One of the things that really interested me when I visited the North End Cemetery the other day was the walled off Jewish Cemetery. I didn't get to explore it though as the sign by the entrance says, "Code of Conduct. Please note that all visitors to the cemetery must wear appropriate dress. Men and women must cover their heads". Turned out I didn't even have a cap in my car so I went no further than the door. I did do…
Over the years my interest in cemeteries has taken me to most of the cemeteries around town with the notable exception being the North End Cemetery. Not because I didn't want to but rather a case of never really being in that part of town with time to go. A week or two ago I found myself there though in search of information I needed as part of a Geocache multi cache put together by Commaille. I was really surprised…
The Russell Road Cemetery is another of Port Elizabeth's historic grave yards dating back to the early days of Port Elizabeth. As the town grew the increased demands on the St Mary's Cemetery next to the Baakens River became too much and a solution had to be found, not just for another cemetery but also to accommodate the different religious affiliations. Small pieces of land was allocated to the various Christian denominations on the town margins in the late 1830's…
In the early days of Port Elizabeth the St Mary's Cemetery was used, first by the military based at Fort Frederick, and later for civilians with the cemetery being under the control of St Mary's Church. As the town grew more burial areas were required by the various Christian denominations and in the 1830's and 1840's the various churches were granted small pieces of land adjacent to each other on the edge of town where Russell Road is today. A…
The old Scottish Cemetery at St George's Park was established way back in 1854 on what was the western edge of town back then. These days the western edge of town is all the way over at Baywest.
Probably the biggest maritime disaster that ever took place on the Port Elizabeth coastline happened way back during the Great Gale of 1902. On Sunday, 31 August 1902 there were 38 ships at anchor along the then North End Beach. Rain and a south-easterly wind started to lash the bay and by midnight the storm turned into a hurricane. By the end of the storm on 2 September 1902, 18 of the ships had been stranded on the beach, while…
I stopped by the South End Cemetery last week to check up on my Geocaches in the area and took a slow drive around the cemetery. It's really sad to see how much vandalism has taken place in the cemetery. Pity the municipality can't put aside a bit of budget to restore a lot of these pushed over and broken historic grave stones. Anyhow, I was looking for an interesting angle to photograph and settled on this one, converted to…
Bethulie in the southern Free State is one of those places not many people pass through as it's not really on any of the main thoroughfares going south (or north, depending how you look at it). On my last trip up to Johannesburg I deviated off the normal route to see what this town on the banks of the Orange River is all about. One of the things I found out was that Bethulie was the site of one of…
This past week I posted two posts featuring the historic St Mary's Cemetery at the bottom of the Baakens Valley. There are so many interesting bits to photograph in a cemetery like this one of what looks like such a sad angel.
Yesterday I posted a photo of the St Mary's Cemetery along with the grave yard's history. I decided to follow it up with another photo of the cemetery but from a totally different angle. This one is standing at the bottom and looking away from the road and up the terraces.