The Voortrekkers were those Boers ( mainly from the eastern Cape ) who left the Cape en masse in a series of large scale migrations later called the Great Trek beginning in 1835 as a result of British colonialism and constant border wars.

The Voortrekkers were mainly of Trekboer ( migrating farmer ) descent living in the eastern frontiers of the Cape.

The Voortrekkers had a distinctive flag, used mainly by the Voortrekkers who followed Andries Hendrik Potgieter, which is why it was also known as the Potgieter Flag.

The Boer Republics ( sometimes also referred to as Boer states ) were independent self-governed republics created by the northeastern frontier branch of the Dutch-speaking ( proto Afrikaans ) inhabitants of the north eastern Cape Province and their descendants ( variously named Trekboers, Boers, Afrikaners and Voortrekkers ) in mainly the northern and eastern parts of what is now the country of South Africa.

The Voortrekkers ( mainly descendants of Trekboers ) embarked on a series of mass migrations caused by the invading British, later known as the Great Trek.

The Republican Bond was established in the 1930s, and other republican organisations such as the Purified National Party ( Gesuiwerde Nasionale Party ), the Voortrekkers, Noodhulpliga ( First-Aid League ) and the Federasie van Afrikaanse Kultuurverenigings ( Federation of Afrikaans Cultural Organisations, FAK ) also came into being.

The first major clash after Shaka's death took place under his successor Dingane, against expanding European Voortrekkers from the Cape.

Initial Zulu success rested on fast-moving surprise attacks and ambushes, but the Voortrekkers recovered and dealt the Zulu a severe defeat from their fortified wagon laager at the Battle of Blood River.

This date has hence been known as the Day of the Vow as the Voortrekkers made a vow to God that they would honor the date if he were to deliver them from what they viewed as almost insurmountable odds.

* Dutch-speaking farmers known as Voortrekkers emigrate northwards from the Cape Colony.

In 1824 farmers of Dutch, French Huguenot and German descent called Voortrekkers ( later named Boers by the English ) from the Cape Colony who were seeking both pasture for their flocks and to escape governmental oversight settled in the country.

The Voortrekkers comprised two groups from the eastern frontier region of the Cape Colony, semi-nomadic pastoralists known as Trekboers, and established farmers and artisans known as Grensboere, or Border Farmers.

On April 6, 1838 the Voortrekkers retaliated with a 347-strong punitive raid against the Zulu ( later known as the Flight Commando ), supported by new arrivals from the Orange Free State.

After the defeat of the Zulu forces and the recovery of the treaty between Dingane and Retief from the latter's skeleton, the Voortrekkers proclaimed the Natalia Republic.

Biltong as it is today evolved from the dried meat carried by the wagon-travelling Voortrekkers, who needed stocks of durable food as they migrated from the Cape Colony north-eastward ( away from British rule ) into the interior of Southern Africa during the Great Trek.

It was heavily used by the Voortrekkers driving their oxen while migrating from the Cape of Good Hope.

The Voortrekkers under the leadership of Piet Retief obtained a treaty from the Zulu King Dingane to settle part of the lands the Zulus administered or held sway over, but Dingane later changed his mind, killing Retief and 70 members of his delegation.

* The Voortrekkers Vow, a poem by Lynn Lyster from

The Cenotaph Hall is decorated with the flags of the different Voortrekker Republics and contains wall tapestries depicting the Voortrekkers as well as several display cases with artefacts from the Great Trek.

He favoured large tracks of land that had been purchased from the ethnic Swazis in the eastern portion of the South African Republic, from the Zulus in northern Natal, and others, as well as largely uninhabited portions of the interior that had been settled by the Voortrekkers.

The Voortrekkers offered protection for Chief Makwana from the Tswana tribes, against the Basotho tribes habouring in the mountains of the current Lesotho and stealing the cattle of the Bataung tribe.

The Cape Dutch spoke a dialect called Cape Afrikaans or Western Cape Afrikaans, while the Trekboers and most Voortrekkers spoke a dialect called Eastern Border Afrikaans.

A significant number in the eastern Cape frontier later became Grensboere (" border farmers ") who were the direct ancestors of the Voortrekkers.

It figured prominently in the late 17th century when the Trekboers began to inhabit the northern and eastern Cape frontiers, again during the Great Trek when the Voortrekkers left the eastern Cape en masse, as well as after the major republics were established during the Thirstland Trek.

In the 1830s and the 1840s, descendants of Dutch and other settlers, collectively known as Boers ( farmers ) or Voortrekkers ( pioneers ), left the British Cape Colony, in what was to be called the Great Trek.

The Voortrekkers ( Afrikaans and Dutch for pioneers, literally " those who pull ahead ", " fore-trekkers ") were emigrants during the 1830s and 1840s who left the Cape Colony ( British at the time, but founded by the Dutch ) moving into the interior of what is now South Africa.

In contrast to earlier conflicts with the Xhosa on the eastern Cape frontier, the Zulu killed the women and children along with the men, wiping out half of the Natal contingent of Voortrekkers.

" The Kaffirs ," in Lord Glenelg's dispatch of 26 December, " had an ample justification for war ; they had to resent, and endeavoured justly, though impotently, to avenge a series of encroachments .” This attitude towards the Xhosa was one of the many reasons given by the Voortrekkers for leaving the Cape Colony.

This massive granite structure is prominently located on a hilltop, and was raised to commemorate the Voortrekkers who left the Cape Colony between 1835 and 1854.

Because of further British encroachments, constant border wars with the Xhosa to the east, as well as growing land shortages, a large number of the Boer settlers of the eastern Cape became Voortrekkers.

The descendants of the Cape Dutch in the twentieth century were considered more " liberal " and internationalist, while their northern, somewhat estranged kinsmen, the descendants of Voortrekkers and Trekboers, were considered more conservative, republican and nationalist.

Secondly no sooner than the Zulu has passed to the north than the first Voortrekkers arrived, some of whom obtained hospitality during their difficult trek north.

Dingane ruled for some twelve years, during which time he fought, disastrously, against the Voortrekkers, and against another half-brother Mpande, who with Boer and British support, took over the Zulu leadership in 1840, and ruled for some 30 years.

Other Voortrekkers migrated north to the Waterberg area, where some of them settled and began ranching operations, which activities enhanced the pressure placed on indigenous wildlife by pre-existing tribesmen, whose Bantu predecessors had previously initiated such grazing in the Waterberg region.

As prerequisite to granting the Voortrekker request, Dingane demanded that the Voortrekkers return some cattle stolen by Sekonyela, a rival chief.

The Trekkers — called Voortrekkers after 1880 — decided to dethrone Zulu chief Dingane kaSenzangakhona after the betrayal murder of chief Trekker leader Piet Retief, his entire entourage, and some of their women and children living in temporary wagon encampments during 1838.

Etherington argues that no such thing as the Mfecane occurred, the Zulu were no more marauding than any other group in the region, and the land the Voortrekkers saw as empty was not settled by either Zulu or Basotho because those people did not value open lowland plains as pasture.

Upon reconsideration, Dingane doublecrossed the Voortrekkers, killing their leader Piet Retief along with half of the Voortrekker settlers who had followed them to Natal.

After the defeat of Mzilikazi the town of Winburg ( so named by the Boers in commemoration of their victory ) was founded, a Volksraad elected, and Piet Retief, one of the ablest of the Voortrekkers, chosen " governor and commandant-general.

Emakhosini in the Mkumbane Valley on the banks of a tributary of the White Umfolozi River near to Babanango is the site of one of King Dingane kaSenzangakhona's great royal kraals, UmGungundlovu, where Piet Retief and his Voortrekkers were massacred in 1838.

* Kerkenberg-The Voortrekkers camped in the area, while their leader, Piet Retief, descended into KwaZulu-Natal to negotiate for land with the Zulu chief Dingane.

The town was founded by the Voortrekkers in 1883 and named it after the Voortrekker leader, Piet Retief, who was killed by the Zulus under their King Dingane's orders after he tried to settle on their land.

The town was established by the Voortrekkers and named Potgietersrus after the slain Voortrekker leader Piet Potgieter.

* 17 January Voortrekkers under Andries Potgieter, Piet Uys and Gerrit Maritz, helped by Rolong and Griqua tribes, defeat Ndebele at Mosega

* 2 February-Voortrekker leader Piet Retief publishes his Manifesto which sets out the reasons why the Voortrekkers are leaving the Cape Colony