Talk on Breaker Morant @ Origins Centre

[Origins Centre]

REAKER MORANT - A LEGEND DEAD AND BURIED

In the dying months of the Anglo-Boer War in the Northern Transvaal, Harry Harbord ‘The
Breaker’ Morant commanded a unit of the Bushveldt Carbineers in the Soutpansberg.  
Morant, an Anglo-Australian with a colourful past, vowed to avenge the death of his best
friend, Captain Percy Hunt, who had been killed in an ill-conceived attack on a civilian
house.

What was to follow was a series of callous murders and trumped up accusations – leading
to arrests, court martial, and executions – the effects of which still reverberate today.

Many books and a stage play have been written on Morant’s life, and a movie called
‘Breaker Morant’ was released in 1980.  Most of these were written from an Australian
point of view.

Now Charles Leach, whose family has been resident in Louis Trichardt (Makhado) in the
Soutpansberg for four generations, has written a local version of the tale in a
newly-published book titled The Legend of Breaker Morant is Dead and Buried: A South
African version of the Bushveldt Carbineers in the Zoutpansberg. He will deliver a
lecture on the subject at Origins Centre later this month.

Date: Tuesday 26 June 2012
Venue: Origins Centre
Time: 18h00 for 18h30
Cost: R45/R35 Wits students and Wits staff
Bookings: a...@origins.org.za

Please e-mail your request for seats to a...@origins.org.za. If you are a Wits student or
Wits staff member, please include your student/staff number. We will then e-mail an
invoice to you, which can be paid by eft.