Timeline: Nelson Mandela 1910 - 1919
- 1910
- The establishment of the Union of South Africa consolidates white rule over the territories that came to be know as South Africa. The Union is founded on racial segregation and disenfranchisement of black people except for a small number who previously qualified in the Cape Colony.
- 1918
- 18 July, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela is born in the small Thembu village of Mvezo on the banks of the Mbashe River, in the district of Qunu near Umtata (Mthathta),the Transkei's largest town. He was born to Nonqaphi Nosekeni and Hendry Mphakanyiswa Gadla Mandela, a minor hereditary chief.
-
Chief Gadla Mandela is one of a score of grandsons of Ngubengcuka, the great Thembu king and leader of the Madiba clan who ruled over what was known as Thembuland and died in 1832. Gladla Mandela is descended from the junior line of the Royal Thembu family, but is a close confident and senior councilor to his cousin Thembu king Dalindyebo and later Dalinyebo's son Chief Jongilizwe.
Nonqaphi Nosekeni is the third of Gladla's four wives with whom she would have three girls and one son. Rolihlahla is her third child and he grew up in a loving and supportive extended family of half-brothers and half-sisters, cousins and stepmothers who are all mothers to him in the proper sense of the word.
- 1919
-
Gadla Mandela is involved in a stand off with the local magistrate around what he considers is a matter of principle regarding their respective authorities. He is charged with insubordination and stripped of his chieftainship. The loss of his position means that he looses his government stipend and the family falls on hard times. Gladla is forced to move his family to the village of Qunu.
