Theme
Labour
Events involving labour systems, coercion, migration for work, indenture, apprenticeship, and labour law.
Initial theme stub generated from the nineteenth-century event dataset.
Events
1652Company's Garden established1652Construction begins on Fort de Goede Hoop1654VOC authorises the importation of enslaved labour to the CapeMarch 1655Three enslaved people recorded at the Cape28 March 1658Amersfoort brings enslaved Angolans to the Cape6 May 1658Hasselt brings a second large group of enslaved Africans29 May 1658Corenhoop slave lodge completed at the fort2 January 1666Foundation stones laid for the Castle of Good Hope1679Castle of Good Hope completed28 July 1679New Company Slave Lodge completed1690Enslaved people in Stellenbosch attempt an uprising1713Smallpox epidemic devastates Cape society1727–1729Extraordinary soldier desertions under Governor Noodt1755Second major smallpox epidemic1767Third major smallpox epidemic1 November 1809Caledon Code promulgated1828Ordinance 50 repeals key Khoikhoi labour restrictions1 December 1834Slavery abolished in the Cape1856–1857Xhosa Cattle-Killing16 November 1860First indentured Indian labourers arrive in Natal13 October 1867First recorded colonial-period diamond discovery1886Main Witwatersrand gold rush beginsOctober 1886Johannesburg founded1894Glen Grey Act1906Bambatha Rebellion1906Gandhi and Natal Indian passive resistance begins1911Mines and Works Act entrenches the colour bar1919Industrial and Commercial Workers' Union founded1922Rand Revoltc. 1930Industrial and Commercial Workers' Union collapses1939–1945Wartime urbanisation12–16 August 1946African Mine Workers' Strike1952Pass-law system tightened1985COSATU founded1995Labour Relations Act16 August 2012Marikana massacre