Nicolaas Jacobus de Wet

Who was Nicolaas Jacobus de Wet?

The Right Honourable Nicolaas Jacobus de Wet, PC, KC was Chief Justice of South Africa and acting Governor-General from 1943 to 1945.

Born in 1873, de Wet obtained a law degree from the University of Cambridge in 1895 and was admitted as an advocate in 1896. During the Anglo-Boer War, he was military secretary to General Louis Botha, commandant-general of the Transvaal forces, and acted as an interpreter at the peace conference that ended the war in 1902.

After the war, de Wet joined Botha in politics, and was a member of the Transvaal legislative assembly from 1907 to 1910. He was a legal adviser to the Transvaal delegation to the 1908-1909 National Convention that drew up the Constitution for the Union of South Africa. In 1913, he was appointed a King's Counsel. He was also a founder member of the Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns in 1909.

De Wet was a member of the Union Parliament between 1913 and 1929, serving as a member of the House of Assembly from 1913 to 1920 and a Senator from 1920 to 1929. He served in the South African Party government as Minister of Justice from 1913 to 1924.