Feature Timeline: Albert Luthuli

SOUTH AFRICAN HISTORY TIMELINES

Chief Albert John Mvumbi Luthuli

1820 | 1901 | 1933 | 1941 | 1951 | 1960

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Historical Context to Luthuli Chronology

While Luthuli himself preferred another spelling and signed his name without an ‘h', his surname is very often spelled ‘Luthuli'. It is so in his autobiography, which was prepared for publication by non-vernacular-speaking friends. While noting this, the spelling on this site has not adhered to Luthuli's preference. This choice is in order to facilitate Internet searches, where the more widespread spelling of ‘Luthuli' is more likely to be used by visitors. Mary Benson in her biography notes that Luthuli, although christened Albert John, preferred his Zulu name Mvumbi, which means continuous rain.

1820s		Shaka, the Zulu king, allows a small party of English traders to found a small settlement in the south of his kingdom near present-day Durban.

1836	January	Dr. Newton Adams and Revs. George Champion and Aldin Grout from the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Mission arrive at Dingane's capital.

1836		Rev. Aldin Grout begins work at KwaNginani, but soon leaves to build the officially termed Umvoti Mission Reserve, on a site near the Umvoti River presently known as Groutville.

1860		Albert Luthuli's grandfather, Ntaba Luthuli, who succeeded Rev Grout as head of the mission station, is elected Chief of Groutville.

1892		John Bunyan Luthuli, second son of Ntaba Ntuli and the father of Albert Luthuli, journeys to Matabeleland in the Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and settles at the Solusi Mission Station near Bulawayo.

1895		John Luthuli is joined in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) by his wife, Mtonya.

Chief Albert John Mvumbi Luthuli - Chronology

1898		Albert John Mvumbi Luthuli is born at the Solusi Mission Station near Bulawayo. Mvumbi, his Zulu name, means ‘continuous rain'

1901		Martin Luthuli, older brother of John Luthuli and the uncle of Albert Luthuli, is involved in the founding of the Natal Native Congress

1908		Mtonya Luthuli and the young Albert Luthuli leave Rhodesia and return to the Union of South Africa. Albert joins the household of his uncle Martin Luthuli in Groutville

1911		Albert Luthuli starts his education at the Groutville School

1913	19 June	The Land Act, Act No 27, is passed. The Act confines Africans to hopelessly overcrowded reserves and deprives them of rights to purchase land outside the native reserves

1914		Having completed Standard Four, Albert Luthuli continues his education at Ohlange Institute – a boarding school – under Dr. John Dube, the founding President of the South African Native National Council After only two terms at Ohlange, Albert Luthuli passes the end of year examinations and is transferred to a Methodist Institution at Edendale, near Pietermaritzburg

1917		Albert Luthuli completes a teacher's training course at Edendale and becomes principal and sole staff member of a tiny intermediate school in Blaauwbosch, Natal

1919		The South African Native National Council organises an anti-pass campaign. In Johannesburg alone, 700 arrests are made

1920		Albert Luthuli attends the Higher Teachers' Training Course at Adams College on a scholarship and joins the staff upon the successful completion of the course. 40 000 African miners strike on the Reef and in Port Elizabeth 21 people are killed by the police.

1921		Josiah Mqebu succeeds Martin Luthuli as Chief of Groutville

1927		Albert Luthuli marries fellow Adam's College teacher Nokukhanya (‘The Bright One') Bhengu, the granddaughter of a hereditary Zulu Chief.

1928		Albert Luthuli is elected Secretary of the African Teachers' Association under the presidency of his friend Z.K. Matthews, principal of Adam's College.

1928	30 April	Josiah Gumede is succeeded by Pixley ka Isaka Seme as African National Congress president. Luthuli commented later: “with his ascendancy, the African National Congress shifted several degrees rightwards into almost total moribundancy.”

1933		Albert Luthuli becomes President of the African Teachers' Association.

1935		Albert Luthuli is elected Chief by the people of Groutville Mission Reserve, and he subsequently leaves Adam's College.

1935	December	Calls for a conference of all African organizations by Professor D.D.T. Jabavu results in 400 delegates attending the All-African Convention in Bloemfontein. Albert Luthuli does not attend.

1938		Albert Luthuli visits India as one of several delegates to the International Missionary Conference in Tambaram, Madras, India.

1941	April	The African National Congress Youth League is formally constituted.

1944		Albert Luthuli joins the African National Congress.

1945		Albert Luthuli is elected to the Executive Committee of the Natal Provincial Division of the African National Congress.

1946		Albert Luthuli becomes the Natal representative on the Native's Representative Council (NRC) following the death of Dr John Dube.

1948		Albert Luthuli attends the North American Missionary Conference and undertakes a lecture tour under the auspices of the American Board and the North American Missionary Conference.

1951		Albert Luthuli represents Natal at the African National Congress national conference.

1951	23 November	M.B.Yengwa and other members of the Youth League in Natal nominates Albert Luthuli for President of the African National Congress in Natal and Luthuli is subsequently elected to this position. In his address to the Annual Conference of the African National Congress in Natal, Luthuli calls for unity among Africans and redefines the challenges that face them in the light of new pieces of apartheid legislation being introduced by the Malan Government.

1952	6 April	While White South Africans celebrate the three hundredth year anniversary of Jan van Riebeeck's arrival at the Cape, large meetings are held in the country's main centres as a warm up for the Defiance Campaign proper.

1952	31 May	Encouraged by the success of huge rallies organised on 6 April in protest against the Van Riebeeck tercentenary celebrations, the executives of the African National Congress, South African Indian Congress (SAIC) and Franchise Action Council (FRAC) decides that the Defiance Campaign shall commence on 26 June.

1952	November	The Government deposes Albert Luthuli from his Chieftainship. Luthuli issues a public statement entitled ‘The Road to Freedom is via the Cross'

1952	December	Albert Luthuli elected President-General at the African National Congress' annual conference.

1953		Under the Internal Security (Suppression of Communism) Act, Act No 44, Albert Luthuli is banned for one year from attending any political or public gatherings and prohibited from entering any major city.

1953	January	The Defiance Campaign of 1952 formally ends. Albert Luthuli visits the Cape to attend the Executive of the Christian Council, which gives him his first opportunity to visit Congress branches outside Natal.

1953	21 February	Albert Luthuli opens the 6th Annual Conference of the Natal Indian Congress in Durban with the speech ‘Let us march together to freedom'

1953	June	In “A message to the African people and their allies in the struggle for freedom in the Union of South Africa”, Albert Luthuli introduces the campaign to make ordinary Black people more aware of their political situation and attempts to bridge the gap between the educated and the uneducated.

1953	August	At the African National Congress Cape provincial congress, Professor Z.K. Matthews suggests the summoning of a national convention at which all groups might be represented to consider the country's national problems on an all-inclusive basis in order to draw up a Freedom Charter for a Democratic South Africa.

1953	18 December - 20 December	The African National Congress' 42nd Annual Conference is held in Queenstown. The Conference endorses the idea of an assembly of the people.

1954		The ban on Albert Luthuli expires and is not immediately re-imposed. Albert Luthuli opens the conference of the Natal Indian Congress in Durban.

1954	23 March	The executives of the African National Congress, South African Indian Congress, Congress of Democrats and the South African Coloured People's Organisation meet at Tongaat near Durban and decide to establish a National Action Council for the Congress of the People.

1954	27 June	A ‘Resist Apartheid' conference is held in Johannesburg, and the day is declared one of ‘Solidarity with the Western Areas'. In his speech Albert Luthuli calls for the enrolment of 50 000 ‘Freedom Volunteers'.

1954	11 July	While on his way to address a protest meeting in Johannesburg, Albert Luthuli is served with a banning order as he steps off a plane.

1954	5 September	Albert Luthuli delivers the speech ‘The Challenge of our Time' to the first Natal Congress of the People held in Durban. It is subsequently cited in the Treason Trial.

1954	November	Nearly the entire Natal Indian Congress executive, elected at the end of 1953, is banned.

1955		Albert Luthuli defines the reasons for the African National Congress' demands for universal suffrage in the speech ‘What is aimed at the African people'.

1955	May	An effective protest strike of Coloured people, supported by Africans and Indians, takes place in Port Elizabeth and the South Western Cape. It is directed against the National Party's intention to remove Coloureds from the Common Electoral Roll.

1955	25 June - 26 June	The Freedom Charter is adopted by the Congress of the People at Kliptown, Johannesburg. Albert Luthuli is given the title, Isitwalandwe (‘Wearer of the feather of Indwe' – a rare legendary bird), traditionally only conferred on the greatest of warriors.

1955	August	The executives of the African National Congress, South African Indian Congress, the Congress of Democrats and South African Coloured People's Organisation recommend the adoption of the Freedom Charter by each of their respective Congresses. A ‘million signature' campaign is conceived to popularise the Charter and the 10 000 ‘Freedom Volunteers' succeeds in collecting nearly 100 000 signatures to the Charter, half of them in the Transvaal.

1955	16 December - 18 December	Albert Luthuli delivers his presidential address to the 44th Annual Congress of the African National Congress in Bloemfontein

1956		In Albert Luthuli's report entitled ‘The struggle must go on' to the Annual Provincial Conference of the African National Congress in Natal, he introduces the idea of supporting boycotts and civil disobedience.

1956	5 May - 6 May	At the Natal Indian Congress consultation in Durban, Albert Luthuli criticises the recent Tomlinson Report for “shamefully ignoring to face the important and urgent question of the inadequacy of land set aside for Africans”.

1956	July	Second banning order on Albert Luthuli expires.

1956	5 December	Albert Luthuli is arrested in Groutville on a charge of high treason.

1957	27 May	In a letter to the Prime Minister, J.G.Strijdom, Albert Luthuli defines the aims and objectives of the African National Congress and its belief in a common society and suggests that a national convention be held.

1957	26 June	A fairly successful one-day stay-at-home of workers is held and 65 treason trialists, including Albert Luthuli, are discharged.

1958		Albert Luthuli delivers a speech entitled ‘Our vision is a Democratic Society' to a meeting organised by the Congress of Democrats in Johannesburg. Albert Luthuli opens the Transvaal Conference of the Liberal Party.

1958	February	The then Minister of Native Affairs, H.F. Verwoerd draws up a proclamation that will give him the power to ban the African National Congress anywhere under his jurisdiction and forwards it to the Governor-General for signature.

1958	April	In an open letter to White voters in 1958, Albert Luthuli states the aim of the African National Congress to be “a common South African multiracial society, based upon friendship, quality of rights and mutual respect'.

1958	3 September	H.F. Verwoerd assumes the office of Prime Minister following the death of J.G. Strijdom.

1958	2 November	Robert Sobukwe breaks away from the African National Congress to form the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC).

1959	25 May	Albert Luthuli is served with his third banning order, which prohibits him from attending any meeting anywhere in South Africa and from leaving his home district for five years.

1960	February	Albert Luthuli warns White South Africans that resentment among Africans is building up.

1960	March	The African National Congress announces that its anti-pass campaign will start at the end of March 1960.

1960	28 March	Albert Luthuli publicly burns his pass.

1960	30 March	Albert Luthuli is detained and held until August, when he is tried and sentenced to a fine of 100 pounds and a six-month suspended sentence.

1960	7 April	The Extension of University Education Amendment Act, Act No 34, bans Black students from attending white universities.

1961	15 March	Prime Minister H.F. Verwoerd withdraws South Africa's application for continued membership of the Commonwealth following bitter opposition in the Conference of Commonwealth Ministers.

1961	29 March	Twenty-eight persons, including Albert Luthuli and Walter Sisulu, on trial for high treason since 1956, are found not guilty and discharged. The three judges of the High Court in Pietermaritzburg unanimously find there is no evidence of communist infiltration into the African National Congress. Hours later the Government retaliates by renewing the ban on the African National Congress and Pan Africanist Congress for another year.

1961	October	Albert Luthuli is informed that he has been awarded the 1960 Nobel Prize for Peace for his “fight against racial discrimination” through non-violent means. Luthuli is the first African to win the prize.

1961	5 December	Albert Luthuli and his wife boards a plane in Durban to be flown to Oslo via London to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for 1960.

1961	10 December	Wearing a Chief's ceremonial garb, Albert Luthuli receives the Nobel Peace Prize in the presence of King Olaf of Norway, many diplomats and other dignitaries and is given a standing ovation. In his acceptance speech, Albert Luthuli declares: “I regard this as a tribute to Mother Africa, to all peoples, whatever their race, colour or creed”.

1961	11 December	Albert Luthuli delivers his Nobel Peace Prize address entitled ‘Africa and Freedom' and pays tribute to the late Dag Hammarskjöld, “a distinguished world citizen and fighter for peace,” to whom the Nobel Peace Prize for 1961 was awarded. At the conclusion of his address, Albert Luthuli sings the liberation anthem Nkosi Sikel'I iAfrika and all the assembly soon joins in singing or humming the anthem.

1962	1 February	A statement entitled ‘We don't want crumbs' appears in New Age. In the statement Albert Luthuli unequivocally rejects the Government's homelands policy.

1962	October	Albert Luthuli is elected rector by the students of Glasgow University in recognition of his “dignity and restraint” in “a potentially inflammatory situation”.

1962	10 December	Albert Luthuli and Dr. Martin Luther King Jnr. issue a joint statement “Appeal for Action Against Apartheid”

1964	May	Minister of Justice, John (B.J.) Vorster, serves Albert Luthuli with yet another five-year ban confining him to his home in Groutville.

1964	12 June	In a statement issued following the imposition of life sentences on Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu and six others after the Rivonia Trial, Albert Luthuli declares: “The African National Congress never abandoned its method of militant, non-violent struggle…However, in the face of the uncompromising White refusal to abandon a policy which denies the African and other oppressed South Africans their rightful heritage freedom - no one can blame brave, just men for seeking justice by use of violent methods; nor could they be blamed if they tried to create an organised force in order to establish ultimately peace and racial harmony”.

1967	21 July	Albert Luthuli is killed after being struck by a train on a narrow railway bridge near his home in Groutville.

1967	23 July	3 000 people gather in the church at Groutville to attend Luthuli's memorial service and to see Mrs Nokukhanya Luthuli unveil the memorial stone which has been erected on his grave.