author

D. E. van Velden

Best known as a co-author of a firsthand account of the negotiations that ended the Second Boer War, this writer helped preserve one of the conflict’s key political moments in book form. The record remains closely tied to the Peace of Vereeniging and the final talks of 1902.

1 Audiobook

The peace negotiations between the governments of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State, and the representatives of the British government, which terminated in the peace concluded at Vereeniging on the 31st May, 1902

The peace negotiations between the governments of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State, and the representatives of the British government, which terminated in the peace concluded at Vereeniging on the 31st May, 1902

by J. D. (John Daniel) Kestell, D. E. van Velden

About the author

D. E. van Velden is a historical author remembered chiefly for The Peace Negotiations Between the Governments of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State, and the Representatives of the British Government, Which Terminated in the Peace Concluded at Vereeniging on the 31st May, 1902, written with J. D. Kestell. Contemporary title pages and library records identify him as Secretary to the Government of the South African Republic, placing him close to the events the book describes.

The book was published in 1912 and later circulated widely enough to be preserved by major public-domain and library collections. Van Velden is also credited as the translator and publisher of the English edition, which helped bring this important account of the peace process to a broader readership.

Reliable biographical details beyond his role in this work are hard to confirm from readily available sources, so it is safest to remember him as a participant-observer whose surviving reputation rests on this valuable documentary history of the end of the Boer War.