Find out more about Who's Who of South Africa's other books and get your self into the Who's Who of Southern Africa too.

Some of the schools included are Marist Brothers Cape Town, Normal College Cape Town, Gill College, Graaff-Reinet College, Grey Institute Cadets, Heidelberg Volksschool Cadets, Jeppe Central Government School Cadets, Kroonstad Secondary School Cadets, South African College High School, St. Aidan's College Cadets, Winburg Secondary School Cadets,  Witbank School Cadets and Wynberg Boys High School to mention a few. 

Do you have any photos or stories about your family members who were cadets? We would love to hear from you and share your family's memoires.

If you want to find out more about the Boer war we suggest you read Cassell's History of the Boer War.

Other databases covering this period is the St. Andrews Bloemfontein Marriages, St Helena Prisoners of War, The Suburban Town Guard of the Boer War and the 1899 – 1900 Free State Voter's List.

When did it start?

The very first burial in Maitland Cemetery was on the 16 January 1886. With over 100 000 souls buried in this huge cemetery covering 100 hectares.

This graveyard is now nearing its capacity and needs to be retained as a haven of remembrance as well as a place where it is safe to walk around the rich heritage of the famous and not so famous people who have made the City of Cape Town what it is today.

A large proportion of bodies from the old Somerset Road Cemetery have been reinterred in Maitland Cemetery. Many of the headstones are laid out as paths, some put up against the wall and others lay buried under mounds of mole hills.

Maitland Cemetery Project

On the 15th September 2010 Ancestry24 in co-operation with the City Parks Cape Town  will embark on the mammoth project of photographing every headstone in the Cemetery. As part of their civic duty and preservation of National Heritage these headstones once photographed and tagged will be available to the public for free on the our gallery.

To help photograph, tag or find out more about the project please contact us

Search our thousands of records of people who applied for citizenship here from Europe, the America’s and Rhodesia. Were they a speculators or skin dressers? And are you proud to have a wattle planter as an ancestor?

Names like Adler, Archer, Baker, Barclay, Bereletowitz, Bloch, Blumberg, Brenner, Chemaly, Dahl, De Lorenzo, De Quintal, Di Pasqualie, Lindgren, Factor, Fine, Forrester, Futeran, Galombik,Gamsu, Gerasimo, Hadjidakis, Hammerschlag,  Haviland, Hirschfield and many more are included.

Write in and tell us about your ancestors who came to South Africa and win a free six month subscription.

Start searching this amazing collection of names of Free Blacks from 1807. This database has Census of the Free Black Community on the Eve of the Abolition of the Oceanic Trade.
This census is important for when it was taken, the year before the importation of slaves into the Cape ceased. The origins of the free blacks listed here reveal who was manumitted and where they were born. The census also contains details of their spouses and partners and their origins. This was clearly a "groep sonder grense" to use Hans Heese's title.

Purchase Robert Shell's E-Book Changing Hands with over 130 000 records pertaining to Land, Slaves and Slave owners
 

With over 100 000 souls buried in this huge cemetery covers 100 hectares. The first burial took place on 16 January 1886. This graveyard is now nearing its capacity and needs to be retained as a haven of remembrance as well as a place where it is safe to walk around the rich heritage of the famous and not so famous people who have made the City of Cape Town what it is today.

A large proportion of bodies from the old Somerset Road Cemetery have been reinterred in Maitland Cemetery. Many of the headstones are laid out as paths, some put up against the wall and others lay buried under mounds of mole hills.

Burials from 1888 – 1925 have already been transcribed are in our database collections

To help photograph and tag the images from this cemetery please contact Heather

As an adopted child in South Africa and having very little information about my birth parents and my adoption, meant that tracing my ancestors and living relatives was proving to be impossible.

Before 1987, the Social Welfare Services would not divulge any information whatsoever to an adoptee about the circumstances of his/her adoption – even if the adoptee was over the age of 21!  Now things have changed and Ancestry24 helped me.   Even if one has the most wonderful adoptive parents and a very happy childhood (as I did) there is a fundamental need and a natural curiosity to find out about one’s background. 

• Where did I come from?
• Who were my natural parents and what were their names?
• Do I have brothers/sisters/cousins out there that I don’t know about?
• What genetic traits have I inherited from my grandparents and great grandparents?
• What were their names and occupations?

A lack of knowledge about one’s background is unsettling.  It doesn’t sit well in one’s psyche, and it affects one’s sense of identity.

What is my Indentity

One’s sense of identity is made up of so many things – your childhood experiences, you family dynamics, your education, your friends, the choices you make and the paths you go down through your life.  It is like a jigsaw puzzle, with lots of pieces, that becomes larger and more complex as you get older.  When you are an adoptee, there is a piece of one’s identity jigsaw that is missing.  The picture is worryingly incomplete.  And the piece that is missing is a significant one as it is right in the middle of the jigsaw.  Weeks can go by when you don’t think about it at all.  But every now and then, it surfaces into your consciousness and is disturbing. 

I found Ancestry24 to help me

I had recently watched the TV series of ‘Who do you think you are?’ with great interest.  The message that comes through loud and clear is that tracing one’s ancestors is an enthralling and deeply fascinating exercise.  Ancestry24  provided me with the necessary tools to help me achieve this – knowing some names of relatives and birth dates can help you with your search. 

I began actively searching for my birth mother in 1989.  The adoption laws in South Africa had changed, but not so in Zimbabwe where my adoption took place.  The Social Welfare Services in Harare were immovable in my request for information about my natural mother and the circumstances of my adoption.  Letters were written and phone calls were made, but to no avail.  We did not have the power of the internet in those days, and the postal system in Zimbabwe was dire. 

I decided to approach the Child Welfare Adoption Centre to see if they could help me.  A report to the International Social Services in Geneva was written to ask them to intervene on my behalf.  It took two years for the Adoption Authorities in Zimbabwe to release information to a social worker giving details of my mother’s name, birth date, and last known address.  At the age of 42, I finally knew my mother’s identity.  It was mind blowing, but unfortunately, this small amount of knowledge didn’t seem to help me very much. 

I wish that I had kept a diary of all the avenues I went down in my search for my birth mother, and all the blank walls that I hit.  I have lost count of all the letters that I wrote and the phone calls that I made.  We now had the internet to help me in my search, but nothing came to light.  Life was busy, and the years went by.  Fourteen of them!  I had almost resigned myself to the fact that I was not meant to find her.  So much time had elapsed since my adoption and it was very possible that my birth mother had died.  I thought about my mother on what would have been her 87th birthday in July, but nothing could have prepared me for what happened in the next few days.  Fate intervened and took me totally by surprise.

Using simple methods + records

Fate came in the form of Heather MacAlister of Ancestry24.  She gave me some excellent and simple advice:  “Ask the neighbours”.  In other words, ask the people who lived on the same street as my birth mother if they remembered her, and if she still lived in the same town.  From this point on, things moved very quickly, thanks to the awesome power of Google.  Phone calls were made, new facts emerged, and finally, the estate records of my natural mother were called up using Ancestry24.com Government Gazette records.  She had indeed died, but at the bottom of the record was the name of her daughter, and my half-sister.  My search of 21 years was finally over.

Since then, I have made contact with my half-sister, my half-brother, and a cousin and an aunt.  They have unhesitatingly welcomed me into the family, and given me all sorts of information about my other relatives (hoards of them!) and my ancestors.  Aesthetics have always been important to me, but I have never known the reason why.  I have learnt that creativity and artistic ability are very strong traits in my family.  I am now in a position to use Ancestry24.com to draw up a family tree and I can’t wait to do it!   I now have closure on a matter that has been troubling me for years, and my identity jigsaw puzzle is now complete.     

Belinda Press

There is a discernible difference between the pre and post war period in that the "white" congregation appears to have become more prominent in the records. However there are surprisingly a number of Basutho’s that were married in this Diocese as well

Interesting marriage entries are Theophilus Tylden Shepstone, Widower; Civil Service of the Cape Colony of Barkly East, Cape Colony married Rachel Anna Frederica Every of Karee Poort, District Bloemfontein on 12 July 1892.

Sidney George Moore professional golfer from Kimberley who married Ellen Maria Staughton of Bloemfontein on 22 December 1908 and also John Henry Squires, professional boxer who married Annie Catrina De Beer on 07 March 1923.

Other notable people were early Portuguese and Greek Settlers Antonio Pereira, fruiterer, who married Johanna Heineker on the 01 January 1884 and Apostal Marroudas, fruiterer, who married Alexandra Kassape on 03 April 1906.
 

Start searching now to find out if your ancestor was Abraham the Rat Catcher, Christian Paulsen the Bioscope operator, Ryno Verster the petrol inspector or George Plaatjies the Asylum attendant.

This database with a variety of surnames and occupations is another vital link to your past.

Don't forget to also make use of our baptisms and burials registers from St. Marks + St. Philips in District six where you will find thousands of families that were born, lived and died in this contraversial area of Cape Town.

If you have any stories to share with us about your families life in District Six – please send them to us now as there are lots of people who would love to hear you story