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In southern Africa, Britain's high commissioner for South Africa and governor-general of its Cape Colony, Alfred Milner, was interested in the gold mines in Boer territory, and he wanted to create a Cape-to-Cairo confederation of British colonies. He pushed for political rights for those British who had entered the Boer territory in search of gold, and this heightened tensions between the British and the Boers. The Boers of the Transvaal – descendants of the Dutch – were feeling closer to the Germans than to the English, and they were planning to link with German Southwest Africa. The British wanted to prevent this. Seeing war coming, the Boers attacked first, with some success, against Britain's colony of Natal and into Cape Colony.The British sent around 350,000 volunteers to fight the Boers, while the Boers had no more than 40,000 men under arms at any one time. The British public supported their troops, with much singing of "Britannia Rules the Waves." Those distributing leaflets opposing the war found overwhelming hostility.The British managed to defeat the Boers' regular military units, and the Boers resorted to guerrilla warfare. The British government sent their famous general Kitchener from Egypt to take charge in South Africa. Kitchener built defensive block houses to protect rail lines. He strung barbed wire. He removed Boer women and children from their farms, and he began systematic drives against one small section of Boer country at a time. Deaths from poor sanitation and disease in the concentration camps killed around 20,000, and indignation arose around the globe.The Boers surrendered unconditionally in May 1902. The British had lost 5,744 dead from combat, 22,829 wounded, and thousands of British soldiers had died from disease. More than 7,000 Boers are reported to have died in combat.Having won control over South Africa, the British now wanted the Boers to cooperate with their rule. Kitchener congratulated the Boers for their "good fight" and welcomed them as members of the British Empire. Amnesty was extended to all the Boers, and the British agreed to grant them loans and to help them restock their farms. Britain united its territories in South Africa, forming the Union of South Africa, which in 1910 became a state within the Commonwealth of Nations.
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