BEAUTY OF A NATIONAL MONUMENT

Only the gardens at The Old Fort and Durban’s first cemetery in KE Masinga (Old Fort) Road have changed since the 1938 painting by Chas E Peers. The fort was built in 1842 by soldiers of the 27th regiment, under the command of Captain Thomas Smith, to strengthen the British presence in the town and fight off the Dutch, who wanted to form a republic in Natal.

The buildings were later given to the Durban Light Infantry, its magazine converted into a chapel and the beautiful gardens established in the inner courtyard. The military cemetery houses the graves of men who died in the siege of 1842.

It was declared a National Monument on April 6, 1936. The painting is one of 100 Peers rendered to be collected in packets of Springbok cigarettes, to fill an album called Our Land, issued by The United Tobacco Company, in 1939.

The Independent on Saturday appeals to readers who have old pictures of Durban and other parts of the province to send them to us for consideration.

If any readers are featured in the old picture, we will do our best to recreate the scene with them in it again. Readers sending pictures digitally – images should be about 1MB – can address them, with the relevant information, to satmail@inl.co.za.

If the pictures are in hard copy format, they can be posted to The Editor, Old Pictures, The Independent on Saturday, PO Box 47549, Greyville, 4023.