Northern Cape

Steel windmills – colloquially known as windpumps – stand scattered on South Africa’s rural landscape. 

Windpumps have become prominent features of the South African landscape, following their pivotal role in the country's development and the survival of rural communities (Walton, 1998). Their primary role is to pump underground water to the surface in regions where surface water is scarce.

They are found in their greatest numbers across the arid Karoo, the Free State, and parts of the Northern Cape. These metal structures played a decisive role in making large areas of the country habitable and farmable by providing a dependable supply of groundwater, at least those that survived.

By harnessing the wind to lift groundwater, farmers could sustain livestock, establish permanent homesteads, and expand agriculture into areas previously considered uninhabitable. In this way, steel windpumps reshaped settlement patterns and directly influenced the economic development of South Africa’s interior.

On a recent Northern Cape and Free State Road trip, I became obsessed with windpumps that have fallen into disuse – pumps that have not been maintained and therefore are no longer functional. Although fully functional pumps were mostly observed, the occasional perished sentinels spotted on our road trip spoke to me – they all fall into the category of industrial archaeology.

A forlorn sentinel standing...

Late last year I purchased a copy of the Diamond Fields Advertiser, Illustrated Christmas Number of 1901. It is a remarkable document — a window into a mature Kimberley returning to normal life after the trauma of the South African War (Anglo-Boer War). The town had endured the long months of siege (14th October 1899 – 15th February 1900) and although the war was still in progress at the time of publication, it was already receding as a front line. British authority had been reasserted, and a process of civic recovery was underway.

The publication offers a vivid contemporary lens through which to view Kimberley at this moment of transition. Advertisements, group photographs, and civic commentary reveal a community re-establishing itself — socially confident, commercially active, and unmistakably shaped by a single dominant industry. There was only one enterprise of consequence, and the entire local economy revolved around it: diamonds.

Among the many articles, one drew my attention. It described a proposed memorial to the curiously named Honoured Dead, designed by Herbert Baker. Even on the printed page, the project conveyed an architectural ambition far beyond that of a conventional monument.

Cover of the 1901 Edition

It was a moment in time when Baker had a well-established practice in...

In the article below, Oscar Norwich, Johannesburg historian and collector, tells the story of the rise and fall of Barney Barnato, mining magnate of Kimberley and Johannesburg. Thank you to the Norwich family for their kind permission to publish this article. 

In the mid-1890s, when the share boom had reached its feverish climax, Barney Barnato was probably the richest and without doubt the most powerful financier in South Africa. His property and mine holdings had a market value of over £20 million and it was estimated that in the summer months of 1895 he earned five pounds for every minute of his working day.

Barney Barnato (Wikipedia)

Who was this flamboyant character who showed such sparks of financial genius? He was born Barnett Isaacs in the heart of London’s poor East End Jewish quarter at a corner of Middlesex Street, long known as “Petticoat Lane,” on the 5th of July 1852, a year to the day before Cecil Rhodes’ birth.

Barney’s brother Harry and sister Kate were raised in a slum area. Their father owned a shop and they had their schooling in the Jews Free School in nearby Bell Lane. Barney’s arithmetic was exceptionally good, and he left school soon after the age of 13.

Their father was essentially a practical, pious individual who closed his shop on the Sabbath, but frequently during the week, he...

To anyone familiar with the history of Richmond in the Northern Cape, the surnames Wagner and Hoffa are of great interest. In 1876, a 33-year-old storekeeper/accountant, John Martin Wagner married Bertha Hoffa, aged 20 years, in Richmond, the ceremony being performed by the Resident Magistrate. One of the witnesses to the marriage was Julius G Mosenthal. I wonder whether this is the same Julius who became a member of the Johannesburg and London Stock Exchanges and was buried in Highgate Cemetery in London?

The Wagners had 3 children who did well for themselves; clearly well educated. The eldest son, John, became a Solicitor; the middle child married a Civil Servant and the third child, born in Richmond in 1885, the subject of this biography, was Percy Albert, who became an eminent Consulting Geologist in South Africa.

But before we get to Percy, it is of interest to look at the family of Bertha. She was the firstborn child of the local doctor in Richmond, Moritz Hoffa, and was born in that little town/village in about 1856. She had 5 siblings and 1 of those achieved great heights in the world of science. This was Dr Albert Hoffa, born in Richmond in March 1859.  He trained as a surgeon, an orthopaedist and a physiotherapist. He is described as the founder of modern orthopaedics. It was he who introduced an operation for congenital hip dislocation in 1890.

When Percy was 17 years old, his father, John Martin Wagner, died on a mail...

The Governor Sir Philip Wodehouse imported an engineer of repute, Mr John Bourne, whom he had encountered in his previous posting in Demerara (now Guyana), where Bourne had saved the colony a large amount of money. The intention was to appoint him as Colonial Railway Engineer, but until there was a public railway for him to control there wasn't much for him to do. He toured the Colony to check out possible opportunities. His most far-reaching recommendation was that the government should plant forests of bluegums to provide timber for fuel, instead of importing Welsh coal to run the locomotives.

The obvious major route was to extend the Wellington line to Tulbagh and Worcester, and this alignment was informally approved by a select committee. Some work on the grading was done to keep the navvies from the original works employed, but in 1866 the government changed, and the Responsible and the Anti-Progressives Parties put a stop to railway construction - mainly because they felt that if country developed, they would lose their seats. Bourne's job opportunity was abolished and he returned to England. His lasting contribution to the Colony was a project he took on while kicking his heels - he stabilised the new lighthouse on Roman Rock which was about to collapse. The granite skirt which he suggested has ensured that the light is still in service today.

However there was steady pressure to extend the Wellington line and an 1868 governmental select committee recommended that railway construction be...

1. Introduction

Taking photographs some 150 years ago was a significantly more complicated process compared to today. It was hard work and required absolute dedication from aspirational photographers.

These pioneer photographers endured tough times, yet they left us with scenes of significant historical importance some of which have been preserved for posterity. Sadly, these photographers have largely been forgotten in that we freely use their images in articles and publications to support our own historical constructions without acknowledging the original photographic artist.

One of these early historical scenes and human activities that attracted treasure hunters and aspirational photographers alike was the frenzy that ensued following the discovery of a single shiny stone in March 1867 in South Africa.

A second stone found shortly thereafter was taken to Cape Town, where it was photographed by the well-known photographer SB Barnard. These images, in carte-de-visite format, were in high demand and were sold to the public in 1867 (Bull & Denfield, 1966).

The diamond, The Star of South Africa, was discovered two years later (March 1869) and is recorded to have been photographed by Port Elizabeth-based photographer James E. Bruton and later also by the Cape Town-based South African Photographic Saloon (to which a Kimberley-based photographer, Sederstrom, was initially linked). It was this diamond that finally resulted in the frenzy searching for the elusive stones in 1869.

While tribute has been paid to the early-day Kimberley pioneers, the contribution made by photographers has sadly been neglected. These early photographers ultimately also...

In the article below, Graham Ross and Tony Murray celebrate the achievements of Richard Thomas Hall, the man responsible for the railway line connecting Okiep and Port Nolloth. The piece first appeared in the publication 'Past Masters: Pioneer Civil Engineers who contributed to the growth and Wealth of South Africa'. Click here to view the stories of other great engineers.

Ore from the Namaqualand copper mines was shipped to Cornwall for treatment, so it was perhaps natural that the Cape Copper Company appointed a Cornishman to investigate its transport problems. Richard Thomas Hall, the engineer who conceived, designed and built the narrow gauge railway through the forbidding country from Port Nolloth to Okiep, was born in Falmouth, Cornwall in 1823. His experience as Superintendent of the narrow gauge Redruth to Chacewater Railway and of its conversion from horse to steam traction stood him in good stead when it came to tackling the transportation problems of the Namaqualand copper mines.

The Port Nolloth to Okiep railway line (DRISA)

He arrived in Namaqualand in 1865, enlisted the help of surveyor Patrick Fletcher, and carried out extremely thorough investigations into the various options for getting the copper to the coast. He did not exclude road transport from his studies, but he must soon have become aware of the difficulties attached to this mode, particularly...

The North Western Cape is not the most hospitable part of South Africa, and young Patrick Fletcher, who hailed from the island of Jura off the coast of Scotland, must have had mixed feelings when he arrived there in 1850. He was born in 1827, and obtained formal qualifications as a civil engineer and as a geologist before arriving in South Africa. Here, strangely, he found that opportunities in his chosen fields were limited, so he studied for and passed the examinations for admission as a land surveyor - a calling for which, in a rapidly expanding country, there was a greater demand. He then took himself off to Namaqualand which was experiencing a copper mining boom. This economic windfall was threatened however by the difficulty in transporting the ore to the coast.

Patrick Fletcher

In 1854 Fletcher surveyed the first 120 miles of the Orange River, and brought the first thirteen bags of copper ore down the river to the anchorage on the coast on behalf of the Kodas Mine, which had hoped that this waterway could be used to transport ore. During the voyage the boat was nearly capsized by a hippopotamus, and without much further ado that mode of transport was abandoned.

His attention then turned to the Cape Copper Company operations in the vicinity of Okiep. Ore from these mines was...

I discovered two documents in a file within a file whilst cleaning out my computer. It appears as though a letter was written at two different times, one quite some time ago and one in 1978 by the same person. I have no idea who gave it to me or when or who the author was. It appears to have been copied by typewriter, not very well and then copied by photostat and is very hard to read. I have had to make some adjustments to the text to make it readable but have kept the original text as much as possible. There is also a short insert by someone other than the author of the main text in cursive writing. The documents will give readers an idea of what life was like at the Premier Mine in the early 1900s. John Lincoln

The Story Begins - The first letter - date unknown

With no literary pretensions I am attempting to set down for my grandchildren a clear picture of life starting as it did at the beginning of the Century.

Your great great grandfather was John Brown and his wife Mary arrived in S.A. with their family, John, James, Adan, Samuel, and twin daughters Flora and Jennie. They sailed from Scotland in The Gypsy Bride, a gallant little sailing ship carrying people to the Cape. The magic news that diamonds were to be found here tempted them to risk the dangers of a long and dangerous voyage. Who knows they might even make a fortune...