Griquatown

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Griquatown is a sheep farming town (primarily dorpers, a South African breed which can now also be found in places such as Australia). It is situated in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa about 150 km from the city of Kimberley. It has the unique distinction of being the first town to be established north of the Orange River.

In 1801 William Anderson and Cornelius Kramer, of the London Missionary Society, established a station among the Griqua at Leeuwenkuil. The site proved to be too arid for cultivation, and in about 1805 they moved the station to another spring further up the valley and called it Klaarwater. Their second choice was little better than their first, and for many years a lack of water prevented any further development. The name of the settlement was changed later to Griquatown or Griekwastad in Afrikaans. They lived among a mixed nomadic community of the Chaguriqua tribe and "bastaards" (people of mixed origin) from Piketberg. Their two leaders Andries Waterboer and Adam Kok II later had a dispute and Kok left for Philippolis.

From 1813 - 17 July 1871, the town and its surrounding area functioned as Waterboer's Land. Waterboer himself lived in a "palace", which in reality was a house with six rooms. A monument for Waterboer was later erected near the town's hospital.

Dr. Robert Moffat and his wife Mary, on their way to the town of Kuruman, were residing in Griquatown when their daughter, also Mary (later Mrs. David Livingstone) was born in 1821. There is now a museum that strangely is dedicated to her rather than the founder of the town, William Anderson.

That Griquatown was later the capital of British Colony Griqualand West from 1873-1880, with its own flag and currency, before it was annexed into the Cape Colony.^[1]

Nowadays, the town is best known for the semi-precious stones found there, particularly Tiger's eye and Jasper.