Malope, a chief of the Bakwena, led his people from the Transvaal region of South Africa into the southeast territory of Botswana.

Somehow (this episode is not explained by Bessie), they held on, and by the time of Chief Khama III's reign (between the years 1875–1923), the Bamangwato had grown (both through natural population increase and the influx of refugees from South Africa and Rhodesia) to become the region's largest ethnic community.

By all accounts he was popular with visiting hunters (who came from South Africa and across the globe), who needed permission to travel and hunt on Ngwato territory.

Although he was often portrayed by his missionary patrons as being primarily motivated by religious concerns, Khama was at the center of not only reshaping the Ngwato economy, but also of extending its power over a host of subject peoples.

[5] In his early twenties, Khama was baptized into the Lutheran church in 1860 by the German missionary Heinrich Christoph Schulenberg[6][7] along with five of his younger brothers.

By this time in his life he had already gone through bogwera (the tribe's traditional initiation ceremony into manhood) with members of his mephato (age regiment).

Khama then ousted Macheng and, in what was either a selfless gesture of goodwill or simply a dogged adherence to tribal custom, re-installed his father, Sekgoma, as Chief of the Bamangwato.

This time Khama and his followers, who now represented the majority of the tribe in Shoshong, relocated northward to the tiny village of Serowe and prepared for war with Sekgoma.

First, although he abolished the bogwera ceremony itself, Khama retained the mephato regiments as a source of free labor for a variety of economic and religious purposes.

All members of the mephato would drop whatever they were doing and begin their six-month tour of duty, without any material support from the village (in particular without any organized contribution of food).

After Khama became kgosi (king) in 1875, after overthrowing his father Sekgoma and elbowing away his brother Kgamane his ascension came at a time of great dangers and opportunities.

Ndebele incursions from the north (from what is now Zimbabwe), Boer and "mixed" trekkers from the south, and German forces from the West, all hoping to the seize his territory and its hinterlands.

He answered these challenges by aligning his state with the administrative aims of the British, which provided him with cover and support,[9] and, relatedly, by energetically expanding his own control over a much wider area than any kgosi before him.

Not only was Khama's biography written at this time, but he received large amounts of other press that cemented his legend as an African Christian.

[11] The journey to Britain by the three Tswana kings eventually proved successful following the ill-fated Jameson Raid of 1896, when Rhodes' reputation was ruined.

Had Khama and his compatriots been unable to convince the British authorities of the need to protect the Bamangwato prior to the Jameson Raid fiasco, it is very likely that much of what is today Botswana would have been absorbed into Rhodesia and South Africa.

Tshekedi Khama's regency as acting chief of the Bamangwato is best remembered for his expansion of the mephato regiments for the building of primary schools, grain silos, and water reticulation systems; for his frequent interest in the administration of justice in Ngwato country; and for his efforts to deal with a major split in the tribe after Seretse married a white woman, Ruth Williams, while studying law in Britain.

In the end, the decision was made by the colonial authorities to exile both men (Tshekedi from the Bamangwato territory, Seretse from the Protectorate altogether).