Page "History of Cape Colony from 1806 to 1870" Paragraph 16

Another war with the Xhosa, known as the War of the Axe or Amatola War, broke out in 1846, when a Khoikhoi escort who had been manacled to a Xhosa thief was murdered while transporting the man to Graham ’ s Town to be tried for stealing an axe.

A party of Xhosa attacked and killed the escort.

The surrender of the murderer was refused, and war was declared in March 1846.

The Ngqikas were the chief tribe engaged in the war, assisted by the Ndlambe and Thembu.

The Xhosa were defeated on 7 June 1846 by General Somerset on the Gwangu, a few miles from Fort Peddie.

However, the war continued until Sandile, the chief of the Ngqika, surrendered.

Other chiefs gradually followed this action, and by the end of 1847 the violence died down after twenty-one months of fighting.