Contact Artefacts please if you have any comments or more information regarding this record.	Menu Home Upfront Now Up Books Towns Structures People Firms Lexicon		Welcome Cottage Glencairn, Simonstown, Western Cape

Date: n.d. Type: Homestead Style: Cape Dutch Status: Extant Street: Glen Oak Road

Declared a national monument on 27 December 1985 vide Item 22, page 12 of Government Gazette No. 10047. Significance as gazetted (Only a description of the property is gazetted) The property, inclusive of the so-called Welcome Cottage and the adjacent dwelling house thereon, being Portion 5 of the farm welcome Cottage 967, in the Administrative District of the Cape, in extent 2885 (two thousand eight hundred and eighty-five) square meters. Concise history The history of the property goes back to 1810 when HE Brand, Deputy Fiscal at Simon's Town petitioned the Cape Government for the lease of a peace of land in what is known today as the Glencairn Valley. This was granted to him. In 1822 a new grant was issued to Mr HE Brand for 15 years period. In 1928 this quitrent grant was transferred to the Harbour Master at Simon's Town, A Mr T B Woolls. On the death of the insolvent Wools in 1942 the property was put up for public auction, the advertisement including a description of the property as: "A Substantial Cottage containing 4 Rooms and kitchen, besides a Store Room, Cow House, Stabling and Servants’ Room…." The property was acquired by Mr F B Pinney, then Sub-Collector of Customs at Simon's Town. In 1871 it was bought by Mrs N Albertyn (nee De Villiers). It was passed down through the De Villiers family until the property was acquired by the Ministry of Defence in 1974 or 1975. The transfer of the property to the NMC was agreed to in 1979. Improvements on the site include: The main house An additional house A Cottage Servant’s room Double garage It can safely be assumed that the core of the present structures on site date to before 1842. The SAHRA Property Register lists the historical importance as being: The land on which Welcome Cottage is built was granted in Perpetual Quitrent to Johannes Henricus Brand, Deputy Fiscal of Simon's Town, in 18 11. He later became Member of the Court of Justice. J H Brand's son, Christoffel, was the first Speaker of the House of Assembly and his grandson, Johannes Henricus Brand, became the first President of the Orange Free State. Both the main homestead and the outbuildings are predominantly Cape Dutch in style and of considerable architectural merit.