Kok III, Adam

Adam Kok III, (born 1811, southern Africa—died Dec. 30, 1875, near Mzimkulu, Cape Colony [now in South Africa]), chief who led the people of the Griqua nation from their home in the Orange Free State (now part of South Africa) to found a new nation, Griqualand East, on the east coast of what is now South Africa. He considered himself an independent ally of the British, but colonial pressures ultimately led to the annexation of Griqualand East by the Cape Colony.

In 1837 Adam Kok succeeded to the rule of the Griqua nation of Dutch-speaking former slaves and Africans of mixed descent. He was friendly to the British administration in the Cape Colony, and he received recognition of his sovereignty in 1848. Pressed seriously by Boer (Dutch) expansion in the Orange Free State, Kok accepted a British offer (1861) to resettle the Griquas in the eastern section of the Cape Colony, and he led his people on a two-year trek across South Africa. Although he aided the British in a campaign to subdue the rebellious Hlubi tribe in Natal (1874), in October 1874 they annexed his country to the Cape Colony.