Leander Starr Jameson

Jameson was born in Scotland, but his family later moved to London, England where he was educated for the medical profession at University College Hospital, passing his entrance examinations in 1870. He showed promise of a successful professional career in London, but his health deteriorated in 1878, and he went out to South Africa and settled down in practice at Kimberley.

There he rapidly acquired a great reputation as a medical man, and, besides numbering President Kruger and the Matabele chief Lobengula among his patients, he came into contact with Cecil Rhodes.

Jameson was for some time the inDuna of the Matabele king's favourite regiment, the Imbeza. Lobengula expressed his delight with Jameson's successful medical treatment of his gout by honouring him with the rare status of inDuna. Although Jameson was a white man, he underwent the initiation ceremonies linked with this honour.

Jameson's status as an inDuna gave him advantages, and in 1888 he successfully exerted his influence with Lobengula to induce the chieftain to grant the concessions to the agents of Rhodes which led to the formation of the British South Africa Company; and when the company proceeded to open up Mashonaland, Jameson abandoned his medical practice and joined the pioneer expedition of 1890. From this time his fortunes were bound up with Rhodes' schemes in the north.

He was later nominated as the administrator of the Mashonaland territory (1881). Soon after taking up this post he led a raid launched from Bechuanaland. On 29 December 1895, he led a band of volunteers on the famous Jameson Raid into the Boer colony of Transvaal in an effort to support a brewing rebellion by foreign settlers or uitlanders (mainly British), and to further Rhodes's ambition for a united South Africa. The raid was premature. Jameson was captured within a few days and turned over by President Kruger to the British to be punished for his unauthorized venture. He was returned to London for trial and sentenced to imprisonment for 15 months. On his release he returned to South Africa. Read more about the 'Jameson Raid'.

Despite the Raid, Jameson had a successful political life following the invasion, receiving many honours in later life. In 1903, after Rhodes' death, Jameson came forward as the leader of the Progressive (British) party in the Cape Colony. When the party was successful he became Prime Minister of the Cape Colony from 1904 to 1908. He served as the leader of the Unionist Party (South Africa) from its founding in 1910 until 1912. Jameson was created a baronet in 1911 and returned to England in 1912, were he died in 1917.

References:

• The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition (2008), Sir Leander Starr Jameson. Columbia University Press.
• Leander Starr Jameson from Wikipedia [online], available at: wikipedia.org [accessed October 2009]