A century of migrant labour in the gold mines of South Africa

1914 was to make the South African gold industry the world's top producer . The South African War of 1899–1902 forced every gold mine into a virtual shutdown and led to a lowered demand for black labour and the loss of over 100, 000 jobs (a, Figure 1). WNLA was requested to set up a realistic structure to achieve a stable workforce ...

Mining industry in South Africa

Since then, the mining industry has become hugely important to the country, contributing roughly 219.5 billion South African Rand (roughly 12.8 billion U.S. dollars) in 2021 to South Africa's ...

Gold in South Africa: Lessons from the Apartheid Era

This chapter considers gold at its most recent historical epi-centre—i.e. South Africa during the apartheid era. For over 130 years gold in Africa has been synonymous with the Witwatersrand which has produced 40% of the gold that was ever mined. 1 From 1887 until 2018 1.7 billion ounces of gold were extracted from the South …

Grade 8

The Indian Mineworkers Strike in 1913 Image source. A form of resistance included to look for better jobs. After the South African War (1899-1902), thousands of African workers boycotted the gold mines because wages had dropped. They tried to find jobs on the railways and in the towns instead.

Historical Reading List: The Diamond Fields of South Africa: Part …

The De Beers Kimberlite Pipe – A Historic South African Diamond Mine, C.R. Clement, J.W. Harris, D.N. Robinson, and J.B. Hawthorne, "Mineral Deposits of South Africa", pp. 2193-2214, (1986). The authors describe the one of the main mines near Kimberley which, since its discovery in 1871, has produced approximately 25 million …

South Africa

Gold and Diamonds. South Africa's modern history has often been dated from the first commercial mining of diamonds and gold in the 1870s and the 1880s, when the region became a magnet for European investment. Mining in the region predated European arrivals by several centuries, however, as the new government recalled in its minerals …

Indigenous Gold Mining in Southern Africa: A Review

popo region (Liesegang 1977). In the 17th century, Barreto recorded gold mining in Manyika, and radiocarbon dates and dateable trade items found in archaeological mines in Zimbabwe indicate mining into the 19th century (Swan 1994:123-124). This is not surprising, because informal gold mining still takes place in Zimbabwe, in ways that

The Development of the South African Gold-Mining Industry, …

The Development of the South African Gold-Mining Industry, I895-1918 By PETER RICHARDSON and JEAN-JACQUES VAN HELTEN T he second half of the nineteenth century was the great era of gold discoveries. Between i849 and i898 a regular series of strikes was made in north America, Australasia, southern Africa, and Asiatic Russia. The …

History of Diamonds | Cape Town Diamond Museum

The story of diamonds in South Africa begins between December 1866 and February 1867 when 15-year-old Erasmus Jacobs found a transparent rock on his father's farm, on the south bank of the Orange River. Over the next few years, South Africa yielded more diamonds than India had in over 2,000 years.

Topic 6 Contextual Overview

B. The South African War: The Build-up to the War and its Components. D. The Natives Land Act 1913 and Sol Plaatje. A. The Mineral Revolution ↵. In this section we will briefly discuss the discovery of gold in the Witwatersrand and the Gold Rush. We will also discuss how the mining industry developed and how the discovery of gold in the ...

Historical Reading List: The Diamond Fields of South Africa: Part …

The South-African Diamond Mines, Author unknown, Popular Science Monthly, Vol. 30, (February), pp. 459-473, (1887). The author reviews the historic sources of diamonds, than summarizes the history and mining operations in the diamond fields. ... "Diamonds and Gold of South Africa", H. Mitchell, F.C. Mathieson & Son, London, 131 …

19th century

The Kimberley diamond mine, one of the richest in the world, was discovered in 1871, setting off a rush by hopeful miners. In The South African Diamond Fields, and a Journey to the Mines the author describes the process of claiming plots of land by individual miners:. The Diggers' Committee, an influential elective body, had made it a …

Southern Africa

Angola and Mozambique in the late 19th century; Germans in South West Africa; Southern Africa, 1899–1945 ... Africa. Dominated by a modernizing elite, the country's economy flourished with the expansion of cattle ranching and diamond, nickel, and copper mining. Botswana played a leading role in efforts to coordinate the regional economy ...

South Africa

Minerals: Diamonds, gold, coal, iron ore, chrome, copper, emerald, fluorspar, ilmenite, lead, manganese, nickel, phosphate, silica, tin, vanadium, uranium, zinc and zircon. Independence: 31 May 1910 Area: 1,221,037 km2 Mining fact: The Witwatersrand Basin in South Africa is the largest gold resource in the world.This is also where the world's …

Africa: Resources

The Driefontein Gold Mine outside of Johannesburg, South Africa, is one of the largest gold mines in the world. The mine is made up of eight shafts that reach depths of up to 3,352 meters (11,000 feet) underground. One of the shafts is in the process of being deepened to about 4,115 meters (13,500 feet), making it the deepest mine in the world.

South Africa's Iron Ore Industry

The South African Iron Ore Cluster Page 2 2.0 HISTORY OF SOUTH AFRICA In 1652, Dutch settlers landed at the Cape of Good Hope to develop farming for ships en route to

South Africa

South Africa - Economy, Mining, Manufacturing: The economy of South Africa was revolutionized in the late 19th century when diamonds and gold were discovered there. Extensive investment from foreign capital followed. In the years since World War II, the country has established a well-developed manufacturing base, and it has experienced …

The Rise and Fall of the Orange Free State and Transvaal in Southern Africa

The Orange Free State and the Transvaal (officially the South African Republic) were independent countries in southern Africa in the 19th century established largely by Dutch/Afrikaans-speaking settlers known as the Boers (Boer translates to “farmer” in Dutch). Occupying areas in what is today South Africa, the …

Book 3: Migration, Land and Minerals in the Making of South Africa

South Africa attracted Europeans because of its temperate climate, its economic opportunities and most importantly because of its huge mineral riches. The discovery of diamonds (1867) and gold (1886) brought large numbers of immigrants and large quantities of investment capital into the country.

History of mining in South Africa

The first diamonds were uncovered at the site of the Big Hole in 1871. Until the mine's closure in 1914, up to 50,000 miners excavated the deepest hole ever dug by hand, extending 215 metres underground. While the mine would yield 2,720kg of diamonds and help establish the De Beers mining company, which remains a major industry player …

A History of Gold Mining in South Africa, Ghana and Tanzania

The African continent is richly endowed with significant mineral, oil and gas resources, including large reserves of gold. As noted in the previous chapter, the continent is home to a large portion of the world's mineral wealth, including 42 per cent of the world's known gold reserves (Bush, 2008, p. 361).The continent's largest producer of gold, …

South Africa

Table of Contents. South Africa - Diamonds, Gold, Imperialism: South Africa experienced a transformation between 1870, when the diamond rush to Kimberley began, and 1902, when the South African War ended. Midway between these dates, in 1886, the world's largest goldfields were discovered on the …

Find out more about gold and diamond mining in south africa in the 19th

Diamond and gold production are now well down from their peaks, though South Africa is still number 5 in gold[3] but remains a cornucopia of mineral riches. It is the world's largest producer[4] of chrome, manganese, platinum, vanadium and vermiculite. It is the second largest producer[4] of ilmenite, palladium, rutile and zirconium.

Living conditions of mine workers from eight mines in South Africa

The study population comprised all workers employed at eight mines in South Africa; the study mines were identified by commodity, and included those in the platinum (n = 3), gold (n = 2), coal (n = 1), diamond (n = 1), and manganese (n = 1) sectors. The participating mines employed approximately 10% of the SAMI workforce in 2014.

Alluvial gold mining and trade in Nineteenth-Century South Central Africa

Alluvial gold mining and trade in Nineteenth-Century South Central Africa - Volume 15 Issue 3 ... The attention of archaeologists and historians, however, has focused mainly on gold reef mining. By comparison, alluvial goldwashing has been neglected, although it was practised by Africans both before and after the period during which they ...

The Impact Of Gold Mining In South Africa | ipl

The Impact Of Gold Mining In South Africa. 2208 Words9 Pages. Gold mining activities in the Witwatersrand have played a pivotal role in the development and existence of Johannesburg since 1886. Mining made Johannesburg 'the city of gold' and has since been the main driving force behind the history and the economic development of ...

OUR NEWSLETTER

join our newsletter

Subscribe to the Puik Store mailing list to receive updates on new arrivals, special offers
and other discount information.