It is fair to say that the establishment of Fort Frederick was more a response to political tensions in Europe than to local enmity between Dutch frontiersmen and Xhosa tribesmen. While the later upheavals arose as the vanguard of the Dutch boeren [Afrikaans boere] approached the advancing Xhosa tribesmen, the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789 had plunged Europe into a protracted period of war. 

This blog traces the fascinating history of Fort Frederick from its inception until the present time. 

Main picture: Fort Frederick dated 12 March 1905

Historical background

The whole Napoleonic era was fraught with danger for both the Dutch and the English. Owing to the fact that the French had a presence in the Indian Ocean in the form of two island colonies – Bourbon and L’lle de France, latter day Reunion and Mauritius, both the Dutch and the English East India companies were apprehensive that the French would take control of the Cape Colony. This cause for concern arose due to their anxiety regarding the potential loss of their sea routes to the east.

When the revolution itself spread to Holland, the Stadtholder, Prince William of Orange and his family took refuge in England. The prince requested that the Governor and the military authorities in the Cape  surrender control to Britain when its naval contingent arrived in Table Bay. Even though this was ultimately achieved, the burghers, especially in the interior, wanted independence from authority of any kind.

During September 1795, formal transfer of control to the British was effected.

In order to improve control over the eastern part of the Colony and to prevent any French interference in the region by supporting the restless burghers of Graaff-Reinet, on 2^nd March 1799, the British government landed troops in Algoa Bay from the HMS Star and HMS Hope. In addition, Brigadier General Thomas Pakenham Vandeleur came overland from Cape Town with more troops. In order to create some fortifications against a possible landing, the troops built an extemporised fort in the form of an earth redoubt. The location of this fortification was on Ferreira’s Farm at Papenkuilsfontein, latter day Cradock Place. Quite obviously this fort must have been given a name even if it was an informal one, Ferreira’s. Much later, it was accorded the name “Star Fort” by which it is now known, but this name was definitely not used during this period.

With the Eastern Cape in turmoil, in May 1799 the Khoikhoi utilised the opportunity to restore their independence and territorial rights. It had been a long time coming but the Khoikhoi attacked the Dutch farmers in the area between Graaff-Reinet and the Zwartkops River. The Xhosas under Chungwa also took advantage of the situation by launching attacks against the Dutch boeren who began to flee the district. Finally, in August the Xhosas invaded along the Fish River.

Due to the tensions along the eastern border, on 19^th August 1799, the HMS Camel set sail for Algoa Bay. On board was a wooden blockhouse which could accommodate 50 men while 30 artificers were on board to erect it. On 10^th August both Khoi and Xhosas attacked the Star Fort and captured livestock which was subsequently recaptured. The fort was strengthened with a breastwork. Meanwhile the blockhouse was erected near the mouth of the Baakens River and was armed with two 3-pounders.

Before the erection of the block-house was complete, a French frigate, the “Preneuse” entered the Bay under Danish colours and exchanged fire with the sloop HMS Rattlesnake and the store-ship HMS Camel. The masts of the Camel were damaged and the quartermaster and carpenter were killed. It was the troops at Star Fort who saved the day for the English vessels. As the British ships were hopelessly outgunned by the Preneuse, the HMS Rattlesnake and the HMS Camel were at risk of being sunk. By moving their puny guns from the blockhouse to the seashore below it and engaging the French frigate, the French vessel gained the impression that there was a formidable shore battery. Under this mistaken impression, the Preneuse left the Bay. Later, it was sunk off Mauritius when her true identity became known. (This battle in Algoa Bay is covered in detail in a separate chapter.)

Taken into use

On 6^th January 1800, Major General Dundas, Commander of the troops in the Cape, reported in a letter to the Governor, Sir George Yonge, that peace had been restored and that in light of the unsettled nature of the frontier, he would be establishing a permanent military post there. In answering Sir George Yonge’s question relative to the defence possibilities of Fort Frederick, General Dundas mentioned some other consideration for the choice of the site of the redoubt viz “on the right bank of the Baakens River at an elevation of about 230 feet above the level of the sea and immediately contiguous to the scarped side of the hill which presents nearly a perpendicular section to the shore of the river”. Taken into consideration was the fact that anchorage was excellent, water was available and there was shelter from the prevailing westerlies, though not from the south easters. These however were not prevalent except for three months of the year.

The utmost that could ever be expected was that the troops left there might be able to preserve themselves against an internal foe, and against any external one, “so far at least as to oblige him to come in force, as nothing like a coup de main can carry the works erected or erecting there.” To be able to overpower Fort Frederick an external enemy must land some heavy ordnance which could prove a difficult task in the face of British troops upon a beach where there as always a pretty considerable surf. If an enemy should decide to land his cannon at any other spot remote from Fort Frederick there would be ample time to alert Cape Town.

The stone fort which Dundas had constructed was completed in February 1800. Perhaps to curry favour with his superiors, Dundas sycophantically named it Fort Frederick after the Commander of the British Army, Frederick, George III’s son, and H.R.H. The Duke of York. It overlooked the best landing place on this stretch of beach and was armed with two 8-pounders. On the 20^th February, now back at the Cape, Dundas reported further to the Governor. He described the new post as a “Block House and Stone Redoubt furnished with Canon and a Garrison consisting at present of 300 men under the command of a Field Officer”.

Design and layout

in his book Forts of the Eastern Cape, Colin Coetzee provides the following description. “Inside the redoubt, to the right of double entrance gates, upon inspection, Holloway found a powder magazine, a small, dry, strong, but low building of masonry with boarded floor measuring 4.9m x 3.9m x 3.0m. in good condition, capable of containing fifty barrels (about 2,000 lbs.) of gunpowder.  His recommendation was that it be retained since it served a useful purpose for the reception of gunpowder landed from Cape Town for the frontier service until means of transport to Grahamstown, the headquarters, became available. On the left of the entrance gates, on the inside was a guardhouse of masonry and in the middle was a blockhouse or ‘keep’ also called a reduit of masonry. [A reduit is a fortified structure such as a citadel or a keep into which the defending troops can retreat when the outer defences are breached.] Originally it had been a two-storeyed building, but by 1827 it was reduced to only one, the wooden superstructure having been razed. On the outside the fort was initially surrounded on three sides by a line of palisades and in front of this stockade were some trous-de-loup or holes (literally wolf holes) with sharp stakes planted upright to check the progress of an enemy and to delay him as long as possible.“

Major Edward Lemoyne, Vandeleur’s successor, of the Royal Artillery was the first Commander. A 5.5 inch howitzer which is mentioned as being landed there is probably the “old gun” shown on a map of 1844 on the hill behind the Fort. Regiments stationed at the Cape at this time, and from which troops were sent to this area, were the 61^st, 81^st, 91^st (Argyllshire Highlanders) and the 8^th Light Dragoons. The 21st Dragoons, stationed everywhere, were Dundas’ main aid in holding the Colony together and assisted the farmers as well.

The fort was a square of 24 square meters with a three-metre-high wall. Within the walls on the right-hand side was a magazine in which 2000 pounds of gunpowder was stored while on the left-hand side there was a tiny guard house. The artillery consisted of eight twelve-pounders. Surrounding the fort palisades were erected for extra protection but the poles were often removed by the colonists to use as cattle kraals. Swiftly thereafter barracks for the garrison, a store house, a bakery, a hospital, as well as carpentry and blacksmith shops were erected.

A few days later Dundas replied in writing to a number of questions posed by Yonge. Regarding the fort, he wrote, “the utmost that has ever been expected is that the Troops left there may be able to preserve themselves against any internal Foe, and against any external one, so far at least as to oblige him to come in force as nothing like a coup de main can carry the works erected or erecting there, and to be able to carry this Post, an Enemy must land some heavy guns; a matter of difficulty in face of our troops upon (the best of times ) a beach  where there is always a pretty considerable surf”.

Furthermore he added that it was intended to stockade [i.e. create a barrier formed from upright wooden posts or stakes] the fort and dig a fortified ditch around it. Because the work had not been finished yet, the final costs could not be given, but as all the final materials had been “procured for nothing on the spot,” there would only be the cost of labour and tools.

It is not possible to state precisely which men built the fort as the garrison stationed at the blockhouse comprised men from multiple regiments. Besides the 8^th Dragoons, the 61^st, 91^st & 81^st Regiments were there, as well as two other regiments and artillery.

Major Holloway was rather scathing of the purpose and utility of this Fort. Colin Coetzee states it as follows: As far as Holloway could make out, the only purpose which the redoubt served at that time was the securing in the magazine of the gunpowder intended for the Frontier and the use the civil authorities made of it for confining prisoners in the blockhouse or ‘keep’ and the placing of constables in the guardhouse.  In his opinion these buildings could be much better appropriated as storehouses which the military urgently needed.  He could not find any references in the Engineer Department as to the purpose for which the redoubt was originally intended and judged that as a work of defence “it was devoid of any apparent utility”. It was too far from the anchorage or approach to the shore to be of use as a sea battery especially because between it and the sea the town of Port Elizabeth was emerging, and in that way intercepting its fire. As a stronghold to withstand a foreign invading army it was of no military importance and he also pronounced it of no use as a place of security against the Xhosa “whose territory is now retired nearly two hundred miles (300 km) from Algoa Bay.”

Treaty of Amiens

In 1801 the Cape Colony was ceded back to Holland and the fort was taken over by 150 men of the Waldeck Regiment under the command of Major von Gilten. This was reduced to 80 men a few months later with command being handed to a Captain Lodewyk or Captain Louis Alberti. In 1806 the Napoleonic wars resumed and England once again took over the running of the Cape Colony, the fort was put under the command of a Captain Cuyler, this was the same year that a Captain Francis Evatt was to arrive in the Cape with the 21st Light DragoonsWith the Treaty of Amiens in 1802, the Cape was handed back to the Batavian government. Included in that handover was the fort. Dundas removed the garrison at the fort on the 19^th September 1802.

Before the arrival of the Batavian troops at Fort Frederick, the missionaries Dr. van der Kemp, Read and the Khoi who had been residing on Botha’s Farm, at Buffelsfontein, were attacked. They were forced to take refuge in the fort. The new Batavian Governor and Military Commander, Lt-Gen Jan Willem Janssens, granted them the farm “Roodepan” which was renamed “Bethelsdorp.”

During this brief respite and peace, the fort was visited firstly by Janssens and his party in 1803 and then in 1804 it was visited by Commissary-General Jacob Abraham Uitenhage de Mist and his party, which included his daughter, Augusta,  and Dr. Heinrich Liechtenstein. The new District of Uitenhage was proclaimed by Janssens and named by him on 25^th April 1804.

The succeeding troops to be based at the fort, were the Waldeck Regiment on 18^th April 1803 under Major Carl von Gilten. They relieved Thomas Ignatius Ferreira who had been put in charge in the interim.

Reign of terror by Ferreira

During the interregnum between the delayed departure of the English garrison in 1803 and its occupation  by the Dutch Commandant , Lieut.-Colonel Alberti, and his garrison of the Jager Company of the 5^th (Waldeck) Battalion of the Dutch regular army, a neighbouring Boer, Thomas Ignatius Ferreira, residing at Papenkuilsfontein, was left in charge of the fort. He immediately instituted aa reign of terror upon the local black population. According to reports, amongst the atrocities committed by him was to roast a Xhosa envoy alive, cut slices out of a living khoikhoi man who had displeased him. Th arrival of the Dutch authorities put a stop to Ferreira’s atrocities and his one-man crime spree. Ferreira was arrested and banished from Algoa Bay. What is most appalling is that no mention has ever been found of his being tried or convicted for his crimes. The only sanction that he suffered was being banished from Port Elizabeth.

Captain Ludwig Alberti takes over

Von Gilten’s successor at the fort was Captain Ludwig Alberti also of the Waldeck Regiment, a unit of German mercenaries. Its commander wrote two books about his experiences, one about the trip aboard a Dutch troopship which has only recently been translated into English and the other, according to Margaret Harradine, containing a panoramic view of the settlement and a plan of it.

Amongst Captain Alberti’s other responsibilities was being appointed the first Landdrost of Uitenhage. Prior to this Uitenhage and Port Elizabeth fell under the District of Swellendam. An aide de camp to Governor Janssens, Captain WBE Paravicini di Capelli, painted a view of the fort and the mouth of the Baakens River which depicts the stockade, the barracks, the storehouses and the commander’s house.

Observations by Lichtenstein

During General Janssens’ visit to Algoa Bay, he was accompanied by a German savant, Lichtenstein. He provided the following account  of the settlement: “On the last hill which goes down to the shore, stands Fort Frederick, built by the British in 1799. Eight guns, 12-pounders, command the shore and protect the buildings lying near[by], and the barracks, guard-houses etc. Westward of the hill on which the Fort stands, comes from a deep gully a little stream called Baaken’s River. At the ford of the river, which is concealed between the hills that rise on each side of it, is another wooden Block House, which under the British Government was prepared in Cape Town and sent in parts by sea to the Bay. It serves at once as a prison and a guard-house. Between the blockhouses lie extensive barracks for soldiers, a magazine for provisions and another for military stores and field equippages, a smith’s shop, a bakehouse, a carpenter’s workshop, and other small buildings, a strong powder magazine, which will contain about 2000lbs of powder, is within the fort itself. Some small houses have been runup [constructed] in the neighbourhood for the officers, among which the house of the commandant is the most distinguished. 

Cape recaptured by the British

War broke out again. In January 1806, the British retook the Cape defeating the Dutch at the Battle of Blaauberg on the 6th. They replaced the fort’s commander with Captain Jacob Glen Cuyler, an American of Dutch extraction on 14^th February 1806. In addition, he was also appointed the provisional Landdrost of Uitenhage. He held this position until April 1817, when he was appointed Landdrost and Captain Francis Evatt assumed command of the fort.

On 6^th October 1812, Sir John Cradock, Governor of the Cape Colony, wrote to Colonel Torrens, military secretary to the Duke of York, Commander in Chief of the British Army, requesting him to put in a word about the establishment of a permanent force in Algoa Bay. He suggested that a garrison be formed for the “exclusive use of this settlement” to be composed of old soldiers already at the Cape, who would be stationed at Fort Frederick. The cost of the establishment of such a garrison would be partly offset by not having to provide the men with a passage home. According to JB Scott, this proposal was never adopted.

In fact, on 15^th February 1813, Torrens replied that the Duke of York was in favour of the formation of a Garrison Company of the “invalid soldiers belonging to the Regiment stationed there” and added that aside from “the military benefits arising from the formation of a stationary corps, considerable advantage may attend the measure, as an introduction to British settlers.” It was recommended that a complement of 150 men commanded by a Captain, two Lieutenants and an Ensign be stationed at Algoa Bay.

During 1813, the Royal Garrison Company, formed specifically for Fort Frederick from soldiers already in the Cape, was established. There new officers were commissioned: Captain Francis Evatt, Lieutenants William Slater and Martin Fleischer and Ensign William Gardner. Returns of troops serving at the Cape were compiled regularly. An entry dated 25^th August 1813 lists the 113 men of the Royal Garrison Company as being stationed at Wynberg. They must have been transferred to the Eastern Cape shortly thereafter as the entry of 25^th April 1814 states that there were 140 men stationed at Algoa Bay. Four months later, the Company of 141 men included 10 sergeants, four trumpeters and drummers. The Cape Almanac of 1814 lists the officers of the Royal Garrison Company, along with those of other regiments.

The Chelsea estate was granted for the use of the officers stationed at the fort on the 8^th February 1815. A piece of land next to the vlei on the hill – present day Trinder Square – was also granted to them for use as a garden. This land was later ceded to the Rev Francis McCleland who, in turn, sold it to Alfred Jarvis.

Up to 141 men formed the company until the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815.

The existence of the Royal Garrison Company at Port Elizabeth was short-lived. By 1815, with the Napoleonic Wars over, the British Government was anxious to reduce the cost of maintaining a large military contingent which was by then stationed at the Cape. There was no longer a need for a strong military presence at Algoa Bay as men could be seconded from those doing their tour of duty at the Cape.

The Return of Troops in the Cape Almanac for the subsequent year shows that as at the 25^th December 1816 only 135 members of the Company are based at Algoa Bay. By April 1817, the contingent is listed for the first time amongst the frontier posts, which would seem to suggest that the attention of the colonial government was now no longer focused upon foreign invasion but rather on the possibility of further incursions by the Xhosas along the unsettled frontier.

As the Return of 25^th June 1817 makes no mention of the Royal Garrison Company, it must be assumed that it had been disbanded in the interim.

Biographies of the officers

All four of the officers – Evatt, Slater, Fleischer and Gardner – were numbered among the sixty six men of the Royal Garrison Company who remained in the Cape after the dissolution thereof. Evatt’s biographyis available on a separate blog)

On 4^th April 1817, Colonel Cuyler was succeeded as Fort Commander by the well-known Francis Evatt who was now appointed Captain but on half pay.

Of the other three officers of the Royal Garrison Company, very little is known. William Slater had been a quartermaster with the 83^rd Foot Brigade and served in the Cape from 1806. From a family perspective, he was married and his two daughters were baptised in Cape Town. In 1815, he applied for a large grant of land in the Baakens Valley. This was the same lot known as Rufane Vale that was later granted to Captain Moresby. Home for these officers was probably Uitenhage in which Slater purchased a house in 1818. One of his daughters, Mary Anne, married Hermanus Johannes Berry, son of an early settler, John James. They had a son, born in 1836, who was christened William Slater in memory of his grandfather. Slater, Evatt and Gardner, were each granted an erf in Main Street, but this lot and that of Gardner, were allocated to others in 1820.

The other officer, Martin Fleischer, like William Slater had also been a quartermaster but in the 21^st Light Dragoons prior to being commissioned in the Royal Garrison Company. Ironically, his wife was also named Mary and their son was baptised in Cape Town in 1807. According to Margaret Harradine, Martin Fleischer was a founder member of the Uitenhage Turf Club in 1815. Sophia Pigot records in her diary that she met a Miss Fleischer from Uitenhage in 1820. Thomas Phillips also records that he met the family when he visited the town. Phillips describes Fleischer as a widower retired from the army with five children, of whom the eldest, John, had been made an Ensign in the Cape Corps. A daughter, Margaret, married the then young teacher, James Rose-Innes, in 1823 and both are buried in St. George’s Park Cemetery.

William Gardner, Ensign in the Royal Garrison Company, and later Lieutenant, married Johanna Magdalena Oosthuizen, widow of Jacobus Andreas Rudolph. She married Gardner, himself a widower with children, in Uitenhage on 24^th February 1817. The marriage could not have been successful because in November 1818, Gardner advertised that he was not responsible for his wife’s debts. Five years later, William Gardner was given permission to leave the Colony on a ship bound for Buenos Aires. The innumerable land transactions relating to South End and Humewood which mention the “widow Gardner”, thus refer to the former Miss Oosthuizen/Mrs Rudolph.

Later years of Fort Frederick

As a possession of the British Army, the fort was examined and reported upon. It is evident from the reports that once the Bay was no longer part of the frontier of the Colony, the fort had been allowed to decay.

The report of 1827 showed that the blockhouse by the river was being used by the authorities as a prison. The supports for the two eight-pounders had rotted and the guns themselves were sent back to England in 1873. Furthermore, the upper floor of the blockhouse had gone. The stout little powder magazine, capable of holding about 2,000 pounds of powder, was still in use. The blockhouse was being used as a prison with constables housed in the guardhouse. The ancillary buildings were also in dreadful disrepair and most were uninhabitable and irreparable.

Military buildings in 1837

Per the Royal Engineers Map of 1837, the following buildings are shown

1: Fort Frederick 2. Barrack & store 3. Old hospital 4. Proposed barrack & battery 5 to 6. New military road 7, 10 & 12. Proposed defensible guard houses. 9. New military offices, stores & workshops

What is not shown is Evatt’s Mill located on Gubb’s property. Originally this structure was known as Gubb’s Mill but the name Evatt’s Mill was probably used from 1834 when the mill was used to store gunpowder. In all probability this site was chosen as for safety reasons as private residences were by then being built on the hill.

Final use

Fort Frederick was evacuated by the military in 1866/67 and the military reserve of twenty acres relinquished by the Imperial Government to the Colonial Government on 27 June 1882. According to a schedule of September 1880 the Reserve comprised the following buildings:.

1. Fort Frederick, a small stone fort 100 feet square [actually 80] with a small magazine and guard room within the enclosure.
2. a stone building of 70 feet x 225 feet, formerly occupied as a barrack room on its upper floor and as a guard room and cells on its lower floor.
3. a long wooden building, formerly a military hospital of about 170 feet x 21 feet “built on brick or stone foundations”. It had a slate roof and was occupied as Police Barracks when the schedule was drawn up.
4. a similar building to the previous one was occupied by the Police Inspector.
5. a detached latrine

The site of Fort Frederick itself and its immediate surroundings, measuring “five morgen, three hundred and eighty-eight square roods, one hundred and thirty square feet and seventy-five hundredths of a square foot (5 mor: 388sq, rds: 130.75sq. ft)”, being part of the old Military reserve, was granted, in perpetuity, to the Port Elizabeth Municipality on November 7, 1889 in consideration of the sum of one pound sterling. The Mayor and Town Councillors undertook, under this grant, to maintain and repair the Fort “as a point in the Ordnance and Admiralty plans” and to utilise the ground around it as a public resort and playground. If, at any time, the ground was required by Government for public services it could resume possession thereof without compensation.

Amongst the final Fort Commanders Captain James Elphinston Robertson of the 6^th Royal Regiment and Captain Richard Hill Rocke of the 2^nd Queen’s Regiment, were family men whose wives and children lived with them. Until 1862, the Commandant of Fort Frederick at the time was listed in the annual directories, the last mentioned being Captain Charles P Cobbe of the 13^th Regiment. After 1862, there were no further commanders. The Cape Blue Book for 1868 lists the military buildings as unoccupied.

Notwithstanding this, when the need has arisen – as during the two world wars and the Anglo Boer war – it has once again seen military service.

In March 1931, representatives of the Historical Monuments Commission, the forerunner of the National Monuments Council, visited Port Elizabeth and saw the fort and other buildings. later the City Council discussed repairs to the fort and the cleaning and better laying out of the grounds. It was handed over to the Parks Department, who laid out paths. Seven old ship’s cannons were collected from various street corners and mounted on the walls of the fort. In 1936 it was proclaimed a National Monument.

In 1956, the remains of Captains Francis Evatt were reinterred at a spot outside the fort and the original slate tombstone was placed on the porch of St Mary’s church.

Much has changed since those halcyon days. The military reserve has been built over, the Baakens River is now only a narrow channel without a lagoon, the sand dunes below the fort have been replaced with buildings and roads and the waves no longer break close to the fort.

Military fortifications in Port Elizabeth

Sources

http://thediariesofavillageidiot.blogspot.co.za/2010/01/fort-frederick-and-captain-francis.html