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South Africa (1910-1928)

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by Graham Bartram
Flag adopted 1 January 1801.

Both the colonial flags and those used by the Boer Republics became dormant after the establishment of the Union of South Africa on 31 May 1910 and the Union Flag of Great Britain became the official flag.

Apparently it was the custom in the former South African colonies to use and regard the colonial flags for use on land as well as at sea. I think this was more a case of ignorance by the locals about the finer points of British vexillology. The Cape colonial Blue Ensign became generally known as the Cape Government flag which implies that it might have been flown at various colonial offices, but I have found no records to confirm this. The same applied in Natal. When the Natal Legislature on their own initiative adopted both a Red and Blue ensign in 1870, the Blue Ensign was later modified on instructions by the Colonial Office as the Natal Seal which they had placed in the fly was too complicated. The Blue Ensign was then apparently designated as the only valid colonial flag for Natal. The inhabitants did, however, continue to use the original Natal Red Ensign. There is a surviving example in the Killie Campbell Library in Durban.

Even the Boer republicans acknowledged the Cape Government flag as representing the Cape Colony. The design of the little New Republic's flag
was a vierkleur with the blue and green bars interchanged. But the original design approved by the Volksraad made provision for flagslets on
each bar: on the vertical blue bar a small Unio