Henry Englebrecht, Yala National Park's first keeper

By Amal Hewavissenti

Henry Englebrecht, a South African Boer was the first keeper of the Yala National Park. He was appointed the keeper of the park by Sir Henry Blake, the then Governor of Sri Lanka as a tribute to his hard life fashioned to the tune of life in the remotest recesses of the country.

Henry Englebrecht

On a significant encounter with each, Henry Blake, the Governor earnestly appealed to him to formally announce his allegiance to King Edward the VII who was now controlling his mother country.

Yet, Henry Englebrecht vehemently refused to betray his conscience by pledging allegiance to the principles of a ruler (Edward the VII) and enjoy privileges back in his motherland.

In spite of all entreaties, remonstrations and influence, Englebrecht refused to go back to South Africa (now ruled by King Edward) and chose to live in Sri Lanka with the friendly people whom he managed to earn within a short spell of time.

The new position as the keeper of the Yala National Park rekindled his memories of the surroundings and the impressive forests of South Africa.

Sir Henry Blake was deeply struck by the courage and the strong moral principles of this strange man who unhesitatingly opted to live in a foreign country rather than live in his motherland being ruled by a foreign king. The Governor immediately appointed him the Chief-Officer-In-Charge of Yala National Park which remained largely uninhabited by animals then.

The new position transformed Englebrecht's life to a great extent and life with animals in the park gradually wore out the radical nature inherent in him. Even though he had been in exile, the Yala Park provided him with complete freedom. The people in Hambantota were the most amiable he had ever met.

Background story

During the Napoleonic wars of 1792 to 1815, Britain captured the Cape and the English speaking colonists occupied it from the 1820s battling with the Xhosa people for the ownership of farmland. In the 1830s, many Dutch farmers who were called Boers wanted to control their own territory and to own more land.

In Natal, Zulu chief Shaka who controlled all the surrounding African tribes strongly resisted the invading Boers. In the course of decisive battles, Britain defeated Zulus of Natal and the discovery of gold and diamonds led to a fierce conflict between the British and the Boers led by Paul Kruger. The Anglo-Boer war consequentially brought about a grave defeat for the Boers who lost their territory to the British. At the climax of the Anglo-Boer war in South Africa, the British arrested Boer rebels and made arrangements to exile them to other British colonies.

Accordingly, thousands of Boer prisoners were exiled to Sri Lanka by 1900 and were detained separately in certain places in the country.

Among them was Englebrecht who had been noted to be a violent fighter for the Boers in the Anglo-Boer war.

The peace accord signed in Pretoria in 1902 stipulated certain conditions for freedom for the exiles and for their return to their countries. The agreement strongly demanded that Boer prisoners were to pledge allegiance to King Edward VII prior to their return to South Africa. But Englebrecht opted to stay in Sri Lanka as he strongly refused to swear loyalty to the British ruler while all other prisoners had yielded to the agreement.

Englebrecht who was by this time living in Diyatalawa was joined by four other Boer exiles who too protested against their motherland (South Africa) being ruled by a British King. Ultimately the Colonial Secretary of Sri Lanka issued a special announcement that the five Boer exiles were allowed to live anywhere they wished. The order demanded that Engle Brecht should collect his monthly allowance from the Kachcheri of Hambantota while the other prisoners (exiles) were to collect theirs from the kachcheris of Batticaloa and Jaffna.

Splendour of Yala

The announcement minimised the possibility that the five exiles could get together and by 1905, Engle Brecht was the only Boer prisoner living in Sri Lanka. He was presumably an extremely strange man because he refused the chance to return to South Africa and live there as a true African by merely expressing loyalty to the foreign ruler. But he seemed to have valued his motherland being ruled by a Boer or at least by a South African far more than his personal benefit.

Guardian of Yala

By 1905, Henry Englebrecht had grown accustomed to the life in Hambantota and he had to make do with the scanty allowance of Rs. 1.25 from the Government. As the first keeper of the Yala forest reserve Englebrecht was instrumental in introducing different varieties of young animals to the park.

Wherever he went he was careful to look for animals or wounded animals and release them into Yala Park after treatment. Once Governor Henry Blake highly praised Englebrecht and expressed his immense delight in making the right choice of the man - the keeper of the Yala Park.Englebrecht, in the mould of Jim Corbett, was both a nature lover and a skilled huntsman who killed animals that posed a major threat to people and the helpless animals newly introduced into the park.

He possessed a fine flock of goats that gradually fell prey to the wild animals specially the tigers.

The most skilled and experienced hunters did not dare to enter the swathe of territory between Yala and Palatupana (an area reserved by the Government for hunting then) without Englebrecht guiding them.

The plight

By now World War I had broken out and a German battleship S.M.S. Emden was severely attacking ships that belonged to the allied forces. This sparked a strong antipathy in British colonies against Germany's S.M.S. Emden that had anchored in the Indian ocean. A provincial chief who had had a personal strife with Englebrecht, spread a rumour that the crew of S.M.S. Emden had disembarked on Yala and Englebrecht was supplying them with beef. Officials from the Intelligence Service in Colombo made a thorough search of his residence in Hambantota and found empty bottles of liquor and canned food. The objects that were really left by his hunter friends were immediately mistaken for the remains of dinner parties that he was alleged to have organised for the crew of S.M.S. Emden.

Englebrecht was immediately remanded on suspicion and was detained for three months. After his death in 1922, he was found innocent of all the charges previously made but he led a life of disappointment till his death.