An unfading legacy of friendship
We have an unfading legacy in my family. My grandfather, Bernard Niland, farmed near Kroomie in the Adelaide district.
During the Anglo Boer War he was part of the Fort Beaufort District Mounted Troops and he later joined up in 1914 to take part in World War 1 to see service on the Western Front in Europe.
His right-hand man on the farm, Mount Prospect, was a black man called Velapi.
Now Velapi had grown up with Bernard, they were about the same age and firm friends.
When Velapi heard that Bernard had enlisted he confronted him with words to the effect of “How can you go off to war and not take me with you? Who is going to look after you and who is going to look after me?”
And so it was that Velapi went off with Bernard — he with the so called Native Brigade and Bernard, his companion, a white soldier armed and ready to fight.
Blacks were said then not to be trusted with arms and only allowed to become stretcher bearers and the like on the battlefields.
Fortune prevailed and both returned to the farm after peace was declared.
It was a friendship that lasted for decades.
I still have a photograph of Velapi taken with his wife and he is seen standing very proudly to attention wearing his army-issued riding boots
something that he always wore and which set him apart from his fellow man.
In today’s context this legacy may be looked upon as a “master /servant” type relationship, but I would like to believe it was more than that.
It is of a firm, loyal and lasting bond between two individuals who, yet of vastly different backgrounds, had utmost respect for and loyalty towards each other.
In the present day, corruption is rife, anarchy prevails and we live in uncertain times. If we could create the same bond between our ordinary, common man that Bernard and Velapi had, it would be a good start to making SA a better place for all of us.