This article was originally published in Familia, journal of the
Ulster Historical Foundation (volume 2, no. 7, 1991). Published
annually.  The Irish in South Africa  The Police, A Case Study
by Donal P. McCracken, University of Durban-Westville
Nineteenth-century South Africa did not attract mass Irish
migration, but Irish communities were to be found in Cape town,
port Elizabeth, Kimberley, and Johannesburg, with smaller
communities in Pretoria, Barberton, Durban and East London. As
one would expect, a fair number of those in British colonial
service in the sub-continent were Irish. A third of the Cape's
governors were Irish, as were many of the judges and
politicians. Both the Cape Colony and the colony of Natal had
Irish prime ministers: Sir Thomas Upington, "The Afrikaner from
Cork"; and Sir Albert Hime, from Kilcoole in County Wicklow.
Place names such as Upington, Porteville, Caledon, Cradock, sir
Henry Lowry's Pass, the Biggarsberg Mountains, Donnybrook and
Belfast reflect Irish impact on the develo