Spreeuw Fontein & Toornits Kraal (Spreeufontein No. 26)

26 on the cadastre · on record 1834–1990 · show on the map

Farm number: No. 26
On the cadastre: 26, whole farmregistered as SPREEUW FONTEIN
District: Prince Albert
Extent, as the diagram states it: 23139 morgen 450 roods (1834)
Modern surveyed area: 15666.1 ha

The historic extent and the modern surveyed area are two separate measurements and are not presented here as confirming each other. The first is what a surveyor wrote on a diagram, usually in morgen. The second is what the modern cadastre draws.

Why this farm is here

Frans Stephanus Botma (1860-1936) lived on this ground. Connected to the Oosthuizen, Marincowitz or Van der Merwe lines BY MARRIAGE, not by blood, 1 step on the shortest path. 54 km from Klaarstroom.

Each step is a recorded parentage or marriage in this model, and the shortest one the record supports, follow the names to check it.

story A written history is set on this ground The aardvark's hole and the Gatsplaas gold rush, 1871-1892
story A written history is set on this ground On 15 April 1841 loan ground becomes property
story A written history names this ground Vrolykheid's story
story A written history names this ground Rondawel's history: from a widow's mark to today's Marincowitz farm
…and 2 more, listed in full further down this page.

Stories

about this farm The aardvark's hole and the Gatsplaas gold rush, 1871-1892
An aardvark turns up a nugget on Spreeuwfontein in 1871; twenty years later a shepherd finds a second one and five hundred people arrive. 1,042 claims yield 504 ounces. The diggers' village was called Gatsplaas.
about this farm On 15 April 1841 loan ground becomes property
One surveyor works the Koup for two seasons. Seven years later, on a single day, the Crown converts the loan farms to perpetual quitrent: twenty-one deeds on twenty parcels, and the map of the district is set for a century.
mentions this farm Vrolykheid's story
The farm where the paper and the people disagree: Stretch's 1833 survey already carrying the names of portions not cut for another century, two titles granted on one day in 1841 - one to an Oosthuisen and one to an 'N. Hitge' whose deed four later portions cite instead - a Trieste immigrant who married a Hitge in 1844 and died holding the farm in 1890, and the death notice that finally put the Hitges on the ground.
mentions this farm Rondawel's history: from a widow's mark to today's Marincowitz farm
From a loan-farm widow who signed with a mark to the Marincowitz farm of today: the full documented history of Rondabel No. 124 - the Venter household of 1829, the twelve-farm grant day of 1841, the Oosthuizen-Theron partnership of 1868, the 1910-34 subdivisions, and the two graves by the huis nobody has read.
set here Minerals under our ground
Four times people have come to this country certain there was something valuable under it: gold in 1871 and 1891, oil in the middle 1960s, uranium from 1969 to 1985, and shale gas from 2011. A drill bit still lies on Rondabel. The boreholes SOEKOR drilled for oil are the same cores that deflated the shale gas estimate fifty years later.
about this farm The ground cut, and then stitched back together
This project holds 124 boundary acts: 96 subdivisions and 20 consolidations. Sorted by date they tell one story with a turning point. The district cut ground for a hundred and fifty years; from 1970 it has only stitched.
set here Vredendal and its people
Vredendal is a werf name on Spreeufontein No. 26, the farm the district called Gatsplaas. Five graves carrying three surnames, an 1886 slate slab whose inscription dates a woman to the day and whose line runs unbroken back to Enkhuizen in 1744, and then a household: the van der Merwes, and a man who died on his own birthday.
about this farm The Botmas of Spreeufontein
Four generations of one family on the ground the district called Gatsplaas. A Botma laid out a village there during the 1891 gold rush; his grandfather held the farm when the first gold was found; and a son of the house married four times and buried three wives before he was twenty-six. Two le Grange women married two brothers, and Botes and Niehaus run through the whole of it.

What this farm became

From 1872 this ground stopped being one farm, and the story continues on the pieces cut from it. Its own record above ends there; what happened afterwards belongs to a portion, not to the whole.

1872 Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 2
19XX Vredendal (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 1)

Still filed here, and probably should not be. These rows are dated after this ground stopped being one farm, so under the rule above they belong on a portion. They are shown rather than hidden, because a misfiled row is only fixable once somebody can see it.

../1874-06-30 residence Lodewyk Bothma (1802-05-24–1874-06-30)
1884 residence Frans Stephanus Botma (1860-1936) (1860-02–1936-04-04)

Who stood on this ground, and how they were related

Everyone the record places here - by deed, by residence, or by burial - and the kinship between each pair of them. Two numbers are given and they are deliberately kept apart. Steps is how far apart two people are in the family graph, counting a marriage as one step. The common ancestor is the nearest one they share by blood, with the year they were born. A pair four steps apart through a couple born in the 1750s is a relationship; a pair ten steps apart through a progenitor born in the 1630s is background, because almost everybody descends from him. Read both.

Each bar is one person's time on this ground. A faded bar has no recorded end and is closed at the next arrival, which is our inference and not a date anybody wrote down. Where two people who follow each other are related within six steps, the step count is printed between them.

1841 Cornelis Floris Johannes Meyer held 1841-04-15
1871 Lodewyk Bothma lived on ../1874-06-30 · held 1871~
1884 Frans Stephanus Botma (1860-1936) lived on 1884

Steps	Between	Nearest common ancestor by blood
2	Lodewyk Bothma · Frans Stephanus Botma (1860-1936)	Huibrecht Cloete born 1763 (1+3 generations up)

Drawn from the parentage and marriages this project holds, never from a shared surname. A pair with no common ancestor here may still be related through a link nobody has recorded yet.

What the record holds, in order

1834 document SG diagram 432/1834
Bf.W.Q.5-26
1841-04-15 to 1848-07-21 ownership Cornelis Floris Johannes Meyer (15 July 1791–21 July 1848)
Perpetual Quitrent · grant · confidence high
1850 boundary change subdivision: becomes Vredendal (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 1)
1871~ to 1874-06-30 ownership Lodewyk Bothma (24 May 1802–30 June 1874)
owner · confidence high
1872 boundary change subdivision: becomes Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 2
before 1874-06-30 lived here Lodewyk Bothma (24 May 1802–30 June 1874)
death notice
1884 lived here Frans Stephanus Botma (1860-1936) (February 1860–4 April 1936)
register
20 August 1891 document newspaper
1903 boundary change remainder: becomes Klein Waterval (Spreeufontein No. 26 Remainder)
14 May 1939 document death notice
entry no. 40
1990 boundary change consolidation: becomes Farm 215
undated boundary change subdivision: becomes Vredendal (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 1)
undated boundary change subdivision: becomes Lot A (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 3)
undated boundary change subdivision: becomes Lot B (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 4)
undated boundary change subdivision: becomes Lot C (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 5)
undated document SG diagram verso 432/1834 (verso)

Ground cut out of this farm

Vredendal (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 1) 5197.5 ha
Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 2
Lot A (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 3) 5227.1 ha
Lot B (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 4) 5237.3 ha
Lot C (Spreeufontein No. 26 Ptn 5) 4.3 ha
Klein Waterval (Spreeufontein No. 26 Remainder)

Bordered by, as the diagram names them

N Ongeluk's Fontein
S Waterval
E Riet Fontein
W Varsche Fontein

On the 1915 divisional map

As the Surveyor-General printed this farm in 1915: the registered holder, the date the title was issued and its quitrent reference, copied off the sheet as written. The whole map, farm by farm

Farm, as printed	Holder	Title	Quitrent	Note
SPREEUW FONTEIN Amended Title	F. S. Botma	7.4.18[?99]	P.A.Q. 5.12 · fol. 97[?3]	printed "SPREEOW FONTEIN"

Also bordered by, as the modern cadastre draws it

Ground that touches this farm on the Surveyor-General's current polygons and that none of the diagrams held here names. Derived from the geometry, not read off a document.

Documents

Scan of Surveyor-General diagram, 432/1834, 1834

Surveyor-General diagram, 432/1834, 1834
SCAN199.TIF

Diagram verso, 432/1834 (verso)
SCAN200.TIF

catalogued, no scan held

Death notice, deed entry no. 40, 14 May 1939
record-image (28).jpg

Newspaper, 20 August 1891
gatsplaas vredendal spreeuwfontein goud.pdf

Cadastre

Surveyor-General diagram index for this parcel

Research notes

Site of the 1891 Prince Albert gold rush. Known locally as "GATSPLAAS" - [FAMILY] Frans: it was Gatsplaas when the gold was found; documented in an official 1939 death notice as a burial place (DOC-0017), while the 1891 press called it Spreeuwfontein. Granted 15 Apr 1841 to C.F.J. Meyer, folio 973. Broken up from 1850. Eastern neighbour of Varsche Fontein. [FAMILY] Vredendal, where Frans's mother grew up and which his maternal uncle holds via a trust, is part of this farm - which portion is not yet established [TO VERIFY].

[3 Aug 2026, SRC-202] WHERE IT WENT, AND WHERE IT CAME FROM. The 1990 consolidation LG 7373-90 (DOC-0168) takes the REMAINDER of this farm, together with the Restant of its Gedeelte 2 and its Gedeelte 6, into DIE PLAAS NR 215 (PAR-000134) of 10 710 ha. That extends this farm's record past the 1939 end it had here. The same document gives the remainder its own diagram, KAART 1/1903, and - more useful - the ORIGINAL GRANT: GRONDBRIEF NR P.A.Q. 6-1. Neither was held before. [TO VERIFY against the grant itself, which is not held.]

[9 Aug 2026] GATSPLAAS WAS PORTION 1 OF THIS FARM, and it was renamed VREDENDAL before F.J.W. van der Merwe bought it in or before the 1950s . So the name belongs to PAR-000020 rather than to farm 26 as a whole.

[8 Aug 2026, DOC-0218] A POSSIBLE ORIGIN FOR THAT NAME. The eastern neighbour, Riet Fontein No. 12 (PAR-000156), has a watercourse called the GATS RIVER drawn across its 1868 diagram, running towards the boundary the two farms share. A place taking its everyday name from the river beside it is ordinary. NOT PROVEN: the 1868 sheet does not use the name Gatsplaas, and "gat" is a common element in Karoo place names. [TO VERIFY] whether the Gats River is drawn on Spreeufontein's own diagrams.

[9 Aug 2026] THE 12.8% SHORTFALL ON THIS FARM IS NOT A PUZZLE, IT IS TWO EMPTY FIELDS. checks.py reports farm 26's portions summing to 13,661.6 ha against 15,666.1. The four portions that carry an area are Portions 1, 3, 4 and 5; PORTION 2 (PAR-000021) AND THE REMAINDER, KLEIN WATERVAL (PAR-000025), CARRY NONE. The gap, 2,004.5 ha, is those two rows. Nothing here contradicts anything; the model simply has no figure for a fifth of this farm. Fill either row from the cadastre and the sum closes.

The research behind this page, kept separate from it: dated working notes, open questions, and what is not yet settled.

Open questions

Six parcels whose surveyed extent is far from their polygon with no reason recorded priority 2 · LEAD-0093
For each, is the extent mistyped, or did ground leave the farm without a note?

What would settle it The deduction table. It lists portion, name, extent, diagram and deed on one line.
Is the ruin on Spreeufontein Portion 1 a gold-rush building, and are the workings above it diggings? priority 2 · LEAD-0121
Two photographs of 29 March 2024 carry real device coordinates on Spreeufontein Portion 1: a collapsed dry-stone building at -32.969131, 22.290139 (855 m) and broken rock and spoil 232 m south and 74 m higher at -32.971036, 22.289128 (929 m). Do either belong to the 1891 rush, or to Gatsplaas, or to ordinary farming?

What would settle it Any contemporary map or report locating the diggings or the village; or a visit recording the ruin's plan, dimensions and any datable material - a fireplace, window openings, mortar, bottle glass, a dump. [14 Aug 2026] TWO CALL NUMBERS NOW ANSWER THE FIRST HALF OF THIS: CCP1/2/1/78 ref A12 for 1891 and CCP1/2/1/23 ref A30 for 1871. What they will not give is a coordinate for the ruin in IMG-0010; only a visit or a map does that.
Spreeufontein drew mineral interest again in 1910-1912, and this record ends the story in 1891 priority 2 · LEAD-0190
Two NAAIRS index lines put mineral activity on Spreeufontein a generation after the rush: an ALLEGED FIND OF CINNABAR in 1910-1911 (KAB SG 3/2/1/35 sys 01 ref MDC770) and THE SPREEUWFONTEIN (PRINCE ALBERT) GOLD MINING SYNDICATE LIMITED, registered under Act 25 of 1892 in 1912 (KAB LC 295 sys 02 ref 1210). What happened on that ground between about 1908 and the First World War, and who was behind the syndicate?

What would settle it Either file. Both would give names, dates and what came of it.
Which Spreeufontein did Stephanus Botma live on? priority P2 · LEAD-0320
Frans believes Stephanus BotmaM (1762-1830, LH6F-TD5), father of the Lodewyk who held Spreeufontein, lived on Spreeuwfontein. Which one?

What would settle it A residence for Stephanus BotmaM in any record, or the farm's district on a deed.

What the record is missing

30 years, and the ground changes hands to nobody we can follow first order · B1 succession
On Spreeuw Fontein & Toornits Kraal (Spreeufontein No. 26), Cornelis Floris Johannes MeyerH is the last owner recorded from 1841-04-15, and the next entry is Lodewyk BothmaH from 1871~, 30 years later, with no person in common. No document records the handover at all.

What would settle it The Deeds Office transfer register for this farm between 1841 and 1871. A transfer names its predecessor in title, so one deed closes the whole gap.
The record stops in 1874 and never resumes second order · B2 trail-ends
Spreeuw Fontein & Toornits Kraal (Spreeufontein No. 26) was worked as far as 1874-06-30, with Lodewyk BothmaH the last owner on record. 152 years follow with nothing. Who held it after that, and is it still one farm?

What would settle it The current title deed traced backwards, each transfer names the one before it, or the Surveyor-General's subdivision diagrams, which are what usually explain a farm going quiet.
“Riet Fontein” is named as a neighbour 5 times and we hold no parcel for it second order · B3 unheld-farm
5 separate surveys in this model put Riet Fontein on the boundary of ground we do hold (PAR-000005, PAR-000020, PAR-000025, PAR-000259). It has no parcel of its own here, so nothing is known about who held it or when, while it borders farms at the centre of the project.

What would settle it The Surveyor-General's farm index for the registration division will give it a farm number and a diagram; the cadastre pull in `fetch_cadastre.py` then places it on the map.

Found by breaks.py reading the model against itself, not written by hand, each one is a shape of missing record, not a fault in the data. The whole set is on the questions page.