Explorers, Teachers and Citizens, A German-South African History

There have been Germans in South Africa for as long as there have been Europeans. During the 17th Century, there were apparently at times more Germans than Dutch at the Cape. But for various reasons the Germans never formed a separate group from the Dutch but were instead quickly integrated into Dutch society. It is said that nearly one-half of all boer ancestors were in fact Germans, and many boer names bear witness to this fact.

But also after the Cape had come under British rule, many Germans continued to settle at the Cape and in the other newly established British colonies. The British actually attempted to settle whole groups of Germans (e.g. in Philippi and Caffraria) as the Germans were known as hard-working and dependable settlers. Furthermore, missionaries of the Hermannsburg, Berlin, Moravian and the Rhenish Missionary Societies spread throughout Southern Africa. Other Germans sympathised with the Boers and moved to the new Boer Republics in the interior. A number of Germans managed to rise to prominent positions in Society and politics in these republics. Finally, the discovery of diamonds in Kimberley and subsequently of gold on the Witwatersrand brought many adventurous or wealth-seeking Germans to the subcontinent. Altogether, by the turn of the 19th Century, it was possible to travel from the Northern Transvaal through Natal, the Eastern Cape and through to Cape Town and to stay with Germans nearly all the way.

The stream of immigrants coming from Germany was interrupted twice in the 20th Century because of the World Wars, but in between the wars and in the 1950's and 60's when the economy in South Africa was booming, many Germans came to settle here as South Africa seemed to offer far more than Germany.