On August 5, 1962, Nelson Mandela was driving to Johannesburg from Durban when he was stopped by the police in Howick, about 20 miles northwest of Pietermaritzburg.
For Mandela, who had gone underground rather than surrender to the apartheid government that had issued a warrant for his arrest, the encounter set in motion events that led to 27 years of imprisonment. Mandela’s companion that day was Cecil Williams, a theater director and political activist who had helped Mandela move through the country without detection.
“Suddenly, in front of us, the Ford was signaling us to stop. I knew in that instant that my life on the run was over; my seventeen months of “freedom” were about to end,” Mandela wrote in his autobiography. Here’s how Mandela describes the encounter:
When our car stopped, a tall slender man with a stern expression on his face came directly over to the window on the passenger side. He was unshaven and it appeared that he had not slept in quite a while. I immediately assumed he had been waiting for us for several days. In a calm voice, he introduced himself as Sergeant Vorster of the Pietermaritzburg police and produced an arrest warrant. He asked me to identify myself. I told him my name was David Motsamayi. He nodded, and then, in a very proper way, he asked me a few questions about where I had been and where I was going. I parried these questions without giving him much information. He seemed a bit irritated and then, he said, “Ag, you’re Nelson Mandela and this is Cecil Williams, and you are under arrest!”
On Saturday, I visited the Mandela capture site, which is marked by a sculpture that consists of 50 steel columns between 21 and 31 feet tall. When viewed at a distance of about 114 feet, the columns form a flat portrait of Mandela.
The sculpture, by the South African artist Marco Cianfanelli, was dedicated last year on the 50th anniversary of Mandela’s arrest.
Beside a plaque that marks the actual spot of the arrest, people have left candles, notes and other tokens of their affection along with wishes that Mandela, who turned 95 in July and who reportedly is recovering at home in Johannesburg from a lung infection, might regain his health.