MY MATERNAL GRAND FATHER WAS SOLOMAN JOHANNES PIENAAR. HE WAS THE SON Of JOHANNES LODEWYK PIENAAR AND HIS WIFE HERMINA (BORN BOTHA). THE PIENAARS WERE DIRECT DESCENDANTS OF THE FRENCH HUGUENOT JACQUES PINARD WHO SETTLED HERE IN SOUTH AFRICA IN 1687. THE HUGUENOTS CAME TO SOUTH AFRICA TO ESCAPE FROM THE RELIGIOUS WARS RAGING IN FRANCE WHERE THE ROMAN CATHOLICS WERE BUTCHERING THE PROTESTANTS. HERE IS AN EXTRACT I TOOK FROM A BOOK I READ ABOUT THE FRENCH HUGUENOTS. “ THE KILLINGS BEGAN ON ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S DAY WHEN A TROOP OF SOLDIERS, LED BY THE CATHOLIC DUKE OF ANJOU, MADE FOR THE HOUSE OF THE HUGUENOT LEADER, GENERAL GASPARD de COLIGNY WHO IT WAS THOUGHT, WIELDED A GROWING AND PERNICIOUS INFLUENCE OVER THE WEAK WILLED YOUNG CATHOLIC MONARCH CHARLES IX. THE SOLDIERS SPEEDILY OVERCAME THE HOUSE GUARDS, THEN SIEZED COLIGNY HE BEGGED FOR MERCY BUT A SOLDIER RAN HIM THROUGH WITH HIS PIKE. COLIGNY WAS THEN THROWN HALF DEAD OUT OF THE WINDOW DOWN TO THE STREET BELOW, WHERE ANOTHER PROMINENT CATHOLIC, THE DUKE OF GUISE, FINISHED HIM OFF BY SPEARING HIM INTHE MOUTH.”
WHEN THE HUGUENOTS ARRIVED HERE IN SOUTH AFRICA, THE DUTCH GOVERNMENT AT THE TIME WERE AFRAID THAT THE CUSTOMS, TRADITIONS AND CULTURE OF THE FRENCH WOULD HAVE A BAD INFLUENCE ON THE DUTCH COLONISTS NOW LIVING AT THE CAPE. THE HUGUENOTS WERE MADE TO ABANDON THEIR FRENCH CUSTOMS AND TRADITIONS, THEY HAD TO LEARN THE DUTCH LANGUAGE, THE CHILDREN HAD TO BE TAUGHT ONLY IN DUTCH, THEY ALL HAD TO BECOME TRUE, DUTCH COLONISTS. SOME EVEN CHANGED THEIR NAMES AND THAT WAS HOW THE NAME PINARD WAS CHANGED TO BECOME PIENAAR.
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My maternal Great Grand Father Johannes Lodewyk Pienaar and his wife Hermina had eight children six sons and two daughters.
JOHANNES. Oom Jannie.
GERHARDUS. Oom Gert.
SOLOMAN. Oupa.
THEUNIS. Oom Teuns.
BAREND.
STEPHANUS. Oom Faans.
MAGRIETA. Aunt Maggy.
DAUGHTER. I cannot remember her name.
The daughter whom I cannot remember married a wealthy farmer who had a large farm in the Orange Free State. He farmed with cattle and fruit. I was told that he had a tremendous orchard with all kinds of fruit growing there. I believe there were mostly peach and apricot trees, as they were mostly used for making dried fruit, and some of the peaches were used for distilling peach brandy, which was also done on the farm.
I was told that they only came once to visit the family down here after they were married, I suppose the Pienaar family were not smart enough for them, as it was said, she did not lift a finger to do anything, she had servants to do everything for her at home, where as the Pienaar woman had to do everything for themselves. He used to be dressed in a black suit every day with starched collar black tie and top hat, just like old Paul Kruger. Oupa did not like him at all, for all he did the few days that they were here was sit on the stoep, drinking coffee and smoking his pipe, while Oupa was out in the lands working.
They never came to visit again but the old lady used to send the family a paraffin box full of dried fruit every year at Christmas time. She always packed two bottles of peach brandy in the center of the box with the dried fruit well packed around them to prevent them breaking. This went on for many years until in the end the boxes stopped coming and the family then surmised that the old lady must have died, her children never wrote to tell the family of her death. Nothing was ever heard of that family again.
When the old people (Johannes and Hermina) had both died Oom Jamie who was the eldest took over all the house work, there were only three brothers left on the farm then, they were Oom Jannie, Oom Teuns, and Oom Barend. Oom Gert had been killed by the elephants, and his wife Aunt Sarah (born Walker) had gone back to her people in Port Elizabeth with her two children John and Katherine. Oupa was married and was working for the South African Railways at Addo. Oom Faans had gone to Johannesburg and was working on the mines; the two daughters had also married and were out of the home as well. The three remaining brothers, lived very happy together. Then after a few years Oom Barend built his own house, also on Zoutfontein moved out and married Susanna Lemmer. We children all called her Tant Sannie. They had two children Martha and Isabella, we just called her Bella. Bella died when she was seventeen, she had developed (T. B.) Martha married a chap by the name of Hendrik van Ek, they lived in the house with Tant Sannie after she died Martha and Hendrik moved to Port Elizabeth where he got a, job, and we never heard from them again.
When Oom Faans was working on the mines he met and married a girl up there and they lived in one of the suburb’s called Braamfontein, I never knew the name of the girl Oom Faans married. They had one daughter, her name was Johanna, we all called her Hannie but later she decided to be known only as Annie.
I think most people must have of the terrible tragedy that hit Braamfontein in 1896, when a goods train ran into a train loaded with dynamite in the Braamfontein goods yard. The explosion practically flattened the whole of Braamfontein; more than eighty people were killed and hundreds were injured. Among those killed was Oom Faans’s wife, their house was blown down and she was killed inside. Annie escaped as she was away spending the day with friends. After this had happened Oom Faans packed up and he and Annie returned to the old farm at Zoutfonteirn. Annie eventually met and married an Irishman by the name of Rafferty..They lived at a place called Bonnyvale near Cape Town, Annie did come and visit her father on the farm a few times, but the visits later stopped and we never heard from Annie again nor from her family either. Oom Faans never left the farm again, he lived and worked with his brothers, Jan and Teuns until he died marry years later.
I personally knew all Oupa’s brothers and his sister aunt Maggie, the ones I never saw was the sister who went to the Orange Free State and Oom Gert who was killed by the elephant that happened before I was born.
I often heard the story of Oom Gert’s death, it happened like this. One afternoon Oom Gert and Oom Teuns decided to go hunting in the bush called “Olifants plaat” where bush buck was plentiful. They were going along quietly when they heard a sound like something breaking, and only then did they discover that they had walked into a troop of elephants, they each climbed into a big tree to hide from the elephants but unfortunately Oom Gert had his dog with him, and the dog started harking at the elephants, Oom Gert had the gun and Oom Teuns told him to shoot the dog, but he said he could not do it, in the mean time the dog was barking at the elephants and then an old bull charged at the dog who then ran back to the tree where Oom Gert was hiding and the elephant followed, when the elephant got to the tree he must have seen Oom Gert because he started pushing against the tree and then he pulled Oom Gert out of the tree and trampled him to death, the old bull then tossed Oom Gert’s body into the air and it landed in another tree and the body was caught in the branches and stuck up in the tree. All this happened in front of Oom Teuns’s eyes, but he could do nothing about it. The elephants milled around for hours, trumpeting and making a hell of a noise, so much so that the dog must have taken fright and ran home. By now it was completely dark and Oom Teuns was afraid to climb out of the tree where he was hiding and go home to get help to fetch Oom Gert’s body, in case he walked into another troop of elephants, so he spent the night sitting in the tree until it started getting light in the morning then he went home. In the meantime the family had begun to worry when Oom Gert aced Oom Teuns did not get home when it got dark, what worried them too was the fact that they had heard the commotion the elephants had been making that afternoon and evening, but of course when‑the dog turned up alone that night they knew that something terrible had happened, but as they could nothing in the dark they waited for the morning. When it started getting light Oom Jannie and Oom Barend set out to look for Oom Gert and Oom Teuns. Some distance into the bush they met Oom Teuns but he was so over come with the nights experience that it took some tire before he could tell them what had happened, but he managed to 1ead the way back to where the tragedy had happened.
They made a kind of stretcher out of sticks and things tied together with monkey rope, got Oom Gerts body out of the tree where it was still hanging put it on the stretcher they had made and carried it home. Oom Gert is buried in the old cemetery at Barkley Bridge. This terrible experience that happened to Oom Teuns, turned him into an old man in no time, I was told that Oom Teuns had red hair and a red beard but within a month, his hair and beard had both turned snow white. It was said that even his personality changed from a happy go lucky young man to a serious old man. Oom Teuns was in his eighties when he died of cancer. Old uncle Bill Dansey and I were with him the night he died.
Oom Faans fell arid broke his hip, he died in the Provincial hospital in Port Elizabeth. Oom Barend had cancer on his bottom lip, it spread all over the side of his face and killed him in the end. Oupa also fell and broke his hip, he refused to go to Hospital, he said he knew he would die from it so he rather wanted to die in his own home, which he did only two weeks after he had the fall. Ouma was also sick in bed at that time, she was suffering from an illness called Dropsy, her legs were swollen to twice their normal size, and the swelling seemed to be going higher every day, she died a month after Oupa. They are both buried in the old family cemetery at the old farm Zoutfontein.
Oom. Jannie was busy in his kitchen, one day. He must have been busy washing up because he said he had gone out to empty a dish of water and as he walked across the yard he tripped and fell and also broke his hip. He was alone at home at the time, and as he could not get up he just had to lie there in the sun and wind until Oom Teuns came home late that afternoon and found him. Oom Teuns got his boy to help carry Oom Jannie into the house and put him on his bed, he then sent the boy to tell my Mom and ask her to come and help, Dad inspanned the horses to the cart and they went to see what they could do to help. Mom said she was shocked when she saw Oom Jannie she said she was sure he would die as the sun had burnt him terribly, he was covered with sand from lying in the wind all those hours. Dad and Mom then washed him and got him into bred. Morn cooked some food and fed him before coming home. The next day they sent for Dr. Grenfell and also sent a message to Aunt Maggie Dansey (Oom Jannie’s sister) who lived at Sandflats. Aunt Maggie and, Uncle Bill arrived that afternoon. Dr. Grenfell had already been, he came by car that morning from Alexandria. He said Oom Jannie had broken his hip and should go to Hospital, but of course 0om Faans had also broken his hip and had died in Hospital, so Oom Jannie refused, he said if he was going to die from his broken hip, then he would die in his home, not among strangers in Hospital. Aunt Maggie and Uncle Bill Dansey (Uncle Bill was now pensioned from the Railways) gave up their home at Sandflats and came to live with Oom Jannie and Oom Teuns on their farm Weltevrede. Aunt Maggie nursed Oom Jannie until he died, five years after he broke his hip, he was then over ninety years old.
Aunt Maggie inherited the farm from Oom Jannie and she and Uncle Bill lived there until both Oom Teuns and Uncle Bill had died. Their son Victor who was working for the Government in the Transkei gave up his job and came with his wife May arid started farming on Weltevrede. It did not last long as Victor was not a farmer and also Victor was a heavy drinker. Then things went wrong and the farm was sold. Aunt Maggie moved to Port Elizabeth with Victor and May, and lived in Algoa Park until Aunt Maggie died at the age of 93. Victor died shortly after his Mom, May died a year or two ago she was 90 when she died. Victor arid May never had any children.
I loved the times when Mom and Dad decided to visit Oom Jannie and Oom Teuns when they still lived at Zoutfontein. It was like taking a trip back in time to see how they lived. For instance they did not have a stove in their kitchen, their cooking was all done the old way, as they only had their food cooked in three legged pots on an open hearth. The pots were all made of cast iron even the kettle for boiling water was cast iron, the kettle used to hang over the fire from a chain, the coffee kettle had its own little stand, just near enough to the fire to keep it hot but not to boil. The three legged pots were used for stewing, and then there was the big round flat bottomed pot in. which the roasting and baking was done. The bread was baked in the old dutch oven in the yard but some times Oom Jannie used to make what he called (pot brood). He mixed the dough and baked it in the big flat-bottomed pot on the hearth in the kitchen. It was lovely eaten hot with honey. I often think of the times when I went there with Mom and Dad, when I do, then I can still smell the smoke from the open fire in the hearth in the kitchen, which blended with the lovely smell of freshly baked bread. Those are smells one does not easily forget, no matter how long after.
Oom Jannie used to play the violin and I remember him going to take it out of its bag that used to hang behind his bedroom door. He’d take it out of its bag tune it up and start playing for us. That violin was given to my sister Kathleen, as she had also learnt to play the violin. Kathleen had actually asked old Aunt Ann for grandpa Newcombe’s violin but Aunt Ann said she could not have it, as she was not the eldest grandchild, so it was given to Dick Hill as he was the eldest grandchild. It was a real waste giving it to Dick because he was not a bit musical, he could not even whistle a tune, so Kathleen got Oom Jannie’s. Oupa also played the violin; he had a beautiful one it had its case as well but of course Uncle Cliff claimed that as he had also learned to play the violin. Dick did not have grandpa’s violin very long before it got broken, Kathleen was very sad when she heard about that. When Kathleen died in 1987 I gave her old violin to Barbara’s daughter Jeanne as she was then taking violin lessons, and I now hear that it is the only family violin still in existence, as Oupa’s has also been broken.
My Pienaar family were all very musical, every one of them played the concertina. Oupa played the violin, Ouma played the concertina too, Mom and Auntie Babe played the organ, mom played the piano as well, uncle Cliff played the violin as well as the concertina, every one of them used to vamp on the guitar as well so they used to accompany each other playing all the time. My sisters Kathleen played the piano organ and violin, Gwynneth played the piano only and she excelled at it, I never heard her equal. She used to play on the organ, as well sometimes, as there was an organ and a piano in our drawing room at. Dundonald, but Gwyn used to say the organ was too slow an instrument and she could not express herself on it. I forgot to mention Auntie Toek she used to play the three-rowed English concertina, and she used to play it very well, she also played the guitar.
Oupa and Oom Barend were the two biggest men in the Pienaar family, they both were six feet tall, broad shouldered, and terribly strong. The Pienaar brothers were all very hairy men, they all had flowing beards as not one of them ever owned a razor, so from the, time that their beards began to grow they had never shaved.
Before Oupa got married he used to do transport riding from Port Elizabeth to places in the North of South Africa. Most of his Transport was done to Kimberly. Diamonds had beers discovered and mining had begun and Oupa transported a lot of mining equipment from Port Elizabeth to Kimberly. Oom Barend used to go with Oupa on these trips. Oupa continued with his transport riding until a. few years after he and Ouma got married, then he gave up and joined the .S. A. Railways as a Ganger, he was stationed at Addo and remained there until he was pensioned sometime about 1904 or 1905. Then he built his house on Dundonald, his home on Dundonald was called “High Gate Villa” he lived and farmed there until he died in 1928.
Oupa was working on the railways while the Boer War was on the go. One day a high ranking officer Colonel somebody came to Oupa and he said Oupa had to keep his eyes open; along the line in case any Military equipment perhaps fell from the train. In which case it had to be taken to the StationMaster and handed in immediately. At first there would be the odd Helmet found next to the line and then again he found an overcoat or two, but later it got worse, and he found some rifles along the line. But the old man picked them up and handed them to the StationMaster as he was told to do. But when the old man found a whole case of ammunition along the line he got mad. When he handed it to the station waster, he told him to tell those BUGGERS to whom, he handed in, the articles that were picked up along the railway line, that he can see that these things were being deliberately dumped there to try and trip him up because he had the name of Pienaar a typical Boer name. Oupa said he was not a Boer soldier so he had nothing to do with the war, he was only doing his work, and if he could not be trusted then they had to kick him out of the railways because from now on any more articles found along the line could lie there and rot because he was not picking up any more army stuff.
Oupa never found anything more lying along the line along his link.
Oom Faans was the youngest son of the Pienaar family, he had a happy go lucky manner about him, very little seemed to worry him, he was the super optimist so unlike his brothers who were all very serious minded old folk, they lived their lives carefully and soberly, one could wonder what they were thinking or what was going through their, minds when they used to sit in silence smoking their pipes and just seemed to be looking into space. Oom Fauns was different, he did not smoke and he was never quiet, he always had something to talk about or a story to tell. I am sure that was perhaps the reason. why we children were all so fond of him, he always had a story to tell us.
Some of his stories were very far fetched but what did we care, it just made them so much more exiting, and I can assure yon he told us some terrible hair raising stories of hunting Elephants and Buffaloes in. the Addo bush. Oom Jannie often used to say “as Faans begin om stories to vertel, song dat jy naby die sout sit “ (if Faans starts to tell stories, make sure you are sitting near the salt) But remarks like that did not affect Oom Faans at all, it just made him make the story more exciting for us for us kids. When Oom Faans worked on the mines in Johannesburg he got married and lived in Braamfontein, his wife was killed in that terrible explosion that occurred ire I896 when a goods train ran into a train loaded with Dynamite in the Braamfontein goods yard, the resulting explosion flattened practically the whole of Braamfontein. Oom Faans’s wife was killed, but their little daughter Annie escaped as she had beers spending the day with friends away from Braamfontein so she escaped the disaster. Oom Fauns left the mines and returned to the farm with Annie. Annie grew up on the farm and eventually met, fell in love and married .an Irishman I forget his name but his surname was Rafferty, their went and lived in Cape Town. Annie had two children, Edith and Frank. She came a couple of times to visit her old Dad, but after Oom Faans died she never came again, she used write to my Mom but eventually her letters stopped, Annie must have died and her family, never contacted us again. .
Well that is the story of my Maternal Grand Father’s family asI knew them. They were all down to earth hard working people, very independent, more honest than you would find anywhere in the world. They did not create great feats, nor did they make names for themselves during their lifetime to be remembered by, but they were all very well respected by every one who knew them. I am therefore very happy to say that I am proud to know that I have a little of their blood flowing in my veins.