Joachim Ferreira

Joachim Johannes Ferreira (8 August 1835 – 16 May 1917) was a Boer commandant of the First Boer War. This general J. Ferreira should not be confused with general I. Ferreira.

Family
Ferreira was born near Uitenhage, Eastern Cape Province, South Africa, as the eldest child of Marthinus Stephanus Ferreira (born 2 February 1810) and Aletta Prinsloo (born 1815), with a younger brother and sister. Young Ferreira was taken on the Great Trek as an infant. He married Adriana Gertina Davel (31 January 1848 – Piet Retief, Eastvaal District Council, Mpumalanga, 29 January 1929) and had a daughter by her.

Career
He settled near Swaziland with other Voortrekker families in what they called the Commonwealth of the Klein Vrystaat in 1875. At the same time, Swazi King Mbandzeni granted a 36,000-acre grazing concession to Ferreira and his son-in-law, Franz Ignatius Maritz, the largest concession to Boer settlers at the time.

Ferreira began during the First Boer War (1880-1881) as the commandant of the Utrecht commando, and went on to lead one of the two Boer divisions at the Battle of Majuba Hill on 27 February 1881. The other group was led by Stephanus Roos. Ferreira was responsible for negotiating the transfer of land east of the Lebombo Mountains to the South African Republic. His plans were frustrated by the actions of Sir Charles Saunders who annexed the territory which became known as British Maputaland.

In the Second Boer War (1899-1902) Ferreira was a Boer general as well.

Joachim Ferreira died near Piet Retief on 16 May 1917.