Jameson Raid, 1895. At the time (29 December 1895) this was presented as a brave attempt by a troop of part-time cavalry led by Dr Leander Starr Jameson, the British South Africa Company's representative in Rhodesia, to rescue English women and children persecuted by a wicked Boer government in the Transvaal. It turned out, however, to be a sordid conspiracy by Cecil Rhodes, almost certainly with the British colonial secretary Joseph Chamberlain's prior knowledge, to seize the Transvaal for the British empire. It failed ignominiously, and sullied Rhodes's, Chamberlain's, and the empire's reputations.

Bernard Porter

Jameson Raid an abortive raid into Boer territory made in 1895–6 by pro-British extremists led by Dr L. S. Jameson (1853–1917) in an attempt to incite an uprising among recent, non-Boer immigrants. The raid seriously heightened tension in South Africa and contributed to the eventual outbreak of the Second Boer War.