¹ The Corner House alone required 1,300,000 Ibs a month for its compounds while the total yearly requirement for all compounds was estimated at 80,000 cattle. (Select Committee on the Meat Producers' Exchange Ltd, SC 9–1922, 148 and Farmer's Weekly (1 June 1921).)

² See Van Onselen, C., Studies in the Social and Economic History of the Witwatersrand, 1886–1914 (Johannesburg, 1982).Google Scholar

³ The big African mineworkers' strike of 1920 underlined the danger of depressing wages further.

⁴ The best expression of this, albeit at a high level of abstraction, is Stanley Trapido's ‘Maize and Gold alliance’. (‘South Africa in a comparative study of industrialisation’, J. Development Studies, vii (1971).)Google Scholar

⁵ Westcott, N., ‘The East African sisal industry, 1929–49. The marketing of a colonial commodity during depression and war’, J. Afr. Hist. xxv (1984).Google Scholar

⁶ For the development of monopoly and monopsony in mining see Innes, D., Anglo American and the Rise of Modern South Africa (Johannesburg, 1984)Google Scholar; for the Rhodesian meat industry see Phimister, I. R., ‘Meat and monopolies. Beef cattle in Southern Rhodesia 1890–1938’, J. Afr. Hist. xix (1978).Google Scholar

⁷ A start has been made in dismantling the shibboleth ‘that there exists such a creature as “the farming interest”, monolithic (and) formidably organised’. (O'meara, D., ‘Class, Capital and Ideology in the Development of Afrikaner Nationalism 1934–48’ (D.Phil, thesis, University of Sussex, 1979), 8.) Much however remains to be done in the disaggregation of ‘Agriculture’.Google Scholar

⁸ The compound system allowed the mines to feed labour at very cheap rates. See Turrell, R., ‘Kimberley: Labour and Compounds 1871–1888’ in Marks, S. and Rath-Bone, R. (eds), Industrialisation and Social Change in South Africa (London, 1982)Google Scholar, and ‘Kimberley's model compounds’, J. Afr. Hist. xxv (1984).Google Scholar Also Levy, N., The Foundation of the South African Cheap Labour System (London, 1982), 43.Google Scholar

⁹ Stanley Trapido found a similar overlap between public office and personal fortune in the Transvaal (‘Reflections on land, office and wealth in the South African republic 1850 to 1900’, in Marks, S. and Atmore, A. (eds), Economy and Society in Pre-Industrial South Africa (London, 1980), 354–357).Google Scholar

¹⁰ Dictionary of South African Bibliography, xi (Cape Town/Johannesburg, 1972), 267–268Google Scholar; evidence of Graaff, , Report of Select Committee on Meat Producers' Exchange Ltd, SC 9–1922, 300Google Scholar; evidence of Malan, C. W., Report of the Select Committee on the Beef Export Bounties Bill, SC 11–1923, 26.Google Scholar

¹¹ In 1922 the surplus was estimated at 200,000. Evidence of Graaff, SC 9–1922, 106.

¹² Farmer's Weekly (24 November 1920).Google Scholar

¹³ Perren, R., The Meat Trade in Britain 1840–1914 (London, 1978), 207–209.Google Scholar Farmers in Argentina tried to wrest the cold-storage facilities from the control of local and foreign capitalists, but by 1909 had failed.

¹⁴ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 94 and 354.

¹⁵ In 1917 South African beef exports peaked at 309, 214 quarters. SC 11–1923, 7.

¹⁶ The Low Grade Mines Commission (1920) warned that 24 out of 30 of the Reefs gold mines would become unprofitable should prevailing conditions show no improvement.

¹⁷ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 37.

¹⁸ Barlow Rand Archives, Johannesburg (hereafter BRA), 22nd TCL Annual Report for 1916, chairman's address.

¹⁹ The most important item in this preparation was fencing, which was three times more expensive in 1920 than it had been in 1914. Department of Agriculture. Report for year ended 31 March 1919, UG 40–1919, 33; BRA, TCL Directors' Report for 1919.

²⁰ Farmer's Weekly (20 June 1923).Google Scholar

²¹ BRA, TCL Annual Report for 1919, chairman's address.

²² Between 1917 and 1920 meat supplied to the Rand Mines rose from 4d. to 5d. per lb. Report of the Meat Trade Commission, UG 9–1920, 5; Johnstone, F. A., Class, Race and Gold. A Study of Class Relations and Racial Discrimination in South Africa (London, 1976), 96.Google Scholar

²³ For example, bulk purchases from the Central Western Cooperative in the Transvaal. Farmer's Weekly (21 May 1924).Google Scholar

²⁴ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 10.

²⁵ UG 9–1920, 18.

²⁶ South Africa's Who's Who Social and Business 1923–4 (Cape Town, 1924)Google Scholar; Archives, Barclays Bank, Johannesburg (hereafter BBA), Minute Book No. 21, 8 November 1918, 47.Google Scholar

²⁷ Evidence of J. H. van der Horst, SC 9–1922, 458.

²⁸ Central Archives Depot, Pretoria (hereafter CAD), Governor General's Correspondence (hereafter GG), GG 3/1800, S. E. Barbour to Governor General, 2 March 1915. See also the evidence of Hunt, E. W. and Van Der Horst, J. H., SC 9–1922, 450 and 493–494; Report of the Select Committee on the Imperial Cold Storage and Supply Company, Ltd., Railway (Private) Bill, SC 4–1915; Die Burger (12 August 1922). All translations are my own.Google Scholar

²⁹ The state set up a number of commissions to investigate complaints. Their published reports include Findings of the Board of Control in an Enquiry into the Meat-Trade conducted at Johannesburg on the 28 February and 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 6th March 1822, UG 21–1922, and also a host of reports from cost of living commissions, including Cost of Living Commission – Profit Report, UG 1–1919.

³⁰ The two major cost of living commissions of enquiry were chaired by H. Pim (1918–20) and G. Owen-Smith (1920).

³¹ Report of the Meat Trade Commission, UG 9–1920, 21.

³² Between 1911 and 1920 the auctioneers' turnover was £46 million.

³³ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 15.

³⁴ A suggestion of the close ties between the ICS and the auctioneers is that Bateman, manager at one time of the ICS, was a prominent member of the Rand Livestock Auctioneers Association in 1919. CAD, LDE 18454, 19579. Meeting of the Land Board, 15 August 1919.

³⁵ Farmer's Weekly (24 November 1920).Google Scholar

³⁶ The ICS too had an intricate system of buying cattle in the country, which was later to place it in a powerful position to hinder the MPE. See The Middelburg Observer (8 April 1921) and SC 11–1923, 21.

³⁷ The auctioneers' position was made stronger by the commercial banks calling in their loans. The auctioneers consequently claimed to be ‘the only cash bank in this country’. Evidence of W. J. Ellis and C. R. Hardy, SC 9–1922, 164 and 213; BBA, Minute Book No. 25, 10 September 1920, 186.

³⁸ In mid 1921 a fall in the maize price and farmer pressure for a higher producer price for maize led the state to pay £0.5 million too much for the maize crop. Attempts to get farmers to repay their debt plunged agriculture into chaos and increased political opposition to the SAP government. See Morrell, R., ‘Competition and cooperation in Middelburg, 1900–1930’ in Beinart, W., Delius, P. and Trapido, S. (eds), Putting a Plough to the Ground (Johannesburg, forthcoming).Google Scholar

³⁹ See Onselen, Van, ‘The Main Reef Road into the Working Class’, Studies in the Social and Economic History of the Witwatersrand.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ Farmer's Weekly (25 August 1920).Google Scholar

⁴¹ In early 1920 a South African Cattle Breeders Association was formed. Farmer's Weekly (13 April 1920)Google Scholar and The Star (23 August 1920).Google Scholar

⁴² Farmer's Weekly (25 May 1921).Google Scholar

⁴³ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 3.

⁴⁴ CAD, Department of Agriculture (LDB), LDB 1516, R2311, Report of Annual Meeting, 7 September 1922, 4.

⁴⁵ Evidence of Ellis, SC 9–1922, 198.

⁴⁶ The Star (12 July 1920).Google Scholar

⁴⁷ CAD, LDB 1516, R2311, Registrar of Cooperative Societies to Secretary of Agriculture, 16 February 1923.

⁴⁸ For a discussion of marketing problems see Grosskopf, J. F. W., ‘Marketing of agricultural products’, Economic Society of South Africa – Proceedings of Conference, Johannesburg (July 1925), 27.Google Scholar Also Bosman, A. M., Cattle Farming in South Africa (Pretoria, 1932), 29–34.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Farmer's Weekly (9 January 1924).Google Scholar

⁵⁰ CAD, LDB 1516, R2311, Report of Annual Meeting, 7 September 1922, 5.

⁵¹ CAD, LDB 1516, R2311, Report of Annual Meeting, 7 September 1922, 21.

⁵² CAD, LDB 1516, R2311, Minute from Secretary of Agriculture to Minister of Agriculture, 4 June 1923.

⁵³ The FCMI was later to suffer a similar fate to that of the MPE, and was taken over by the ICS. (Evidence of M. Alexander, MLA, SC 9–1922, 250–3.) Another body similar to the FCMI, Smithfields Cold Storage, also suffered the consequences of competing with the ICS by going bankrupt in 1925. (See The Middelbwg Observer (6 February 1920), and CAD, Department of Justice, JUS 5/95/25.)

⁵⁴ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 19.

⁵⁵ Phillips's elder son, H. L, Phillips, managed his father's farm and was also a leading member of the S.A. Cattle Breeders' Society, which had been formed by noted Swaziland rancher Allister Miller and reflected big ranch interests. H. L. Phillips was later unmoved by the fall of the MPE.

⁵⁶ Evidence of Graaff, SC 9–1922, 94.

⁵⁷ It becomes possible to speak of ‘the mines’ after the feud between the mining companies was ended in 1911 by the agreement over labour recruiting. See Jeeves, A. H., ‘Competitive recruiting and labour piracy in South East Africa, 1900–1921’, paper to the History Workshop ‘Town and Countryside in the Transvaal’Google Scholar; Innes, , Anglo American, 58.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ The difference between the open market price and the quarantine market price, for example, was reduced from £5 (1918–20) to five shillings (June 1922). This vindicated the early optimism of the Northern Transvaal farmers. CAD, LDB 1516, R2311, Report of Annual Meeting, 7 September 1922, 5.

⁵⁹ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 17.

⁶⁰ The Star (20 September 1921).Google Scholar

⁶¹ The Star (6 September 1921).Google Scholar

⁶² When the JLAA's interests were directly threatened, they forsook their tacit agreement with the mines and the ICS and attacked the MPE, which at this point enjoyed the blessing of the mines.

⁶³ The Star (26 April 1922).Google Scholar

⁶⁴ The auctioneers' £15,000 ‘war chest’ was exhausted, so they were unable to continue the fight against the MPE. Farmer's Weekly (15 February 1922); UG 21–1922, 3.Google Scholar

⁶⁵ The auctioneers were not utterly defeated, for in January 1923, as the MPE experienced difficulties, they formed a union which, Die Burger claimed, was ‘ primarily aimed against the MPE’ (17 January 1923).

⁶⁶ Farmer's Weekly (12 September 1923).Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Towards the end of 1912 Hertzog specifically singled out Smartt for attack on these charges in his famous de Wildt and Nylstroom speeches. Shortly afterwards in 1914 Hertzog and his followers indicated the strength of their feelings by breaking with the SAP and founding the National Party (NP).

⁶⁸ The NP gained 44 seats in the 1920 general election, which made it the largest party in the House of Assembly. The SAP had 41 seats and the Unionists 25. Smuts only retained power with Unionist support, but late in 1920 he strengthened his position by absorbing the Unionists. In the 1921 election the NP won 45 seats and the SAP 79. Smuts tried to bridge the gap between the SAP and NP but abandoned these efforts in September 1922. This may well have set him on a more partisan course in the MPE affair, for he was now free to ignore rural NP supporters.

⁶⁹ Evidence of Graaff, SC 9–1922, 308.

⁷⁰ Evidence of Hunt, SC 9–1922, 508.

⁷¹ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 386.

⁷² Evidence of E. Edwards and W. Light of the Witwatersrand Master Butchers Association, SC 9–1922, 270.

⁷³ Who's Who in South Africa (London, 1923)Google Scholar; BRA, Vol. 222, File 37, J. E. Orr to L. Phillips, 29 March 1906; Die Burger (12 February 1923).Google Scholar

⁷⁴ Evidence of Gwynn and J. H. Van Der Horst, SC 9–1922, 41 and 475.

⁷⁵ Die Burger (12 February 1923).Google Scholar

⁷⁶ Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 359.

⁷⁷ CAD, LDB 1516, R2311, Report on Meeting, 7 September 1922, 22.

⁷⁸ Farmer's Weekly (10 January 1923).Google Scholar

⁷⁹ Leisk was also a director of the TCL! Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 70 and 397; BBA, Minute Book no. 28, 11 and 21.

⁸⁰ Liebigs was an international canning concern which, together with the ICS, controlled the meat-processing industry in South Africa. Though they were often in competition with one another, they seem to have sunk their differences on this occasion when faced with a common threat.

⁸¹ Farmer's Weekly (31 January 1923).Google Scholar

⁸² Evidence of C. R. Hardy and W. J. Ellis, SC 9–1922, 148; Die Burger (12 February 1923)Google Scholar; Farmer's Weekly (14 February 1923).Google Scholar

⁸³ Farmer's Weekly (25 April 1923).Google Scholar

⁸⁴ Shipping was also prone to monopoly control and Graaffs intrusions. In 1915 it was alleged that he used his cabinet position to meddle in the affairs of the Union Castle Line, while later in 1924 allegations of a ‘shipping ring’ circulated. Hertzog paid attention to widespread discontent with freight services in 1929 by creating a Shipping Board (Act no. 20 of 1929) to investigate the situation. CAD, GG 3/1800, S. E. Barbour to Governor General, 2 March 1915; The Star (4 September 1924).Google Scholar

⁸⁵ Farmer's Weekly (11 April 1923).Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Die Burger (21 May 1923).Google Scholar

⁸⁷ The proliferation of co-operatives throughout South Africa in the early 1920s placed severe strain on the Land Bank's resources, and the catastrophic 1921 over-advance meant that little extra cash was available for funding other agricultural enterprises.

⁸⁸ Farmer's Weekly (10 June 1925).Google Scholar

⁸⁹ CAD, LDB 1516, R2311, memos submitted by directors commenting on joint and several guarantee, n/d.

⁹⁰ Die Burger (24 May 1923)Google Scholar; Rand Daily Mail (10 May 1923).Google Scholar

⁹¹ Smartt himself headed the ‘Smartt syndicate’, a cattle syndicate which enjoyed a privileged position on the Johannesburg market. He therefore had little incentive to support the MPE. (Evidence of Gwynn, SC 9–1922, 52; evidence of Graaff, SC 9–1922, 100.)

⁹² Hertzog's government scrapped the Beef Bounties Act from 31 May 1925. David Kaplan has mistakenly described the above act as an aid to agricultural exporters although the general thrust of his argument correctly identifies the hostility of the Smuts government towards farmers. (‘Class Conflict, Capital Accumulation and the State: An Historical Analysis of the State in Twentieth-Century South Africa’ (Ph.D. thesis, University of Sussex, 1977), 216.)Google Scholar

⁹³ Die Burger (12 April 1923).Google Scholar

⁹⁴ The Star (12 October 1923).Google Scholar

⁹⁵ Die Burger (19 October 1922).Google Scholar

⁹⁶ Die Burger (7 April 1923). Smuts supported the MPE at its inception, precisely because it was dominated by these ranches, and in this case was simply, and slickly, exploiting public feeling against monopolies.Google Scholar

⁹⁷ For Smuts's correspondence on this, see Van Der Poel, J. (ed.), Selections from the Smuts Papers, v (Cambridge, 1973), 151.Google Scholar See also Warhurst, P. R., ‘Rhosesia-South Africa relations, 1900–1923’, 5. S. Afr. Hist. J. III (1971).Google Scholar

⁹⁸ For an example of the earlier treatment of state and capital see Leys, C., Underdevelopment in Kenya. The Political Economy of Neo-Colonialism (London, 1975), 34–35.Google Scholar Recent studies that show the intricate nature of the state include: Lonsdale, J. and Herman, B., ‘Coping with contradictions: the development of the colonial state in Kenya, 1895–1914’, J. Afr. Hist. xx (1979)Google Scholar; Phimister, I., ‘Accommodating imperialism: the compromise of the settler state in Southern Rhodesia, 1923–29’, J. Afr. Hist. xxv (1984)Google Scholar; McCracken, J., ‘Planters, peasants and the colonial state: the impact of the native tobacco board in the Central Province of Malawi’, J. S. Afr. Studies, ix (1983).Google Scholar