Huguenot Cemeteries
Graveyards at Franschoek, Paarl and Wellington, popularly referred to as ‘Huguenot cemeteries’ merely because French refugees and their descendants were predominant in the particular localities. There are, however, no exclusive Huguenot graveyards in existence in South Africa. `Apartheid’ between French and Dutch colonists, so eagerly desired by the former to preserve their identity, was effectively countered by Governor Simon van der Stel. Besides, it is impossible today to identify the grave of any of the original French settlers. One can safely say that François du Toit and most of his successors lie buried at Kleinbosch, Dal Josafat, and that Pierre de Villiers and his wife Marie E. Taillefer were buried in the churchyard of the old N.G. church (Strooidakkerk) in Paarl, but the graves cannot be identified.
In French Hoek’s historic cemetery near the Huguenot Monument one looks in vain for the grave of a Huguenot immigrant or a first-generation descendant. The `Huguenot cemetery’ at near-by La Motte was laid out in 1760, almost a century after the landing of the Huguenots and the question arises as to the extent to which the people buried there were genealogically still French. The Standard Encyclopaedia of Southern Africa has made its own investigation, based on 300 marriages in the male line, spread over 13 Huguenot families and contracted between 1688 and 1788. This sample revealed that 5-7 per cent of the brides bore French names while 43 per cent were of Dutch, German and Scandinavian extraction. It would therefore appear that the term ‘Huguenot cemetery’ is not entirely a misnomer and that – seen in its true perspective – it is historically justified and culturally desirable to preserve these few graveyards as Huguenot cemeteries.
The National Monuments Council has already erected bronze plaques at La Motte and at Kleinbosch, which provide some protection even though the sites remain unproclaimed. The Kleinbosch cemetery was laid out in about 1692 by the ancestor of the Du Toit family, but the known graves there date from the close of the 19th century. Important Huguenot members of the Genootskap van Regte Afrikaners (1875) lie buried there, as well as a sister of Piet Retief, the famous Voortrekker (see Kleinbosch). At La Motte gravestones were placed for Huguenot descendants known to be buried there but whose graves could not be identified with any degree of certainty. One other graveyard, popularly known as a Huguenot cemetery, is at Wehevreden, Wellington. Here, also, it is impossible to identify the graves of any particular Huguenots of the early years but numbers of Huguenot descendants were buried there.