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1899

9 October 1899 Beginning of the Boer War between Britain and the Boers of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State.

Mid-October 1899 Mafeking is besieged by the Boers. Because Ronald had been born in the Orange Free State, he and his mother would have a special interest in events occurring there. On 16 November 1914, not long after the First World War begins, he will write to his friend *Christopher Wiseman expressing patriotism and a fierce belief in nationalism, but denying that he is a militarist: ‘I no longer defend the Boer War! I am a more & more convinced Home Ruler’ (Tolkien Papers, Bodleian Library, Oxford).

November 1899 Ronald sits the entrance examination for *King Edward’s School, Birmingham, which his father had attended, but fails to obtain a place.

Late 1899 or early 1900 Mabel Tolkien begins to take her boys on Sunday to St Anne’s, a Roman Catholic church in Alcester Street, Birmingham.