but Stephen Leacock’s warning that reconciling electioneering with statecraft was the cardinal problem of the parliamentary system made him turn to law. According to Hertzog, he and Rupert first met as a result of student anti-war activities. At a meeting to protest against the internment of a member of the SRC, first Rupert and then Hertzog spoke: ‘Everybody else kept mum, as there were too many detectives in the audience,’ he related.8 It was Hertzog’s interest in politics that triggered the two incidents in question.
The first was an interview with Gen. Hertzog that his nephew organised shortly after the outbreak of war. Their party comprised six members of the ANS executive, including himself, Rupert and Demps van der Merwe. They wanted the veteran leader to advise them as to where their duty lay in these turbulent times. At first the septuagenarian Boer general was sceptical. Why come to him for counsel after vilifying him all these years, he asked. He pointed out that until recently many students had questioned his Afrikaner identity and loyalty. In the end he wanted an assurance that they would follow whatever advice he gave them. The young men asked leave to deliberate. When they returned Rupert, acting as spokesman, agreed that they would accept his advice unconditionally: for his part, he had requested it because he needed it. They recall Hertzog’s words to them as follows:
‘If you ever want to exercise control, you must first learn to obey. And the true test of obedience is not when you are in agreement but especially when you disagree. Jan Smuts has declared a war that you do not agree with. As you know, I do not agree either. But it was done legally under a constitution that I helped to write, so as law-abiding citizens we are bound by it. Smuts assured me that he would not conscript South Africans for duty beyond our borders. I told him if he introduced conscription or martial law I would personally lead you to the hills [i.e. head a rebellion]. I think he learned a lesson in 1914, he won’t repeat that mistake.
‘Now I am telling you: go back and prepare yourselves to take over. The wheel will turn and the day will come when you have to take the reins, and then you must be ready. Go back to your studies, do your duty and obey the law. And remember, whatever you do unto others will be done unto you.’
The former prime minister then insisted on personally pouring the coffee and slicing the bread.
Rupert was profoundly impressed. He had expected Hertzog to instigate them to rebel against the Smuts government. He decided then and there that he would desist from protest in future and rather engage in positive, practical action. To his mind this was an even more life-changing resolve than his decision to turn down Verwoerd’s offer to join Die Transvaler. Hertzog died two years later in November 1942. His former private secretary, Wennie du Plessis, described him as ‘Boer, Soldier, Statesman, Prince among humans’. Du Plessis eventually became an MP when he defeated Smuts in his stronghold, the Highveld constituency of Standerton, in the watershed election of 1948, which brought to an end the era of the Boer generals who had ruled the Union of South Africa since 1910.
The group of student friends all followed Hertzog’s advice and completed their academic training, except Demps van der Merwe, who was interned during the war. He was a theology student, newly returned from the Netherlands, who eventually headed the Gereformeerde Kerk’s Transvaal training centre for black theology students at Hammanskraal. In Huberte’s opinion it was Hertzog’s ‘wonderful’ advice that inspired Anton to join the Reddingsdaadbond when he was asked to do so.
The other crucial incident that influenced Rupert during the war years took place in 1940, when Dirk Hertzog persuaded Rupert to accompany him to Swartruggens to attend a political meeting at which Oswald Pirow was to speak. In 1939 Pirow, minister of defence in Hertzog’s government, had started a right-wing totalitarian movement, the New Order. Back in Pretoria after the meeting, Rupert was invited to tea by Pirow’s sister Sylva Moerdyk, wife of the well-known architect Gerard Moerdyk and member of a political triumvirate in the Transvaal, together with Adv. JG (Hans) Strijdom, later prime minister, and Prof. LJ (Wicus) du Plessis of Potchefstroom University for Christian Higher Education.
When he arrived she did not mince words. ‘Anton, why are you throwing away your future like this?’
Surprised, he asked what she meant.
‘Why do you mix with the likes of Oswald Pirow?’
Bewildered, he told her he didn’t understand. She replied: ‘We’re grooming you as leader in our party.’
He was shocked to hear a sister speak about her brother in such terms. That evening he told Huberte: ‘If that’s what politics is like, I want nothing to do with it. I’m through with politics.’
Rupert’s decision to steer clear of politics differed from that taken by Harry Oppenheimer, heir to an earlier South African family fortune, at about the same time. In 1947 he was elected a United Party MP. After the death of his father, Sir Ernest, in 1958 he became chairman of Anglo American and left politics, no doubt because he sensed a conflict of interests which the dual role as politician and head of a mighty gold, diamond and mineral empire would have entailed.
Dirk Hertzog in his turn received advice that turned him away from politics from his uncle Gen. Hertzog, whom he often visited at Waterval, although he did stand for election once. In his memoirs he records that when he questioned Hertzog about Stephen Leacock’s view of politics, the old man replied: ‘Yes, my boy, Leacock’s right. Smuts and I entered politics with the prestige we had gained over three years during the Anglo-Boer War. We could still achieve something on occasion. But if you have to start from the bottom, you have to kiss so many hands to get to the top that by the time you do, you are powerless. Besides, it’s always difficult to decide whether you should do the popular thing − and it’s never hard to tell what that is − or rather do what your own knowledge and experience tell you is in the public’s long-term interest. If you choose to do what you believe to be right, you must accept that you may become unpopular. And if you want to be popular, you must accept that you will have to act against your own judgment, if not your conscience.’
Rupert retained great respect for Gen. Hertzog, whose stature grew after his death. And he considers the international statesman Gen. Jan Smuts, prime minister from 1939 to 1948, and the poet and naturalist Eugène Marais to have been the two real geniuses that South Africa produced.9
His decision to shun politics was indeed life-changing. Most of his university friends believed he was destined for a political career. Dr Colijn van Bergen expressed a firm view in this regard: ‘If Anton had become prime minister instead of Hendrik Verwoerd, South Africa would have been a totally different world.’
During the war years the relationship between Rupert and Huberte was formalised. Rupert duly approached Huberte’s stepfather, Piet Wessels, to ask for her hand in marriage. His future father-in-law responded: ‘I know you can’t support her, but I’m sure you will manage in the end.’
Although far from the war arena, South Africa felt the reverberations. Strict rationing and other wartime measures were introduced and towards the end of the war 200 000 South Africans in uniform took part in the war effort. In the midst of this comparative austerity the young couple were blissfully in love. They went to buy an engagement ring at the Amsterdam Diamond Cutting Works in Johannesburg. The counter staff made such a fuss of them that they quite forgot to pay for the ring. They were nearing Pretoria when Huberte realised the oversight. Horrified, she remembered that they had even been told that when they came for the wedding ring, it would be a present. When they hastened back the next day to settle the bill the staff were unfazed. ‘They said they knew we would come back to pay them, can you believe it?’ Huberte related in 2001.
They announced their engagement on Kruger Day, 10 October 1940. Their photograph appeared prominently on the social page of Die Transvaler, with the caption stating that the engagement was bound to ‘arouse general interest in republican circles’. The same issue contained
