Graves

The first quarter of 2022 marked the centenary of the great White Miners’ Strike on the Rand, also referred to as the Rand Revolt, or even the Red Revolt.

The causes of the Rand Revolt and its suppression by the government are well known. Less well known, is how many people were killed and where their remains now rest.

Conflicting statistics abound and quite possibly we may never know the actual number of people killed during this violent insurrection.

Perhaps the most authoritative account, the Report of the Martial Law Inquiry Judicial Committee concluded the number of fatalities comprised 43 soldiers, 29 policemen, 11 revolutionaries, 28 suspected revolutionaries and 42 civilians (18 European and 24 others), totalling 153.

A Police Plaque, previously mounted in the now virtually demolished Marshall Street Barracks, detailed the rank, initials and surname  of 26 White Policemen, 6 Special Policemen and 3 ‘Native’ Policemen, who lost their lives during this great Revolt.

The Story of a Crime being the Vindication of the Transvaal Strike Legal Defence Committee, published and sold for the benefit of the Strike Victims Dependants Relief Fund, mentioned 12 civilians by name; 3 children, 3 women and 6 men, all killed in Benoni.

Fortunately, the regimental histories of the Active Citizen Force (ACF) units on duty during this Revolt recorded the names of their Officers, Non-Commissioned, and Men killed in action or lost through accidents. We were not able to locate the campaign history of all the regiments active during this period...

The March 2022 wedding reception of my niece at the Kalmoesfontein Wine Farm near Riebeek Kasteel provided us with the excuse for a  meandering road trip through the Cape.

En route to Hanover, we diverted to the civilian cemetery at Springfontein where I hoped to locate the grave of Constable Jury Johannes Geldenhuis killed during the 1922 Rand Revolt.

Springfontein Cemetery. The grave of Constable Geldenhuis may be towards the rear. (SJ de Klerk)

Colonel RS Godley in his memoirs Khaki and Blue, recalled Constable Geldenhuis cantering his horse down the Brixton Ridge on Friday 10 March 1922 to buy some bread at the nearest shop, when a striker on the veranda of an adjacent house shot and killed him. Initially buried in the temporary burial ground at Milner Park, his remains were seemingly later reinterred in Springfontein, where he and his wife lived. It seemed appropriate to visit his long forgotten grave, almost 100 years later to the day of his death. But after the recent country wide summer rains, the older precinct of this little cemetery was rather overgrown, and I was unable to locate it.

Travelling through the Karoo, the sight of a little hamlet such as Hanover remains a welcome one with the beckoning tower of the Dutch Reformed Church, abundant bird life, shady Oak, Acacia, Cypress...

Three times in its history, the Free State went to war against the Basutos and their king, Moshoeshoe. That was 1858, 1865-66 and 1867-68. It was a turbulent time for both sides, which included the time in between the wars.

In this article I am reporting on some of the trekker monuments, graves and fortifications that still exist from that time. This is not a complete collection, it is just items I have come across in my travels.

First a summary of the historical events. Conflict between the Basutos and the trekkers started as the first trekboers crossed the Orange River to seek better pastures.

The confusing boundary situation between the Basutos and the Free State

Underlying the conflict was the confusing situation regarding the boundary between the Free State and the Basutos. The map above illustrates this. There was the Napier line, the Warden line, the various attempts in between to get some agreement and finally the present borders. When the first trekboers came over the Orange River they saw this as empty, uninhabited land, but the Basutos viewed it as the land of their ancestors. When the British took over the Free State in 1848, the Warden line was declared as the boundary between the Free State and the Basutos. Little heedance was given to this border by the...

It was the well-preserved slate headstone - arranged like a spreadsheet of family history - that first got my attention: its organisation of facts stand in contrast to the just-contained chaos of nature in the green and secluded churchyard of St Gluvias in Penryn. But it was a chance glimpse of the surname in a book about Cornish minerals that intrigued me, and prompted me to look deeper. Pioneers in South Africa, New Zealand and Australia are all part of the family’s story - and the instigator of one of the most bizarre buildings in Cornwall…

The well-preserved slate headstone (Louise Hollick)

The Medieval church of Merther – a tiny hamlet on the east side of the Tresillian River, now a picturesque ruin – was the setting for the marriage of Edward Haweis Lavin, a carpenter, to Sarah (nee Poat) on 4th October 1781. At least four sons were born to the couple in Merther, and sometime around 1810, the family relocated towards Penryn, a busy port town since medieval times, further down the river. When their eldest son, Michael, married Mary Bennett in 1814, it was at St Gluvias church, a beautiful setting just near to the Penryn River (see main image).

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July is mid-summer and warm in New York. But in this world city, July 1965, Nat felt cold, miserable, depressed and missing his country, his people.

Nataniël Nakzana Nakasa, popularly known as Nat, could not ever return to his country of birth. The premier placing this restriction on his passport which prevented him from returning to South Africa, was none other than the architect of apartheid, Dr Verwoerd. Verwoerd, as Nat once commented, was himself not even born in South Africa (Dutch), while Nat was.

Verwoerd (via Wikipedia)

Nakasa left his country from Johannesburg in 1964 to follow his dream. It was an ideal of many journalists, to study at Harvard. He persevered and became a Nieman Fellow in 1965 – maybe the first South African who accomplished this fellowship. Eventually he moved to New York to practice his skill with vigour.

In New York that summer, Nat was depressed. He had experienced an America riddled with racism, albeit more subtle and not as legislated like in his home country. Maybe this also contributed to his lesser success in selling articles. Yet, he appeared on television, a programme on apartheid: The fruit of fear.

Nat also surely missed his people in Durban in Natal, now KZN. That is where he grew up and where his father, a letter setter, his teacher mother and his 4 siblings, lived. And there he started writing articles...

It is almost inconceivable to think the South African Air Force (SAAF) was established when T. E. Lawrence was still working on his much acclaimed biographical Seven Pillars of Wisdom, a history of the Arab Revolt during the First World War. Yet, this was indeed the case when Prime Minister Jan Smuts on 1 February 1920 appointed Lieutenant Colonel Sir Pierre van Ryneveld ‘Director of Air Services’ in the Union Defence Force (UDF). This date is now generally accepted as the founding date of the South African Air Force (SAAF), making it the second oldest independent air force in the world.

Ryneveld’s appointment was necessitated by the British Government’s generous offer in 1919 to each of the four self-governing dominions; Canada, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand, of a substantial donation of aircraft and equipment to establish their own air forces.

This donation, subsequently known as the ‘Imperial Gift’ comprised a wide range of surplus war material, including 100 aeroplanes, complete with engines and spare engines, workshops, tenders, motor cars, motor cycles, and trailers; hangars for housing aeroplanes and stores; radio, and photographic equipment for two squadrons; tools to equip the SAAF mechanics and thousands of litres of paints, fuel, varnishes and dope. ‘’Dope’ is a plasticised lacquer that is applied to fabric-covered aircraft. It tightens and stiffens fabric stretched over airframes, which renders them airtight and weatherproof, increasing their durability and lifespan. The 100 aeroplanes included 48 De Havilland DH9, 30 Avro K and 22 SE5a aircraft.

Jan...

On my visits to Cape Town, I often find myself drawn to this attractive little stone church and attendant graveyard situated on the little knoll above Main Street, Rondebosch. It is hard to explain my interest. It is not because of devoutness, since I am not very religious. It may well be due to the association of this church with two of the Cape Colony’s important official appointments: the first Surveyor General and the first Anglican Bishop of Cape Town. But perhaps one requires no real reason, other than curiosity to visit this very interesting and historical site.

Rondebosch, originated from the Dutch name ‘rondeboschen’ meaning round thicket, referring to a clump of trees that grew on the banks of the Liesbeek River.

By the 1830s the village of Rondebosch had become an important residential area for merchants, government officials and visitors from India, yet it lacked a place of worship.

Major Charles Michell (1793-1851), a talented and many faceted man - soldier, musician, artist, surveyor, civil engineer and architect, appointed as the Cape Colony’s first Surveyor General in 1828, decided to remedy this omission. At a meeting held in early August 1832, Michell along with four other Anglicans were elected to serve as trustees of the proposed church building. Following a petition to the Governor for a piece of government land between the Groote Schuur estate of Abraham de Smidt and the Main Road, approval was speedily granted barely three weeks later. Six days later it was consecrated by...

A recent invitation to spend a weekend in the Western Free State provided an opportunity to visit the cemetery at the small town of Bultfontein. Situated approximately 90 kilometres north of Bloemfontein, I had passed through this town at least fifteen years ago, when I cursorily traipsed the cemetery. This time I undertook to explore it in more detail.

Although approval for the establishment for a village was granted in 1862, disagreement as to the site delayed the laying out of the town until 1873, when it was decided to lay out two towns, one at Bultfontein and one at Hoopstad. The former was established on the farm Bultfontein and accordingly named in 1874. Reputedly, it has the largest grain silo in Africa and quite possibly in the southern hemisphere, with a capacity of 850 000 bags.

The cemetery, opposite the town’s handsome Dutch Reformed Church, seemed to be reasonably maintained with little evidence of vandalism visible.  This Church was designed by Hendrik Vermooten (1921-2013), a prolific church architect who had apparently designed 144 churches across South Africa. Vermooten adhered to a distinctive style of church architecture, of which the above church seems to be a typical example.

The oldest graves date from the earlier years of the twentieth century and there are several examples of slate tombstones that have survived the intervening years, surprisingly well. Tombstones engraved from slate seemed to have been popular amongst the Afrikaner rural communities, many of these containing unusual and varied symbols adapted from folk...

The title refers to the road coming through Witsieshoek, now Phuthaditjhaba, in the Free State, going up to the Sentinel car park. It is a strange road. Was it constructed just to give us hikers better access to the top of the Tugela Falls and Mount-Aux-Sources? Very unlikely.

Mount-Aux-Sources map (Barrier of Spears)

The road this article is about is shown on the map, roughly in the middle going past Basuto Gate and finishing at the Witches.

The first piece of road, the road to Witsieshoek towards the Drakensberg, was constructed in 1928. This was partially to pick up on the traffic over the Namahadi Pass to and from Basutoland, as it was called then. The path only allows for foot and animal traffic. The importance of this pass can be seen by the fact that a police post was built near the top, on the South African side, the picture from my archives shows the ruin how it looked in 1994.

Namahadi Police Post (Horst Müller)

And the remnants of the building still serve a purpose, giving shelter from the cold winds that blow over the plateau in winter.

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Durban, to me is a motley memory of youthful, carefree and sunny beach holidays. While Cape Town offers stunning vistas, top-end restaurants and a sense of Europe-in-Africa, it somehow feels clinical in comparison. The exotic fragrances, clamour, sub-tropical climate and personal recollections are what most attract me to this colourful Indian Ocean city.

A recent trip to the KZN South Coast concluded with a visit to the historic Brook Street cemetery. Driving down Theatre Lane, the din produced by a multitude of taxis, passengers and street vendors soon faded as I entered this peaceful oasis. Exiting my air conditioned vehicle in early winter, I found the climate pleasantly warm with just a hint of humidity. Glimpsing a snake charmer entertaining a crowd on the far side of the cemetery fence, my senses momentarily confused, I briefly pondered whether I was still in Africa, or somehow magically transposed to the Indian subcontinent.

This historic cemetery, surrounded by interesting markets and vernacular architecture, offers much to see and appreciate (see main photo with ‘The Mansions’ building dating from 1904).

My rather tattered copy of ‘Durban’s Heritage explored … on walks and drives around the City’, as always proved very useful, although many of the street names have changed since first published.

This cemetery, previously known as the West Street Cemetery, is still very well maintained and safe to visit. It is a veritable ‘Who’s Who’ graveyard of early settlers to Port Natal, or Durban as it was subsequently named.

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