In the aftermath of the passing of former President Nelson Mandela last month, the world has mourned and reflected, quite rightly, on the enormous contribution he made in liberating South Africa from the suffocating grip of apartheid and for the role he played in leading the country to a peaceful, nonracial democratic dispensation during the early 1990s.

While much has been written and said about Mandela’s life, especially as an antiapartheid freedom fighter, prisoner, politician and statesman, it is lesser known that, as a young man, he worked, albeit for a brief period, on one of Johannesburg’s most iconic mining operations, Crown Mines, on the Central Rand.

In his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, Mandela explains that, in 1941, when he was 22 years old, the regent of the Thembu people, Chief Jongintaba Dalindyebo, who acted as Mandela’s guardian and benefactor, chose a bride, as was custom, for his young charge. However, Mandela, who was already quite headstrong, believed the marriage to be unfair and ill-advised and decided to rebel against the decision by running away to Johannesburg, the “city of danger and opportunity”. His friend Justice, who happened to also be the regent’s wayward son, joined him on that fateful and history-changing journey.

A few months prior to their hasty departure, the regent had made arrangements for Justice to get a clerical job, one of the most respected and coveted positions for black men on the mine, within Crown Mines, which was owned and operated by that giant corporation, Rand Mines. (It is interesting that, of the 350 000 black migrant workers employed on the Witwatersrand’s gold mines at that time, about 34% were drawn from Xhosa communities, such as the Themba, living in the old Cape Province. Consequently, the wishes of chiefs such as Dalindyebo, who had great authority over the pools of unskilled labour both on the mines and at ‘home’, carried great weight.)

Knowing of this arrangement, and understanding that they would not be allowed to stay in Johannesburg without valid proof of employment, the two men made their way to the chief induna, or headman, on the mine compound and Justice declared himself ready for duty. He similarly explained that Mandela was his brother and the fact that the regent had failed to mention him in his letter of introduction was a mere oversight. Justice pleaded his case and insisted that ‘their’ father had already posted another letter requesting that his “other son” also be given a clerical job on the mine. Although the chief induna, whose name was Piliso, was sceptical about this story, he decided to give Mandela a job as a mine security guard on the basis that, if he worked well, he would be given a clerical job after three months.

Mandela’s first impression of the mine, which at the time was one of the largest gold mining operations in the world, covering some 2 000 ha, was not romanticised in the least: “There is nothing magical about a gold mine, barren and pockmarked, all dirt and no trees, fenced in on all sides, a gold mine resembles a war-torn battlefield. The noise was harsh and ubiquitous: the rasp of shaft lifts, the jangling power drills, the distant rumble of dynamite, the barked orders. Everywhere I looked I saw black men in dusty overalls looking tired and bent. They lived on the grounds in bleak, single-sex barracks that contained hundreds of concrete bunks separated from each other by only a few inches.”

He adds: “I had never seen such enterprise before, such great machines, such methodical organisation and such back-breaking work. It was my first sight of South African capitalism at work, and I knew I was in for a new kind of education.”

Because Piliso believed him to be the regent’s son, Mandela was treated with extra care and was given free rations, sleeping quarters and a small but decent salary. He started work immediately as a night watchman being given a uniform, a new pair of boots, a helmet, a torch, a whistle and a knobkerrie.

Mandela reveals that the job was a simple one. “I waited at the compound entrance next to the sign that read, ‘BEWARE: NATIVES CROSSING HERE’, and checked the credentials of all those entering and leaving. For the first few nights, I patrolled the grounds of the compound without incident. I did challenge a rather drunken miner late one evening, but he meekly showed his pass and retired to his hostel.”

However, after a few days working on the mine and being flushed with their success, the two men boasted of their cleverness to an acquaintance from Thembuland. This man, believing himself to be a good subject, went straight to the chief induna and revealed their secret. At the same time, Dalindyebo had sent a telegram to the mine demanding that the two boys be sent home at once. Piliso had little choice but to fire the two men and insist that they return home.

However, while they felt ashamed and humiliated, the two young men left the mine “determined not to return to the Transkei”. The rest, as they say, is history.