Download or read book The Origins of the South African War, 1899-1902 written by Iain R. Smith and published by Longman Publishing Group. This book was released on 1996 with total page 488 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tracing the roots of the conflict into the first half of the nineteenth century, Dr. Smith shows how the conflict between Britain and the Transvaal republic intensified after the discovery of gold on the Witwatersrand in 1886. The resulting wealth and the influx of foreign, mainly British, Uitlanders transformed what had been a poor land-locked Boer republic into the hub round which the future of South Africa was to turn.