in period Voortrekker garb enthusiastically welcomed the procession as it approached towns and cities.1" Bearing in mind the success of this event, recruiting officials sought to stage a similar 'road show', but with a different content and aim. Significantly called the 'Steel Commando' - drawing upon contemporary popular Afrikaner discourse in which the term 'commando' was in common usage as a traditional Afrikaner military form of organisation - a unit consisting of a bugle band, military vehicles and various weapons of war visited numerous small towns to raise awareness of the war. A mobile recruiting van accompanied the procession and a fluent bilingual individual acted as broadcaster to spread the message. At the larger towns, military parades and formal recruiting meetings were held, using local speakers in addition to those accompanying the tour.'2

A number of such recruiting tours, including an 'Air Commando' with military aircraft took place. An important dimension of these tours was their sheer novelty value in rural areas deprived of any form of organized outside entertainment. In some ways it was akin to 'the circus comes to town', and at the very least, on a local level, the 'demonstration tours' served to inject some interest in the war where very little had existed previously.

This was especially the case with the 'Air Commando'. It toured many towns and attracted approximately 350,000 people (more than one-seventh of the white population). A taste of aviational culture in rural districts unaccustomed to aircraft proved to be a winning recipe. While this form of 'visual propaganda' would not have had the same impact in Britain where, as a result of the profile of the Royal Air Force and club flying displays in pre-war days, the average citizens was already 'air-minded', South Africa had only a minuscule air force and fewer than 300 private aircraft, based in urban areas, of which few had ever made an appearance over country towns. For people in the rural 'platteland', even in the larger towns, any visiting aircraft was a source of immediate attraction. The stir caused by the visit of the 'Air Commando' to Upington, a principal and almost exclusively Afrikaner town in the barren Northern Cape, was well described by an intelligence officer who accompanied the tour: The display was attended by 20,000 people, the biggest crowd which had ever gathered in Upington for a single event. One man travelled 6oo miles to see the flying display and hundreds of others came distances ranging from 20 to 500 miles. It was a minor Great Trek in which the transport of half a century ago - ox wagons,

" Grundlingh and Sapire, 'Great Trek mythology', 24. 12 South African National Defence Force (SANDF) Pretoria; Documentation Centre

(DOC), Chief General Staff War (CGS War, 207/45/4 G. Werdmuller - CGS, 3 Oct. 1940.




Cape-carts, donkey wagons, mule-carts - were used equally with the modern sedan car. There were bearded 'ooms' [elderly men] and 'kappie '-[bonneted] clad women, sturdy farmers and their wives and families, thousands of whom had never seen an aircraft at close range in their lives."3

The performances by the 'Air Commando' were the most dramatic and attracted large crowds, but the tours involving a display of weaponry were not far behind. Hardline nationalists in some towns tried to organise a boycott of these displays and although some of them met with a measure of success, often such directives were ignored. Political sentiments were shelved and curiosity took over as the defence force displayed its fire-power and encouraged civilians to handle some of the weapons. Some Afrikaners had a long-standing interest in weaponry, stemming from a life on farms where a rifle was always at hand and where there was a military tradition stretching back to the involvement of successive generations in frontier wars and skirmishes in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, through to the South African War of I899-I902 and the Afrikaner Rebellion of I914. The latest in military hardware thus struck a ready chord. In addition, the military officers on tour emphasized that much of the equipment chosen for display was manufactured in South Africa, such as Marmon-Herrington armoured cars, local howitzers and mortars. Although the onlookers might have had misgivings about South Africa's participation in the war, the display did encourage a sense of nationalist pride in the weaponry that 'our' factories were able to produce.'4

The Afrikaner military past further came into play with attempts to merge that history with the new ideological requirements generated by the Second World War; participation had to be seen not as an aberration of the Afrikaner past, but as a logical extension of it. General J. C. Smuts, himself a veteran of the South African War of I899-I902, made much of the supposed historical continuity. In an attempt to obtain fresh recruits for the desert campaign in North Africa, Smuts typically invoked the Afrikaner heroes of yesteryear:

We are back to the days of swift movement, surprise, mobility and skill - the days of Botha, De la Rey and De Wet, the days of High Adventure. This is the new warfare to which I am calling you, and I know that no country in the world possesses greater aptitude for this mobile warfare than South Africa, with its youth accustomed to life in the open and swift movement over the wide spaces ... Even more mobile than their fathers were on horsebacks, South Africans now fight as their fathers fought in loose formations and with the advantages of great speed and sudden surprise ... The man on the wheels has taken the place of the man on the horse.15

The strategy of establishing linkages with a past to which Afrikaner nationalists had lain prior claim, is readily discernible in the propaganda

13 Cited in J. W. Illsley, "'The weak link that held": A study of wartime official and semi-official propaganda in South Africa, 1939-I942' (B.A. thesis, University of the Witwatersrand, I985), 65. The exposition on the interest in aircraft in South Africa is also indebted to Illsley.

'4 Cf. Illsley, 'Weak link' 64-5. For Afrikaner interest in weaponry, see F. V. Lategan, Die Boer en sy roer (Cape Town, I974).

'5 University of South Africa (Unisa), United Party (UP) Archives, J. M. Conradie Collection, 4.2, J. C. Smuts, Zidi Rezegh and its Call, 5-6.




film, Noordwaarts (To the North). The soundtrack of the film was in Afrikaans only, and the target audience was clearly defined as the rural Afrikaner who was ambivalent or opposed to South Africa's participation in the war. The backdrop to the film was a lounge in a farm house, adorned with ornaments considered to be typically Afrikaner: models of Voortrekker wagons and paintings of the revered president of the republican Transvaal, Paul Kruger, as well as a stuffed lion's head and Boer weaponry. The story line centred on a family called Potgieter. The eldest son, who has enlisted, arrives on leave from a training camp and proudly shows off his modern rifle to his younger brother, and they then compare the rifle with the old 'voorlaaier' (Voortrekker rifle) that has been in the family for generations. The weapons assume an emblematic significance, linking the past with the present. The younger son continues by relating the history of the 'voorlaaier' and the mother adds to the narrative by referring to Voortrekker battles such as Vegkop (I836) and Blood River (I838), visually reinforced by inserts depicting mock enactments of these battles. The black leaders who opposed nineteenth-century Boers are put on a par with Hitler, and the comparison is made that Hitler is just as autocratic and deceitful as these African leaders were deemed to be in nationalist history. This allows the mother to state emphatically that the Voortrekkers never surrendered meekly, and that it is preferable for a Potgieter to die in battle than to stay at home and safely preach neutrality to old women. With an Afrikaans folksong in the back- ground, the final scenes show South African troops in action and flashbacks to the Great Trek and the South African War of I899-I9O2.16

Films, like air shows, were a novelty in the rural areas. Noordwaarts was very popular and was viewed by more than 200,000 people a year. In a medium-sized town such as Standerton in the Transvaal, it attracted 2,000

people. From evidence like this it would appear that the reformulation of Afrikaner history was done skilfully enough to resonate with a number of Afrikaans-speakers.17 It certainly raised concerns in the nationalistic Afrikaner press and readers were warned against the way in which Afrikaner history was being 'distorted' to serve the war aims of the Smuts government.18

In line with attempts to provide an 'authentic' Afrikaner dimension to the war, General Smuts' wife, Issy Smuts, also played a part. Mrs Smuts, a tousled-haired and unprepossessing woman in her early seventies, was fondly portrayed in the press and elsewhere as a nurturing, caring grand- mother, anxious for the welfare of 'her' troops. Mrs Smuts, it was claimed:

was the personification of all those characteristics which are so highly appreciated in the true Afrikaner housewife; the mother of her children and the help of her husband. But this does not nearly do full justice to her. She is also 'par excellence' a volksmoeder (mother of the nation). No better proof of the way in which the nation accepts her, is to be found in the honorary title of Ouma (Granny) which has been bestowed upon her and by which she is widely known.'9

16 National Film Archives, Noordwaarts; Illsley, 'Weak link', 30-I.

17 Illsley, 'Weak link', 3 I . 18 Di Transvaler, 8 July I94I, 'Soetkoek a la Malherbe'. 19 Die Volkstem, 24 Dec. I 942, 'Ouma Smuts' (translation). See also Die Suiderstem I 3

Jan. I94I, 'Inspirerende boodskap van Mev. Smuts'.




Employing the notion of volksmoeder and casting Mrs Smuts in that role, meant forging a direct connection with prevailing views on the prescribed role of women in Afrikaner nationalistic circles. The idea of the self- sacrificing volksmoeder was an integral element in nationalistic gender politics of the I930s.20 By inserting Ouma Smuts into that discourse, it was hoped that the war effort would benefit by being perceived as part of the cultural world in which 'true' Afrikaners moved.

In like vein, sport was also invoked as a common denominator, linking Afrikaner culture and the war. The war broke out at a time when Afrikaner nationalists were increasingly laying claim to rugby as 'their' game. Rugby as a cultural export of the British upper classes had gradually been appropriated by Afrikaners during the first three decades of the century; its aggressive and physical nature appealed to resurgent Afrikaner nationalism and it was considered ideally suited for ideological investment, particularly if Afrikaners could prove that they were better at the game than the English. The nationalistic University of Stellenbosch, home to the young Afrikaner elite, played an important role in its popularization and in disseminating rugby, and increasingly the game was embraced as part and parcel of Afrikaner culture.21

This emergent trend opened up the possibility of associating rugby with war service, and it was suggested that the camaraderie and values instilled on the rugby field could be transferred to the battlefield. Danie Craven, a well- known South African Springbok rugby captain who had joined the defence force in 1938, was roped in to target Afrikaans-speakers specifically. An almost full-page advertisement was placed in certain Afrikaans newspapers with a large photograph of a resolute Danie Craven in uniform, peering into the distance, proclaiming, 'I am playing in the biggest Springbok team ever; join me and score the most important try of your life.' Exhorting fellow Afrikaans-speakers 'not to be spectators only', he encouraged them 'to join their teammates, to push in the scrum; it is the only place for a "true" Springbok', and it was only in this team that the 'sweet sensation' of 'ultimate victory' could be savoured.22

The main thrust of the recruiting campaign was clearly to link the war to Afrikaner history, politics and culture in such a way that South Africa's participation in the conflict could be drained of some of its controversy, and that the war could be seen as a 'natural' continuation of the Afrikaner past and also in the general interest of Afrikaners. The claims of hardline Afrikaner nationalists that they had sole ownership of Afrikaner culture were contested and the space created for a broader view which included the possibility of Afrikaners enlisting for war service. In short, attempts were made to establish the perception that one could join the forces and still be a 'good' Afrikaner.

20 Compare E. Brink, 'Man-made women: gender, class and the ideology of the "volksmoeder",' in C. Walker (ed.), Women and Gender in South Africa (Cape Town, I99I), 288.

21 For the correlation between Afrikaner nationalism and rugby, see A. Grundlingh, A. Odendaal and S. B. Spies, Beyond the Tryline: Rugby and South African Society (Johannesburg, I995), IO6-I35.

22 Die Suiderstem, IO Feb. I942, Advertisement (translation).




REASONS FOR ENLISTING

While the recruiting campaign created a climate conducive for Afrikaans- speakers to enrol, that in itself does not explain why so many of them enlisted. In the final analysis, it was still up to the individual or groups of individuals to take the crucial decision about whether or not to join. Here, a number of factors came into play.

On an ideological level, the notion of 'South Africanism' has a certain relevance. It was an ideology that in part had its roots in capitalist interests which sought to subdue and incorporate a fractious white working-class during a period of considerable strife on the labour front during the first quarter of the century. It presented itself as an embracing ideology, capable of establishing the conditions necessary for optimum growth and of working for the common good. As such, it emphasized voluntarism, co-operation, consensus and harmony.23 This ideology found a ready political home in the United Party and was given added impetus with Smut's holistic philosophy of smaller units being incorporated into larger entities. It promoted a composite white South African nationhood consisting of Afrikaans and English-speakers which stood in contrast to the narrow ethno-nationalist line taken by the National Party. Smuts believed that through industrial development, an improved communications system and an effective civil service, parochial loyalties would dissolve and disintegrate, allowing for the emergence of an overarching white South Africa nation and state which could demand more than sectional loyalty.24

Although 'South Africanism' lacked the emotional and populist rhetoric which sectional nationalists rousingly promoted, its inclusive call did hold out a certain appeal, and some Afrikaners were quite comfortable within a broader fold that through state policy seemed to promote the material interests of all whites. Afrikaners in the United Party certainly realized the importance of economic and political ties with Great Britain which the nationalists sought to deny. Neither were cultural concerns neglected. 'South Africanism' may not have addressed these as strongly as did exclusivist nationalists, but through a 50:50 policy of language equality assuaged possible Afrikaner anxieties over the language issue. In addition, a high rate of working bilingualism amongst many Afrikaners contributed to a certain pragmatic language outlook on the part of those Afrikaners subscribing to 'South Africanism'.25 As long as distinctive Afrikaans interests were not blatantly slighted, they were able to support an ideology which promised internal white unity and linked them profitably to a wider world. This group would then have been more susceptible to wartime appeals which invoked notions of co-operation between Afrikaans- and English-speakers in the face of an external potential totalitarian threat. An officer of a Free State regiment with a large percentage of Afrikaans-speakers

23 B. Bozzoli, The Political Nature of a Ruling Class: Capital and Ideology in South Africa, I890-I933 (London, I98I), 204-7, 28I -2.

24 Cf. F. D. Tothill, 'The 1943 general election' (M.A. thesis, University of South Africa, I987), 258; Giliomee, 'Nation-building in South Africa', (Paper delivered at the South African Historical Society conference, Pretoria, I99I), 3.

25 J. C. Coetzee, 'The bilingual problem in South Africa' in E. G. Malherbe (ed.), Educational Adaptations in a Changing Society (Cape Town, I937), 87-9.




reflected this line of thinking when he commented on the troops under his command, declaring: 'We are but one big family ... We regard ourselves as South African regardless whether we speak English or Afrikaans and we all agree that our cause is worth fighting for.'26 The degree of unanimity might perhaps have been slightly exaggerated, but the discourse revolving around 'South Africanism' is clearly discernible.

Besides the ideology espoused by the United Party, Smuts himself had a personal Afrikaans following. Some of this support can be dated back to his days as a Boer general during the South African War of I899-I902, and at political rallies in the 1940S he made a special point of meeting veterans of that war.27 Closely linked to the affinity for Smuts as a leader was a degree of traditionalism in certain Afrikaner families which found expression in the term 'bloedsap' (a dyed-in-the-wool supporter of the United Party), indi- cating that the political socialization of more than one generation took the form of support for Smuts, as a matter of family preference and pride stretching back over several decades.28 At the time of the Second World War, this 'bloedsap' lineage ensured a core of support for Smuts, and in some cases tangible proof was to be found in several members of the same family enlisting.29

There were also those, particularly among the officers and the more educated, who idealistically claimed that their decision to join was based on what they regarded as the need to defend the indivisible freedom of mankind. In this respect, Malherbe has recalled a conversation he had with Leo Marquard, a fellow Afrikaans-speaking officer in the Army Information Service and a noted author:

I remember vividly one dark night in the Western Desert when the two of us were sitting huddled together in our dugout tent and the sky was being lit up by the occasional flashes of bursting bombs, I said to Leo, 'Do you realise that about 40 years ago your father and mine shared a tent in the Anglo-Boer War fighting against British imperialism. Now you and I are here sharing a tent fighting with the British. Isn't that rather remarkable? ' ' Not really, E.G.,' replied Leo. 'Our fathers were fighting for their freedom against British imperialism. Now we are fighting against a worse imperialism, namely Hitler's. History is the story of man's eternal struggle for freedom'. With these words, Leo virtually epitomized the feelings of so many Afrikaners who volunteered to serve in this war against Nazism.30

Certain Afrikaners might well have had such lofty and laudable motives, but it is doubtful whether the majority was animated by concerns of a highly idealistic nature. Rather more prosaic pecuniary considerations propelled many an Afrikaner into the armed forces. After the depression of the early I930s, despite an upswing in the economy and the government's 'civilized labour' policy, there were still a considerable number of men with limited skills who struggled to eke out an existence. As far as white fortunes were concerned, it was Afrikaners in particular who found themselves at the

26 Die Volkstem, 3 Feb. I94I, 'Vrystaatse Boere in Uniform' (translation). 27 Die Volkstem, 20 Aug. I945, 'Gessels met ou strydmakkers'; Unisa, UP Archives,

Central Head Office, 52/I5, P. J. Schoeman - D. J. Opperman, 3I Oct. I94I. 28 Cf. Unisa, UP Archives, Central Head Office, 52/I5, H. Badenhorst- D. J.

Opperman, 27 Aug. I942. 29 For example, Die Volkstem, 27 Apr. I 942, 'Hulle veg vir ons vryheid'; Die Volkstem,

3 Feb. I94I, 'Vrystaatse Boere in Uniform'. 30 Malherbe, Never a Dull Moment, (Cape Town, I 98 I), 2 I 7.



THE KING S AFRIKANERS? 36I

bottom end of the scale. A contemporary sociologist at the University of the Witwatersrand, J. L. Gray, commented in 1940 that 'Afrikaners were the " have-nots " and the English and Jews the " haves ", and even where Afrikaners were not poor whites, their economic status was low on the average '.31 The lot of the newly urbanized poor Afrikaner was also graphi- cally described by a Dutch Reformed Church commission at the time:

he was looked down upon, he had to come with his hat in hand, he had to be satisfied with the crumbs which fell from the tables of the rich. To make any sort of progress, however little, he had to beg the English oppressor and had to obey his every command. Any job that was offered him, however humiliating, dangerous and lowly paid it might have been, he had to accept with gratitude. He and his family had to be satisfied with the worst living conditions in dirty ghettoes. The door to well-paid occupations was firmly closed. His erstwhile independence was reduced to humiliating servitude and bondage.32

The war accordingly opened up opportunities for impoverished Afrikaners. They may not necessarily have agreed with the decision to enter the war, but their political convictions took second place to their material wants. Often when Afrikaners approached welfare and aid societies in Johannesburg, which were run mainly by English-speakers, they were brusquely told to enlist instead of begging for financial assistance.33 A National Party member of parliament sketched the salience of monetary considerations for Afrikaners in I940, observing that 'only a few days ago I was visited by a young friend of mine who had lost his job ... He is a young able Afrikaner. There was no way out for him and he came to ask me whether he should join up, and I could not stop him.'34

Another National Party member of parliament regarded this as a blatant form of economic conscription, whereby the 'condition of starvation among Afrikaners is being abused in order to force them into the Defence Force'. These Afrikaners, it was argued, had a stark choice, 'you can get bread for yourself, your wife and your children, but the price is your blood - go and join the military units.'35 Although the defence force might not have been their first choice of employment, many Afrikaners, out of sheer desperation, were only too thankful to find a regular income for as long as the war lasted.36

Outside of the urban areas, farmers in financial difficulty also enlisted, often to evade their creditors.37 Another source of Afrikaner recruits was the alluvial diamond diggings at Barkly West where, after the Vaal river had flooded their claims, the diggers sought to exchange the precariousness of their prospecting for the greater financial security of the army.38

Rand Daily Mail, I I Dec. I940, 'South Africa infected by foreign ideologies'. 32 J. R. Albertyn (ed.), Kerk en Stad: Verslag van Kommissie van Ondersoek oor

Stadstoestande, (Johannesburg, I940), 2I6-7 (translation). 3 Oral interview with Mrs J. Terburgh, a social worker in the I 940S in Johannesburg,

24 Oct. I990. I am indebted to Dr D. Prinsloo of the University of South Africa who conducted the interview and kindly lent me a copy of the tape.

34 House of Assembly Debates, 5 Mar. I940, T. van der Merwe. 35 House of Assembly Debates, 24 Jan. I940, J. J. Serfontein. 36 Tothill, '1943 Election,' 293-4. 37 Unisa, UP Archives, Central Head Office, Vol. 52/I5, D. J. Opperman - M. J.

Erasmus, 20 Feb. 194I.

38 SANDF Archives, Doc, Adjutant General (hereafter AG), 24/6/4, Magistrate Wolmaransstad - Col G. Werdmuller, 20 June I94I; Die Transvaler, 26 July I943, 'Bitter lot van delwers'.




Apart from financial considerations, purely personal and individual motives cannot be discounted in explaining Afrikaner enlistment. A sense of adventure, curiosity, and the opportunity of male camaraderie offered by war service ('being one of the boys'), often coupled with a desire to escape domestic strife, were all part of the range of reasons which prompted individuals to join.39 The touristic potential of the war, particularly for rural people who wished to broaden their horizons, was well illustrated by Deneys Reitz, prominent South African politician and author. Although Reitz describes an encounter during the South African campaign in East Africa during the First World War, it could just as well have taken place during the Second World War. Reitz met a simple Boer farmhand, Piet Swart, from the Heilbron district in the Free State during the East African campaign. Swart was delirious from fever, starved and ragged, but upon being asked whether he regretted his enlistment, he replied unequivocally: 'No, he had travelled in a ship, he had seen aeroplanes and Kilimanjaro and elephants, and if his parents wanted to see all this it would have cost them fifty pounds.'40 Unfortunately, Piet Swart was denied the opportunity of telling people back home what he had seen as he was subsequently killed in action.

It is clear from an analysis of the motives of why Afrikaners joined, that the hold of ethno-nationalists was not sufficiently strong to deter them from doing so. Whether these reasons were political, idealistic, pecuniary or personal, or a combination of all these, they transcended the prescriptions emanating from anti-war nationalists. Did this, however, also mean that those Afrikaners who took up arms abandoned their cultural identity in the defence force ?

THE WAR AND IDENTITY

White South Africans fought in East Africa (July I940 to November I940), North Africa (May I94I to November I942), Madagascar (June to November I942) and Italy (April I943 to May I945). Those who served outside the borders of the Union of South Africa had to take a special oath in terms of the Defence Act. This was publicly displayed by a uniform with an orange flash shoulder tab. In the eyes of anti-war nationalists, those who had taken the oath were seen as the handymen of empire and the ultimate betrayers of Afrikanerdom. Politically and culturally, they were regarded as reprobates and singled out for particular opprobrium.41 Such stereotyping meant that subsequent nationalist historians discarded those Afrikaans-speakers who had served in the armed forces, tacitly assuming that in the military blender they had become indistinguishable from their English-speaking counter-

Cf. SANDF Archives, AG 24/7/5, G. Werdmuller - A. Kingwill, 3 June I94I; UP Central Head Office, 52. I5, D. Opperman - M. Kruis, 3 July I944; Springbok, 27 Apr. I944, 'Boerseun se avontuurlus onversadig'; Die Suiderstem, 6 Jan. I94I, 'Veertienjarige loop weg na Kenia'.

40 D. Reitz, Trekking On (London, I933), 88, io6. I am indebted to Dr F. A. Mouton for this reference.

41 Cf. for example, Die Suiderstem, 23 Jan. I94I 'Uitskellery'. Die Transvaler, 3 Feb. I94I, 'Die oorlog'; Die Transvaler, 22 July I940, 'Soldate'; P. F. van der Schyff (ed.), Die Ossewabrandwag: vuurhoutjie in die droe gras (Potchefstroom, I991), 77; P. J. Furlong, Between Crown and Swastika: The Impact of the Radical Right on the Afrikaner Nationalist Movement in the Fascist Era (Johannesburg, I990), I45.




parts. Whether that was indeed the case needs to be examined by looking at the way in which Afrikaans participants handled their war experience in cultural and political terms.

The military world that the new Afrikaner recruit entered, was pre- dominantly British. The defeat of the Boer forces during the South African War of I899-I902 at the hands of the British, meant that as far as South African defence organization was concerned, republican military service traditions and structures were to be replaced by those of the British. The Union Defence Force, established in I9I2, bore therefore a strong British institutional imprint. Between I9I2 and I939 Britain remained the focal point for the development of the Union Defence Force; in the absence of any alternative military model, it was only logical for the leaders of the fledgling South African military to gravitate towards British experiences and norms in shaping the force. In keeping with this military culture, the majority of officers were English-speaking. The sprinkling of Afrikaans officers who did serve between I9I2 and I939, with some exceptions like the ex-Boer general, C. F. Beyers, and Jopie Fourie who had joined the Afrikaner rebels during the uprising of I9I4, slotted into the dominant British character and ethos of the forces.42

Upon induction into this army, some Afrikaner recruits found time- honoured British military conventions strange and in some cases irksome. The notion of 'mess fees , for example, was considered a form of exploitation and it was strenuously argued that the money that was deducted should rather be sent to their families.43 Similarly, for many recruits military discipline was a problem; they were used to living unfettered lives and now they were being hemmed in. There were bitter complaints that they were not granted sufficient leave and were treated like 'prisoners'. When they took up the matter with officers, they were told to 'shut up, you are in the army now, and if you don't keep quiet we'll send you to the detention barracks'.4 Some new recruits were convinced that 'General Smuts did not know what his sons had to endure'. 45

Undoubtedly, for some Afrikaner recruits it was not a matter of slipping effortlessly into an army routine as decreed by British military culture. Apart from problems of adaptation, there was a sense of cultural deprivation. Malherbe was one who was very much aware of this:

However loyal these Afrikaners are towards the British cause and however conversant they are in English, it is not conducive to their morale to be transferred suddenly from an almost exclusively Afrikaans home environment to an environment which is culturally virtually only English.46

42 P. H. Frankel, Pretoria's Praetorians: Civil-Military Relations in South Africa (Cambridge, I984), I4; L. Jooste, 'Die politieke koerswending van I948 besorg 'n nuwe identiteit aan die Unieversdedigingsmag', Militaria, 3I (I996), II3-44.

4 Unisa, UP Archives, Central Head Office, 52/9, L. J. Gouws - D. J. Opperman, 2I Mar. I 944.

4 Unisa, UP Archives, Central Head Office, 52/9, D. van Zyl - D. J. Opperman, i9

July I942 (translation). 4 Unisa, UP Archives, Central Head Office, 52/I6, W. H. Bloem - D. J. Opperman,

28 Mar. I942.

46 Die Transvaler, 30 June I94I, 'E. G. Malherbe aangestel om soldate te bearbei' (translation).




An important issue for many Afrikaner soldiers was the question of language in the army: little attempt was made to maintain a 50:50 policy. There were many complaints about the blatant neglect of, or poor standard of, Afrikaans in official orders. Moreover, Afrikaners felt aggrieved that they were overlooked for promotion because of a less than perfect command of English, while English-speaking soldiers who did not even made an attempt at bilingualism were promoted. As one disgruntled soldier explained: if you come from Durban, went to the right school and your name is "Jack" or "Mac" then you are assured of your position.'47 Such practices rankled, and there were proportionately far fewer Afrikaans- than English-speaking officers.48

Concern about the place of Afrikaans in the defence force is a clear indication that Afrikaans-speakers did not meekly, as nationalist detractors had averred, accept the Anglicized environment in which they found themselves. This is not to deny that in the ranks - given the social context of everyday life in the military - a degree of cross-cultural exchange would have taken place and a certain sense of camaraderie would have developed between Afrikaans- and English-speakers.49 But the point is that on this level, such developments did not necessarily take place at the expense of Afrikaans.

The war experience of many Afrikaans-speakers also had distinct political implications. Although most soldiers still voted for the United Party in the I943 election, there was an increasing subterranean groundswell of antagonism towards the government. Afrikaner soldiers in particular felt that General Smuts had discarded them, that they had made no meaningful contribution to the war effort since they were part of a very much greater Allied army, and that their compatriots who had stayed at home were financially better off.50

The disenchantment of such Afrikaans-speakers with the military coincided with attempts of organizations like the Ossewabrandwag not only to temper their criticisms of Afrikaners who had enlisted but also actively to woo them back into the fold.5" Once it had become clear that the tide of war had turned against Germany, Afrikaner nationalists modified their earlier anti-war policy and this, together with a desire to bring about greater Afrikaner unity, contributed to the more conciliatory attitude towards Afrikaans-speaking soldiers. Although a range of factors account for the Afrikaner victory at the polls in I948, it would not be inaccurate to include among these the social dynamics generated by Afrikaner participation in the

4 Unisa, UP Archives Pretoria, Central Head Office, 52/I5, G. B. van Wyk - D. J. Opperman. This is but one example. The file contains numerous letters with the same complaint.

48 Killie Campbell Library, E. G. Malherbe collection, 56975(982); 447/4, Ds. R. W. Nicol - Moderator Dutch Reformed Church, 9 Jan. I944 (cOpy). I am indebted to Chaplain S. van Niekerk for this reference. See also Malherbe, Never a Dull Moment, 242.

4 For example, A. Paton, Hofmeyr (Cape Town, I97I), 277.

50 For example, SANDF, Doc, CGS 205/45/I, 'Secret report on morale', 2 Apr. I944; Unisa, UP Archives, Central Head Office, 52/8, Report of Lt. J. Greyling, 5 Jan. I943; Unisa, UP Archives, Central Head Office 52/I5, F. van der Merwe- D. Opperman, undated; Tothill, 'I943 Election', 384, Table 22.

51 H. van Rensburg, Die Ossewabrandwag en die parlementsverkiesing, die soldate en die kommuniste (Johannesburg, I943) unpaginated.




war, and the impact of Afrikaner soldiers who had returned much more disgruntled with the United Party government than had been the case upon their enlistment.

CONCLUSION

In contrast to other Commonwealth countries, where the notion of British and imperial kinship still had some common resonance as far as recruitment appeals were concerned, in South Africa a different strategy had to be adopted to lure Afrikaans-speakers into the net. There was less of an emphasis on the commonality of the 'imperial family' and more attention was paid to recasting the war effort in Afrikanerized terms. Furthermore, the fact that at least 50 per cent of the Union Defence Force consisted of Afrikaans-speakers during the war, was only in part due to Smuts's call for 'South Africanism'; personal and financial reasons also propelled Afrikaans- speakers into the military.

Wars often magnify underlying currents in society, and issues which in peace-time may be glossed over, become more clearly delineated in wartime. In the case of South Africa and the Second World War, this is especially apparent in the divisions which emerged in Afrikaner ranks at the outbreak of war. Although these antagonisms were real enough, they were not necessarily, in contrast to existing historical interpretations, of an enduring and unyielding nature. Wartime pressures and developments, and the experiences of Afrikaners in the military underlined the often hybrid and fluid nature of identity - an identity which ultimately was able to ac- commodate divergent views on participation in the war and which was culturally resilient enough to allow for the expression of Afrikaans interests in an overwhelming English-speaking military environment. Politically, this was translated into a greater sense of Afrikanerhood and a common agenda. The war, then, did not turn those Afrikaners who had enlisted into the 'King's Afrikaners' - on the contrary, it diluted the notion of Afrikaner loyalty to the Crown.

SUMMARY

In South African historiography in general, the history of 'war and society' remains relatively underdeveloped. This article looks at one dimension of such history, namely, Afrikaner participation in the Second World War. While there is no shortage of studies on the growth of Afrikaner nationalism during the I 930s and I940S and Afrikaner nationalist opposition to South Africa's entry into the war, little attention has been given to those Afrikaners who, despite nationalist prescriptions, joined the military. The reasons for enlistment and the contradictory impact of the war on Afrikaner identity are analysed. In assessing the way in which Afrikaners in the Union Defence Force dealt with their experiences in an overwhelmingly English-speaking environment, cultural factors are highlighted. It is concluded, in contrast to the existing historiography on Afrikaner nationalism, that the impact of the war on Afrikaner ethnicity was more nuanced and complex than has been hitherto assumed.



Documents

The King's Afrikaners? Enlistment and Ethnic Identity in the Union of South Africa's Defence Force during the Second World War, 1939-45