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De Buys and Dogson – a walk through time
August 30, 20111899 Longlands Directory of Pretoria
November 8, 2010
Find those missing relatives in our over 2800 records of the 1899 Longlands Pretoria Directory.
This directory includes a host of famous people including Cornelis Vincent Van Gogh, brother of the Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh, President Kruger, William Juta Registrar of the High Court whose wife Louise was the sister of Carl Marx. As a bonus SPE Trichardt, grandson of Voortrekker Leader Louis Trichardt as well as many Jewish Immigrants and Muslim shopkeepers are found. Did your family live next door to any of these famous people?
This database is a Street Directory, Alphabetical directory and Classification of Professions and trades. Below is a list of the surnames included.
Was your Ancestor a Master Builder ?
June 29, 2009The history of our country has been built not only by genealogical pedigrees of our ancestors but also the occupations and contributions that they have made to the country.
There is an intriguing history about the development of the building industry in South Africa, starting with the simple dwellings erected in the Cape by the nomadic Khoikhoi, to the advanced shopping malls built around the city centres across the land. It includes the tale of Piet Retief and the emergence of speculative builders from the 1820 Settlers.
The City of Gold, better known as Johannesburg or Egoli, has blossomed, through three wars and a brief civil war, from a small mining town constructed from corrugated iron and six inch nails, to the industrial metropolis which it is today.
Cape Town developed out of the vegetable garden and a chandlers’ staging post established by Van Riebeeck. Port Elizabeth was established after the 1820 Settlers landed on a lonely, uninhabited beach. Durban had its roots in a military stockade which was established on the Natal coast as a defence point.
These cities were built by people of vision and drive with the able assistance of the craftsmen who made up the building industry in South Africa. Many of the buildings and endeavours reflecting building construction in South Africa have disappeared, but the people who contributed are still very much alive in our history as well as our memories – they are part of our heritage.
Master Builders played an integral part of the building foundation of South Africa. These men are not only those who belonged to organized bodies such as the Master Builders Association or other recognized institutions but those men whose skills as builders, carpenters, joiners, road makers, engineers, architects, bricklayers and artisans have cemented the path for growth and development in South Africa.
Many of these talented men who were either of English, French, Italian, Dutch, Chinese or even of Xhosa descent made remarkable contributions to our heritage and buildings that still stand today.
Master builders
The first stone was laid for the Castle de Goede Hoop – the magnificent fort that was halfway house to the rest of the world. The finest stonecutters and builders were used to build this castle. Douwe Gerbrandtz Steyn, master mason, Adriaan van Braeckel, mason, and engineer Pieter Dombaer were the craftsmen behind this mammoth project. Timber for the project was brought from Hout Bay. Other building materials such as the magnificent stone, and the lime burnt from shells, were obtained from Robben Island. The actual building was done by soldiers.
The city of Cape Town began to grow, bringing skilled artisans from far and wide. Local slaves were soon trained to become skilled artisans whose inept ability to become outstanding craftsmen has been carried on through their ancestors until today.
In 1797 Servaas van Breda, who already owned Molenvliet on the southern boundary of Koornhoop in the Gardens, acquired the southern third of Koornhoop, on which the oldest buildings of the farm stood, viz. the old barn, a homestead that had by then probably assumed an H-shaped plan, three small square buildings alongside of very considerable age, and possibly two other large barns opposite them and nearer the river. Van Breda came from a family of builders and was himself a builder. Today the Van Breda family still continues in the construction industry in the form of Scheltema Roofing in Cape Town owned and run by Barry and Hammie Van Breda.
Today a company like Group Five Construction had one of its founder members R.H. Morris building for giants like Cecil John Rhodes and AB Reid. The Morris story lives on today to be one of South Africa’s largest and oldest building companies in existence.
Master Builders Association
In 1904 William Ralph Poynton banded the independent Associations of the Master Builders together to form the National Federation of Building Trades Employers. This was based on its British counterpart and the Federation set out to unify the building industry at a time when there was growing labour unrest and dissatisfaction among employees. It is unlikely that when Poynton and a small group of men met in the board room of the MBA at 339 Smith Street, Durban, on 23 March 1904 that what they were planning would survive and become a respected and dynamic organization 100 years later.
The Master Builders Association came up with the ideals to set the standards of quality building, fair wages as well as workmen’s compensation for disability and death.
98 Years of Past Presidents of the Master Builders Association
W.R. Poynton
1906 - F. Turner
J. Z. Drake
T. W. Reynolds
M. C. A Meischke
A. E. Parfitt
J. Prentice
T. Clarke
A. F. Turner
J. J. Kirkness
J. Thompson
W. Nottingham
H. W. Harris
A. R. Midgley
D. F Corlett
A. B. Reid
P. J. Hittinger
A. Anderson
C. Carr
R.G. McClelland
D. M. Evans
F. Bakker
W.M. Pattison
H. O. Turner
1932 -Albert Barrow (Johannesburg
1933 – H. J. Hedden (Cape Town)
1934 – J. D. B. Clark (Johannesburg)
1935 – B. P. Jones (Bloemfontein)
1936 – J. Garnett (Pietermaritzburg)
1937 – H. O. Young (Cape Town)
1938 – W. Knuckey (Johannesburg)
1939 – G. F. Vercoe (Durban)
1940 – C.C. Pike (East London)
1941 – J. Downie (Pretoria)
1942 – A. J. Brokensha (Durban)
1943 – J. N. Bird (Cape Town)
1944 – R. Rutherford (Johannesburg)
1945 – R. Barras (Pietermaritzburg)
1946 – J. Glendinning ( Port Elizabeth)
1947 – J.C. Bitcon (Johannesburg)
1948 – J. J. Smith (Durban)
1949 – F. B. Blomkamp (Cape Town)
1950 – J. P. Lamb (Pretoria)
1951 – G. J. R. Bulman (Pietermaritzburg)
1951 – J. A. Annand (East London)
1953 – F. H. Mitchell (Johannesburg)
1954 – F. H. Radford (Durban)
1955/6 – R. T. Morrison (Bloemfontein)
1956 / 57 – A. Barrow (Johannesburg)
1957 / 58 – H. Aitken (Durban)
1958 / 59 – J. W. L. Ruddy ( Port Elizabeth)
1959 / 60 – F. E. Kennard (Johannesburg)
1960 / 61 – T. Pattullo (Cape Town)
1961 / 62 – W. P. Hamilton (Durban)
1962 / 63 – H. H. Lobban (Johannesburg)
1963 / 64 – H. McCarthy (Cape Town)
1964 / 65 – H. T. Stirling (Johannesburg)
1965 / 66 – J. A. Reardon (Durban)
1966/ 67 – R. A. Briggs (Cape Town)
1967 / 68 – P. J. Van Twisk (Pretoria)
1968 / 69 – M. Lipshitz (Durban)
1969 / 80 – D. R. Herd (Johannesburg)
1970 / 71 – H. N. Dodd (East London)
1971 / 72 – J. Zylstra (Pretoria)
1972 / 73 – F. Williams (Johannesburg)
1973 / 74 – C. H. R. Kincaid (Durban)
1974 / 75 – G. K. Breedt (Bloemfontein)
1975 / 76 – B. L. Moyle (Johannesburg)
1976 / 77 – L. Fish (Durban)
1977 /78 – D. F. D. Allan (Cape Town)
1978 / 79 – D. H. Mitchell (Johannesburg)
1979 / 80 – R. L. Stevenson (Durban)
1980 / 81 – J. A. Barrow (Johannesburg)
1981 / 82 – L. S. Glaser (Cape Town)
1982 / 83 – P. O. Morris (Johannesburg)
1983 / 84 – G. H. Rowles (Kimberley)
1984 / 85 – A. J. M. Stewart (Durban)
1985 / 86 – B. J. S. Zylstra (Pretoria)
1986 / 87 – A. P. Jacobson (Johannesburg)
1987 / 88 – D. N. Fraser (Cape Town)
1988 / 89 – B. G. Thompson ( Port Elizabeth)
1989 / 90 – R. G. Hurry (Johannesburg)
1990 / 91 – E. V. Hulme (Johannesburg)
1991 / 92 – V. N. Smailes (Kimberley)
1992 / 93 – R. M. Guiricich (Johannesburg)
1993 / 94 – G. P. Volck (Johannesburg)
1994/ 95 – B. R. Buys (Bloemfontein)
1995 / 96 – R. A. Edwards (Johannesburg)
1996 / 97 – S. E. Jones (Cape Town)
1997 / 98 – W. S. Deacon (Durban)
1998 / 99 – P. J. Ridl (Durban)
1999/ 00 – J. A. Dempers (Boland)
2000 / 01 – N. L. Klopper (Johannesburg)
2001 / 02 – M. B. Van Breda (Cape Town)
2002 / 03 – N. Maas (Johannesburg)
From a failed builder to a famous Voortrekker leader and hero
In 1815 the famous Voortrekker leader, Piet Retief, moved to Grahamstown where the building boom and the shortage of skilled builders encouraged him to try his hand at speculative building.
His unfortunate involvement with Government contracts began with the erection of new military barracks and headquarters. Retief put in his tender for £3 000 and after being awarded the contract, construction started on Scott’s Barracks in May 1820. The plans included a group of buildings, the largestof which was two storeys in height running the full width of the site and built of stone with mud cementing, earthen floors and a slate roof.
The entire erf was to be surrounded by a high wall and the building was planned to house 180 soldiers and six officers with stables, stores and a powder magazine. Retief soon realised that he had under quoted for his work but was not permitted to withdraw from the contract. To save costs, he undertook much of the stonework himself and employed an under-qualified carpenter to complete the woodwork. The military authorities, unhappy with the shoddy carpentry, stopped payment, causing a long and bitter dispute over the terms of the original contract. Work nevertheless continued and the barracks were finally completed in April 1823, but unfortunately for Retief the building collapsed six months later during a storm. Retief lost the case against him and was ordered to make good any damages in addition to paying a 5 000 rix-dollars indemnity.
Shortly after Retief had set to work rebuilding Scott’s Barracks, a previous contract that he had signed for the erection of a Drostdy went into dispute. From the start, the plans and contract were dubious and since the building was still a shell fourteen months after work had begun, the Landdrost, Harry Rivers, filed a complaint and Retief was sued for breach of contract. Retief again lost the case with costs. Although he was eventually paid a token sum for his work, Retief was insolvent and left the Cape to become the leader of the Great Trek. He was more successful as leader of men than he had been as a builder and he has become one of South Africa ‘s most famous historical figures. He was treacherously killed by Dingaan in February 1838. (Source – Our Building Heritage, An Illustrated History by Paddy Hartdegen)
Women in the Industry
Rose Resnick was one of the first women in South Africa believed to have been involved in the building industry. At the age of 17 she was already running her own import/export plywood company and by the time she had immigrated to South Africa in 1920, her business began to expand. By 1923 the company was firmly established in Johannesburg with the versatile material called Plymax which was used in the contraction industry, engineering and the manufacturing of ships, cars, rail, trams and aeroplanes.
Other
Builders
Anderson, John – mason/ builder Simonstown Dock Co
Anhuyser, L.F. – master carpenter
Baines, Andrew Geddes – road builder
Baines, Thomas Charles John – road builder
Barker, George – builder
Barry, Francos Henry – builder
Boers, Willem Cornelis – fiscal and builder – Rust en Vreugd
Cock, William – harbour builder
Colling, Thomas – builder
Darter, William Silver, piano-tuner and -builder
Douthwaite, Richard – builder
Durham, Edward – builder with William Warren – (built Bertram House) who founded the firm George Findlay and sons.
Edwards, Roger
Elliot, George – brick layer
Findlay, George – builder and Merchant
Fitzpatrick, Thomas – stone mason – Robben Island
Gush, Richard – builder
Hagard, Thomas – glazer + builder
Heyward,William – builder
Hitchcock, TJ
Kestell, Charles – builder + carpenter
Kressien, Fran – bouer in Kaapstad – SA Family Register
Main, Robert – bricklayer to Mr Kohler of the CT Museum
Mapikela, Thomas Mtobi – Carpenter / Builder
Maritz, Gerhardus -father – builder
Melck, Martin
Mitton, John – joiner + builder
Mokgatle, Naboth Monyadioe Moreleba – Carpenter / Builder (see biography: New Dictionary of SA)
Mokone, Mangena Maaka – Builder – (see biography: New Dictionary of SA)
Schutte, Hermann – builder
Scott, John – mason
Shepstone, Theophilus
Smit, MJ – architect and builder
Thiabult – architect
Warren, William – bricklayer to Thomas Dixon of Graaf Reniet
Will, William – mason / builder
Was your Ancestor a Murderer?
June 15, 2009
Daisy de Melker
From the beginning of time, there have been murderers and psychopaths – if we delved deeply enough into our family we may find that somewhere along the way one of our ancestors either killed someone for revenge, love or by mistake. We now take a look at some famous and not so famous South African murderers – perhaps you are related to one of them?
DAISY LOUISA DE MELKER was born on 1st July 1886 at Seven Fountains, near Grahamstown. She was the daughter of William Stringfellow Hancorn Smith from Grahamstown and Fanny Augusta Mathilda Bird from Ascension Island.
At the age of ten she went to live with her father, who had settled in Bulawayo, and was educated there and at the Good Hope Seminary in Cape Town.
She completed a nursing course at the Berea Nursing Home, Durban. On 3rd March 1909 she married William Alfred Cowle, aged 35, a municipal plumber of Johannesburg. There were five children borne from that marriage, of whom all but one, named Rhodes, died in infancy. William Cowle enjoyed good health until 11th January 1923, when he took Epsom salts prepared by his wife and developed symptoms which soon proved fatal. The post mortem report attributed his death to chronic nephritis and cerebral haemorrhage. Mrs. Cowle inherited £1 250, a house in Bertrams, Johannesburg, and received 550 pounds from the municipal provident fund.
Daisy De Melker
On the 1st January 1926 she married Robert Sproat, a bachelor, aged 46. He, too, was a municipal plumber and was worth about 4 000 pounds in gold shares, municipal stock and cash in a building society. On 6th November 1927 he fell ill after drinking a glass of beer. The doctor diagnosed arteriosclerosis with cerebral haemorrhage. In terms of Sproat’s will his wife was paid about £5 000.
Before long she married again. Daisy married her third husband on 21st January 1931. Clarence Sydney de Melker was a Springbok rugby footballer of 1906 and also a plumber. Rhodes Cowle joined them. He had long been indulged by his mother; often morose, quarrelsome and ill-behaved, he once assaulted her. On 25th February 1932 she visited a Johannesburg pharmacy, bought white arsenic and signed the poison register ‘D. L. Sproat’. Within a week Rhodes fell ill and three days later he died.
A doctor certified death to be due to cerebral malaria. A suspicious relative went to the police and the bodies of Cowle, Sproat and Rhodes were exhumed. In the first two, tiny particles of strychnine were recovered. Rhodes was found to have died of arsenical poisoning. At first the prosecution could not clinch the case, as no purchase or possession of strychnine or arsenic could be traced to Mrs. De Melker. Then a photograph of her, captioned ‘Daisy de Melker’, appeared in a newspaper. The pharmacist recognised her as the woman to whom he had sold arsenic. He supplied the missing link in the evidence.
Her trial began on 17th October 1932 in the Witwatersrand division of the Supreme Court and lasted for thirty-nine days. She was defended by the brilliant advocate H.H. Morris and was tried by Judge L. Greenberg and two assessors. The judge’s finding was that there was insufficient evidence to prove she had murdered her two husbands, but that there was no doubt she had murdered her son. A petition for mercy on Christmas Eve of 1932 was rejected and she was executed on 30th December the same year.
An unattractive woman of medium height, with bushy hair and cold, penetrating blue eyes, at no time did Daisy de Melker admit her guilt or show any sign of remorse. She accepted the death penalty calmly and courageously.
Hancorn Smith Family Tree
Report on medicine murders (1951); Hedley Chilvers: Out of the crucible (1929); Napier Devitt: Celebrated South African trials (1941); H. H. Morris: The first forty years (1947); Benjamin Bennett: Up for murder (1934); id.: Freedom or the gallows (1957); Too late for tears (1948); The clues condemn (1949); The evil that men do (1950); Genius for the defence (1959); Murder will speak (1962); The amazing case of the Baron von Schauroth (1966); H. J. May and I. Hamilton: The Foster gang (1966).
Dorothea Kraft
DOROTHEA KRAFT (later Van der Merwe), the first woman to be hanged after Union, lived on the farm Treurfontein in the Lichtenburg district in 1914. When Louis Tumpowski, a Polish Jew, aged 55, called at the farm as a pedlar, she was divorced and having trouble with her Bantu labourers. Turnpowski offered to manage the farm and she agreed. His attorneys drew up a lease under which he was to pay an annual rental and have the right eventually to buy the property.
For several years he and Mrs. Kraft lived as man and wife. Then he informed her that he intended to exercise his option and buy the farm at the agreed figure, which was below the ruling price. She hired a Coloured witch-doctor, Jim Burds, to induce Tumpowski to marry her by antenuptial contract. When Burds’s potions proved ineffective, she enlisted the aid of Hermanus Lambertus Swartz, a distant relative, who had deserted from the army during the war and turned up at Treurfontein.
On the night of 2nd February 1918, at the height of a great storm, Burds arrived on the farm at Mrs. Kraft’s urgent request. He struck Tumpowski on the head with a heavy stick. Swartz then tied a leather thong round the man’s neck and slit his throat. The body was buried in an ash-pit. Tumpowski’s sudden disappearance caused little comment. Mrs. Kraft moved to another district, remarried and became known as Mrs. Van der Merwe.
Tumpowski’s sister in Johannesburg became suspicious when her letters were returned, and went to the police. A prolonged search and widespread excavations on the farm were unsuccessful until, two years later, a violent wind-storm swept Treurfontein and torrential rain caused a deep subsidence in the ash-pit. The police dug into it and found the body. Dorothea van der Merwe and Hermanus Swartz stood trial at Potchefstroom on 13th June 1921 and were sentenced to death. Burds, who had turned king’s evidence, was acquitted.
MARIA HELENE GERTRUIDA CHRISTINA LEE (born Van Niekerk) was four times married, first when she was 16, and three times divorced. One of her husbands, Jan de Klerk Lee, a Pretoria metal-worker whose name she kept, died in 1941, ostensibly of tuberculosis. From 1946 to 1947 Mrs. Lee worked for a firm of jewellers in Cape Town, from whom she stole jewellery worth several thousand pounds. At the time she was living with her latest lover, Alwyn Smith, a discharged soldier, who sponged on her.
When her thefts were discovered and she was dismissed, his use as travelling salesman for stolen jewellery ended. Mrs. Lee, who by now had made another male conquest, began to add ant poison to Smith’s food. He went into a decline and died on 2nd May. The doctor suspected poisoning and refused a death certificate. A post-mortem was held. Police investigations lasted months and Mrs. Lee was arrested in Pretoria on 14th October.
In the Pretoria central prison, where she was lodged before being remanded to Cape Town for trial, she confided to her cell companion that she had given Smith doses of arsenic. This woman told the police. The trial opened in Cape Town on 6th April 1948 and on 10th May Mrs. Lee was sentenced to death. An appeal was dismissed and she was hanged on 17th September 1948.
MARGARET ELIZABETH RHEEDER was avaricious and sex-hungry. A daughter of Clarence and Grace Harker, she was born at Platbos, near Keurbooms River, Knysna on 6th September 1922 and grew up in grinding poverty. At 21 she married a man who soon left her to support herself and two baby daughters.
After some casual love-affairs she divorced her husband and on 6th September 1952 married Benjamin Fredenman Rheeder, aged 39, formerly a farmer. They lived in Port Elizabeth. She disliked her step-children, Rheeder’s daughters by his previous marriage, and this led to frequent quarrels. It was, however, her sex urges that hastened the crisis. Rheeder surprised her with a paramour one night and thrashed her. On 27th April 1957 she bought a bottle of ant-poison. Two days later her husband fell ill at work, and he died on 7th May. A doctor certified that the deceased had suffered acute gastro-enteritis and then heart failure. A police check of poison registers revealed the woman’s purchase of ant-poison containing arsenic.
Exhumation of the body established that Ben Rheeder had died of arsenical poisoning. The trial was held in Port Elizabeth and Margaret Rheeder was sentenced to death and hanged on 6th May 1958.
Murder Mania
A number of mass murders have occurred in South Africa during the past half-century. They were mainly due to self-absorbed brooding over fancied slights, insults or wrongs that led to an outbreak of vengeful violence.
STEPHANUS SWART, killer of five policemen, his wife, two neighbours and three Bantu, declared that he could get no justice from the courts. He was a hard, embittered man. In 1927, at the time of his crimes, he was farming at Potter’s Hill near Majuba on the Natal-Transvaal border. His loss of a civil lawsuit determined him to avenge himself on the world. He assaulted a relative and was jailed for 18 months.
After his release he committed a serious sexual offence on a relative, fired a shot at a man while he awaited trial, and heard that a warrant had been issued for his arrest. He sent a message to the police that he would shoot anyone who came to fetch him. Ignoring the threat, a police posse set out for Potter’s Hill on the morning of 6 th May 1927 to apprehend Swart. Warned of their approach, Swart crept from his farmhouse unseen, outflanked the police and, taking them in the rear, shot five of them dead. He then set out on horseback for Charlestown, where he killed his wife, who was being sheltered by friends, and other innocent people who crossed his path. Trapped by a search party soon afterwards, he put a bullet through his brain.
CORNELIUS JOHANNES PETRUS VAN HEERDEN, aged 22, a railwayman who lived with his parents on the outskirts of Bethlehem, Orange Free State, in 1931, also had unpleasant legal experiences which had stirred feelings of persecution in him. He held up and killed a commercial traveller, stole his car, and shot down a former member of the Bethlehem town council. He continued to fire indiscriminately at a Bantu whom he met on the road and left a trail of dead and dying until he drove into a ditch and shot himself.
PIETER LUBBE, who farmed near Fauresmith in 1953, was in a morbid, prolonged fit of sulks before he gave way to his murderous impulses. Three months previously he had had a nervous breakdown and had been treated by a psychiatrist. He then fell under the influence of some religious sect and began to blame his family for the hardships ‘thrust upon him by God’. He threatened suicide several times -but not until he had ‘cleansed’ his farm of ‘everything impure’. In the ‘impurities’ he included his wife and children. He shot and killed six members of his family and then turned his gun on himself.
PETRUS LAFRAS LOMBARD, aged 48, a farmer near Morgenzon in the Ermelo district, in 1954 assaulted a Bantu who subsequently died. He regarded the court’s penalty – a £100 fine and a suspended sentence of imprisonment – as an injustice and bitter humiliation. He shot another Bantu who had struck him. Then he went berserk, killed five other Bantu and wounded four more. He was cornered while attempting to get away, and committed suicide.
PIERRE CORNEILLE FACULYS BASSON was a different type of mass murderer. He killed a dozen victims, but not in anger. His crimes were inspired by greed and executed with cunning and deliberation. Born in 1880, he showed cruelty at an early age. Aware of the advantages of insurance, he, when he secured the proceeds of his father’s policy, insured his 17-year-old brother Jasper for £3 500 and paid the first year’s premium. Then, inviting Jasper to go fishing at Gordon’s Bay on 14th February 1903, he murdered him.
The body was never found. The insurance company at first opposed Basson’s claim, but was ordered by the courts to pay the full amount of the policy. Basson believed that there was money to be made by offering loans on easy terms on the security of the cession of an insurance policy on the debtor’s life. Several of Basson’s friends (and debtors) were found dead, shot or drowned, and he was paid their insurance cover. In no case could it be proved that he was responsible for their sudden deaths.
The murder of Wilhelm Schaefer, aged 54, who farmed Highlands on the Cape Flats, finally led to Basson’s undoing. He negotiated with Schaefer for the purchase of Highlands, although he had no money to clinch the deal, and inveigled Schaefer to his home, where he overpowered him with chloroform and strangled him with a cord. The body was stripped and lowered at night into a deep hole. A Bantu woman passing by saw the grisly burial and informed the police. When they arrived at his home, Basson watched the digging party from a hiding-place. He locked himself in his bedroom and committed suicide.
Murder and politics
Two characters in South African criminal history were fortuitously linked with the lives of important political personalities. One was Franz Ludwig Kurtze, alias Karl Brown, also known as Baron von Veltheim; the other was William Robert Clem Foster. Their deeds had repercussions in the political field which neither of them could have foreseen.
VON VELTHEIM, international crook, bigamist and swindler, was, according to himself, invited to South Africa in 1897 by the mining magnate Barney Barnato. He blackmailed Barnato’s nephew, the millionaire Woolf Joel, sending him letters signed ‘Kismet’. He demanded £11 000 and ten per cent of the ‘millions’ the house of Joel would make on the stock exchange for ‘secret information’ supplied in advance. Joel inserted a notice in The Star inviting ‘Kismet’ to negotiate with him.
Von Veltheim turned up saying that he was the go-between for ‘Kismet’. Joel refused to be blackmailed or to participate in any plot and ordered Von Veltheim to leave. On 14th March 1898 Von Veltheim returned to ‘negotiate’ and offered to take a smaller sum in exchange for his silence. Defied again, he whipped out a revolver and shot Joel dead. Von Veltheim was arrested, but insisted that Joel had fired at him first and that he had returned the fire in self-defence.
In London, New York and Paris the murder was at first thought to have originated in ‘Reformer’ activities, which had been nipped in the bud, and the share-market slumped. Excitement rose to fever pitch on Von Veltheim’s declaration that he had been encouraged to enter the Transvaal from Bechuanaland to plot against the State at the instance of the mining magnates. He was tried, but the jury returned a verdict of not guilty and the judge had to discharge him. Although Von Veltheim may have exaggerated or invented his role of a political catspaw, there is little doubt that his long and sensational trial and plausible story of an anti-Republican plot served to heighten the Government’s mistrust of the Reformers and the magnates and to keep aflame passions that were soon to erupt in the Second Anglo-Boer War.
There were at the time many rumours of a political plot and a conspiracy, even of a design to assassinate President Kruger or members of the Executive Council. Of these rumours C. P. Bresler, Q.C., later wrote in his book Lineage of conflict (1952), after a careful analysis of the evidence: ‘ … one is not surprised that the learned judge directed the jury that the letters’ (written by Von Veltheim to Joel, demanding money with menaces) did not appear to him to have had any political background and that he did not think that there had been a conspiracy…
The Foster Gang
WILLIAM FOSTER swore vengeance on society when his younger brother was sent to prison on account of a hold-up. Between the time of his vow and its fulfilment, eleven people lost their lives. Foster, born in 1886, was headstrong and undisciplined. After several brushes with the law and a taste of prison, he developed into an embittered juvenile delinquent. He graduated to big crime in 1913 when he organised a hold-up at a jeweller’s shop in Longmarket Street, Cape Town. With his brother and another accomplice he stole £5000 worth of jewellery, but they were caught and sent to prison for 12 years.
Foster insisted that this was a cruel and savage punishment for his brother, a first offender, who had played only a minor part in the affair. After serving nine months, William Foster escaped from prison and joined John Maxim, a Texan cowboy and criminal, and a 19 year-old rascal, Carl Mezar. They formed the ‘Foster gang’ and embarked on a systematic campaign of burglary with violence. They broke into a bank at Boksburg and shot a man dead during their escape. They blew open safes in post offices and, on 13th September 1914, burgled a bottle-store in Doornfontein. They killed two policemen who attempted to arrest them and escaped on a motor-cycle.
Foster and his associates lay low for a while at their base, a house in Regent’s Park, Johannesburg. With Foster were his wife and their baby daughter. When they were traced, Foster shot a detective dead, and the gang escaped in a car with false number-plates. Police found the house crammed with stolen property, false moustaches, tubes of face-paints and hair-dyes. A cordon was drawn round the town and roads leading to Reef towns and the country were patrolled. Cars were stopped and searched.
Anyone who ignored a challenge was to be fired on. Dr. Gerald Grace, on his way to the East Rand to answer an urgent call, did not know of Foster’s latest exploits or hear an order to halt. A volley was fired into his car and he was killed.
In a similar way Gen. J. H. de la Rey was killed while on his way, with Gen. C. F. Beyers, to Potchefstroom. The shooting of Gen. De la Rey caused a furore as it was a time of unrest and, somewhat later, open rebellion, and some people at first inclined to the belief that it was more than an accident. Meanwhile, Foster, Maxim and Mezar had abandoned their car and taken refuge in a cave on the outskirts of Johannesburg.
They were besieged by the police for many hours, but Foster’s wife and child were permitted to join him when he offered to surrender to her and no one else. Other members of the family, allowed to enter the cave to reason with Foster, emerged with the child. Immediately afterwards shots were heard. Foster, his wife, Maxim and Mezar were found dead. Maxim had acted as executioner and then turned the revolver on himself.
Unusual murders
The records of murder in South Africa are studded with unusual trials, unexpected verdicts, and bizarre means of death. The rarest type of murder is matricide. The strangest weapons used have included dynamite, poisoned arrows used by Bushmen against police patrols, and blazing pyres on which victims of witchcraft and superstition have perished.
PETRUS STEPHANUS FRANCOIS HAUPTFLEISCH , the matricide, was a soldier of the First World War who lived with his aged mother at Richmond (Cape) in 1924. He bore her a grudge for blacklisting him, cutting off his liquor supplies. Also, she possessed £300. He throttled his mother, placed the body on its side on a built-up hearth, sprinkled it with petrol and ignited the vapour with a match. He intended in this way to suggest an accident after his mother had had a fatal heart attack while cleaning the stove with petrol. Lividity patches on the back of the body, however, proved that Mrs. Hauptfleisch could not have died in the position in which she was found. A post-mortem established beyond doubt that throttling was the cause of death. Hauptfleisch was hanged on 23rd December 1924.
HUIBRECHT JACOB DE LEEUW , town clerk of Dewetsdorp, chose dynamite for his crime. To destroy evidence of his embezzlement of town funds, he blew up the town hall and fatally injured the three members of the finance committee who had been deputed to examine the books. Having previously experimented with the explosive properties of dynamite, he himself had remained near an exit and had escaped serious wounding. His experiments and timely escape were to prove decisive evidence of a murder plan. De Leeuw, hanged on 30th September 1927, was one of the few murderers who did not question the justice of the penalty. In any list of unusual verdicts must be included those on the man who was sentenced to death twice, and those on the man who was discharged twice on the same charge of murder.
ALFRED PERCIVAL VON ZELL, an eccentric megalomaniac, shot his wife in Pretoria on the night of 21st April 1952. The defence failed to show that he had acted on an irresistible impulse or in a state of mind providing extenuation. The jury found him guilty and he was condemned to death. The Appellate Division set aside the sentence and directed the judge to pass another on the basis that the jury had, in fact, found various extenuating circumstances. The judge offered to hear mitigating evidence from Von Zell, but when this offer was rejected he re-imposed the death penalty. Von Zell spent nine months in the condemned cell before he went to the gallows on 13th November 1953.
THOMAS ANDREW KERR was tried for the rape and murder of Edith Pinnock, aged nine, on 8th October 1907. Her beaten and outraged body was found in a cellar beneath the golf club-house at Grahamstown. At the conclusion of the trial the jury were unable to agree on a verdict and were discharged. The attorney general withdrew the indictment, but Kerr was retried at Cape Town, on the same facts, for rape and murder. This time he was found not guilty, acquitted and released from further prosecution.
Unsolved murders
JACOBA (‘BUBBLES’) SCHROEDER, an attractive ‘good-time girl’, was the victim of an unknown killer. Her body was found on Wednesday morning, 17th August 1949, in a plantation near Johannesburg. She was lying on her back as though she had been carried over someone’s shoulder and then carefully laid out. She was hatless and her shoes, bag and coat were missing.
In her mouth were several bits of hard, clay-like material from a near-by heap of lime. According to the post-mortem she had died of asphyxia. Police questioned the youth at whose home, in an affluent suburb, ‘Bubbles’ had been entertained on the Monday night. They also questioned his 20-year-old cousin, who had driven her part of the way to her flat. The youths were arrested, but there were no clues to link them with the crime and they were discharged after a preparatory examination.
Taxi murders
JAMES ARTHUR DE VILLIERS, of Cape Town, answered a call at 9:40 on Friday night, 9th August 1929. When he reached the address given in Salt River he found he had been hoaxed – no one there wanted a taxi. Setting out to return to the rank, he was probably picked up by the man who had lured him to Salt River with the bogus call and awaited the opportunity to hail him. An hour later De Villiers was found shot dead near the Woltemade cemetery. He had been robbed of his takings. His taxi was found abandoned 3 km away on the Esplanade. A spent cartridge case lay under the seat.
At 9:30 the following night a masked man, pointing an automatic, attempted to hold up customers at a hotel in Newlands. When someone lurched toward him he turned, fired a shot that narrowly missed the barman, and darted into the street. In the bar the police picked up a cartridge-case that had almost certainly been ejected from the same weapon that had killed De Villiers. A series of other hold-ups followed, but the bandit, who was most likely the murderer, was never caught.
Like De Villiers, ARTHUR VICTOR KIMBER, taxicab owner of Pietermaritzburg, was shot dead by a fare. His body was discovered at the side of the Maritzburg-Durban road on 22nd September 1931. Connected with the mystery were two eloping lovers – Richard Louis Mallalieu (21), a former public schoolboy from England, where his father had been an M.P., and Gwendoline Mary Tolputt (23), adopted daughter of a doctor practising at Tarkastad.
The couple had reached Pietermaritzburg on an illicit honeymoon and were there when Kimber was shot and robbed. They were short of money and were seen in town at the time of the crime. They were arrested in Cape Town. In Mallalieu’s luggage was an Astra pistol. Two spent cartridge-cases which ballistics experts said had been fired from this pistol had been found at the scene of the crime. Mallalieu was tried at Pietermaritzburg on 8th March 1932. During the trial the defence questioned the identification of Kimber’s passengers on the fatal night and the similarity of the markings on the spent cartridge cases. The jury returned a unanimous verdict of not guilty. Tolputt did not stand trial and she and Mallalieu were deported.
The murder of IRENE KANTHACK, a young Witwatersrand University student, near the Zoo Memorial in Johannesburg, shocked the public. But what was never fully explained was the attempt of a woman to cast suspicion on an innocent man, her former sweetheart. At 6:15 pm on 24th November 1927, Miss Kanthack was seen behind the zoo, returning from a walk. Soon afterwards her pet terrier ran into her home, whimpering strangely. Her father called the police and urgent messages were broadcast. Her body was found beneath a clump of leaves and branches.
Clues showed that she had been killed in a nearby bush after fighting fiercely for her life. The chief of the C.I.D. was certain that the murderer was a Bantu, as the body had been left under a tree and covered with branches – the way in which Bantu usually conceal game they hunt and kill.
Some time afterwards a woman told her friends that her sweetheart, ‘Billy’, had confessed to the murder of Irene Kanthack. ‘Billy’, a youth of 21, was arrested, although handwriting experts were convinced that the letters allegedly written by him were forgeries. The woman took poison in a fit of contrition, but recovered and was called to testify at a preparatory examination. Under cross-examination she broke down and the magistrate described her evidence as a fabrication. He discharged ‘Billy’.
Not guilty, but liable for damages
The sequel to one murder verdict remains unique in court records. A young stockbroker’s clerk was charged with shooting a pawnbroker in his shop in Long Street, Cape Town, on 2nd March 1938. The jury found him not guilty and he was acquitted.
Unlike Kerr, he was thus immune from further prosecution; but the victim’s widow sued him in the civil courts for £1 500 damages and a similar sum for her baby son, for depriving them of their bread-winner. On the same facts the judge, who had also presided at the criminal trial, and a second judge found that, on the balance of probabilities, the youth had fired the fatal shots and was, therefore, liable for damages. He disappeared for 20 years, but was eventually traced and compelled to pay. No apparent motive. The trial of Y was one of the causes’ celebres of the 1970′s. It was a case unique in several respects.
A young building tycoon murdered his wife without apparent motive, and he was saved from the gallows by a judge’s finding of extenuating circumstances. In 1958 Y was divorced from his first wife and married a girl of 18 on 26 th February 1963. He was then 34. At Easter, 1970, Mrs. Y and her two small children spent a week with friends at a Cape coastal resort and flew back to Cape Town on Sunday afternoon, 5 th April. Y met them at the airport. He and his wife had a meal alone in the library. About 10.45 p.m. the housekeeper-governess heard a number of dull thuds. Moments later Y ran into her bedroom and called her. The governess saw Mrs. Y’s body sprawled on the library floor. Her skull had been shattered and there were other fearsome wounds, all caused by two heavy library ornaments. Y’s trial lasted four weeks. Announcing a unanimous verdict of guilty of murder, the judge said that the punishment prescribed by law was hanging unless there was evidence of extenuating circumstances. But the law made it clear that the onus of proof of extenuating circumstances, rested, not on the State, but on the accused person. The defence called a psychiatrist to report on his examination of Y. All Y’s actions during the fatal assault, according to the psychiatrist, emanated from a person in a state of lowered responsibility. Agreeing that the death penalty was not appropriate, as he found the crime unpremeditated – this constituted an extenuating factor – the judge sentenced Y to 12 years’ imprisonment. An application for leave to appeal was rejected.
Murder for a reward?
The murder of Baron Dieterich Joachim Gunther von Schauroth, a farmer of Blinkoog, Karasburg, remains unique. Not only were tragedy and mystery etched against a background of illicit diamond deals and a vast fortune in insurance, but fiction has rarely matched the murderer’s story that Von Schauroth promised him a reward of R10 000 to carry out a plot to swindle the insurance companies.Von Schauroth (born in his father’s castle in South West Africa on 30th November 1924) and his brother inherited Blinkoog on the death of their father, a member of an aristocratic family. Dieterich’s share of Blinkoog, which was mortgaged for R20 000, was worth between
R50 000 and R60 000. But a prolonged drought turned a prosperous Karakul breeding farm into a desert. Von Schauroth decided to move to Cape Town and invest the R10 000 to R12 000 that he had saved. He rented an expensive flat for himself, his wife, formerly Miss Colleen Baron and Colleen von Schauroth and his baby son, and led a life of pleasure.
He opened a banking account with R4 000 and handed over R3 800, to be paid into the trust account of insurance brokers as premiums on a number of short-term policies. Von Schauroth was sold insurance and eventually had cover for R400 000. He was well known for his idiosyncrasy of carrying large sums of money on his person. Early in January 1961 he was introduced to Marthinus Rossouw, aged 24, an electronics fitter on the railways, who was temporarily stationed at Bitterfontein, near the State diamond-diggings, and was on the look-out for a buyer of illicit gems.
On one occasion, with Rossouw as a go-between, Von Schauroth bought a parcel of uncut stones from a man known as ‘The Boss’ for R200. Rossouw appeared dissatisfied with the R10 Von Schauroth gave him for an introduction to ‘The Boss’, and was also disappointed with the amount of a loan he obtained from him. Nevertheless, the two were frequently in each other’s company. On Friday night, 25th March 1961, Von Schauroth left his flat with R4 000 in notes. He met Rossouw and they drove to a hotel in Milnerton, near Cape Town.
The following morning Von Schauroth’s body was found beside the road to Malmesbury, about 25 km from Cape Town. He had two bullet wounds in his neck, both fatal. The diamonds he had bought from ‘The Boss’ lay scattered about, giving the impression of a quarrel or scuffle during an illicit diamond transaction.
Rossouw was arrested. He adhered to his story that he had shot Von Schauroth at his request ‘to relieve him of his grief and marital unhappiness’. In contradiction, evidence was produced that Von Schauroth had left his wife a large sum in insurance money and that the couple had been happy together. The jury returned a verdict of murder without extenuating circumstances. Rossouw was sentenced to death and hanged on 20 June 1962. It was subsequently announced that the estate had approached the insurance companies for a settlement and that all legal actions had been withdrawn on payment of R20 000 by one company and the estate’s costs.
Shooting of a judge
Mr. Justice Simon Meyer Kuper, of the Witwatersrand Division of the Supreme Court, was shot at his home in Lower Houghton, Johannesburg. About two months before the crime a young man arrived, uninvited and unexpectedly, at the judge’s home. The caller did not give his name. Mrs. Kuper told him to make his approach through an attorney or an advocate. Someone rang the next evening, and the judge also advised the caller to consult an attorney. On the night of 8 March 1963 Kuper was shot while sitting in front of an open window in his home. The motive for the crime remains obscure and the murderer is still at large.
Headless torso
The torso of a woman was found in a suitcase in the Boksburg Lake on the East Rand on 27th October 1964. There were many stab wounds in her chest. The legs were recovered from the Wemmer Pan, near Johannesburg, on 7th November and the head in the Zoo Lake on 17th December 1964.
The main problem was identification of the remains. Sketches of the head and features were made and published in newspapers throughout the country, but without result. Three young women, daughters of Mrs. Catherine Louise Burch, told the police that their mother, the fourth wife of Ronald William George Arthur Burch, had disappeared shortly before the torso had been found.
The artist’s sketch in the newspapers had aroused their suspicions, but they were unable to state with certainty that the victim was their mother. Burch, too, had vanished. Investigations continued for several years and it seemed as though the mystery would never be solved. Then in November 1968 chance played a part. A letter written by Mrs. Catherine Burch to her daughters four years previously was found and taken to the police. Investigation proved that the letter had been written by the dead woman. Soon afterwards Burch was traced to his mother’s home in a Johannesburg suburb. When detectives entered the house to arrest him, he locked himself in a room, attached live wires to his arms, and electrocuted himself.
The panga man
Phineas Tshitaundzi, known as the ‘panga man’, terrorised Pretoria couples for six years, from 1953 to 1959. In spite of frequent police warnings about the danger of parking in secluded places at night. White men and women were repeatedly surprised and attacked in their cars on the outskirts of the city. The men were robbed and slashed with a panga. Some of the women were outraged and severely beaten.
The ‘panga man’ inflicted bodily injuries indiscriminately. Before he was tracked down and arrested he had been responsible for a score of assaults and had stolen a considerable amount of money and many valuables. The ‘panga man’s immunity to arrest made him careless.
When his victims had no money he took their possessions. He kept some and sold others. Among these was a watch which a Bantu bought from him. This Bantu told others of his ‘bargain’ and eventually the police heard of it. They searched Tshitaundzi’s room at Vlakfontein and found a collection of articles taken from the ‘panga man’s’ victims. The panga was also found. Most of the articles were identified by the victims, and a number of them were also able to identify the man. After his arrest Tshitaundzi confessed. He was sentenced to death and hanged on 14th November 1960.
Source: Standard Encyclopaedia of South Africa.
Were your Ancestors in the Circus?
June 15, 2009
Boswell Circus 1959
From the evidence of early Dutch and Cape paintings, it may be assumed that the first White inhabitants of the Cape were diverted by performing dogs and various animals trained to do tricks, notably monkeys (which were common household pets) and baboons. The garrisons at the Castle possibly spent part of their leisure in training such animals, and performing bears and various animals from the Orient may have been seen when in transit to Europe. In the country districts feats and tricks of horsemanship were highly esteemed, and were probably demonstrated at kermis (fair) and other occasions where the farmers gathered. Organised exhibition of performing persons and animals cannot be traced before 1810, when an application was made for leave to stage a circus in Cape Town. Except for occasional theatrical performances and amateur diversions in the town, organised entertainment was rare, and the circus was one of the first forms to develop.
One of the earliest was W. H. Bell’s circus, but by the eighties there were several, including Feeley’s, Wirth’s, Cooke’s, Val Simpson’s and that of the incomparable Frank Fillis who, coming to South Africa in 1880 to join Bell’s circus, took it over when Bell died. The two mining towns, Kimberley and Johannesburg, and the seaports of Cape Town and Durban now provided profitable ‘pitches’, and the smaller inland towns, formerly almost completely Fillis’s Circus building, Cape Town, in 1895 without entertainment, constituted a worth-while ‘circuit’.
Going overseas from time to time in order to recruit his ‘turns’, Fillis developed his circus into a major entertainment which the highest in the land were glad to patronise. He established a permanent building in Johannesburg in 1889 known as ‘Fillis’s Amphitheatre’ and specialised in spectacles such as a reconstruction of the Niagara Falls, ‘Dick Turpin’s ride to York’ and ‘Major Wilson’s last stand’. These were also staged at a structure opened in 1896 in Cape Town at the foot of Adderley Street alongside the Pier. Madame Fillis was an equestrienne of note and performed haute école at a benefit night given in Johannesburg in 1895. Mr. Lionel Phillips presented Mr. Fillis with a set of diamond studs and Madame Fillis with a ruby and diamond brooch on behalf of Johannesburg residents.
The artistes and company presented him with a gold star set with diamonds’. In spite of the high tone and spectacular scope of his performances, Fillis was frequently in financial straits. In 1900 he took an extraordinary show entitled ‘Savage South Africa’ to England, but despite the attraction of an authentic South African stagecoach, black warriors and other novelties, it failed and he was again bankrupt. He was reintroduced grandly to his old South African pitch by the impresario A. Bonamici in 1902 with an ‘Imperial Circus’, but the current depression militated against him. He faced bankruptcy again and again, and his animals were once sold over his head to pay his creditors. Finally ‘Madame Fillis’s Circus and Wild West Show’ went into opposition against him in Durban in 1910. (Vincenta Fillis, once the world’s first ‘human canon-ball, died in Durban in May 1946 at the age of 75.) Frank Fillis, with the circus that had become a national institution, then left South Africa and operated in the East. He died in Bangkok in Jan. 1922, but his sons continued in the entertainment field. The eldest, Frank, a well-known cinema manager, died in Johannesburg at the age of 80 in March 1961.
During the acute depression that followed the Second Anglo-Boer War the circus was often the only entertainment in the large towns. In addition to Fillis, Bonamici himself, Blake, Willison, Bostock and Wombwell, and F. W. A. Pagel toured during this period. Pagel and his wife survived many vicissitudes to become as much a national institution as Fillis. Born in Pomerania, Wilhelm Pagel was a professional weight-lifter, wrestler and lion-tamer. Madame Pagel also performed with the lions and tigers in her earlier days. Later she left the ring to undertake the entire direction of the complex circus organisation. She was known all over South Africa and frequently caused a sensation by driving about in the streets in an open car with a fully-grown lion beside her. She died at the Pagel training farm for animals near Pretoria in December 1939. The circus continued even after her husband retired in 1944 and after his death at Knysna in October 1948. Bostock’s Circus, based in England, visited South Africa intermittently. One of its clowns, ‘Spuds’ (George Kirk), later joined Pagel, and in 1930 formed his own circus, which was disbanded in 1944.
The cinema and other forms of entertainment were drawing audiences away from the circus except in the smaller towns, where it was a welcome diversion, and in the large towns during holiday seasons. James Boswell, who with his three brothers had come to South Africa in 1910 to perform in a circus, stayed to establish his own. It rivalled Pagel’s as a South African entertainment institution, and in 1956 African Theatres bought an interest in it and kept it on the road. Boswell celebrated his 80th birthday in retirement in April 1961. Competing with Boswell on the Southern African circuit was Wilkie’s Circus, the two amalgamating on 1 July 1963 under the direction of Wilkie, and the combined circus continued to tour. A less ambitious enterprise operating simultaneously was Doyle’s Circus, which was sold in liquidation in 1967. In 1964, the two enterprises were faced by competition on a grand scale when the famous Chipperfield’s Circus was imported lock, stock and barrel from England to settle in South Africa, and opened for the Christmas season in Cape Town. A succession of misfortunes failed to prevent its establishing itself and regularly touring the sub continent.
In 1968 the International Circus Performers’ Award was won by the clown Charlie Bale, the first South African circus artist to be so honoured. Nicknamed the Circus Oscar, the trophy is awarded every five years by an international body to a circus performer whose work is outstanding.
Source:Standard Encyclopedia of Southern Africa
Was your Ancestor a Beauty Queen ?
June 12, 2009
A large number of beauty contests have been held in South Africa since 1910. The most important being those in which the winners are entered in overseas contests.
The first beauty contests
In 1910, a beauty pageant was held in Cape Town to celebrate the newly formed Union of South Africa. Each province sent a representative that was picked by a prominent man in her region.
The first national beauty contest was organised by the magazine Stage Cinema in 1918. Three women were chosen to star in films based on Rider Haggard's books.
Edna JOYCE was chosen to play the Queen of Sheba in King Solomon's Mines. Mabel MAY and Elise HAMILTON were chosen to play twin sisters in Allan Quatermain.
Many contests held after World War I were mainly fund-raising efforts, often for the Governor-General's fund. In 1925 Mavis ALEXANDER won the Cape Argus Queen of the Gala competition.
The first woman to carry the Miss South Africa title, unofficially, was Winnie COMYNS of Cape Town, who won a national contest organised by the South African Lady's Pictorial in 1926. Blanca Borckenhagen was Queen of the Orange Free State; Ethel Jagger, Queen of the Cape, Gyn Hathorn, Queen of Natal, and Blanca van der Hoven, Queen of the Transvaal.
In 1927, the Cape Town city council banned beauty contest as they felt that they are undignified and not for the good of the city.
In 1930 Molly LAMONT, a dancing teacher from Scottburgh, won the Outspan Film Candidate competition. Her prize was a holiday in England and a film test at Elstree Studios. She went on to act in more than 50 films in England and the USA.
In 1938, the Sunday Express held a Marlene Dietrich look-alike national contest, which was won by Thelma Fairlie of Kensington, Johannesburg. In 1963, Thelma met Marlene Dietrich during her visit to South Africa.
During the late 1930s and early 1940s, there were many Wool Queen contests across the country. Local winners went on to regional and provincial contests, from which one girl would become the overall winner. However, the final stage was never reached. Doreen O'Neill was Midlands Wool Queen in 1939, but only four more regional queens were chosen and when World War II broke out, the contest was abandoned.
After the war, the Wool Board partnered with Photo News magazine and Metro Goldwyn Meyer Films to create a national Meet the Stars contest. The winner was to be known as Miss South Africa 1948. Forty-nine finalists spent a week in Johannesburg. General SMUTS, then Prime Minister, crowned Avelyn MACASKILL of Bloemfontein as winner at the Johannesburg City Hall. Her prize included a trip to Hollywood as the guest of MGM, visits to New York, Holland, London, Paris and Canada, and a diamond ring.
A few days before Avelyn's crowning, Stage & Cinema ran a readers' contest which gave the winner an entry in Universal International's Hollywood Beauty Contest. June FULTON of Durban won. Her prize included a six-month film contract and being photographed with film stars.
In 1944 Avelyn MaCASKILL won a beauty pageant. In 1949, Wynona CHEYNEY won a beauty pageant and reigned from 1949 to 1951.
Before the 1950s, most of the larger contests were organised by magazines such as Stage & Cinema, South Africa Pictorial and Outspan, or by newspapers, often in partnership with African Consolidated Theatres. Women submitted a photo and from these photos finalists would be chosen and published. The readers would vote for their favourite.
Beauty contests were racially segretated until the late 1970s. In the 1950s, Drum magazine, aimed at black readers, started running model and beauty contests. Later on a Miss Black South Africa pageant was held. Other popular contests were organised by the Ellerines furniture chain, and football associations.
In 1952, Outspan magazine and African Consolidated Theatres started a contest to find an entrant for the first Miss Universe pageant that year. Catherine HIGGINS, a short-hand typist from Johannesburg, wanted to become an actress. She entered the contest and won, taking her to Long Beach, California, where she was placed 7th and voted by the other contestants as Miss Friendly Spirit.
In 1956, Piet BEUKES, editor of Die Landstem, obtained the right to send a South African representative to the Miss World pageant in London. In 1960, the Miss Universe pageant in Miami Beach, Florida, and the Miss International Beauty pageant in Long Beach, California, also gave Die Landstem the right to enter a South African representative. Die Landstem, in partnership with the Sunday Times, arranged the contests for the Miss World entrant. The Sunday Express was in the partnership to choose the entrant for Miss Universe.
Beauty competitions were held in Margate where Miss Hibiscus was chosen and entered in the Miss Universe pageant. The Miss Hibiscus organisers re-named their title to Miss Protea in 1968.
The history of the Miss South Africa contest
The first official Miss South Africa contest was held in 1956. This was after the Afrikaans newspaper, Die Landstem, acquired the rights to enter someone in the Miss World pageant in London. Together with the Sunday Times, a South African English newspaper, they organised the first official Miss South Africa contest. It wasn't a pageant yet as entrants only sent in their photos and the newspaper readers voted for their favourites. The finalists' photos were again published and readers selected Miss South Africa. There was no crowning ceremony.
In 1964 and 1965, the selection system changed. The finalists and the winner were selected by the newspapers' editorial staff. In 1966 and 1967 the finalists were still selected by the newspapers, but the winners were selected by the readers.
In 1968, Die Landstem closed down and the Sunday Times took over the contest, bringing in another Afrikaans newspaper, Dagbreek. The selection process in 1968 still saw the finalists selected from photos but the winner was selected by a panel of celebrity judges meeting in Johannesburg.
The selection process changed again in 1970. Regional pageants were held and the regional winners appeared before celebrity judges in Johannesburg. The winner and runner-up were announced at a cocktail party in Johannesburg, after being announced in the newspapers. In 1972, the Miss South Africa contest became a pageant and Stephanie REINECKE was crowned in front of a live audience in the Johannesburg City Hall.
Regional pageants were not held in 1975. The finalists were selected after nationwide auditions. This system remained in place until 1994.
In 1978, the Miss South Africa pageant was opened to all races.
In 1994, Doreen MORRIS, a former M-Net presenter, went into partnership with Sun International to run the Miss South Africa pageant, after Rapport and the Sunday Times withdrew due to political interference from the ANC's Youth League. Sun International took full ownership of the pageant in 2000.
In the spotlight
Beauty pageants, especially Miss South Africa, crown came with many opportunities and most of the winners made good use of them. After their reigns, many beauty queens launched busy careers, while others found domestic life pleasing. Here we take a look at what happened to some of them.
Mavis Alexander
In October 1925, a Cape Town newspaper, the Argus, sponsored a beauty contest. Close to 800 contestants entered by sending in their photos which went on public display. On the 14 November the winner was crowned in the Tivoli Theatre in Cape Town.
Mavis ALEXANDER, a school teacher from Montagu won. Her prizes included a cheque for 25 guineas, theatre seats, a camera, a hat, a dress, silk stockings, shoes, an umbrella, lunch for six people for a week, a perm, a one-seater sofa, a watch, dance lessons, and a photo frame for her winning photo. She was also driven around Cape Town in the car which the Prince of Wales had used in Cape Town shortly before the contest.
Mavis later moved to the Strand, where her mother lived. She went back to teaching and spent 26 years teaching at Somerset West Primary. After her mother's death in 1950, she married a life-long friend, Bertie MITTEN. A few years later Bertie passed away. Mavis became involved in charity work and the Methodist church in Strand. In her will she left money to the Rotarary Club. In 1994, the Rotary Anns of the Strand, erected a clock in Beach Road in her memory. A bronze plate has the following inscription: "Tyd vir vrede, time for peace, Ixesha Ngo Xola. A gift to the community from Strand Rotary Anns. In memory of Mavis Mitton. 1994
Avelyn Macaskill
After her reign, Avelyn went to London where she attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art for two years. When she returned to Bloemfontein, she married businessman Jannie WESSELS and they had three children. After Jannie's death, she married Ronnie VAN REENEN. They moved to Cape Town in 1983, where they were involved with the Capab Opera Chorus and the Philharmonic Choir. In 1994, they bought an apartment in Spain 's Costa del Sol, and divide their time between Cape Town and Spain. Avelyn enjoys working in her gardens and painting in oils.
Winnie Comyns
Winifred (Winnie) Nora Mary Florence COMYNS married Egmar WESEMANN, but was divorced in 1951.
June Fulton
After returning from her prize trip to California, June met Antony BURTON from London. They got married and had two daughters. The family lived in Portugal for 11 years, where June ran a modelling school. They moved to England, where June died of cancer in 1990. June had acting roles in The Gal Who Took the West (1949) as a dance hall girl, and in Yes Sir That's My Baby (1949) as Mrs. Koslowski.
Catherine Edwina Higgins
Catherine became a successful model in South Africa. She was known for her diamond smile, as she had a diamond embedded in one of her front teeth. She was the daughter of James Arthur HIGGINS and Christopholina Edina VAN RENSBURG (MHG reference 10845/71, her father's death notice). She had an aunt and uncle, Mr and Mrs F.C. TOWNSEND who lived at 86 Moore Street, East London, in 1952. This was her mother's sister. Catherine's uncle on her mother's side, Freddie VAN RENSBURG, was a national professional snooker and billiards champion. He passed away in 1997 at the age of 88.
Ingrid Mills
Now Ingrid DE HAAST, she is a successful glass artist in Somerset West, after starting out as a potter more than 20 years ago. She attended classes in Corning, USA, as well as in Oregon. The former Miss South Africa 1953 also had a role in a Hollywood film. Ingrid was crowned in Johannesburg in May 1953. Her runner-up was Una DE BEER (Miss East London). Ingrid was Miss Salisbury, and was born in East London.
Penny Anne Coelen
Penelope Anne was born in Shepperton, Middlesex, on April 15, 1939, she lived in the Cape, in Witbank, Pretoria, Swaziland, Benoni and Estcourt before the family finally settled in Durban. When she won Miss World in 1958, it was the 8th Miss World pageant and had 22 contestants. Penny was an 18-year-old secretary. After her reign, she tried acting in Hollywood with James GARNER's help, but failed her screen test. After returning to South Africa, she married her first love, Michael REY, whom she met when she was 16. Michael was a suger-cane farmer at Umhlali, outside Durban.
They had five sons – Michael, Jean-Paul, Dominic, Nicholas and Christopher. Penny ran a beauty salon and gave lectures. She used to do promotional work, marketing and sales for American Airlines. In 1991, the ATKV awarded her a Vrou vir Vroue award for her involvement in charity and environmental work. Penny has her own clothing range, and endorsed beauty products. Her hobbies include gardening, painting, and learning languages.
Anneline Kriel
In November 1974, Helen Morgan, Miss UK, was crowned Miss World. Four days later, it was discovered that she was an unmarried mother and the title was passed on to the runner-up, Anneline KRIEL (19). She was born in Witbank on 28 July 1955 to Johannes (Hannes) and Marie. Her father passed away in Pretoria in November 1997. Anneline's siblings are Renette and Ernst. Renette was married to Graham McKENZIE, an Australian cricketer.
Anneline was Joolkoningin at Tukkies. She was Miss Northern Transvaal when she won Miss South Africa. After her Miss World reign she appeared in films (she studied drama at the University of Pretoria), including Someone Like You (1978), alongside Hans STRYDOM; Kill and Kill Again (1981), alongside James RYAN, Bill FLYNN and Ken GAMPU; and Reason to Die, alongside Arnold VOSLOO. She also had a role in the TV series, Ballade van 'n Enkeling. In 1986 she acted in the play, The Marriage Go Round.
In 1976, a scandal erupted when her naked pictures appeared in the Sunday Times. Ray HILLIGEN, a bodybuilder, had taken them while Anneline was sunbathing next to his pool.
Anneline also tried her hand at singing, releasing a record, He took off my romeos, in 1981. At the age of 39, she posed for Playboy magazine, draped in the new South African flag.
When she won Miss World she was dating fellow student Jacques MALAN but the relationship did not stand the strain. A relationship with Richard LORING, the singer, followed. He recorded a song for her, called Sweet Anneline. Another short relationship followed with the wealthy Italian baron and industrialist, Rudolf PARISI. In 1979 she dated Henk PISTORIUS of Johannesburg for awhile. Anneline married three times – first to Sol KERZNER, hotel magnate, in 1980 in the Randburg magistrate's office (they divorced in 1985). On 10 October 1989 she married Philip TUCKER, a show jumper, but they divorced in 1993. They had two children, Tayla and Whitney. On 29 March 1996, she married current husband, Peter BACON (Sun International executive). They live in Cape Town where she is involved with charities such as Child Welfare and the Cancer and Heart Foundations. Her business interests include marketing her clothing range her beauty products and perfumes.
Margaret Gardiner
Margaret, born in Woodstock, was 15 when she was discoverd as a model by the then Rapport photographer Bernard JORDAAN. In 1978 she was crowned as Miss RSA. Later that year she won the Miss Universe pageant in Acapulco, Mexico, becoming the first African winner, and the only South African winner to date. Her mother, Dawn, lives in Table View. Her father passed away in 2000. Her sister, Sandy BRONKHORST, lives in Klerksdorp. Sandy was a finalist in the 1976 Miss South Africa pageant.
Margaret married André NEL, son of Kay, in Cape Town on 14 February 1987 at St. George's Cathedral. He is a medical researcher at the University of California in Los Angeles, where the couple have lived since 1989.
Margaret has faced some serious health issues. She had TB as a child. In 1993 she was close to death after suffering an ectopic pregnancy. In January 1995 she gave birth to Brandon. He was christened at St. George's Cathedral in 1996. Margaret had breast cancer in 1998.
She has a degree in psychology from Charleston College in South Carolina. In the early 1990s she took small roles in a TV series, a film and in theatre plays. In 1994 she published a book for aspiring beauty queens, Die wenpad vir modelle en skoonheidskoninginne, published by Human & Rousseau.
She is now a freelance journalist and TV reporter, and a member of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association. Margaret often reports for the SABC show, Top Billing. Her articles regularly appear in the You, Huisgenoot and TVPlus magazines.
Norma Vorster
Later changed her surname to FOSTER and went on to make TV documentaries.
Mitzi Stander
Mitsianna (Mitzi) died in a car accident while driving her sports car in Victory Park, Johannesburg, on 18 June 1973. She was married to David Johannes FOURIE at the time (her death notice: MHG 6664/73).
Denise Muir
She died at her home in Sandton in 1992.
Monica Fairall
Monica became a radio presenter in Durban.
Yvonne Hulley
Her father served in the South African Air Force. Her parents retired to Hermanus where they had a restaurant.
Nickey Carras
She married Bobby VERWEY, the pro golfer.
Ellen Peters
She was Miss Africa South 1973 and placed in the final 15. In 1976, she entered Miss RSA and came second. Afterwards she went to live in Greece and met Israeli-born Naaman SKOLNIK, a businessman. She converted to Judaism and was married in Israel. They live in Hertzelia Pituach, where Ellen is an Orthodox Jew. (see picture)
Kazeka Ntantala
It's not everyone that hits the headlines thirty years after their moment of glory, but in the case of former Miss South Africa, Kazeka Somhlahlo (nee Ntantala) this is exactly what happened. BARBARA HOLLANDS recently caught up with her. Kazeka, of Idutywa then but now living in Amalinda, won the Miss South Africa 1970 pageant in Umtata, which was under the auspices of the South African Non-White Cultural Syndicate. Tandiswa BAM of Umtata was second. Kazeka's prize included cosmetics from Elida Gibbs, a bedroom suite, a radio display cabinet and clothing vouchers. The main prize of a trip to the USA was cancelled because the organisers ran out of money. She was a teacher in Idutywa. She endorsed Karoo Cream in magazines. In 1972 she was in a car crash near Willowvale, which left her with facial scars. Kazeka ended up marrying the social worker who was driving that night and they had two children. After marriage she taught in Alice and later worked for an insurance company before joining Zingisa Educational Project where she is still a regional co-ordinator.
Liz Bunting
In 1977, Liz was the first non-white contestant to place in the Miss South Africa pageant.
Ellen Liebenberg
Ellen was until recently the wife of Jannie Engelbrecht , former Springbok rugby player and owner of Rust en Vrede. She was Miss Matieland 1962. In 1963 she got engaged to Jannie in Sea Point and they went on to have three children – Jean, Angeline and Judy (married to GRAAFF). They met during her student days at the University of Stellenbosch. Ellen left her studies in 1963 shortly before her wedding, to represent South Africa at the Miss Universe pageant in Miami. Ellen was Miss South West Africa, which made her an automatic finalist in the Miss South Africa contest. The Engelbrecht family was broken up recently when Jannie divorced Ellen, and a court case followed whch involved the farm Rust en Vrede.
Vera Johns
Vera married the All Black rugby player, Alan SUTHERLAND. They have a horse stud farm, Somerset, near Mooi River. She has a rose named after her.
Wilma van der Bijl
She was a qualified pharmacist when she won the crown. She married the Greek businessman, Ari TAPANLIS, owner of a toy company. In 1995 Wilma's first child passed away two days after being born.
Yolanda Klopperss
She married Walter WARD, a doctor, and had a stormy marriage.
Karin Sickel
Karin married show jumper Errol WUCHERPFENNIG.
Odette Scrooby
She married Willie JOUBERT and they owned a nature reserve near Warmbaths for a while. Her sister, Olivia, was runner-up in Miss South Africa 1990.
Leanne Hosking
Leanne married an Australian cricketer, Mike HAYSMAN.
Letitia Snyman
She converted to Judaism in 1991 before marrying businessman Geoffrey RUBENSTEIN.
Andrea Steltzer
She owns a modelling agency in Edenvale. She is the only Miss South Africa to represent another country in the Miss World contest. In 1989, she won the Miss Germany contest as she was of German origin and still had a German passport. In 2002 she was engaged to the Springbok rugby player, James DALTON. Tat same year, a rose was named after her at the Bloemfontein Rose Show.
Sandy McCormack
She married businessman Richard BARKHUIZEN and lived in Knysna.
Janine Botbyl
She has a son and lives in Johannesburg.
Diana Tilden-Davis
Her grandmother was Thelma Fairlie, who was also a beauty queen. Older sister Janine BOTBYL won Miss South Africa 1988, and her sister Leanne was a finalist in 1982. Diana had a role in the horror film Howling IV and the action adventure Captive Rage. While doing a documentary in the Okavango, Diana met Chris Kruger. They were married at the Momba camp. They live in Maun in their safari business.
Michelle Bruce
She has a son and lives in Cape Town. Some of her business ventures included edible underwear and marketing condoms.
Suzette Van der Merwe
She was married to Greg VOGT, but later divorced.
Amy Kleyhans
Amy was the first Coloured woman to wear the Miss South Africa crown. Amy married a New Zealander, businessman Leighton CURD. The couple have a son, Thomas. She is involved in educational ventures.
Jacqui Mofokeng
Jacqui was the first black woman to win Miss South Africa. She was nominated by the ANC in the elections but she declined. In 1994 Jacqui appeared in the film, A White Man in Africa, in the role of Hazel, an illiterate rural woman who has a relationship with an Australian diplomat. Today she is involved with human resources and production companies, and serves on the boards of several companies.
Basetsane Makgalemele
Basetsane was a popular beauty queen. She was born and bred in Soweto. After her reign she became a TV presenter. She went on to become a shareholder in Tswelopele, the company that produces Top Billing. She has two older sisters, Lerato and Johanna, and a younger brother, Abbey. Her parents are Philip and Beatrice. She is married to Radio Metro station manager Romeo Khumalo and has a son, Nkosinathi.
Peggy Sue Khumalo
Peggy Sue (21) was Miss South Africa 1996. Five days afer her crowning, it was discovered that she was Peggy Priscilla Erasmus (24) and had changed her name first to Peggy Priscilla Khumalo and subsequently to Nonhlanhla Peggy-Sue Khumalo, as was publised in the Government Gazette on 04 April 1996. She was born in Newcastle on 07 December 1972 to Jumaima Khumalo and James Erasmus, a coloured or white farmworker. She was raised by her white grandmother, Afrikaans-speaking Cornelia Susanna Dunn. She attended Chelmsford, a coloured school in Newcastle, and matriculated from Haythorne High School in Pietermaritzburg. Peggy caused a public outcry when she said that she would slaughter a goat and several cows if she won Miss Universe or Miss World. After establishing her own PR company she went to study further in the UK, where she is a fund manager for Investec.
Kerishnie Naicker
Kerishnie had an honours degree and planned to open her own pharmacy. She was the first Indian woman to wear the crown. She grew up in Reservoir Hills, Durban, with her parents Amra and Joey, and two siblings. After obtaining a first class Matric, Kerishnie enrolled for a Bachelors Degree in Pharmacy, and later a Masters in Pharmacy. During her final year, her father passed away from a heart attack. He was a self-employed businessman and Kerishnie got involved in the family's business interests. In 1997, whilst practicing as a pharmacist, Kerishnie entered the Miss South Africa pageant and won. She participated in both Miss Universe and Miss World. Kerishnie is involved in many business ventures, health research, is a television presenter, producer, master of ceremonies and public speaker. She helped secure funding for the building of 12 community health clinics, and played a key role in getting the Chatsworth Youth Centre up. She is also director of her own company, KJN and Associates, a consultancy facilitating corporate social investment projects.
Jo-Ann Strauss
Now a TV presenter, businesswoman and speaker, Jo-Ann was 19 when she won Miss South Africa in 2000. She started presenting the magazine programme Pasella in the same year, and joined Top Billing in June 2005. She speaks English, Afrikaans and Xhosa. Jo-Ann was head-girl at Hottentots Holland High School in 1998. She graduated from Stellenbosch University with a B.Comm (Law) degree. In July 2002, Jo-Ann participated in the Celebrity Big Brother reality TV show to raise R2 000 000 for five children's charities. She finished in second place. She has her own communications company.
Heather Hamilton
Heather has a Bachelors in Commerce from the University of Kwazulu-Natal. She became a fund manager and joined a prominent asset management firm working as an investment consultant. In 1994 she won the South Africa Junior Equitation championships. Her brother was instrumental in exposing canned lion hunting.
Sonia Raciti
One of Sonia Raciti's dreams is to release her own CD. She was a member of the National Youth Choir for three years, having started singing at 13. Sonia, from Estcourt, studied for a higher diploma in education at Edgewood College of Education.
Joan Ramagoshi
Miss South Africa 2003 was rcently marred to Jeff. Khanyisile Mbau. She was a part-time model from Pretoria. Joan speaks five languages: English, Afrikaans, Northern Sotho, Tswana, and Zulu. After completing a PR diploma, she started her own PR agency.
Claudia Henkel
Claudia was a second-year top law student at the University of Pretoria when she entered the Miss South Africa pageant. She has two sisters, Anica and Nicola. Her father Irmin is an ear, nose and throat surgeon, and mom Linda looked after the family home in Pretoria East. Claudia attended Pretoria Girls High and was a finalist in a model search competition in Matric. She spent two months in Italy and finished Matric through correspondence while modelling. Claudia could not represent the country at Miss World in Sanya, China, as it was held on the same night as the Miss South Africa finals in Sun City. Her runner-up, Dhiveja Sundrun, was sent in her place.
Dhiveja Sundrum
She represented South Africa at the Miss World pageant in 2005. Dhiveja was a fifth-year University of Cape Town medical student. She lives in Gardens, Cape Town. The Miss World competition was the third pageant she'd entered. Her first one was Rapport's Miss Cape Peninsula in 2004, which gave her automatic entry into the Miss South Africa pageant. She's appeared in TV ads and fashion catalogues, and was a TV presenter. Her father Dayalan is an orthodontist and mom Veena is a former teacher.
South Africans in the Miss World pageant
Miss South Africa has done well in the Miss World pageant, with Penny (1958) and Anneline (1974) taking the top prize.
Politics got involved and from 1978 to 1991, Miss South Africa was barred from Miss World. In 1970 a non-white South African was chosen to compete in Miss World and was given the title of Miss Africa South. This continued until South Africa was expelled from Miss World after the 1977 pageant.
In 1975, Vera JOHNS was not allowed to take part in the Miss World as she did not meet the pageant's residency requirements. She had been Miss Rhodesia in 1972 and had not lived in South Africa for 5 years. Her first runner-up, Crystal Cooper, refused to enter Miss World unless she was awarded the Miss South Africa title and prizes.
The second runner-up, Rhoda Rademeyer, competed at Miss World 1975 and was finished in the top 15. In 1976, the presence of a black Miss Africa South and a white Miss South Africa, caused 9 countries to withdraw their contestants in protest against South Africa's apartheid system. In 1977 ten countries withdrew in protest against the presence of a white Miss South Africa. After 1977, Miss World organizers did not accept South African contestants until 1991, with the end of apartheid. Diana TILDEN-DAVIES represented South Africa at the 1991 Miss World contest, ending the ban.
From 1992 to 1995, and 2001, the pageant was held at Sun City, South Africa. In 2002, Vanessa CARREIRA boycotted the pageant which was held in Nigeria, in protest against the Amina Lawal affair. Claire Sabbagha, runner-up, was sent as a replacement when the pageant moved to London. This led to confusion as the Miss World organisers said that at 25, Claire was too old. Karen Lourens (19), Miss Junior Africa, of Roodepoort, was also sent in as a replacement but after two days she was sent home without being allowed to participate.
Contestants at the Miss World Pageant
1957: Adele KRUGER, third
1958: Penelope Anne COELEN won the title
1959: Moya MEAKER, semi-finalist
1960: Denise MUIR, third
1961: Yvonne Brenda HULLEY, semi-finalist
1962: Yvonne Maryann FICKER, fourth
1963: Louise CROUS
1964: Vedra Karamitas
1965: Carrol Adele Davis
1966: Joan (Johanna) CARTER, semi-finalist
1967: Disa DUIVESTEIN, semi-finalist
1968: Mitsianna (Mitzi) Stander
1969: Linda Meryl COLLET, sixth
1970: Pearl Gladys JANSEN (Miss Africa South), second, and Jillian Elizabeth JESSUP (Miss South Africa) fifth
1971: Monica FAIRALL, semi-finalist, and Gaily Ryan (Miss Africa South)
1972: Stephanie Elizabeth REINECKE, semi-finalist, and Cynthia Shange (Miss Africa South)
1973: Shelley LATHAM (Miss South Africa), fifth, and Ellen PETERS (Miss Africa South), semi-finalist
1974: Anneline KRIEL won the tile, and Evelyn Peggy WILLIAMS (Miss Africa South), semi-finalist
1975: Rhoda RADEMEYER, semi-finalist, and Lydia Gloria Johnstone (Miss Africa South)
1976: Veronica Rozette Kuki Matsepe (Miss Africa South) and Lynn Massyn
1977: Vanessa Wannenburg (Miss South Africa)
1991: Diana TILDEN-DAVIS, third
1992: Amy KLEINHANS, fifth
1993: Palesa Jacqueline (Jacqui) MOFOKENG, second
1994: Basetsane Julia MAKGALEMELE, second
1995: Bernalee DANIEL, semi-finalist
1996: Peggy-Sue KHUMALO, semi-finalist
1997: Jessica MOTAUNG, third
1998: Kerishnie NAICKER, fifth
1999: Sonia RACITI, third
2000: Heather Joy HAMILTON
2001: Jo-Ann Cindy STRAUSS, semi-finalist
2002: Boycotted the pageant in Nigeria, but then joined in London
2003: Cindy Nell
2004: Joan Kwena Ramagoshi
2005: Dhiveja Sundrum, semi-finalist
South Africans in the Miss Universe pageant
The Miss Universe pageant has been held annually since 1952. It was started by the Californian clothing company Pacific Mills to showcase its Catalina swimwear brand. In 1996 Donald Trump acquired ownership of the pageant. Various beauty contests had the right to send a South African representative to Miss Universe.
In 1952 the winner of the Miss South Africa (Universe) contest represented South Africa. In May 1952, Catherine HIGGINS, Miss Johannesburg, represented South Africa. Her runners-up were Jean BROWNLEE (Miss Cape Town), Stella COUTTS (Miss Durban) and Helena VAN DER LINDE (Miss East London). In 1953 the winner of Miss Golden Jubilee competed in Miss Universe.
From 1960 until 1967, the South African representative for Miss Universe was elected at the Hibiscus Queen contest in Margate. The contest existed prior to 1960 and still continues today. From 1969 to 1974 South Africa did not take part in the Miss Universe pageant. In 1975, Rapport, an Afrikaans newspaper, acquired the rights to send a representative to the Miss Universe pageant. They sponsored the Miss RSA regional pageant and the winner went to Miss Universe. Gail Anthony was selected to represent South Africa in 1975. In 1978 the Miss RSA pageant became a national pageant. Jenny KAY, Miss RSA 1980, did not compete at Miss Universe 1980 in Seoul as the Korean government did not recognise the government of South Africa and refused to grant her a visa.
In 1982 the newspaper changed the name Miss RSA to Miss South Africa. This followed after a dispute about the national title and international participation. In 1982 and 1984, the dispute led to two beauty pageants – each sponsored by a Sunday paper – Rapport, and the Sunday Times, an English paper. Rapport argued that as the only pageant to have entry to an international pageant, their winner should be known as Miss South Africa. This is why there are two Miss South Africas in 1982 and 1984. In 1985, the newspapers agreed to join forces and one Miss South Africa pageant was held.
Miss South Africa did not compete in Miss Universe from 1985 to 1994. In 1985, Andrea Steltzer was not allowed to compete in the pageant. Andrea went on to become Miss Germany 1988 and was a semi-finalist in the 1989 Miss Universe pageant. As Miss Germany 1988 she was not allowed to enter Miss World because of her South African background.
In 1995, South Africa was again allowed to participate in the Miss Universe pageant. A new title, Miss Universe South Africa, was created but was discontinued after the 1997 pageant, as the Miss South Africa organisation acquired the right to send their winner to the Miss Universe pageant. Miss South Africa now represents South Africa in both international pageants.
Contestants at the Miss Universe Pageant
1952: Catherine Edwina Higgins, semi-finalist
1953: Ingrid Rita Mills, semi-finalist
1954-1959: no entry
1960: Nicolette Joan Caras
1961: Marina Christelis
1962: Lynette Gamble
1963: Ellen Leibenberg, semi-finalist
1964: Gail Robinson
1965: Veronika Edelgarda Hilda Prigge, semi-finalist
1966: Lynn Carol De Jager
1967: Windley Ballenden
1968: Monica Fairall
1969-1974: no entry
1975: Gail Anthony
1976: Cynthia Classen
1977: Glynis Dorothea Fester
1978: Margaret Gardiner, winner
1979: Veronika Wilson, semi-finalist and 2nd runner-up for Best National Costume
1980: no entry
1981: Daniela Di Paolo
1982: Odette Octavia Scrooby
1983: Leanne Beverly Hosking
1984: Leticia Snyman, runner-up
1985: Andrea Steltzer did not compete
1986-1994: no entry
1995: Augustine Masilela, semi-finalist
1996: Carol Anne Becker
1997: Mbali Gasa
1998: Kerishnie Naicker, semi-finalist
1999: Sonia Raciti, third
2000: Heather Joy Hamilton, semi-finalist
2001: Jo-Ann Cindy Strauss
2002: Vanessa Do Ceu Carreira
2003: Cindy Nell, third
2004: Joan Ramagoshi
Miss Africa South
The Miss Africa South competition, for non-white women, was first organised in 1970, with the winner taking part in the Miss World pageant.
Winners:
1970: Pearl Jansen
1971: Gaily Ryan
1972: Cynthia Shange
1973: Ellen Peters
1974: Evelyn Williams
1975: Lydia Johnstone
Miss International Beauty Winners:
1960 Nona Sheriff
1961 Dina Robbertse
1962 Aletta Strydom
1963 Madie Claassen
1964 Lorraine Mason
1965 Dianne Webster
1966 Dawn Duff-Gray
1967 Mary Macdonald
Sources:
Naspers newspapers
Generations – A South African genealogy newsletter, Vol. 3, Iss. 19
http://www.pageantopolis.com/international/world.htm
http://www.pageantopolis.com/international/universe.htm
http://www.geocities.com/southafricanbeauties/
http://www.jimmyspageantpage.com/sa.html
http://www.golive.co.za/52/
Written by Anne Lehmkuhl
Freemasons in the Family
June 3, 2009Have you ever wondered why your Ancestors became Freemasons? Was it because of the idea of belonging to a secret society, or perhaps a night off from the nagging wife once a week? Men join and practice Freemasonry to make themselves better human beings, and the rituals, symbolism, and teachings of Freemasonry focus on morality and ethics.
What are Free Masons?
Freemasonry is a fraternal secret society limiting its membership to adult men who believe in a Supreme Being. While it absorbed a good deal of occult symbolism from its roots in Renaissance Hermeticism, and a great many male occultists have belonged to it in the last 300 years, it is not an occult order. Similarly, while it was closely associated with liberal political causes for the two centuries after 1717,and Masons such as Louis Thiabult, Piet Retief and President Brand and Cecil John Rhodes have played important roles in political affairs and South African history, it is not a political organization. Non-members are often surprised to learn that its actual focus is self-improvement.
What do they do?
No Freemason is ever asked to perform any task or take any oath which may conflict with his duties to his God, his family or as a citizen. Freemasonry is not a religion, but it demands that every member believe in a power greater than man. It does not focus solely on charity, but strongly promotes charitable activities and encourages members to contribute to those less fortunate than themselves. It is certainly not politically motivated, but it expects its members to play a meaningful role in society.
In simplest terms, Freemasonry’s aim is to improve the world we live in by uplifting the moral and spiritual standards of the men living in it.
Freemasonry is many centuries old, the most commonly accepted theory being that it originated back in medieval times when the great cathedrals of Europe were built. The stonemasons who created these magnificent Gothic structures formed craft guilds to protect the secrets of their trade, to help one another and to pass on their knowledge to worthy apprentices.
In 17th century England, these guilds began accepting honorary members. These new members were men of learning and position who were not working stonemasons or even associated with the building trades. As time passed, they developed into a separate body, referred to as the Free and Accepted Masons, and it is from this that structured Freemasonry was formed. The earliest recorded “making” of a Freemason was in 1646, being that of one Elias Ashmole.
History of the Masons in South Africa
Formally organised Freemasonry, as we know it today, began with the founding of the Grand Lodge of England in 1717. Looking to expand their horizons, they opened foreign Lodges such as The Hague in Holland in 1734. As the Order progressed, so a number of new Grand Lodges were established, one of the earliest being the Grand Lodge National of the Netherlands in 1758. Each of these Grand Lodges then sought to spread further by establishing new Lodges both at home and in their territories overseas.
While history shows that there were a number of Freemasons living in the Cape prior to this date, it was on the 2nd May 1772, that the Dutch formally introduced Freemasonry to South Africa and 10 founding Brethren established Lodge de Goede Hoop under the Mastership of Abraham Chiron. To say that these early Brethren laboured diligently is an understatement and it is recorded that some 400 degrees were conferred in the first 9 years and that in 1775 alone, the Brethren met 32 times and conferred 53 degrees.
It is worth noting that, in the early days, the Cape’s main purpose was to provide a safe shelter and halfway-station en route to the East Indies and the Dutch East India Company played a major role in all local activities. Indeed, the Lodge depended for its existence on visitors and generally failed to attract the local residents as members, mainly because of the rigid social and religious attitudes of the confined Cape society. This consisted mainly of two broad classes, the Company official and free burgher. Due to rigid Company policy their employees were not permitted to trade or own land until they were released from their contracts, and it was only after this that they could settle in the Cape and become free burghers. The Masonic philosophy of equality in the Lodge violated the structure in the Cape where difference in rank between Company officials and free burghers was practiced. Religious interference was also widespread.
In the early 1780s, war broke out between England and Holland and, as a result, ships stopped calling at the Cape. This had a major impact on Masonic labours and contributed to the Lodge, in 1781, going into recess for a period of some 9 years. The Lodge recommenced activities in the early 1790s, this time attracting more prominent persons of the Company, such as Johannes Andreas Truter, later to become Chief Justice of the Cape.
These more influential members offered some protection from the Company and the pulpit and, whereas previously almost all the members were of a transient nature, more and more of the new initiates were locally born and primarily resident in the Cape – a far more stable situation. The Lodge has now laboured, uninterrupted, for well over 200 years.
It is not the objective of this article to concentrate on a single Lodge, and little more will be said about Lodge de Goede Hoop itself, although it is impossible to ignore the very major role it has played in all aspects of the history of South African Freemasonry. Indeed, in one way or another, every single one of the Lodges operating in this country can trace its foundations back to the Mother of all our Lodges.
In the late 18th century, after the year of the British occupation in 1795, there were a large number of members of overseas Lodges living in Cape Town. De Goede Hoop allowed them to use their facilities, with certain restrictions, and they functioned as irregular Lodges. One of these was Goede Verwachting, which was duly warranted as a lawful Lodge in the early 1800s. In the process of ratification, the name was changed to de Goede Trouw, now our Number 2 Lodge.
Further impetus was given to Freemasonry in the Cape by the take over of the Batavia Republic in 1802, and, after that, with the arrival of Jacob de Mist, a Deputy Grand Master in Holland, who then became the 1st Deputy Grand Master, National Netherlandic Constitution in the region. He had been sent out to re-establish the Dutch presence in the Cape and one of the important avenues he used was Freemasonry.
The 2nd British occupation of the Cape Colony saw the return of the British Military Lodges. The Commander in Chief was a Freemason and, seeing him as an ally, the Deputy Grand Master National welcomed him into Lodge De Goede Hoop as a protector.
However, the influx of English speaking members into the Lodge brought its own tensions. Almost inevitably, the English speaking members broke away in 1811 and formed the British Lodge, this being the 1st permanent Masonic involvement in the territory by the United Grand Lodge of England.
Political circumstances triggered off the Great Trek when thousands of burghers moved North. Coupled to the general economic climate, this adversely affected Freemasonry at the time. Relative prosperity in the 1850s, however, resulted in an influx of English settlers and the development of the Eastern coast and the Natal Colony. The Craft was revitalised, with English Freemasonry spreading to the Eastern part and Dutch Freemasonry towards the newly formed Republics of the Orange Free State and Transvaal. Once again, the use of English in the Dutch Lodges created tensions and in 1860 resulted in the formation of the very 1st Lodge under the Scottish Constitution, that being Lodge Southern Cross. The 1st of the local Irish Lodges, St Patricks, was formed in 1897. There were now four Constitutions at labour in Southern Africa.
As early as 1875, there were calls for a United Grand Lodge to be formed, where all Masons would be able to find a common home and there was a similar move in 1892, when the proposal was narrowly defeated. While no unification has yet been successfully pursued, it must be said that the 4 Constitutions have almost always worked together in great harmony, have shared many projects and have always promoted the common cause of Freemasonry.
There have been some extremely testing times, such as during the Anglo-Boer war, and there are many tales of Masons from opposite sides remembering their Masonic oath and saving their Brethren. It is also noted that Temples were often spared from destruction.
Perhaps as a result of political circumstances, the upsurge of Afrikanerdom and a growing campaign for a South African Republic, the striving for a South African Grand Lodge again gained momentum. The failure to make any progress in establishing a United Grand Lodge resulted in some of the Brethren of the Netherlandic Constitution forming an entirely South African “Grand Lodge” in 1952. As it was irregular, however, the 4 Constitutions operating in South Africa prohibited members from attending the meetings.
The 2nd World War heavily disrupted the world’s Masonic structures and, once the war had ended, the Grand Lodge of the Netherlands was forced to re-establish itself. In so doing, they had decided to accept Grand Orients which did not comply with ancient land marks, the 2 most important being the belief in a living God and the presence of a Volume of Sacred Law during the labours of the Lodge.
This resulted in grave disagreements with the Grand Lodges of England, Ireland and Scotland who threatened to withdraw recognition from the Netherlands – a serious problem for the Netherlandic Lodges in South Africa who worked in close cooperation with the various Lodges under these Constitutions.
When a break in the relationship between the Netherlands and the 3 Grand Lodges became imminent, the English Grand Secretary advised Districts in South Africa of the situation. The Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of England wrote to Colonel Colin Graham Botha advising him that, in the circumstances, it would probably be prudent to break away from the Netherlands. As a result, in 1961, the Grand Lodge of Southern Africa was duly established.
Today, the Grand Lodge Centre is based in Orange Grove, Johannesburg. 5 Provincial Divisions have been established over the years, being Southern (1863), Northern (1906), Central (1962), Eastern (1977) and Eastern Cape (2002). The harmonious interaction between the various Divisions, as well as that enjoyed with the Sister Constitutions, plays a very positive role in the overall development of South African Freemasonry.
This article draws extensively on a paper which was presented by M Wor Bro George Groenewald and appreciation is extended to him for his efforts. It is also acknowledged that material has been drawn from various brochures produced by our Sister Constitutions.
Social life at the Lodge
The focal point of social life in the later 8th and early 19th century for masons, and many non-masons, was the Lodge De Goede Hoop’s Society Rooms, a building adjacent to the main lodge.
As early as 1794, these rooms offered recreation and relaxation – meals, a library, billiards, bowls, skittles and “Kolf” played on a small course in the grounds. But all games of chance were prohibited. Similar facilities were offered when the lodge moved to its new property in the Garden Domburg on Bouquet Street in 1803.
There were few other venues in Cape Town for men to meet for serious discussion or recreation. One of the earliest social clubs was the Society Concordia in Concordia Gardens on Bouquet Street. Founded in 1797, it offered meals and a small library but the members “principally drank, smoked and gamed”. In the first British occupation in 1795 the African Clubhouse in the Heerengracht, another exclusive social body, was formed, later to change its name to Society Harmony. It also offered a library, billiards, cards and meals.
After the second British occupation in 1806, Cape Town could boast of other clubs, the New Clubhouse, Union Club and De Vriendschap. All had limited membership. While several masons were members of these clubs, the majority supported the De Goede Hoop Society Rooms, which grew in importance with the passing years, particularly as members often met three to four times a week for lodge business and adjourned afterwards to the rooms for evening refreshment and relaxation or used the society facilities at weekends.
The golf “course” and bowling green at De Goede Hoop Lodge created much interest and, after the first quarter of the 19th century, periodical golf matches were held followed by beefsteak dinners. A floating trophy of a silver golf club was awarded but so enthusiastically had this game been taken up that, in 1848, its playing on Sunday was prohibited. The golf “course” was in effect a pitch and putt course, the only course of its kind in the environs of Cape Town.
De Goede Trouw and British Lodges, both of which owned land on Bouquet Street, followed De Goede Hoop’s example and opened flourishing society rooms. While De Goede Hoop Lodge Society Rooms were open to guests, the lodge ensured privacy for members by holding “Society Days” on Thursdays and Saturdays. All Effective Members had to be present on one or both of these days or they were fined.
The Society Rooms were rebuilt in 1814 at a cost of £4 000 and included a large hall 104 ft. (31,6 m) long and 20 ft. (6 m) wide which later became the meeting place of the Cape House of Assembly for many years.
“Discord, disunion and animosity” among members led to the dissolution of the Society Rooms in 1834. But this seems to have been a device to get rid of some undesirable members for, a month later; the Society Rooms were reformed, though under stricter regulations. At the end of 1842 non-masons were admitted to membership of the society and the lodge made admission to the society an easy way of obtaining initiation.
The billiard room was, however, kept solely for use of members who individually bought shares in the “Biljard Tafel”.
Use of the Society Rooms was offered to members of the Cape House of Assembly when the Assembly met in the hall from 30 June 1854. The Assembly made alterations to the premises during its lease of the building, which lasted to 1874.
In the meantime the lodge opened its extensive gardens to the public for promenade concerts and theatrical performances. The grounds were illuminated, a vegetable garden uprooted and gravelled and a stage erected while concerts were held until the end of 1875. Lodge members were issued with free vouchers while the public was charged a small entrance fee and proceeds went to charities.
Other lodges – British and De Goede Trouw, for instance – were not so much in the public eye, not having the grounds to offer these recreational amenities. But their presence in Cape Town society did not go unnoticed by the public for, in common with De Goede Hoop, their members paraded through the streets every St John the Baptist’s Day, 24 June, the occasion of the installation of their new master, or on public ceremonies.
For masons’ families, St John’s Day was also a time of entertainment after the new master had been installed. The first recorded festivity was on St John’s Day in 1 775 when De Goede Hoop members held a concert to which ladies were admitted and the entertainment lasted to 4 am.
These concerts, followed at times by supper, were to become annual features on that day but apparently, during the Dutch East India Company rule, no dances were held. This changed under the first British occupation as a result of the presence of military lodges.
Africa No. 1 Lodge, formed by the 98th Regiment and others in 1798, held a Masonic ball in 1801. Lady Anne Barnard on 4 January 180 wrote to the Earl of Macartney: “Tomorrow there is a great Ball in town at which I don’t appear nor any of the English ladies of fashion at the Cape whose husbands are not masons. There is much taste for masonry here.”
She complained that the married ladies had been invited, presumably as companions for the military, but not one non-mason husband.
When the British regiments departed, these functions ended and the social occasions for masons again became evenings at lodge society rooms or all-male banquets following Masonic ceremonies.
As military lodges returned with the second British occupation, Masonic balls again became a feature, principally held by English lodges, both in Cape Town and the Eastern Province.
A Masonic “dress ball” was held by British Lodge in June 1844 at the George Hotel, 36 Heerengracht, setting a yearly pattern.
Lodge anniversaries were also occasions for jollity. British Lodge celebrated its jubilee on 9 August 1861 with a Grand Ball, which was described as “one of the gayest affairs that had ever taken place”. Both Dutch and English masons attended and Sir Christoffel Brand, the Netherlandic Deputy Grand Master, gave a special address.
The masons’ families were not forgotten. Entertainments for them included concerts, musical soirees and the inevitable suppers. Often the men dined in one room and their families in another.
Some Famous South African Masons
Anreith, Anton
Anton Anreith
Anton Anreith became a Freemason in 1797 as a member of the Loge de Goede Hoop. He was born in Riegel near Freiburg in Breisgau, Baden, Germany on 11th June 1754 and died in Bloem Street, Cape Town on 4th March 1822, sculptor and art teacher.
Bale, William Ebrington
Born in Tedburn St Mary, Devon, England on 14th April 1820 and died in Pietermaritzburg on 13th November 1903, Natal immigrant, businessman and philanthropist. He belonged to the Masonic Lodge in Pietermaritzburg.
Bell, Charles Davidson -A prominent Freemason.
Botha, General Louis - He joined Aurora Lodge in Pretoria 1890, then a Dutch Lodge.
Brand, President
President Brand was born in Simonstown on 21st June 1797 and died in Madeira House, Stal Plein, Cape Town on 19th May 1875. He was an advocate, journalist, and first speaker of the Cape Parliament. He played an important role in South African Freemasonry. In 1819, while still a student, he became a member of the La Vertu lodge in Leyden, and on 6 July 1824 he joined the De Goede Hoop lodge in Cape Town. After holding various offices he was appointed in 1847 by Prince Frederick of the Netherlands as deputed grand master of the movement at the Cape, the highest office of Freemasonry in the Colony. Under his leadership the movement prospered in South Africa, and new lodges were founded whose disputes were sometimes settled by Brand. One example of his activities in this connection was the dispute (which he settled in 1866 and expounded in two publications in 1867: Masonic epistle and Masonic decision) over the viability of the Colesberg lodge. Brand travelled a good deal in the interests of Freemasonry, and carefully noted the routes and length of his journeys. His ‘Journey book 1860-66′, which is in the Orange Free State Archives, bears evidence of this. In Pretoria in 1869 he visited the Aurora lodge of which Pres. M. W. Pretorius was a member.
Burgers, T.F. President
Chisholm, John
Born in Carlisle, England circa 1777 and died in Cape Town on 26 th September 1856), civil engineer, was waterworks engineer for Londonderry, Ireland, from 1807 to 1812 and completed the installation of that city’s water supply – Master Mason.
Chubb, Ernest Charles
Born in London, England on 16th September 1884 and died in Durban, Natal on 9th October 1972, ornithologist, natural historian and museums pioneer.
De Klerk, Daniel Petrus
Born in Onverwacht, Molteno, Cape Colony on 25th October 1883 and died in Cape Town on 14th August 1964, lawyer, cultural leader and businessman. He was the first master of the first Afrikaans Masonic Lodge.
De Villiers, Bernardus Josephus van de Sandt.
De Vries, Maurits
A Dutch Jew, Lawyer, politician and author.
De Wet, Olof Godlieb
Born in Cape Town, baptised on 11th October 1739 and died in Cape Town on 6th December1811, V.O.C. official and judge. In May 1772 he was one of the founders of the Masonic Lodge, De Goede Hoop.
Duminy, Francois Renier
Francois Renier Duminy
Born in Lorient, France on 4th October 1747 and died in Cape Town on 26th May 1811. V.O.C. official, was the ancestor of the Duminy family in South Africa. Grand Master of the lodge De Goede Hoop from 1794 to 1797. In the history of the lodge De Goede Hoop, the time during which he was a member is known as the Duminy period.
Faure, David Pieter
Born in Stellenbosch on 11th November 1842 and died in Camps Bay, Cape Town on 17th August 1916, minister, founder of the Free Protestant (Unitarian) Church in Cape Town. In 1869 Faure became a member of the Masonic lodge De Goede Hoop and from 1870 held various positions in it. In 1892 he became Deputy Grand Master for Southern Africa and from 1895 to 1907 he was Provincial Grand Master of the Goede Hoop lodge of Freemasons.
Forssman, Magnus Johan Frederik
Born in Kalmar, Sweden in 1820 and died in Pretoria on 7th October 1874. He was the surveyor-general of the Transvaal Republic and the first master of the Potchefstroom Masonic Lodge.
Hofmeyr, Jan Hendrik (‘Onze Jan’)
He was a Statesman.
Huckins, Daniel Montgomery
Born in Sedgwick, Hancock Co., Maine, U.S.A. circa. 1814 and died in Cape Town on 18th February 1862. He was the American consul to the Cape Colony. He was a Freemason of the brethren of four Cape Town lodges, De Goede Trouw, the British Lodge No. 419, the Joppa Lodge and the Southern Cross Lodge.
Korsten, Frederik
Born in Zierikzee, Schouwen Island, Netherlands on 17th August 1772 and died in Cradock Place, Port Elizabeth on 16th June 1839. He was a pioneer and a businessman. He was a member of the Masonic Lodge, De Goede Hoop.
Lewis, Charles Edwardes
Born in Milford Haven, Wales on 5th December 1855 and died in Newlands, Cape Town on 13th January 1945. He was a classical scholar and educationist.
Lezard, Ernest
Born in London on 15th January 1873 and died in Johannesburg on 9th May 1947. He was an auctioneer, art expert, and a composer.
Born in Monifieth, Angus, Scotland on 16th November 1845 and died in Cape Town on 1st March 1925. He was an educationist.
James Barrie Lowe
Low, James Barrie
Lys, John Robert
Born in Alderney, Channel Islands on 17th January 1829 and died in Pretoria on 14 th August 1880. He was a pioneer merchant in Pretoria and started the first Masonic Lodge in Pretoria in 1868.
Meintjies, Stephanus Jacobus, M.R.C.S., M.D.
He came of a well-known Graaff-Reinet
Born in Cape Town on 26th August 1770 and died in Cape Town on 4th June 1838. He was a jurist, advocate, deputy fiscal and member of the Council of Justice.
Johannes Henoch Neethinling
Neethling, Johannes Henoch
Ornstein, Abraham Frederick
He was a Minister of religion and educationist. He was prominent in the masonic lodge De Goede Hoop.
Philipps, Thomas
An 1820 Settler was a was a staunch Freemason, responsible for the founding of the Albany Lodge in 1828, and its first Master. Except for the Lodge de Goede Hoop, Cape Town, this is the oldest Masonic Lodge in South Africa.
Pretorius, M.W. President
He was made an honourary member at De Goede Hoop Lodge in 1862.
Phillips, Sir Henry Lushington
Born in Manchester, England in 1825 and died in Southport, England on 5th December 1896. He was a judge and founder of the Prince Alfred Masonic Lodge in Pietermaritzburg.
Prince Frederik of the Netherlands
Grand Master
Purland, Thomas Terence Constantine (Con)
Born in London, England on 4th February 1860 and died in Wynberg, Cape Province on 19th August 1923. He was a civil servant and soldier as well as Master Mason of Simonstown Lodge.
Reitz, F.W. President
Initiated in May 1874
ellekamp, Johan Arnold
Born in Amsterdam, Netherlands on 16th January 1812 and died in Bloemfontein on 25 th May 1866. He was a pioneer trader with the Voortrekkers, Bloemfontein landdrost and member of the Orange Free State volksraad. He was also worshipful master of the Unie Masonic lodge in Bloemfontein.
Johan Smellekamp
Sm
Thibault, Louis Michel
He became a Freemason and at the Cape was admitted to the Lodge De Goede Hoop.
Trichardt (Trigardt), Louis
Born in Cape Town on 11th October 1763 in Cape Town and died on 5th June 1845. He was the judicial official at the Cape and president of the council of justice. For many years he was the grand master of the grand lodge in South Africa and provincial grand master for South Africa of the English order of Freemasons. On 12th January 1829 he became provincial grand master of all the lodges in South Africa. When he died he was buried with full Masonic honours in the Somerset road cemetery.
Truter, Johannes Andreas (Sir John Andries)
Truter was Deputy Grand Master for South Africa of the Order of Freemasons (Netherlands constitution)
Van Praagh, Joseph
Born in County of Middlesex, England on 15th July 1864 and died in Kimberley on 13th February 1946. He was a diamond merchant and a Rhodesian pioneer. He first became associated with the Masonic movement in England, at the age of twenty-one, and before coming to South Africa served as Master of the Samson Lodge in London. In Salisbury he was first Senior Warden and then acting Master of the Rhodesian Lodge and in Sydney-on-Vaal he helped found and build up the Mendelssohn Lodge, of which he was an Honorary Past Master. Later he became a member of the Richard Giddy Lodge in Kimberley and played a prominent part in national Masonic affairs. At the time of his death he held the British Empire record for service as a District Grand Master and was the world Senior District Grand Master of the English Constitution. He was South Africa’s ‘Grand Old Man of Freemasonry’, and his diamond jubilee as a freemason, celebrated in November 1945, it was attended by freemasons from districts throughout the country as well as from Rhodesia.
Also:
Richard Southey
General Louis Botha
Field Marshall Lord Roberts
General Ben Viljoen
Lord Kitchener
CJ Langenhoven
Lord Metheun
Sir Redvers Buller
Arthur Conan Doyle
Origins and Connections of Freemasonry
Type: Fraternal
Founded: Some time before 1590 in lowland Scotland
Actual Origins: Evolved out of Scottish medieval craft guilds of stoneworkers.
Legendary origins: Almost infinitely varied
Alternate names:
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; the Craft; Free and Accepted Masons, Masons; the Royal Art
Adonhiramite Masonry
Adoptive Masonry
Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry
Ancient Arabic Order of Nobles of the Mystic Shrine
Ancient and Archaeological Order of Druids
Ancient Noble Order of Gormogons
Ancient Order of Druids
Ancient Order of Druids in America
Beneficent Chevaliers of the Holy City
Benevolent Protective Order of Elks
Builders of the Adytum
Clerks Templar
Co-Masonry
Crata Repoa
Druid Circle of the Universal Bond
Egyptian Rite
Emperors of the East and West
Fraternal benefit societies and orders
Fratres Lucis
Germanenorden; Hell-Fire Club
Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn
Improved Order of Red Men
Kabbalistic Order of the Rose Cross
Knights of Columbus
Knights of Pythias
Ku Klux Klan
labour unions
Loyal Orange Order
Order of Mopses
Order of the Amaranth
Order of the Eastern Star
Order of the Golden and Rosy Cross
Ordo Templi Orientis
Palladian Order
Patrons of Husbandry
Philadelphes
Priory of Sion
Rite of Memphis
Rite of Memphis and Misraim
Rite of Misraim
Rite of Strict Observance
Rosicrucian Fellowship
Rosicrucian Order of the Crotona Fellowship
Rosicrucians
Royal Order of Scotland
Royal Oriental Order of the Sat B’hai
Royal Society; Societas Rosicruciana in America
Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia
Society of Eight
Society of the Inner Light
Sublime Perfect Masters
Swedenborgian Rite
Wicca
Woodcraft
York Rite
Ancient Noble Order of Gormogons
Antimasonic Party
Roman Catholic Church
Sources and Acknowledgements
Grand Lodge of South Africa
Provincial Grand Master RW. Br. Alf Rhoodie
Standard Encylopeadia of South Africa
The Element Encylopeadia of Secret Societies by John Michael Greer
The Freemasons of South Africa by Dr.A.A. Cooper
How do you become a Free Mason ?
Contact: Grand Lodge of South Africa
Grand Lodge Centre
75 – 13th Street
Orange Grove
Tel: 011- 6401324
Fax: 011-6403915
www.grandlodge.co.za
Email: [email protected]
The way of life of our ancestors
June 2, 2009
The life of the early burghers of the Cape was rough and crude in the first few decades of the settlement. In the beginning they had to concentrate on producing their own food and sufficient foodstuffs for supplying the Dutch East India Company’s ships. The early houses generally consisted of only one or two rooms, sparsely furnished with the barest necessities, and a kitchen.
Home Making
By the 1770′s larger houses with more pretensions to comfort and appearance were being built in the Western Cape. In Cape Town itself flat-roofed, double-storied houses were not uncommon. At the same time, a greater variety of furniture began to appear. Sonic furniture was still being imported, from Europe or the Orient; but to an increasing extent it was locally made, either from South African woods or from wood imported from the Far East, Mauritius or Madagascar. The work was carried out mainly by White craftsmen, by slaves, or by Malay craftsmen from the Orient. From the 1740′s onwards the burghers were more and more able to purchase porcelain, pottery, stoneware and brassware from the East and from Europe. Silver and glass, too, became more general in the later 18th century.
In the pioneer days, most of the early houses were single-storey, rectangular structures. In Cape Town, in the course of time, they were generally built on the flat-roofed U plan; elsewhere they had high-pitched thatch roofs on the T, H or other pattern. But flat-roofed houses were also found in many other parts of the country in the 19th century, including the Little and the Great Karoo and the Eastern Province. The walls would be painted or colour-washed with red or yellow clay, or whitewashed with shell-lime. From the 1830′s, wallpaper began to be used on the interior walls. Floors were covered with slate or tiles, or smeared weekly with diluted cow-dung (`misvloer’), sometimes with ox-blood thinly spread over the surface. Alternatively, peach-pips were embedded in a clay floor to form a hardwearing surface. Windows might have external half-shutters or full-length shutters, while internal wooden blinds came into general use in Victorian times. In Cape Town in the late 18th and early 19th century fanlights were elaborately carved and an oil lantern was inserted in its centre to throw light on the stoep and steps as well as into the entrance hall.
Necessities of Life
Until about the 1870s, before communications had improved, farmers had perforce to be largely self-supporting and provided most of their own food (especially meat) and clothing. They made their own soap, candles, bread, butter, jam, ham and biltong; they cured and tanned hides and skins for harness and `riems’ (thongs). Where the climate permitted, they produced dried fruits, dried peas and beans, raisins and nuts. Their shoes were homemade `velskoene’, and they often wore trousers and jackets made by their wives from soft-tanned animal skins. Farmers made a journey once or twice a year to the nearest town or village to lay in supplies of whatever they could not produce themselves (coffee, tea, sugar, salt, needles, cotton, and bales of material for making clothes).
Beverages: Tea and coffee were introduced in the late 17th century and, although at first scarce and expensive, soon came into general use. Because coffee was often difficult to obtain, all sorts of substitutes, made from various roots, from acorns or even dried figs, were resorted to in remote districts; and the Voortrekkers were perforce tea-drinkers. Spirituous beverages were of course always popular; but many wine-farmers, from the last quarter of the 19th century, refused to drink wine as they believed in abstinence. Other beverages were cordials based on syrups boiled from fruit, e.g. lemon syrup, and homemade ginger beer based on root ginger, maize meal, raisins or other substances.
Social Customs
Family occasions such as births, christenings, weddings, confirmations and funerals all called for gatherings of friends and relatives from far and near. At a birth or at the christening the father would designate a calf or sheep as a gift to the baby, to be the nucleus for a herd or flock. By the time the child was 18, this might have reached an appreciable size, so that a young man would be able to set up on his own as a farmer, or a girl have a dowry on her marriage. Weddings were celebrated with much festivity and with large and elaborate meals; while music of some kind, probably on guitars and similar instruments, was provided, usually by the servants.
Funerals
Funerals during the first century and a half were often elaborate. Written or printed intimations of death and invitations to attend the funeral were sent out by messenger on horseback in rural areas. In the first two centuries it was not customary to attend a funeral unless a formal invitation had been received. When a funeral took place on a remote farm, to attend which people travelled long distances, a meal served after the funeral was profuse and lavish. In the 17th and 18th centuries hired mourners (‘huilebalken’) took part in the funeral procession, during which they had to weep, exhibit great distress and utter loud lamentations.
Another class of paid mourners (‘tropsluiters’) walked at the end of the funeral procession. The bearers were provided with black gloves and long crape bands, a yard or more in length, which hung from their hats. In the early days of the Cape settlement funerals were held at sundown or after dark by torchlight, while interments of the highest officials or leading burghers took place in a church.
Birthdays
Birthdays were celebrated on a generous scale, many relatives visiting the person whose birthday it was. Large meals would be provided at mid day, while all day cakes, cookies, tarts and tartlets, preserves and other delicacies, as well as tea and coffee, would be served to relatives and friends.
New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day
New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day were generally given over to festivities of all kinds, while in country places picnics might be arranged in some shady spot, with games, dances and sing-songs, followed by lavish meals and much conviviality with friends and relatives who were otherwise seldom seen. The telling of tall yarns about hunting or adventures in the veld were a feature of such occasions.
Christmas was not celebrated before the 1850′s. Generally communion services (‘Nagmaal’) took place at that time, as Christmas was solely regarded as a sacred occasion.
Social Intercourse
The social intercourse of earlier generations largely consisted of exchanging regular visits with friends and relatives, varying from a few hours to several weeks. The usual social visit included offering refreshments to guests or smoking together, when pipes, tobacco and glowing coals would be offered, and possibly snuff, too. Chatting and exchanging greetings from and news about other relatives or acquaintances, as well as any general news, constituted an important element in an age when there were no newspapers or other means of communication. Hotels or wayside inns were generally unknown until about the 1830′s.
Hospitality to unexpected guests, as well as to total strangers, was a social obligation, part and parcel of colonial life. Meals, forage for horses and other animals, as well as sleeping accommodation, were provided as a matter of course: no payment of any kind was ever accepted or expected. Only after the discovery of diamonds and gold, when heterogeneous immigrants streamed across the veld and the kindly hospitality of people in the interior was on occasion abused, did the farmers begin to feel that they could no longer dispense universal hospitality.
Etiquette and manners
The mode of address for uncles and aunts (`oom’ and `tante’) was extended to all older persons. Older cousins would be addressed as `neef’ or `niggie’ (for a male or a female cousin respectively), and this was carried over in speaking to contemporaries. Courtesy and respect, too, were shown to all women and even girls. Rather formal manners and formal relations were the general rule. Elderly persons behaved with dignity, and their attitude toward the young engendered respect, which they expected to be returned. The moral code was strict and transgressions were severely frowned upon. Parents exercised a rigid discipline and protected their daughters assiduously, no girl ever being left alone with a man. In spite of that, the custom of courting at night (‘opsit’) was tolerated, a candle being provided by the parents of the girl; when it had burnt down, it was time for the man to go home.
The Traditional Kitchen
Until the introduction of iron stoves in the second half of the 19th century, the kitchen fireplace consisted of an open hearth. Over the fire-place there was a thick beam, while high up inside the chimney a thick iron bar was built in, from which chains hung for suspending pots, kettles and other cooking utensils over the fire. Pans were placed on trivets or on four-legged gridirons. The baking oven, if not a separate structure outside, was built on to the chimney on the outside and had a vaulted roof, being almost the size of a small room and up to a metre high or more. A large quantity of bread, 24 to 36 loaves, would be baked at one time, perhaps every other day or twice a week, since all farm labourers were fed from the farmer’s kitchen.
Utensils
In the kitchen there was generally a meal-bin of about 30 cu ft with separate compartments to hold different kinds of meal. Bread was kneaded in the dough-box. Both the meal-bin and the dough-box were usually of yellowwood, regularly scrub-bed after use until it was almost white. Unless the homestead had a separate dairy, a side table in the kitchen was used for skimming milk as well as for rolling out pastry or mixing cake-dough. A wooden churn, a sausage-making machine and a mincer (in the later 19th century) would be found in the kitchen, on shelves or in cupboards. Pride of the housewife’s heart would be copper tart-pans and cake-moulds, flat-irons, copper kettles and jugs, brass waffle-pans and the copper `komfoor’ with its brazier of glowing charcoal for keeping coffee hot through-out the day and from which the farmer and his sons could tap hot coffee whenever they came in from out-of-doors. A brass pestle and mortar would be used for pounding ginger and spices, while a partly hollowed-out wooden block would be used with a wooden pestle for pounding maize or wheat.
Jars, vats and tubs. In the burgher’s home a number of stoneware or earthenware jars or pots were generally to be found: for example, stoneware jars (or jugs) for vinegar or `moskonfyt’, jars for fat or lard, as well as earthenware jars for storing jams, often made from grapes, apricots, peaches or figs; preserves made from water-melons or green figs; or jellies made from apples or quinces. In the pantry or the kitchen a cask, with copper, brass or iron hoops and hinges, preserved meat in brine. There were also low tubs of various shapes (oblong, round or rectangular) and heights, used for salting or pickling meat and for washing the best tea-service, which would then be stacked in the tub and kept on a side table in the dining-room, covered by a white cloth. A fairly tall tub was for storing and preserving salted butter used for cooking. Wooden buckets with iron hoops were used for carrying water to keep the water-barrel filled. Water was not laid on into houses on farms or in small villages until near the end of the 19th century. A shallow tub of water was used in the dining room or kitchen by all members of the family who had been working out of doors during the day, for washing their feet before partaking of the evening meal. Coffee beans were roasted in a flat pan, then ground in a coffee mill; or in earlier days the beans were pounded in a mortar, specially used for this purpose.
Home Nursing
As there were very few medical practitioners or hospitals and practically no trained nurses before the second half of the 19th century (and then only in a few of the larger centres), the mother of the family living on a remote farm had perforce to undertake nursing at home.
She relied chiefly on home remedies, and most families purchased as an essential item a medicine chest containing homoeopathic remedies from Halle or other places in Germany. This home pharmacy (`huisapotheek’) contained a number of remedies for mostordinary ailments. The medicine-chest was supplemented by traditional home remedies (`boererate’) and medicinal herbs. Each village or neighbourhood had a midwife of sorts, completely untrained but not inexperienced.
Education
Such education as was provided was closely related to the church and was mainly concerned with learning to read, as a preparation for confirmation in church. Itinerant teachers were employed on farms for periods of six months to a year in order to teach the three R’s before moving on to another farm. Practically the only reading matter in the possession of farmers living during the 18th and 19th century in the interior was an, often illustrated, family Bible, a psalter and hymnal, possibly a volume of sermons and a Biblical commentary, or a few religious or devotional books.
Schools for young ladies in the early and mid-19th century taught little more than elegant accomplishments, rules of deportment and acceptable social behaviour. Boys’ schools of the same period aimed at turning out young Christian gentlemen who had acquired the elements of respectable behaviour, as well as some knowledge of the classics, a little arithmetic and a good handwriting. Both boys and girls were as a matter of course instructed in Biblical knowledge and religion.
Amusements and Recreation
Before the 19 th century there was little public recreation. The colonists had to depend on their own resources for amusements, which were mainly carried on in the home. But outside the home hunting wild animals, target shooting, horse riding or going for a drive in a carriage or other horse-drawn vehicle always remained popular.
During the 19th century horseracing gained in favour until even small villages had a rough, dusty racetrack of sorts. Dancing in the home was carried on from the earliest times to music provided by stringed instruments, often guitars, played by a couple of slaves or other farm or domestic workers. Public balls were generally confined to entertainments in Cape Town, provided by the Governor or by garrison regiments.
These later became also a feature of the main garrison towns such as Grahamstown, King William’s Town, Pietermaritzburg or Fort Beaufort, where regimental bands furnished the music. On farms an outbuilding was cleared and neighbours gathered from far and near. Some young women in later days came on horseback from long distances with their dresses packed in a leather or tin hatbox tied to the back of the saddle.
Outdoor games might include tip-cat (‘kennetjie’), competitions involving the throwing of horse-shoes, high cockalorum (‘bok-bok-staan-styf’) or playing with yoke-pins (‘jukskei’). Near the coast or rivers fishing was popular, or occasionally even rowing; while from the 1880′s cycling became a favourite pastime. The singing of English or Dutch folk songs was a feature of gatherings in the home, at picnics or wherever young people congregated, while even choral singing was on occasion indulged in.
From early times a favourite pastime in all parts of the country was attending auction sales of all kinds, whether in towns or villages or on farms. If on a farm, people would travel long distances to the sale, and ample meals had perforce to be provided by the farm-owner for those attending.
Mercenary troops in the Dutch East India Company’s service began from the 1780′s to produce dramatic performances or concerts. After the `African Theatre’ in Cape Town was opened in 1801, plays were staged more frequently, mainly by military or amateur groups, while concerts were, after the opening of the Commercial Exchange in 1822, frequently given there.
By the early 19th century there were various categories of drinking places, from taverns selling the cheapest types of drink for sailors and others, to more respectable inns or hotels which developed from this time. Soon after, clubs, which catered for the more dignified and affluent citizens, were established in Cape Town.
Mills
Mills to grind wheat or maize were found on many farms, particularly water-mills and horse-driven mills, which also served their neighbours. An 18th-century example of a windmill is the surviving Mostert’s Mill in Mowbray, Cape Town.
Lighting and Heating
Homemade tallow or water candles were among the earliest forms of lighting at the Cape. Each home owned a candle-mould for making 6 or 12 candles at a time from suet or lard. Candlesticks of brass or other metal were used to hold the candles. A scissors-like type of wick-trimmer was used, while snuffers for extinguishing candles were in general use. Both articles might be of pewter or brass, or later even of silver.
From the end of the 18th century whale oil was used for lighting and thenceforward oil lamps were introduced into more and more homes. In 1809 sonic oil lamps were erected for illuminating the Heerengracht and the Keizersgracht, Cape Town’s main streets. In the early 19th century the burghers in Cape Town were enjoined to put oil lamps on the corners of houses, which faced two streets. People going out visiting or to attend a gathering at night carried a lantern containing a candle. Gas became available in Cape Town from 1847 onwards, while by 1852 some 252 street lamps were installed, but for many years there were none in the suburbs. Paraffin lamps calve into use during the early Victorian age. Electricity made its appearance only toward the end of the 19th century.
Cookery
The ways of cooking and recipes have traditionally been handed down from mother to daughter until the early 1890′s. Thereafter cookery books began to be published. Strips of dried meat (‘biltong’) were equally enjoyed by the early colonists and by the Hottentots, and carried very well on long journeys in a warm climate. Sour milk (‘maas’) or calabash milk was much used among the Bantu. The Cape’s fat-tailed sheep played a large part in early cookery, supplying fat for spreading on bread and for baking cakes or cookies, as well as for candle-making.
East and West made their respective contributions to everyday life as far as cooking was concerned. This was much influenced by the Javanese or Malay cooks (whether slaves or exiles) in most Cape households. Various traditional dishes with distinctive flavours were evolved. Although the Bantu along the east coast had since the early 17th century lived on maize, which they crushed with a large wooden pestle in a hollowed-out tree-trunk, the White settlers favoured wheat. Although Kaffir-corn (grain sorghum) and maize are the staple food of the Bantu, and maize is also much used among the Whites, yet in the main all racial groups in South Africa have been mainly meat eaters. The tribal Bantu still regard vegetables as women’s food. The flesh of practically every kind of animal, bird or fish, large and small, has been used as a food.
Information about this picture: The most elegant hotel in South Africa in the 1880′s was the International at Cape Town, which led the way by introducing that very fashionable pastime, lawn-tennis. Players of today may marvel how it was possible for anybody to play in those frilled and bustled dresses, those flowered hats and gloves. The game was not very fast, but, judging by the generally relaxed air, our ancestors enjoyed it!
Source: SESA (Standard Encyclopedia of Southern Africa)
Burgher Councillors
May 31, 2009Representatives of the free burghers on the Court of Justice (the supreme court of judicature) and later on the Council of Policy at the Cape. In the exercise of their functions the burgher councillors were not confined by any standing orders. It was, however, customary for the Council of Policy to confer with them on legislation affecting the burghers, and in some instances retired burgher councillors were also invited to attend preliminary discussions in this regard. Only since about 1780 did the burghers regularly have representation in the Council of Policy.
The first burgher councillor was Steven Jansz Botma, appointed in 1657 to serve on the Court of Justice for a term of one year. After the first year the free burghers were directed to submit a list of names from among which Botma’s successor could be designated. Hendrick Boom was the nominee, but the authorities having increased the number of burgher councillors to two, Botma was retained. One of the two members was to retire in rotation every year. In 1675 the number was increased to three, and in 1686 to six. From the time of Jan van Riebeeck trivial matters came within the purview of the ‘Collegie van Commissarissen van Kleine Saken’, in which two burghers sat with two officials and a secretary.
It had become customary to leave punitive expeditions against the Bushmen in the hands of burgher commandos, and in 1715 the burgher councillors were required to levy the costs of the expeditions from the citizens of Cape Town, the heemraden being responsible for the levy from burghers in the hinterland.
By 1779, under the governorship of Joachim van Plettenberg, agitation among a group of colonists for greater representation in the management of their affairs had gathered considerable momentum. These burghers already referred to themselves as ‘Patriotten’ (patriots). Among the measures they proposed was the appointment of a sufficient number of elected burgher councillors to counterbalance the officials. A strongly worded petition was taken by Tieleman Roos of Paarl and others to the Netherlands . Although this document was even submitted to the States General, it proved of no avail, the Dutch ‘Patriotten’ being at that time in the minority.
The only notable success attained by the petitioners was the concession made by Van Plettenberg in his reply to the Council of Seventeen, that an equal number of burgher councillors and officials could be appointed to the Court of Justice. Neither Van Plettenberg nor the Seventeen would tolerate a position in which the Council of Policy would virtually be dominated by the burgher councillors. The system of burgher councillors continued until the first British occupation, and in 1796 the Burgher Senate took the place of burgher councillors.
BIBL. C. Beyers: Die Kaapse Patriotte 1779-1791 (1930); Cambridge history of the British Empire , vol. 8 (1936); G. M.
Theal: History of South Africa , vol. 3, 4 (‘964); Eric A. Walker: A history of South Africa (1928).
Boers
May 31, 2009Boeren Beschermings Vereeniging
(Farmers’ Protection Society)
In 1878 a section of the Afrikaans-speaking farmers of the Cape resolved to form an organisation for the purpose of ‘watching over the interests of the farmers of this Colony, and protecting the same’. It arose, in the first place, from opposition to an excise duty imposed on liquor by the Cape parliament in 1878. Later aims of the association were: ‘to endeavour to have all those with an interest in farming registered as parliamentary voters, and to watch against the abuse of the franchise’. J. H. Hofmeyr (‘Onze Jan’) was its leader and its first representative in the Legislative Assembly. On 24 May 1883 the organisation merged with the Afrikaner Bond under a new name: Afrikanerbond en Boeren Beschermings Vereeniging.
Boer Generals in Europe
During the Second Anglo-Boer War 30,000 farm houses were destroyed, and in addition 21 villages (Ermelo, Bethal, Carolina, Amsterdam, Amersfoort, Piet Retief, Paulpietersburg, Dullstroom, Roossenekal, Bloemhof, Schweizer-Reneke, Harte beestfontein, Geysdorp and Wolmaransstad in the Transvaal; Vredefort, Villiers, Parys, Lindley, Bothaville, Ventersburg and Vrede – the last mentioned partly – in the Orange Free State). In extensive areas not a single animal was to be seen. In the Free State , for instance, only 700,000 out of approximately 8,000,000 sheep remained and one tenth of the cattle. The speedy reconstruction of the former Republics was a pressing necessity. In terms of Article 10 of the Treaty of Vereeniging £3,000,000 was granted for this purpose and in addition loans at 3% (without interest for two years). This amount was considered to be totally inadequate by the representatives of the Boer people at Vereeniging, and a head committee (M. T. Steyn, Schalk Burger, Louis Botha, C. R. de Wet, J. H. de la Rey and the Revs. A. P. Kriel and J. D. Kestell) was elected on 31 May to collect further funds. Generals Botha, De Wet and De la Rey were sent to Europe for this purpose. After cordial receptions in Cape Town, Paarl and Stellenbosch they left for England on 5 Aug. 1902. Huge crowds welcomed them in London, and they were presented to King Edward VII. On the Continent they were likewise enthusiastically cheered by thousands of people. (The Hague 20 Aug., Amsterdam11 Sept., Antwerp 19 Sept., Rotterdam 22 Sept., Groningen 27 Sept., Middelburg 30 Sept., Brussels 10 Oct., Paris 13 Oct., Berlin 17 Oct.). In a letter to Joseph Chamberlain dated 23 Aug. they requested an interview to discuss, inter alia, the following matters: full amnesty for rebels; annual grants for widows and orphans; compensation for losses caused by British troops; payment of the war debts of the Republics. At the interview on 5 Sept. Chamberlain stated that if he should accede to these requests a new agreement with the Republics would have to be drawn up and that could not be done. Thereupon the Generals published on as Sept. ‘An Appeal to the Civilised World’ in which they asked for further assistance to alleviate the dire distress. The result was most disappointing. Up to Jan. 1903 the ‘Appeal’ brought in only £116,810. This was possibly due to the unwillingness of the nations to continue assisting the Boers, who were now British subjects, and to the fact that Chamberlain had announced in Parliament on 5 Nov. that the Government would grant further loans if necessary. De Wet returned to South Africa on 1 November, Botha and De la Rey on 13 December.
Boer Prisoners of War – Camps
Generals De Wet, De la Rey and Botha, Germany, 1902
The approximately 27,000 Boer prisoners and exiles in the Second Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) were distributed far and wide throughout the world. They can be divided into three categories: prisoners of war, ‘undesirables’ and internees. Prisoners of war consisted exclusively of burghers captured while under arms. ‘Undesirables’ were men and women of the Cape Colony who sympathised with the Orange Free State and Transvaal Republics at war with Britain and who were therefore considered undesirable by the British. The internees were burghers and their families who had withdrawn across the frontier to Lourenço Marques at Komatipoort before the advancing British forces and had finally arrived in Portugal, where they were interned.
Prisoners of war were detained in South Africa in camps in Cape Town (Green Point) and at Simonstown (Bellevue), and some in prisons in the Cape Colony and Natal; in the Bermudas on Darrell’s, Tucker’s, Morgan’s, Burtt’s and Hawkins’ Islands; on St. Helena in the Broadbottom and Deadwood camps, and the recalcitrants in Fort Knoll; in India at Umballa, Amritsar, Sialkot, Bellary, Trichinopoly, Shahjahanpur, Ahmednagar, Kaity-Nilgris, Kakool and Bhim-Tal; and on Ceylon in Camp Diyatalawa and a few smaller camps at Ragama, Hambatota, Urugasmanhandiya and Mt. Lavinia (the hospital camp). The internees were kept in Portugal at Caldas da Rainha, Peniche and Alcobaqa. The ‘undesirables’, most of them from the Cape districts of Cradock, Middelburg, Graaf Reinet, Somerset East, Bedford and Aberdeen, were exiled to Port Alfred on the coast near Grahamstown.
In the Bermudas, on St. Helena and in South Africa quarters consisted chiefly of tents and shanties patched together from tin plate, corrugated iron sheeting, and sacking, and in India and Ceylon mostly of large sheds of corrugated iron sheeting, bamboo and reeds. The exiles, whose ages varied between y and 82 years, occupied themselves in various fields, such as church activities, cultural and educational works, sports, trade, and even printing, and nearly all of them to a greater or lesser extent took part in the making of curios.
The exiles in Ceylon and on St. Helena were the most active in printing. Using an old Eagle hand press purchased from the Ceylonese, the prisoners of war in Ceylon printed the newspaper De Strever, organ of the Christelijke Streversvereniging (Christian Endeavour Society), which appeared from Saturday, 19 Dec. 1901, to Saturday, 16 July 1902. Other newspapers, which they published, mostly printed by roneo, were De Prikkeldraad, De Krygsgevangene, Diyatalawa Dum-Dum and Diyatalawa Camp Lyre. Newspapers issued on St. Helena were De Krygsgevangene (The Captive) and Kampkruimels.
The range of the trade conducted among the prisoners of war is evident from the numerous advertisements in their newspapers. There were cafes, bakeries, confectioners, tailors, bootmakers, photographers, stamp dealers, general dealers and dealers in curios. An advertisement by R. A. T. van der Merwe, later a member of the Union Parliament, reads in translation:
Roelof v.d. Merwe, Shop No. 12, takes orders for men’s clothing. Has stocks of all requirements.
Another, by C. T. van Schalkwyk, later a Commandant and M.E.C., may be roughly translated as follows:
Here in Kerneels van Schalkwyk’s cafe a Boer
Be he rich or be he poor
For money so little its spending not felt
Can have his tummy press tight on his belt.
In religious matters the exiles in overseas camps devoted their efforts in the first place to the establishment of churches. In most of the camps building material was practically unprocurable, with the result that most of the church buildings were patched together out of corrugated iron sheets, pieces of tin, sacks, reeds and bamboo. Pulpits were constructed from planks, pieces of timber, etc. There were a number of clergymen and students of theology among the prisoners; with them in the forefront and with the help of others who had gone to the camps for this purpose, congregations were founded and church councils were elected. From these developed Christian Endeavour Societies, choirs, Sunday-school classes for the many youngsters between 9 and 16 years of age, and finally catechism classes for older youths. Many a young man was accepted as a member of the Church and confirmed while in exile. Attention was also given to mission work, and funds were collected by means of concerts, sports gatherings, etc. Many of the prisoners died in exile, and the burial services as well as the care of the graves and cemeteries were attended to by their own churches.
In the cemetery of Diyatalawa 131 lie buried, and on St. Helena 146; in the Bermudas and in India a considerable number also lie buried. Through the years the Diyatalawa cemetery has been maintained in good order by the Ceylonese. Boer prisoners of war in the Bermudas were buried on Long Island. The graves themselves are neglected and overgrown with vegetation, but the obelisk erected in the cemetery on the insistence of the returning prisoners after the conclusion of peace is still in fairly good condition. It is a simple sandstone needle on a pedestal of Bermuda stone. The names of those buried in the cemetery and those who had died at sea on the voyage to Bermuda are engraved on all four sides of the pedestal.
Boer Prisoners of War with their handwork
Cultural activities covered a number of fields. At first debating societies were formed, and from these there developed bands, choirs and dramatic groups; theatrical, choral and other musical performances were given, festive occasions such as Christmas, New Year, Dingaan’s Day (now the Day of the Covenant and the birthdays of Presidents Kruger and Steyn and of Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands were celebrated. Judging by the numerous neatly printed programmes, many of the concerts and other performances were of quite a high standard. Celebrating Dingaan’s Day at Ahmednager (India on 16 Dec. 1901 the prisoners reaffirmed the Covenant. Beautifully art-lettered in an illuminated address, the text reads in translation as follows: ‘We confess before the Lord our sin in that we have either so sorely neglected or have failed to observe Dingaan’s Day in accordance with the vow taken by our forefathers, and we this day solemnly promise Him that with His help we with our households will henceforth observe this 16th Day of December always as a Sabbath Day in His honour, and that if He spare our lives and give us and our nation the desired deliverance we shall serve Him to the end of our days …’ This oath was taken by the exiles after a month of preparation and a week of humiliation in Hut No. 7.
Education received special attention and schools were established; bearded burghers and commandants shared the school benches with young boys and youths. The subjects studied were mainly bookkeeping, arithmetic, mathematics and languages, and fellow-exiles served as instructors. It was in these schools that the foundation was laid for many a distinguished career in South Africa, such as those of a later Administrator of the Orange Free State (Comdt. C. T. M. Wilcocks), a number of clergymen, physicians and others who, after returning to their fatherland, attained great prestige and became leading figures in the Church and social and political fields. Literary works were also produced in this atmosphere of religion and culture, such as the well known poem ‘The Searchlight’, by Joubert Reitz:
When the searchlight from the gunboat
Throws its rays upon my tent
Then I think of home and comrades
And the happy days I spent
In the country where I come from
And where all I love are yet.
Then I think of things and places
And of scenes I’ll ne’er forget,
Then a face comes up before me
Which will haunt me to the last
And I think of things that have been And of happy days that’s past;
And only then I realise
How much my freedom meant
When the searchlight from the gunboat Casts its rays upon my tent.
Sports gatherings were frequently arranged and provided days of great enjoyment, when young and old competed on the sports field, while cricket, football, tennis, gymnastics and boxing matches filled many an afternoon or evening. Neatly printed programmes for the gatherings and the more important competitions were usually issued.
Various daring attempts at escape were made, but few were successful. Five exiles – Lourens Steytler, George Steytler, Willie Steyn, Piet Botha and a German named Hausner – who succeeded in swimming out to a Russian ship in the port of Colombo (Ceylon), travelled by a devious route through Russia, Germany, the Netherlands and again Germany, and finally landed at Walvis Bay. One captive on St. Helena attempted to escape by hiding in a large case marked ‘Curios’ and addressed to a fictitious dealer in London. But he was discovered shortly after the ship left port and was returned to St. Helena from Ascension Island. Of those in the Bermudas two succeeded in reaching Europe aboard ships visiting Bermudan ports, while J. L. de Villiers escaped from Trichinopoly disguised as a coolie and made his way to the French possession of Pondicherry, from which he finally reached South Africa again by a roundabout route through Aden, France and the Netherlands. Among the exiles held in Ceylon two brothers named Van Zyl and a German did not return to South Africa, but went to Java, where they developed a flourishing farm enterprise with Friesland cattle. Among those held in the Bermudas a number went to the United States of America, where in some of the states such well-known Boer names as Viljoen and Vercueil are still found.
Repatriation of Boer Prisoners of War
As early as 1901 Lord Milner realised what a stupendous task the resettlement of close on 200,000 Whites involved, among whom were about 50,000 impecunious foreigners, as well as 1000.000 Bantu who, as a result of the Anglo-Boer War, had become torn from their usual way of life and had either been herded together in prisoner-of-war and concentration camps or scattered all over the Orange Free State and the Transvaal as refugees and combatants. These people had to be restored to their shattered homes and their work in order to become self-supporting. Milner wished Britons employed by the Transvaal mines and industries to be repatriated first. This began after the annexation of the Transvaal in 1900. By Feb. 1901 as many as 12,000 had already been repatriated, and by the beginning of 1902 nearly all of them had returned to the Witwatersrand.
To aid the resettlement of former Republican subjects, special Land Boards were set up early in 1902 in both the new colonies. They were also expected to help settle immigrant British farmers. From April 1902 the repatriation sections of the Land Boards were converted into independent departments in order to prepare for the repatriation of the Afrikaner population. The post-war development of the repatriation programme was adumbrated in sections I, II and X of the peace treaty of Vereeniging. In terms of sections I and II all burghers (both ‘Bitter-enders’ and prisoners of war) were required to acknowledge beforehand the British king as their lawful sovereign. Section X read that in each district local repatriation boards would be set up to assist in providing relief and in effecting resettlement. For that the British government would provide £3m as a ‘bounty’ and loans, free of interest for two years, and after that redeemable over three years at 3 %. The wording ‘vrije gift’, as the bounty was termed, gave rise to serious misunderstanding, and the accompanying provision, that proof of war losses could be submitted to the central judicial commission, created the erroneous impression that this bounty was intended to compensate the burghers for these losses. The eventual British interpretation, that the bounty was intended as a contribution toward repatriation, created a great deal of bitterness. Eventually it turned out that there was no question of a bounty, since repatriates were held personally responsible for all costs, the £3m being part of the loan of £35m provided by the British treasury for the new colonies.
After the conclusion of peace two central repatriation boards, one in Pretoria and the other in Bloemfontein, began to function, and 38 local boards were set up in the Transvaal and 23 in the Orange River Colony. The repatriation departments were reformed into huge organisations, each employing more than 1,000 men. The real work of repatriation came under three heads, viz. getting farmers back to their farms with the least delay; supplying them with adequate rations until they could harvest their crops; and providing them with seed, stock and implements to cultivate their lands.
The general discharge of prisoners of war in South Africa began in June 1902. Many overseas prisoners of war, especially those in India, were sceptical about the peace conditions and refused to take the oath of allegiance to the British Crown. In spite of the efforts of Gen. De la Rey and Comdt. I. W. Ferreira to induce them to return, about 500 of the 900 ‘irreconcilables’ were not to be persuaded until Jan 1904.
In July 1904 the last 4 Transvaalers were discharged from India, but in May 1907 two Free Staters were still there. There were 100 men per district to every shipload, and on their arrival they were first sent to camps at Umbilo and Simonstown, where they were given food and clothing. Those who were self-supporting were allowed to go home. Through judicious selection – land-owning families first and ‘bywoners’ (share-croppers) next – repatriation was made bearable. By the middle of June 1902 almost all the ‘bitter-enders’ had laid down their arms and were allowed to return to their homes, provided they could fend for themselves. In other cases they were allowed, like the prisoners of war, to take up temporary accommodation with their families in concentration camps until they were sent home by the repatriation departments with a month’s supply of free rations, bedding, tents and kitchen utensils.
By Sept. 1902 only the impoverished group was left in the camps. In due course relief works, such as the construction of railway lines and irrigation works, were started to employ them. However, a considerable number of pre-war share-croppers became chronic Poor Whites. Spoilt by their idle mode of existence during the war, many Bantu refused to leave the refugee camps, but when their food rations were stopped they soon returned to the firms to alleviate the labour shortage.
The road to repatriation was strewn with stumbling blocks. Nearly 300,000 ruined people had to be brought back to their shattered homes. Supplies had to be conveyed over thousands of miles of impassable roads and neglected railways, already heavily burdened by the demobilisation of the British army and the transport of supplies to the Rand. Weeks of wrangling preceded the purchase from the military authorities, at exorbitant prices, of inferior foodstuffs and useless animals, many of which died. The organisation was ineffective, and the authority and ditties of the central and local repatriation boards were too vaguely defined, leading to unnecessary duplication. Moreover, the burghers mistrusted the repatriation. By the end of 1902 most of the ‘old’ population had, however, been restored. Unfortunately the long drought which dragged on from 1902 until the end of 1903 made it necessary for many of the repatriation depots to be kept going until 1904, in order to keep the starving supplied on credit. From 1904 conditions gradually began to return to normal, and in 1905 repatriation was complete. A great deal of the £ 14m spent on it had gone into administrative expenses.
Sharp criticism was levelled against the repatriation policy, especially against the incompetence and lack of sympathy among the officials, and financial mismanagement. The composition of the repatriation boards was also suspect. On the other hand, agricultural credit came in with repatriation and prepared the way for the present system of Land Bank loans and co-operative credit. Milner himself considered the repatriation a success, although he conceded that a considerable sum of money had been squandered. Yet it was not the utter failure it has often been represented to have been. Milner deserves praise for his genuine attempt to resettle an impoverished and uprooted agricultural population and to reconstruct an entire economy. The accomplishment of the entire project without serious friction can largely be attributed to the self-restraint and love of order of the erstwhile Republican burghers.