← 1846 1845 1844 1847 in South Africa → 1848 1849 1850
Decades:	1820s 1830s 1840s 1850s 1860s
See also:	List of years in South Africa

The following lists events that happened during 1847 in South Africa.

• The Montagu Pass is opened.
• Sugar cane plantations are started in Natal.
• The settlement of East London is established.
• Robert Gray is ordained as the first Bishop of Cape Town in Westminster Abbey, London.
• The AmaXhosa Resistance rejects British peace terms, but avoids direct warfare. The British then destroy homes, cattle, and crops to force a surrender.
• Harry Smith is appointed as Cape Governor, and begins to pursue an aggressive expansion policy.
• The British Kaffraria Colony is established on AmaXhosa land, and the AmaXhosa are made British subjects.
• Harry Smith overturns Maitland's agreement, seizing rental payments for the Crown and allowing white settlement on Griqua land.
• Harry Smith claims land between the Orange and Vaal rivers for Britain but restricts white settlement, except in Griqualand.
• With British support, Moshoeshoe unifies Basotho chiefdoms and secures protection from white settlers.

• 9 July - Henrietta Stockdale, pioneer of nursing in the Cape Colony, is born in Nottinghamshire, England
• 22 October - Jacobus Herculaas de la Rey, Boer general, is born near Winburg, Free State

See Years in South Africa for list of References