Eastern Cape, FORT BEAUFORT district, Post Retief, Cemetery

Cemetery information:- Additional information by David Butler: Post Retief was a fortification started in 1836. During its early years the fort saw no action and was occupied by the farm's owner Ann Edwards, an 1820 Settler widow who ran a trading store from within the fort's walls and shared the fort with her five children. In 1846 Rev Joseph Willson came to share the space within the fort inadvertently starting the first Anglican parish in the country by his ministering to the remote Winterberg farmers from the Officers Quarters within the fort walls. There are at least ten 1820 Settlers buried in the cemetery and given the English surnames in the burial register and their corresponding ages it is feasible that there are at least another ten settler graves in the graveyard mostly in unmarked graves . Settlers John Joseph SMITH snr and his French wife Marie Anne de FALLAUX are buried in the heart of the graveyard close to its original core. Smith was known by his nickname “French” Smith and had settled his French-speaking family in the eastern side of the valley on the farm “Haartebeesfontein” (now Waylands) that he had aqcquired from trekboer Willem Adriaan Piek in 1835 after his trading store at Balfour had been looted and destroyed during the devastating 6th Frontier War 1835. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour,_Eastern_Cape) SMITH further acquired the large farm “Driefontein”. This kloof became known as Smiths Kloof or French Hoek and was situated on what was then known as De Waal’s River. It is now generally accepted as part of the headwaters of the Koonap River. To the left of the core of the graveyard is the cast iron grave marker without specific inscription that marks the grave of Sergeant William SALT, husband of the legendary Elizabeth SALT – heroine of the Battle of Grahamstown 1819. After Elizabeth’s sudden death at the age of 65 on her birthday in the vicinity of Tarkastad, William Salt continued to live under the care of their only child Elizabeth who was married to John Joseph SMITH jnr and was living at “Hartebeesfontein”. Elizabeth Smith’s 35 year old husband 1820 settler John Joseph SMITH jnr had died a few months before the death of her mother in 1850 and is also buried in an unmarked grave in the cemetery at Waylands Country House. (acknowledgements to Dr Carl Kritzinger) Album complete. eGGSA captions by: Esmé van der Westhuizen and Wilna Eygelaar. The GGSA Cemetery DVD only has information on the location of the cemetery Cemetery ID: 4000 Google Earth Project Information:- GPSID: 4742 GPS: +/- -32 30.516, 26 31.643