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Willemsrivier (old town, now Trekpad Guest Farm)
Nieuwoudtville district, Northern Cape
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Click to view map Coordinates: | Heritage significance In one of the interiors of the oldest buildings in the farm complex is a timber beam bearing the date 1700. This probably does not relate directly to the founding of the settlement and may be timber appropriated from elsewhere in this wood-scarce area, or it may be the year of birth of the farmer, but certainly relates to of the earliest pioneer Trekboer settlers in the are, the oldest building being from 1745. The single street layout of the various buildings with the different functions certainly attests to an envisioned town settlement, and perhaps when the church was built also served as a nagmaaldorp. It therefore is a fine extant record of what the character the earliest pioneer permanent settlements of the area might have been. History of the Kotze's on the farm In the early 1800’s a widow Carstens with four daughters lived on Willemsrivier. Two of them were twins. The first Kotzés to come to Willemsrivier were originally from Aurora. According to oral tradition they were a family of nine children of which three went to the Nieuwoudtville area. Two of the young men wed two of the widow Carstens’ daughters. In 1832 the widow transferred the land to the Kotzé son-in-laws. Willemsrivier has been in Kotzé ownership for 180 years. Originally the farm was called 'Kliprivier', named after the river that flows here. But after a violent Khoi group murdered a San herdswoman of an earlier generations of Kotzé’s, the farmer decided to move the farm site to where the current buildings are today. The Church Hulpkerk Alexander McGregor, who, according to oral tradition, had been one of the McGregor's who had arrived there by foot, having come from Citrusdal, donated approximately 2,5 Ha of land on which the church was to be built. In 1874 the Calvinia congregation broke away from Clanwilliam, including the congregants Nieuwoudtville. The Tulbagh circuit had, by then, already recommended that a new congregation should be formed in Calvinia. While this had repeatedly been brought to the attention of the circuit, a suitable location for a farm church could not be found. In 1885 the total number of congregants attained two thousand. Representatives from Calvinia were sent to investigate the founding of a congregation in Nieuwoudtville. On April 1885 construction of a church building commenced, which became known as the Circuit Church of the Calvinia congregation in service of the Northern Under-Bokkeveld. The church was built with sandstone, locally sourced, and sledged on unbraided horse hides to the building site. In later years a consistory, mother’s room and a stable for the church member’s horses were built alongside the church building. From 1890 there was a concerted effort to form a new congregation, but the farm Willemsrivier was then not for sale at an affordable price, neither was it suitable as a site for a new town since there was an insufficient supply of water for such a burgeoning population. Today the church is owned by Mr Japie Nel and it is being used as a storage place. Presbytery Approximately 400 meters from the church, there is a presbytery which was built from sandstone which is also used as a storage facility today. Jail There is a jail, or more correctly, a holding cell, where the convicts engaged in the building of the nearby Vanrhyn's Pass were quartered. Office (Kantoor) This is of the oldest buildings on the farm and was erected in 1745. Oral tradition has it that both Boer Generals Maritz and Smuts bivouacked there, but on separate occasions as they were known to not get along, during their guerrilla incursions into the Cape Colony in the Anglo-Boer War. Glaciated Pavements There are exposed rock pavements scarred by rocks dragged across the face by glacial flows from previous ice ages clearly visible in the farmyard. [See also Willemsrivier Blog] Books and articles that reference Willemsrivier (old town, now Trekpad Guest Farm)
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