The Zulu War veteran that drowned on a film set

Lieutenant Colonel Johan Colenbrander CB – frontiersman and commander of Kitchener’s Fighting Scouts

Lieutenant Colonel Johan W. Colenbrander CB when commanding 1st Kitchener's Fighting Scouts during the Second Anglo-Boer War (Killie Campbell Library) 

Johan Colenbrander, the legendary South Africa frontiersman, sometimes referred to as both the Boss and the white whirlwind, died at the age 61 while playing the role of Lord Chelmsford in the 1918, Zulu War film, The Symbol of Sacrifice.  In his action-packed life, he fought in the Zulu War of 1879, was a mercenary during the 1883-84 Zulu Civil War, advisor and interpreter to King Lobengula of the Matabele and commanded Kitchener’s Fighting Scouts on anti-commando operations during the Boer War, but there was so much more to him.

Johan Willem Colenbrander was born in Pinetown, Natal on 1st November 1856 the son of Dutch emigrant, Theodorus Christiaan Colenbrander who for a while had resided in the Duch East Indies. He was the sixth of thirteen children and as a young man, he learnt to speak isiZulu while living on his parents’ plantations in Stanger and with Zululand right on his doorstep he traded with the Zulus and became fully acquainted with their customs.

In 1870, as a trumpeter he joined the newly formed Stanger Mounted Rifles of which his uncle Johannes A. Colenbrander later became the quartermaster. Being a small unit, numbering about 40 all-ranks at any one time, the Stanger Mounted Rifles was mobilized in December 1878 for service in the coming Anglo-Zulu War of 1879. On 22nd January 1879, as part of Colonel Charles K. Pearson’s, No. 1 Column, they fought at the battle of Nyezane during the first invasion of Zululand and were on left flank during the battle – this was the young Johan’s first taste of fighting. Unlike the disaster that befell No. 3 Column at iSandlwana, Pearson’s men defeated the Zulu amabutho under Chief Godide kaNdlela, however, the column within days was back across the border, with just a small force under Pearson defending the Eshowe Mission Station.  He joined the Natal Guides and took part in Lord Chelmsford’s expedition to relieve Eshowe and was present at the battle of Gingindlovu on 2nd April of which the guides formed up immediately behind the 60th Rifles on the north face of the square.

The battle of Ulundi fought on 4th July 1879, being a decisive victory for Lord Chelmsford brought the war to an end, apart from the pacification operations that continued until September. With King Cetshwayo kaMpande in exile in Cape Town, Zululand was divided into thirteen chiefdoms of which, John Dunn, the famed Natal frontiersman who had for years been living among the Zulus and was a white inDuna was awarded the largest chiefdom in Zululand and Colenbrander became his secretary. Presumably, Johan knew Dunn from before the war when he dabbled in trading in Zululand.

Colenbrander, then became the adviser to the 39-year-old, inkosi Zibhebhu kaMaphitha of the Mandlakazi faction of the Royal House. The talented Zibhebhu, had during the Zulu War, fought at iSandlwana and Khambula earlier in the war, then at the White Mfolozi and at Ulundi. Like Dunn, he was appointed as one of the thirteen chiefs, although he now felt that the royal house had little authority over him and moreover, he could see the economic benefits that the Europeans brought and advocated that the old royal house system was finished.  

Johan purchased rifles and trained Zibhebhu’s men to both ride and shoot and they made life difficult for many of the royal uSuthu faction. When Zibhebhu was enforcing his authority over members of the uSuthu, there was often some skirmishing and in one such fight in October 1881, Colenbrander found himself in hand-to-hand combat with a Zulu and came close to being killed.     

With the British chiefdom’s system being unworkable, King Cetshwayo returned from exile in January 1883 and the thirteen chiefdoms were divided into three and soon a violent civil war broke out. During the fighting, Colenbrander supporting Zibhebhu was present at the battle of Msebe on 30th March 1883 where they defeated the Royal uSuthu Army although it was still an active threat.  Four months later, on 21st July 1883, at the battle of oNdini, they finally defeated the uSuthu, almost four years to the day that the British defeated the Zulus at the same location – Cetshwayo died soon after.

Johan Colenbrander and Chief Zibhebhu marching in triumph after they defeated the uSuthu faction at oNdini on 21st July 1883 (Pictorial World)

In December 1883, at St Thomas’s Church, Berea and styling himself as a trader, he married 22-year-old Maria ‘Mollie’ Mullins of Verulam, who not only could speak fluent isiZulu, but was an accomplished horse rider; they were to spend the next 17 years of their marriage together on numerous adventures. In 1884, when the Boers proclaimed 16-year-old, Prince Dinuzulu kaCetshwayo as the new King of the Zulus, the uSuthu faction once more moved against Zibhebhu. Colenbrander hastily returned to Natal to raise a force of white mercenaries, but he only managed to raise a small group of twenty men, although it was rumored to be much larger. He was cut off when attempting to re-join Zibhebhu’s impi's who were defeated at the battle of Tshaneni on 5th June 1884 by the uSuthu faction that was supported by 120 Burghers under Kommandant Lukas Meyer.

Immediately after Tshaneni, the Natal government forced Colenbrander to disband his meagre force, and pursuing pastures new, he and Mollie spent some time in Swaziland before moving to the newly established, boom-town, Johannesburg where he briefly worked as a claim’s inspector. Then, in 1888, he travelled to Matabeleland where he met and became an interpreter to King Lobengula of the Ndebele and son of Mzilikazi, one of Shaka’s former indunas who broke away and established the Ndebele nation in what is today Zimbabwe.

For a brief period, Johan opposed Cecil Rhodes’, British South Africa Company ambitions in Mashonaland that Lobengula also ruled over of which there was a frenzy of concession seekers all lobbying Lobengula. In February 1889, he accompanied two Ndebele induna’s who were acting as Lobengula’s official envoys to visit Queen Victoria in London where they were to lodge a formal request to protect the Ndebele from concession seekers, although, it was too late as Rhodes was raising a force to occupy Mashonaland and obtained the Royal Charter on 20th December 1889.

Colenbrander with the Ndebele indunas while in London seeking protection from concession hunters in 1889 - it was all too late (South Africa Magazine)

Upon his return to Matabeleland, Lobengula sent Johan with an impi to observe Rhodes’ Pioneer Column moving into Mashonaland in July 1890. He twice presented the column commander, Colonel E.G. Pennefather of the 6th Dragoon Guards with a message from Lobengula instructing him to turn back and that he may not be able to control his young warriors to which Pennefather replied that, ‘I am an officer of the Queen of England, and my orders are to go to Mashonaland, and there I am going.’  However, despite the warnings to retire, there was not a shot fired and the British South Africa Company raised the union jack in Mashonaland on 13th September 1890 and named the location, Fort Salisbury, now Harare.

Shortly after the occupation of Mashonaland, Johan became a British South Africa Company man, however, he remained with Lobengula at kwaBulawayo while keeping Rhodes and the company well advised as to the situation in Matabeleland. Mollie was also with him at kwaBulawayo. In 1893, prior to the Ndebele War, he operated on secret orders from the company and was regarded as being a major agitator of peace in the region – Rhodes was after Matabeleland as well.  

The Cape Colonies, High Commissioner was aware of Colenbrander’s movements and believed him to be spreading rumours among the Ndebele that drove them into a frenzy of anxiety. He and Mollie escaped with their lives from kwaBulawayo just prior to the war breaking out in 1893. During the Ndebele War, he served as a captain in the Salisbury Horse and following the defeat of the Ndebele, Rhodes appointed him a Native Commissioner of Matabeleland.

He became renowned as a big-game hunter and hunted with many famous people including Major James Grant, the Glen Grant distilleries proprietor. He was also credited to have killed a lion with his bare hands and never an idle man, he was always looking for opportunities and took up hundreds of gold mining claims and formed Colenbrander’s Matabeleland Development Company.  

Immediately following the Jameson Raid in January 1896 and with a large number of police being detained in the Transvaal, the Ndebele took advantage of the company forces being weak, rebellion broke out in Matabeleland and soon spread into the neighbouring Mashonaland.

In March 1896, with the rank of captain, he raised and commanded Colenbrander’s Cape Boys and in fact on 25th April, the company forces fought a battle on his farm located on the Umgusa River that was named the battle of Colenbrander’s Farm – here he and Mollie had built a humble ‘one storied brick building.’

Following a bloody and costly war, on 21st August 1896, Rhodes, along with Colenbrander as an interpreter and two others, at great personal risk decided to approach the Ndebele induna’s who reluctantly moved out of cover to meet them.  Following several hours of discussions, military operations were suspended and for the next two months, from a small camp close to the Ndebele, negotiations continued until the terms of peace were agreed on 13th October 1896 – Mollie was with them at what became known as the indaba camp.     

Colenbrander (left) at Indaba Camp in the Matopos. Cecil Rhodes is seated second from the right, while Mollie Colenbrander is seated next to Rhodes (With Plumer in Matabeleland)

For his actions during the war, he was mentioned-in-despatches by General Fred Carrington who wrote:

‘Captain, Colenbrander, Bulawayo Field Force, organized and commanded a corps of Cape Boys which rendered good service throughout the war. He was most instrumental with Mr Rhodes in bringing about the final surrender of the chiefs in the Matopo’s.’

When the Second Anglo-Boer War broke out in October 1899, Johan initially did not take part until Mollie died at Bulawayo on 9th October 1900. With no children and looking for military employment, he was offered an intelligence position with Captain Sandy Butters' Rhodesian squadron of the Commander-in-Chief’s Body Guard that he took up on 1st November 1900. Butters was a Rhodesian and Ndebele War veteran and knew Colenbrander well. He served briefly as a lieutenant in the body guard until he was summoned to a meeting with Lord Kitchener, the Commander-in-Chief in South Africa.  It was proposed that Colenbrander would raise a mounted regiment that could move swiftly and without being hindered by wheeled transport – additionally, each man would have two horses. Johan said that he would call the regiment, Kitchener's Scouts to which Kitchener said, he wanted them to do more than scouting and thus ‘Kitchener's Fighting Scouts’ was born.

He was appointed a major and commanding officer of Kitchener’s Fighting Scouts on 23rd November 1900 and following the recruiting of veterans and frontiersman from across Southern Africa, they initially took to the field in the Cape Colony.  The regiment was riddled with Rhodesians and men who had previously served in the Cape Frontier Wars, while many younger men had been fighting in the war since October 1899. His two brothers-in-law, Frank and George Mullins, who both served with him during the Ndebele Rebellion, also joined the scouts as troop commanders.

The Fighting Scouts initially served in the Cape Colony in pursuit of the Boer Commando’s commanded by Generaal’s James B.M. Hertzog and Pieter H. Kritzinger that remained elusive.  The scouts were a fast-moving regiment and covering large distances, they were constantly engaged with the commandos, but they sustained regular casualties, which was the cost of fighting the Boers as they experienced when they came up against Kritzinger. On 8th March 1901, in the Cape Colony, Captain J. Boyd-King commanding ‘A’ Squadron, KFS, was leading his men near Stellenbosch Vlei when they were surrounded by Kitzinger’s men, and after Boyd-King was killed, 30 men surrendered, but were released soon after. Johan was up against a tough adversary of which he had never fought against Europeans before and never commanded a mounted regiment of likeminded men.

On 9th April 1901, the regiment doubled in size with Colenbrander’s second-in-command, the 31-year-old, Australian and Ndebele War veteran, Major Alfred E. Wilson being promoted to lieutenant colonel and taking command of the newly constituted, 2nd Kitchener’s Fighting Scouts – he also had formal military training that he received while serving as a lieutenant in the Victorian Field Artillery. Johan, like Wilson, was also promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel and continued to command what became known as the 1st Kitchener’s Fighting Scouts, while an imperial officer, Colonel Harold Grenfell of the 1st Life Guards and a former Jameson raider took command of the entire regiment and commanded a column that including KFS. Grenfell had already spent 12-months fighting in Brabant’s Horse and knew colonials well.

Despite the Stellenbosch Vlei reverse, the regiment was operationally a success, and they really grew into the anti-commando role with Kitchener being satisfied. With countless fights, too many to cover in this article, Colenbrander’s 1st KFS was continually in the saddle against top-tier Boer commando leaders such as Generaal’s Jacobus H. de la Rey, Christiaan F. Beyers, Christoffel C.J. Badenhorst and Kommandant Barend J. Barend – their exploits being continually mentioned in the press around the world at the time.

Colenbrander (centre) with officers of his Kitchener's Fighting Scouts during the period that the regiment split into two wings. A tough and experienced group, although the officers of 1st KFS would later refuse to serve with the imperial adjutant, Captain Collins (Rhodesia served the Queen)

While Wilson and the 2nd KFS, was functioning well, apart from him being admonished for recruiting surrendered Boers without permission, Colenbrander felt that the 1st KFS lacked discipline and was in need of a strict adjutant, he wrote that, ‘my regiment was not getting along as smoothly as it should be.’ On 14th June 1901, 21-year-old, Sandhurst graduate, Lieutenant Charles G. Collins of the 1st Battalion, Cameron Highlanders was appointed as the captain and adjutant of the regiment - Collins and Johan worked well together from the outset.  Collins who was undoubtedly daring in action, had been recommended several times for an award, however, he rubbed the colonials up the wrong way, and an air of tension set into the regiment of which the officers were in a funk and on the brink of mutiny.

Collins offered to resign his appointment and return to his battalion, but Johan would not permit it, then, eventually in February 1902, 12 officers, including three squadron commanders threatened to resign if Collins did not go!

Johan, not accepting the descent of his officers, some of whom he had known for years believed they must go. With the support of senior command in Pretoria, the disgruntled officers were permitted to resign on 23rd February 1902 and join other regiments.  Interestingly, one of the officers was Lieutenant Edward F. Thackeray, the son of a Victoria Cross winner who was destined to command a South African battalion during the Great War – like a lot of these men, there is a story in him alone.

A month after the mass resignations, on 8th April 1902, Johan, who was never out of Kitchener’s despatches, was appointed a Companion of the Bath while the war came to an end the following month. Returning to Rhodesia, he married Yvonne Nunn in Bulawayo on 21st August 1902 who was the daughter of Colonel Loftus Nunn late of the 99th Foot - she died in 1904. He resigned from the fighting scouts on 21st September 1902 while still in Rhodesia.

In 1905, he was accused of fraud dating back to the Boer War in relation to cattle prize money discrepancies. Kitchener’s Fighting Scouts were well-known for impounding live-stock and at one point when in the Northern Transvaal, another Ndebele War veteran, Corporal Edward ‘Yank’ Allen from Arkansas, United States, drove cattle into Rhodesia – Colenbrander was in fact referred to as ‘Colar and Brander’ during the war. Wilson was also accused of fiddling the books, but nothing came of either charge, while he went on to command the 86th Field Artillery Brigade on the Somme and died in New York in impoverished circumstances during the 1950s.

Johan, later in 1905, led an expedition in search for the missing Kruger’s Millions and in 1906, he was farming with his brother in Stanger where he also became a freemason. When the Bambatha Rebellion broke out the same year, he volunteered to raise an irregular regiment for service, however, the authorities did not take him up on his offer. While he took no part in fighting the rebels, while in Johannesburg, he offered to be official custodian of Dinuzulu in the event of him being deported from Natal.

He then travelled to England in 1909 and then onto the United States where he briefly worked in Massachusetts with his former adjutant, Charles Collins, however, he lost his money in a business venture and returned to England. Collins was in fact drafting the story of Colenbrander’s life, but the manuscript went missing. Collins later commanded a battalion at Gallipoli in 1915, then became a secret courier and had several scrapes with the law. He lost his money during the depression, then became a journalist.

By 1912, Johan was back in Rhodesia having married Catherine Gloster at Milltown, Co Kerry in Ireland – she was to outlive him, and they had one son. When the Great War broke out in 1914, he attempted to obtain a position with both the British Army and the South African forces, but he was not accepted, presumably due to his age. In 1918, he was employed by the African Film Productions Company in Johannesburg as an advisor for their patriotic Zulu War film, The Symbol of Sacrifice. He was also playing the role of Lord Chelmsford and apparently as he was not well, he had been advised by a doctor against it.

On 10th February 1918, when filming at Henley-on-Klip in the Heidelberg District, they were working on the scene that depicted the relief of Rorke’s Drift. When crossing the Klip River, a number of the actors horses became unsettled and threw some of the riders into the water. Johan, being one of the men that was thrown, was initially seen to be swimming well, but he then disappeared, presumably due to a heart attack, although the South African Police later recorded that he ‘accidentally drowned.’ His body was not found for several days and following his wife identifying him, he was buried at the Brixton Cemetery in Johannesburg.

The name of Johan Colenbrander still remains well known today, while the South Africa Magazine wrote immediately after his death, ‘Thus closes one of the most adventurous and picturesque careers ever lived by an Afrikander.’ In 1961, the South African historical author, T.V. Bulpin published his semi non-fiction autobiography of Johan that mainly covers his life up until the Boer War and is aptly titled The White Whirlwind.

Also, please watch the video produced by Chris Parkinson at Red Coat History of which this story formed the basis of the script:

References:

BSAC Reports., The 96 Rebellions

Bulpin, T.V., The White Whirlwind.

Greaves, Adrian and Knight, John., Who’s Who in the Zulu War 1879

Guy, Jeff., The Destruction of the Zulu Kingdom

Laband, John., The Atlas of the Later Zulu Wars 1883-1888