Buffelsvlei (aan de Groote Swarteberg, Swellendam district)

· on record 1808–1828 · show on the map

Also recorded as: de Buffelsvallij gel: aan de Zwartberg (1808); de Buffels Valeij aan de Grootswartberg (1828); Buffels Vally (1828)

This parcel has no matched survey polygon, so it cannot be drawn on the map. That is a gap in the cadastre match, not an absence from the record.

Why this farm is here

Pieter Cornelis Oosthuizen (1788-1842) held it. Not yet placed on the map.

Pieter Cornelis Oosthuizen (1788-1842) is on record on this ground directly. No trace needed.

document A document in the collection describes this ground DOC-0369
document A document in the collection describes this ground DOC-0371
lead An open question in this record is about this ground Which Ladismith-country farm is the Buffelsvlei of 1808 and 1828?
lead An open question in this record is about this ground Align and read the rest of the 1808 Landerijen leaf, image 343, rows 440-472

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.

1808 Pieter Cornelis Oosthuizen (1788-1842) held ../1808 · lived on ../1808
1828 Johannes Jacobus Oosthuizen (b.1753) held 1828-01-27 · lived on 1828-01-27

Steps	Between	Nearest common ancestor by blood
3	Pieter Cornelis Oosthuizen (1788-1842) · Johannes Jacobus Oosthuizen (b.1753)	Dina Carolina Britz born 1732 (2+1 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

before 1808 ownership Pieter Cornelis Oosthuizen (1788-1842) (18 February 1788–7 December 1842)
loan farm · occupation · confidence medium
before 1808 lived here Pieter Cornelis Oosthuizen (1788-1842) (18 February 1788–7 December 1842)
opgaafrol
28 October 1828 document estate inventory
MOOC8/44.45
10 November 1828 document estate inventory
MOOC8/73.34
28 October 1828 estate Johannes Jacobus Oosthuizen (b.1753) (1753–26 June 1828)
MOOC8/44.45 · de Buffels Valeij aan de Groot Swartberg (Buffelsvlei No. 18, Oudtshoorn)
10 November 1828 estate estate inventory: Anna Johanna Oosthuysen and her widower Pieter Andries Craffort
MOOC8/73.34 · Buffels Vally
1828-01-27 to 1828-06-26 ownership Johannes Jacobus Oosthuizen (b.1753) (1753–26 June 1828)
loan farm (one third of the opstal) · estate inventory · confidence high
27 January 1828 lived here Johannes Jacobus Oosthuizen (b.1753) (1753–26 June 1828)
estate inventory

Documents

transcription held, not an image

Estate inventory, deed MOOC8/44.45, 28 October 1828

transcription held, not an image

Estate inventory, deed MOOC8/73.34, 10 November 1828

Research notes

[2026-09-23, SRC-673] THE LOAN PLACE WHERE JOHANNES JACOBUS OOSTHUIJSEN SENIOR DIED. MOOC8/44.45: he died 26 June 1828 'op de plaas genaamt de Buffels Valij aan de Grootswartberg', having bought a third of its opstal from Marthinus OosthuysenM M:zn on 27 January 1828 for Rd 1064 (OWN-000129, RES-000050). MOOC8/73.34 (SRC-675) is a second Oosthuysen household on 'Buffels Vally' the same year. THE PIN: the cadastre has one Buffelsvlei on the Groot Swartberg, Oudtshoorn No. 18 at De Rust, 1263 ha, on the south face of the mountain 18 km from Klaarstroom and at the far end of the poort that opened in 1858; the Beaufort West 'BUFFELS VALLEY' No. 268 that the 1915 divisional map labels is in the Dwyka corner, nowhere near the mountain, and Calitzdorp's Buffelsvlei burial ground (CEM-487) has no farm of that name in the farms layer. [TO VERIFY] against the ward of the field cornet G. Joubert, who took both 1828-29 sheets. PREQUEL GROUND under 9a, on the far side of the Swartberg; NEVER core.

[2026-09-23, SRC-690] THE DE RUST PIN IS WITHDRAWN, THE SAME DAY IT WAS MADE. Three things put this Buffelsvlei in the Ladismith country and not at De Rust. (1) The Swellendam opgaafrol of 1808 has Pieter Cornelis OosthuizenL junior (PER-002084) on 'de Buffelsvallij gel: als boven' - aan de Zwartberg - at 14 uuren from the drostdy, and the three Ladismith farms read on the previous opening calibrate that column at about five kilometres to the hour; Oudtshoorn No. 18 is about 43 hours out. (2) Both 1828-29 sheets were taken by the field cornet G. Joubert and sworn at Swellendam before the resident magistrate (MOOC8/71.28), and the Swellendam district's 'Field Cornetcy of Groote Swarteberg' is where the diagrams of 1832-38 put Voorbaat, Buffelsfontein, Buffel Rivier Poort and Ockerts Kraal (DOC-0328 to DOC-0330, DOC-0347): the range the papers call the Groote Swarteberg is the one above Ladismith. De Rust lay in the George district from 1811. (3) The family's other places are all there. NO POLYGON YET: the Ladismith cadastre has no Buffelsvlei by name; the candidates are Buffelfontein No. 129 at about 13 hours beside Wolvefontein, Buffelsfontein No. 36 and Buffel Rivier Poort No. 30 at about 16, and the 'Buffels-kraal aan de Swartberg' of 1808 at 14. LEAD-0365. A wrong pin is worse than a missing one, so the row carries none.

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

Open questions

Which Ladismith-country farm is the Buffelsvlei of 1808 and 1828? priority 2 · LEAD-0365
Pieter Cornelis OosthuizenL junior held 'de Buffelsvallij gel: als boven' (aan de Zwartberg) as a loan place in 1808, 14 uuren from Swellendam (SRC-690); Johannes Jacobus Oosthuijsen senior died on 'de Buffels Valij aan de Grootswartberg' in 1828 (MOOC8/44.45) in the field cornet G. Joubert's ward, sworn at Swellendam; a second Oosthuysen household was on 'Buffels Vally' the same year (MOOC8/73.34). The Ladismith cadastre carries no farm of that name. Which farm is it?

What would settle it A diagram or a grant that names Buffelsvlei with a farm number in the Swellendam or Ladismith division, or a neighbour that is already pinned.
Align and read the rest of the 1808 Landerijen leaf, image 343, rows 440-472 priority 3 · LEAD-0366
The right-hand leaf of the opening that holds entries 436-472 names the farms of the Touwsberg, the Touws river, the Rooiberg and the Swartberg at 13-18 uuren, with the ward labels 'agter de Swarteberg' and 'agter de Tradouw', but on screen the rows after 439 could not be ruled against the names leaf. Which household holds which farm?

What would settle it Each farm line matched to an entry number, and the column headers of the numeric block on the right-hand leaf read.

What the record is missing

The record stops in 1828 and never resumes second order · B2 trail-ends
Buffelsvlei (aan de Groote Swarteberg, Swellendam district) was worked as far as 1828-06-26, with Johannes Jacobus OosthuizenH (b.1753) the last owner on record. 198 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.
20 years, and the ground changes hands to nobody we can follow second order · B1 succession
On Buffelsvlei (aan de Groote Swarteberg, Swellendam district), Pieter Cornelis OosthuizenL (1788-1842) is the last owner recorded from ../1808, and the next entry is Johannes Jacobus OosthuizenH (b.1753) from 1828-01-27, 20 years later, with no person in common. DOC-0369 records the later arrival but not the 20 years before it.

What would settle it The Deeds Office transfer register for this farm between 1808 and 1828. A transfer names its predecessor in title, so one deed closes the whole gap.

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.