A different view on current affairs & history
Main picture: Thunderstorm viewed from Stanley House Port Elizabeth in 1916
South End has experienced a tumultuous past. From devastating floods in 1867 to the destruction of a culturally diverse community through forced removals in terms of the Group Areas Act in the 1960s, South End has experienced it all.
The focus of this blog is the early beginnings when the Baakens River isolated South End from Port Elizabeth and its subsequent transformation from a huge farm into a residential area.
Main picture: Port Elizabeth from an agrarian South End in 1830
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Any criminal justice system, apart from the Wild West, comprises several independent components: the constabulary, the magistracy and the prisons. This chapter deals with all three elements during the early years of the town’s development.
Main picture: Commercial Hall which housed both the Magistrate’s Court and the Police Offices before their relocation. Ultimately this site became the public library.
Viewed through the sanguine eyes of nostalgia, Port Elizabeth in its formative years is naively seen as idyllic. This is not altogether true. Port Elizabeth not only exemplified a “frontier town” with all its attendant travails but it also bore the undesirable hallmarks of a busy, under-policed port.
This blog exposes the seamy, sleazy underbelly of that era.
Main picture: The sea wall from the north jetty in 1885. Beyond it was the Strand Street, the den of iniquity
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Main picture: The Willows today with its revamped bungaloes
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Society holds priests and other arbiters of human behaviour to a higher standard than normal humans. So when their behaviour does not conform to these standards, the disbelief and interest is all the greater.
So it was with two clergymen of St. Mary’s Church half a century apart.
Main picture: Rev Francis McCleland
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One misconception about the Malays in South Africa concerns their ethnic nomenclature “Malay.” In fact they originate from Batavia, today called Indonesia, and not from Malaysia. Instead the word Malay was derived from the language that they spoke. The Malay language is spoken in Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia and Singapore where it holds official or national status. It is also spoken by communities in other countries, such as the Philippines, Southern Thailand, and East Timor.. Another erroneous notion is that Malay population only arrived after the British settlers.
This chapter rebuts these fallacies. It also reveals the important role the Malays played in the development of Port Elizabeth.
Main picture: The Green or Pier Street Mosque
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Port Elizabeth is fortunate in having somebody who prepared a list of its inhabitants at the inception of the town itself. Without a functioning civil authority, nothing is recorded, let alone a population register.
This blog lists Port Elizabeth’s inhabitants in 1822 together with a biographical sketch of some of them.
Main picture: Port Elizabeth in 1823
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Initially the Presbyterians in Port Elizabeth could not afford their own church so they supported the “New Church,” an Independent Church, from 1853. This church was located at the corner of Main and Donkin Streets. Finally, in 1861 they were able to support their own church.
Accordingly, they built a magnificent Gothic Revival style church in a prominent position on the hill which is visible from Algoa Bay.
Main picture: View of the Hill Presbyterian Church from Donkin Reserve
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