‘I am in the Batawana's country,’ wrote the Herero chief Samuel Maharero to the British Magistrate in Tsau in Ngamiland on 28 September 1904. ‘I am writing to tell you that I have been fighting with the Germans in my country; the Germans were my friends; they made me suffer so much by the manner in which they troubled me, that I fought with them…’ (PRO CO 879/80). On the same date he wrote to the Tawana chief Sekgoma: ‘I tell you that I have fought with the German, they trouble me and killed my people, then I was angry about that. I have fought with them for 8 (eight) months, and I have no ammunition to-day, this is the reason why I came here…’ (PRO CO 879/86).