Battle of Dimawe

The Battle of Dimawe was fought between several Batswana tribes and the Boers in August 1852. Under the command of Kgosi Setshele I of the Bakwena tribe, the Batswana defended Dimawe Hill and the Bahurutshe tribe against Boer troops.

Background
At the time, Boer farmers used the Bahurutshe as slaves on their corn fields around Bloemfontein. A group of Bahurutshe, led by Kgosi Manyana Mangope, escaped and fled north to seek help from Setshele I and the Bakwena tribe in Manyana. The Bakwena and other surrounding tribes were recovering from attacks in the 1830s by the Zulu Kingdom as they moved towards present-day Zimbabwe. The Boers followed the Bahurutshe into Bakwena territory and asked for Kgosi Mangope's whereabouts.

Battle
According to the grandson of Kgosi Mangope, when a Boer delegation asked about Mangope, Kgosi Setshele said, "I have eaten him and he is right inside me. You have to open me to get him." Setshele then demanded that the Boers take off their shoes when speaking to a kgosi. Once they did, the Bakwena attacked, and since the ground was rough, the Boers had a hard time escaping and were killed.

The Bakwena had knowledge of the surrounding hilltops and used them as watchtowers and hiding places. When the Boers were spotted, Kgosi Setshele ordered the women and children to hide; Setshele's own pregnant wife was hidden in Mmasechele Cave several kilometers away. The Boers stole cattle and wagons, and raided both Bakwena and English homes, including the house of David Livingstone at the Kolobeng Mission. As the Boer troops climbed the hills, Setshele's warriors rolled large stones down the hillside to crush the Boers.

The battle lasted between 3 and 7 days. David Livingstone wrote that the Boers captured hundreds of women and children before the Tswana stopped fighting, but today, historians believe that the Tswana won by using Setshele's large gun stockpile.

Aftermath
After the battle, the Tswana tribes split; the Bakwena travelled to Ditlhakane and Dithubaruba while the Bathurutshe finally settled in the Kolobeng River valley around Dimawe Hill.

An agreement was signed between the Boers and the Batswana in January 1853. Setshele attempted to travel to Great Britain to ask for further protection from the Boers, but he only made it to Cape Town before being turned back. The British did not want to make an agreement with the Batswana as that would hurt relations with the Boers. However, this first failed attempt may have inspired a second successful trip to Britain in 1895 during which Kgosi Khama III, Kgosi Sebele I, and Kgosi Bathoen I asked for Botswana's incorporation into the Bechuanaland Protectorate, a separate entity from Cecil Rhodes British South Africa Company or the South African Republic. While Kgosi Setshele was en route to Britain, a group of Setshele's army encountered a small group of Boers. The Boers were so frightened that they arranged to have Setshele's children, who were captured and enslaved by a Boer commandant, returned to him.