BOER WAR - MAFEKING INTEREST

Album of autographs and dedications, limp red leather – worn and stained and with the spine missing, 100 pages approximately.

The ownership is uncertain but is thought to be a Mrs Gleeson, of the Burgher Camps Department. The entries date from June 1902 to 1912. Several are by members of the Bechuanaland Rifles including Major B.V.Cowan, Comds. B.R. Mafeking; 17/6/02; E. Pritchard, B.R. Camp, June 17/02; Maud Hussey, B.R.C., Mafeking 20/7/02; and others. A number are signed from the Burger Camp: J.M. Meyer, Burgher Camp, Mafeking, 19 June 1902;  Richard Solomon, Mafeking Burgher Camp, 20June 1902; and others. Many others are signed from Somerset Strand and elsewhere in South Africa. Several sketches including one of O.C. Bechuanaland Rifles, Mafeking 15-2-02 showing an unnamed figure between a rocky outcrop.

There are two official passes: 1. Burgher Camps Deparment – This is to certify that Mrs Gleeson in in the employ of this Department as Relief Matron of BR Mafeking….2. Mrs Gleeson resident of Mafeking has permission to pass through the Outpost Lines at any time…..Mafeking 19.10.01.

Initially The Burgher Camp Department was set up by the British to build and administer camps to house the families of Boers who surrendered voluntarily. They were soon used to forcibly detain the dependants of active combatants. Euphemistically called refugee camps they soon became known as the infamous concentration camps.

Size: 170 x 130 mm

1901 – 1912