3-070-525 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Mr. J. H. Brand, President of the Orange Free State, 1881. 'It has been the rare good fortune of this worthy public man, having a twofold personal connection with the British and Dutch communities in South Africa, to render the greatest service equally to both of these, to the Government of Queen Victoria as well as to the Boers of the Transvaal, and not less to those of the Orange Free State. To the opportune mediation of Mr. Brand, conducted with admirable tact and discretion, and with sincere goodwill to all parties concerned, we may ascribe the success of the recent negotiations between Sir Evelyn Wood and Messrs. Kruger and Joubert, for a peaceable settlement of the unhappy conflict, impending these four years past, which broke out last December in open warfare[ie the First Boer War]. Mr. Brand is probably the one man in South Africa who deserves to be reputed a statesman; and his conduct...has been inspired by no petty sectional interests, no animosities or jealousies of race and place, but what Shakspeare calls "a general honest thought, and common good of all."...it is the special merit of President Brand to have played the part of peacemaker, with happy success, between her Majesty's Government and the Transvaal'. From "Illustrated London News", 1881.