Extract from newspaper article entitled 'The South African Crisis; Waiting the Free State Decision; An Expected Autumn Session' from theExpress and Star

Extract from newspaper article from the Express and Star, containing two extended quotations, one from [Joseph] Chamberlain, politician, 31 March 1883, and the other from Lord Randolph Churchill, politician. In the first, Chamberlain highlights how easily the conflict over the Transvaal in 1883 could have escalated, involving war with both the Orange Free State and the Dutch population of Cape Colony, resulting in the most serious war since the American War of Independence. In the second, Lord Randolph Churchill describes the criticism of [William] Gladstone, prime minister, following his surrender of the Transvaal [to the Boers] after the battle of Majuba Hill [1881], believing that while Britain may have beaten the Boers militarily and regained the Transvaal, it may have lost Cape Colony.