Being Port Elizabeth born and bred and being the descendant of prominent 1820 stock, the fact that “other people” could have inhabited this area prior to the arrival of the 1820 Settlers never crossed my mind. Ironically, I was disabused of the notion that the original residents of the area were English speaking people from England, or Ireland in my case, when I accepted the notion that the khoikhoi predated the Whites by perhaps 10,000 years.
In due course, i.e. years later, the realisation dawned that the Afrikaner must have played a role in the creation of town even if it was not as significant as the English settlers. This epiphany arose when I asked myself a simple question, “How did the Afrikaans place names such as Buffelsfontein, Nooitgedagt and Welbedacht arise?
The fact that the arrival of the Trekboers was in the 1770s led me to a fuller understanding of the people of this part of South Africa and the role that they played in it.
Main picture: Trekboers
Freedom from VOC control
Human nature abhors restrictions and controls. Humans will undermine and subvert such constraints. The VOC had established cattle posts about 80 kilometres from Cape Town. When the cattle trade was released from the VOC’s petty restrictions, it rapidly expanded. This spark ushered in and ignited a farming community which saw potential and moulded a new breed of farmer, the nomadic farmer or trekboer.
The hinterland
Various expeditionary and hunting parties explored north and east of Cape Town. Most were illicit but as most Trekboere was illiterate, nothing could be recorded. In 1736 a hunting party under Hermanus Hubner travelled beyond the Keiskamma River to the Gonubie where some of the party were massacred by the Xhosa. Both of these rivers as well as the Sundays River had already been named but nobody knew by whom and when as no records were kept.
The first official expedition which would explore in the area around Port Elizabeth in 1752 was led by Ensign August Frederick Beutler. His party travelled to Mossel Bay, up Attaquas Kloof to the Langkloof, across the Gamtoos River to Kragga Kama. They then headed to the coast in the vicinity of Port Elizabeth and the mouth of the Zwartkops River. After placing beacons there, he continued his journey north eastward crossing the Bushman’s, the Great Fish and then the Keiskamma and ultimately retired back to Cape Town.
Grazing permits outside the Colony
To succeed, the emboldened farmer amended their modus operandi in the following manner. The proto Trekboers would use their permanent dwelling as a base. Then they would apply for a Grazing Permit which would allow them to use an area outside the colony for a period of three months as a grazing area for their sheep and cattle. After expiry of the permit, they were compelled to return their livestock to the Colony. This Pemit enabled the farmer to own a large herd of animals as they were not restricted by overgrazing and phenomena such as droughts and fires. Later the permits period of validity was increased to six months and in1721 it was expanded to a year in a specified area. An annual Recognition Fee of R$12 [12 Rix dollars], was charged from 1714 and doubled in 1732.
As the number of cattle farmers increased, the unofficial boundary of the colony advanced noticeably along three main routes of which the third one was parallel to the east coast, through the Langkloof to the area near the mouth of the Gamtoos River.
A steady advance
From the record of permits issued, the advance of the farmers can be plotted both for hunting but later for grazing as both were recorded in the Wildschutte Boeken. By 1713, Peter Joubert was at the Breede River, in 1726 Johannes Swellengrebel was at the Sergeant’s River in the Swellendam District and in 1729 Jan le Roux was at Mossel Bay and Izaac Visagie was at Zeevefonteine beyond the Gouritz River. By 1740 farmers had penetrated the Langkloof and soon afterwards a permit was issued to farm at the Gamtoos River when Maria Botha made an application to do so in 1744.
Duration and renewability of permits
In due course, a degree of permanence was obtained when the validity of permits was extended to a year, and they were made renewable. Nevertheless, farmers in the lead often forged ahead and their “abandoned farms” were occupied by others. The procedure was practiced by the farmers as the land tenure system inherently favoured the expansion of the Colony. With the outright purchase of land beyond the means of most farmers, land tenure in the form of Loan Places was preferable. Moreover, it provided an opportunity to relocate if the area was overgrazed or if they suffered from drought or wildfires. In due course as the population increased, trespassing on unfenced land led to disputes arising. In these cases, as litigation was expensive and involved travelling to a magistrate [landdrost] , it was far simpler for the aggrieved farmer to relocate to fresh viable grazing.
Loan Places
The chief characteristic of a Loan Place was that the land remained government property and could not be passed on by way of inheritance. In dividing up an estate upon death, only the opstal id est improvements such as buildings and paddocks, could be sold. As a consequence, when sons came of age, as they lacked the possibility of inheritance, they left home in order to find a farm for themselves.
Furthermore, it was customary for both sons and daughters to be given cattle at birth and to hand them and their progeny over when the child came of age. This custom probably enticed some men to increase their herd size by through judicious marriage.
A halt called to expansion
Based at Cape Town, the Government became alarmed at the increasing area to be controlled. To halt the unchecked expansion, in 1745 the Government declared the Great Brak River to be the colonial boundary. In terms of this proclamation, all settlers to the east of the revised boundary were required to return to the Cape Colony but it proved impossible to enforce the law. “Facts” on the ground in terms of physical occupation were driving the policy and not vice versa. To forestall further moves, the eastern boundary was amended in 1771 to read the Gamtoos River. But the “cattle” had already bolted. It was a case of too little too late. Nine years later in 1780, the Colonial Government conceded defeat and moved the frontier to the Great Fish River. By 1785,it was then amended to the Fish and Baviaans Rivers. These frontiers would remain at these rivers until after the second British occupation in1806.
First local settlements
By 1776, Theunis Botha and his family were encamped at Buffelsfontein, Thomas Ignatius Ferreira at Papenkuilsfontein and Johannes Willems van Staden at Coega. Two years earlier in 1774 Johannes Scheepers was at the Sunday’s River and was soon joined by parties of trekboers. Reality struck the Cape Town based authorities. It was obvious that the magistracies of Cape Town and Stellenbosch were inadequate both in terms of area covered and staffing. Simply put, additional districts were required. In short order the district of Swellendam was formed in 1745 followed by Graaff-Reinet in 1786.
Other farmers followed the advancing Trekboers but established farmers were reluctant to move into the wilds and vacate their long-established farms. Consequently, it was only slowly that some families , and in those cases, it was mainly the younger generation.
What happened to the Trekboers?
Interestingly, the census returns indicated that there was no settlement at Algoa Bay until Fort Frederick was built in1799. What had happened to the Trekboers who had settled in Port Elizabeth – the Bothas, the Ferreiras, the Mullers and the Scheepers – prior to that? They were still resident in the Port Elizabeth area in 1820 but they appear to have vanished without a trace by the 1840s. JJ Redgrave’s book Port Elizabeth in Bygone Days provides a comprehensive list of residents residing in Port Elizabeth in 1849, yet none of these trekboer families are enumerated.
That then begs the question, “what happened to the trekboers?”. My best guess is that Redgrave’s book only lists those people resident within the boundary of the town and excluded all inhabitants on outlying farms as they were not considered Port Elizabethans. Even though the Trekboers had stolen a march on the English settlers in arriving half a century prior to them, their future contribution to the development of Port Elizabeth was so inconsequential or trifling as to be ignored. Possibly many had followed Piet Retief and his band of Voortrekkers and colonised the Free State and the Transvaal instead. It would only be the drought-stricken years of the 1920s and 1930s which would force the now “Afrikanerised” trekboer, speaking a pidgin Dutch, from the platteland to the emerging industrial town of Port Elizabeth.
Founding Fathers
Based upon the above, can the Trekboers or proto-Afrikaners be deemed to be the Founding Fathers of the town? I highly doubt it. What contribution did they make to its development? None unless I have not yet uncovered some activities. Some pundits allude to the fact that Piet Retief owned large swathes of Port Elizabeth both in the Strandfontein, current day Summerstrand, as well as a huge garden plot in North End. The Strandfontein farm can be discounted as it possessed abysmal farming conditions while the North End area was more suitable as a “garden plot”, but it lacked a water source.
Moreover, as far as can be ascertained, Retief’s plots were never farmed in any significant way, if at all. Hence, in no demonstrable way, can Retief be considered a successful farmer in Port Elizabeth. Retief’s chief financial interest in Port Elizabeth was simply as a property speculator.
Nothing more and nothing less.
By and large, the Trekboers would play no meaningful role in Port Elizabeth’s development as they were akin to the Khoi in one material aspect. They were itinerant and nomadic by nature. Furthermore, they abhorred government control and desired freedom. Permanently settling down was yet another form of bondage, maybe not in the form of governmental diktats but the demands of the land and the farm. Hence many would follow their dreams in the form of the Voortrekkers.
Source
Piet Retief: The Background. A Study by J. B. Scott. [Looking Back, Volume IX, No. 2,June 1969]