Robben Island - Childhood memories of growing up there.

Dear Mr Klerck

I was in the process of trying to find details of the service of my great great grandfather as lightkeeper at Robben Island when I stumbled upon your site. Perhaps you may be able to guide me.

I have some ancestry associated with Robben Island. There may even be more that I am not aware of!

1 My great great-grand grandfather DAVID ALLEN was the first lightkeeper of the Robben Island lighthouse from 1/1/1864. (Some sources say that the lighthouse was commissioned on 1/1/1865.)

The record in “Southern Lights” by Harold Williams is incomplete: it does not state when David Allen completed his service there. David Allen moved to Mossel Bay where he died 17/09/1895.

David Allen’s daughter MARGARET ANNE married JOHN FOSTER who became the Senior Lightkeeper at Cape St Blaize, Mossel Bay on 21/10 /1881 (“Southern Lights”)

John Foster was born in Calcutta in 1853 but it is not known when he came to South Africa. The story was that he had jumped ship at Port Nolloth.

Based on the year of birth (September 1875) of their first child, Alice Jane (my grandmother), one can calculate that they must have married about 1874/1875 when John would have been about 21 or 22 years old.

Margaret died in Mossel Bay in 1895 at the age of 43. In 1874 she would also have been about 21 years old.

It is surmised that Margaret would have been about 8 or 9 years old when her father became the light keeper.

It is possible that John Foster landed up on Robben Island where he would have met Margaret. Perhaps they were married on the Island.

As John Foster was appointed Senior Lightkeeper at Mossel Bay in 1881 it is possible that he may have gained experience as an assistant lightkeeper elsewhere, perhaps on Robben Island under the tutelage of his father-in-law David Allen. His name does not appear in the list of lightkeepers in “Southern Lights”

David Allen’s wife was ALICE. She died on the Island 10/05/1872 at the age of 38.

Grave of Alice Allen taken January 2013 in the cemetery on Robben Island

The inscription reads

My questions are:

(1) When did David Allen cease to be lightkeeper at Robben Island?

(2) Was John Foster ever employed at the lighthouse in any capacity?

(3) Did John Foster marry Margaret Allen on the Island?

(4) Was their first child Alice Jane born on the Island?

(5) Would there be any photographs of any of these people available anywhere?

(6) Would there be any records of births, marriages etc at any of the churches on the Island? If not, where would they be kept?

Could you possibly help with answers to any of these questions?

2 WILLIAM DAVID FOSTER, the son of John and Margaret Foster, was born in Mossel Bay. After the Boer War he met CATHERINA (Katie) VISSER (possibly on Robben Island). What he would have been doing on the Island is not known.

Katie Visser was the daughter of Cornelis Johannes Visser whose farm near Heilbron, OFS, was taken and destroyed by the British in 1901. Katie was placed in a concentration camp in Pietermaritzburg. After the war she moved to the Cape with her father and brother Christoffel to live near Kleinmond. In about 1905 when she was 16 years old Katie became a nurse at the Women’s Asylum on Robben Island.

Nursing Staff, Women’s Asylum 1907. Katie is seated in front far left.

Willie Foster and Katie married in Wynberg 21/05/1912 at the DRC. In 1918 they moved to Robben Island with their first three children, Margaret (Maggie), Cyril John and Jacobus (Jackie). Willie was a joiner and cabinet maker but later became a dresser at the leper colony. A fourth child, Glenda, was born on the Island in 1922. Jackie died as a result of an accident in 1926 when he was 9 years old and is buried on the Island. Subsequently family members have not been able to locate the grave.

Katie’s brother Christoffel had followed her to the Island when she became a nurse.

Christoffels first two sons also died on the Island and are buried there. (cause unknown). The graves have not been located.

After Christoffel married, Cornelis Johannes Visser, the father of Katie and Christoffel also moved to the Island where he died and was buried. The grave has not been located.

Robben Island transport! Circa 1922/1923. Willie Foster, son of John and Margaret Foster and grandson of David Allen first lightkeeper. Katie is on the cart with the 4 children, Maggie, Glenda, Jackie and Cyril. The family left the Island in 1929 after Willie Foster was caught with a half jack of brandy when he returned from a visit to the mainland! A fifth child, Irene was later born in Kuilsrivier.

I visited the Island some years ago but it was a conducted tour in a minibus and we were not allowed to get out except at the designated tourist spots, so I was not able to visit the cemetery or the lighthouse or the churches etc.

Here is another photo, taken in 1925, of the school children of Std 3 and 4. The girl on the right is Margaret (Maggie) Foster, daughter of Willie and Katie Foster and great grand daughter of David Allen the first lighthouse keeper. Maggie died in 1965 at the age of 52.The photo is in the possession of Irene Enid Islip (nee Foster) who is the younger sister of Maggie. She lives in Parow and is now 87 years old.

Grateful for you assistance if you can help in any way with my questions.

Regards Arnold Clarke (Great grandson of Margaret Anne Foster (Nee Allen) and John Foster)

37 Snowdrop Avenue Jeffreys Bay Eastern Cape 6330

[aclarke1@vodamail.co.za]

January 2017

I found your web site very interesting. I have been research my family tree over the past 10 years and found out that my great grandfather Richard John Sellers died on Robben Island. Is there any way I can find out what he was there for and what he died from??

Last Name: Sellers
First Name: Richard John
Date of Birth: 1827
Place of Birth: St. Giles in the Fields, London, England
Parents – Father: Richard Sellers
Parents – Mother: Anne
Name of Spouse: Jane Ellen Herd
Marriage Date: 1857/05/04
Marriage Place: Wesleyan Chapel King Williams Town
Date of Death: 16 Apr 1870 age 43y 8d
Place of Death: Robben Island.

Looking up woltemade ferry and your site popped up. Interesting. Wedding photo suggests your father was in the Marines. Coastal Artillery perhaps?

Christopher Nash [christopher.nash@ntlworld.com]

[Sept 2016]

Dear Mr Klerck,

I hope this email finds you well. I just came across your website and I'm very much hoping you might be able to help me.

My name is Maddy Bazil and I am a freelance photographer with a particular interest in photojournalism through a sociopolitical lens. I am interested in shooting a photographic project regarding the lives of the dwindling population living on Robben Island today, documenting the relationships amongst former wardens, guards and former prisoners as they coexist in the mundanity of everyday life in a place with a nuanced history. My goal would be to engage in a correspondence with a handful of residents in order to get to know them and ultimately photograph them as they go about their lives engaged in the constant intersection between past and present, the giving and accepting of forgiveness, reckoning with history yet continuing onward.

However I am finding it admittedly hard to get my hands on any contact information for residents of the island. Since you are quite adept at connecting people and have close ties to the island, I am wondering if you perhaps know of any contact details for the Robben Island Village Association or for any residents of who might be amenable to speaking with me, or even just a heads-up as to any other channels of communication I might try to get in contact with residents.

I think this is such an important story to be told, one which is already under-reported due to the age and geographical isolation and desire for privacy of many of the small population -- and as more years go by and people grow older and/or continue to move away from the island, this story will become impossible so it is in the essence of time to document this remarkable and complicated slice of the South African narrative before it slips away.

Needless to say, any help or leads would be much appreciated!

Kind regards

Maddy Bazil madeleinebazil.com

august 2016

I trust this email finds you in good health. I recently came across your website highlighting Robben island. We recently discovered that my wife’s biological father whom she has never met worked on the island in the early 1980’s. Would you know of a police ledger detailing members of the police force who worked on the island, or stayed on the island between 1975 and 1985. Co-incidentally his surname is Burger. That is unfortunately all information we have at the moment.

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I am looking for information about my grandfather that worked on Robben Island – he was Alfred Henry Prosser, a Police Sargent – 1940 – 1950. If you can help with any information about him, I will appreciate it!

Esther de Beer Administrative Assistant 018 299 5390, 018 297 5130, estherd@tlokwe.gov.za

He is my wife Annamarie Pearson(Johnston) cousin I believe as my wife’s father was Charles and that would be Gilberts brother.

[June 2015] sadly I cannot find Leslie Johnson's email address or the email she sent me, which is at the bottom of this page, so must be long ago. Can anyone help Ed?