A year prior to this evacuation, the environment of Shoshong had become progressively uninhabitable. A calamitous drought that had struck the surroundings of the Shoshong Hills, and ushering in a season of poor crop yields, also resulted in diminished pastures and inevitable malnourishment of cattle. The result of the drought was a disheartening sight of dead cattle carcasses that littered the area, producing a repulsive stench in the settlement. Problems after another continued mounting amongst Baphaleng, Bangwato, Batalaote, Bakaa and Bakalanga living in Shoshong. These poor sanitary conditions were escalated by shortage of clean water caused by the drying of a perennial spring and wells that supplied the town.
Poor hygiene conditions coupled with a future that was uncertain hovered above Shoshong. This reduced the once affluent trading town into a place of anguish and hollow dreams for the people living in the town. This gloomy condition finally forced King Khama III to issue an instruction for his people to pack their belongings, burn down their homesteads and begin an exodus of over 200 kilometres to Photophotho Gorge in the Tswapong Hills. When this decision was finally reached in 1899, an enormous economic blow had already been dealt to the people of Shoshong. Arriving at the bountifully refreshing waters of the perennial Phothophoto Gorge, the people soon forgot the disaster that had befallen them in Shoshong. Before the business of setting up a new capital dawned on the minds of the people, Phalatswe, while still in its infancy stage, was met by a new regional development. This event was to change the course of history in many ways.
