Whittals, Randalls and Foxcrofts.

A very close relationship.

Granny Foxcroft, Oupa Dave Randall, Vernie Whittal &
behind Granpa Henry Whittal & Eric Foxcroft

            I have told you that my dad’s sister, Gertie Whittal, married my mother’s cousin, Willie Foxcroft, and that they farmed on “Mooihoek” on the other side of Bothaville.   Uncle Willie’s mother was a sister to my Oupa Dave Randall.   She was known as Aunt Sal, but I knew her as Granny Foxcroft.   There was a very close relationship between this family and ours so although we lived a little distance apart, we saw each other quite often.   They had four children, Olive (the same age as my sister Daphne), Eric who was a year older than me, Molly and Sarah.   Olive and Daphne were very close friends, and Eric was my best friend.

            We used to visit each other often, but as there were no telephones we always took a chance that they would be at home, and they did the same.   One weekend we went to visit them by cart and horses and at the same time they came to visit us.

   We took the back road, via Mirage, and they came on the other road, via Bothaville, also by cart and horses.   Nobody locked their houses in those days and you had honest and reliable servants who would see to the milking, the separating of the milk, feeding the poultry, pigs, dogs and cats.  So, when we got to their place and learned from the servants that they had gone to visit us, we made ourselves at home while we waited for them to return, and they did exactly the same at our place.   When it got too late for us to go back home my mother made supper for us, and Aunty Gertie did the same for them at our place, and so we spent the night in each others homes.

            We left for home the next morning after breakfast, taking the road via Bothaville, and they left for their home, via Mirage.   The result was that we once again missed each other, but fortunately the women had left thank you notes with the hope of seeing one another again shortly.   Nobody was fussy in those days and as there was always a bag of mealie meal in the house to make porridge and plenty of milk to go with it, it was easy to feed a big family.   There would also be a loaf of bread, butter and jam, or homemade bacon, and there would be fresh eggs.   It was fun and we all laughed about it for years to come.

            On another occasion, a year when we had a good crop of pumpkins and theirs were destroyed by a hail storm, my parents decided that we would visit them and take them some of our produce.   We left by cart and horses with a nice load of pumpkins.   Thelma and I sat on the seat with Daddy and Mommy, while Bertha and Daphne sat at the back on the carrier with pumpkins around them and under the seat.   There was place for our little luggage and ‘padkos’ in front of the seat.   It may have been crowded and uncomfortable, but no one ever complained as we were a very happy family.

    

        The horses were trotting along nicely and we were all happy, most probably singing as we went along, when suddenly the cart’s ‘disselboom’ (shaft) broke, and the cart toppled backwards.   The horses stopped immediately and Daddy helped every one down, outspanned the horses and tied them to the fence posts.   There were pumpkins all over and Bertha was hopping on one leg, crying and saying that her leg was broken.   Daddy soon found out that she would have nothing more serious than a bruise and then everything was fine again.   He climbed on Chummy and rode him home bareback to ask Petrus to bring his cart and horses to take us home.   They quickly made a temporary shaft, took the cart back home and repaired it.

           

The Foxcroft farm, “Mooihoek”, was near the Vals River and there was a ‘spruit’ running through it.   Uncle Will had built a house from black iron-stones found on the farm and always hoped that one day he would become rich when the Government would mine for iron ore on his farm.   This, of course, never happened.   They had a windmill by the house which pumped up very brak water and old Granny Foxcroft always told us that the water was full of ‘padda’ (frog) wee which we children believed, but they were all used to that water and used it for everything.    

       The ‘spruit’ (a stream) was situated a little way from the house and there were a lot of reeds growing there.   This is where I saw Red Bishop as well as Yellow Bishop birds for the first time.   My sisters robbed some of their nests in the reed beds of eggs for their collections.  There were also many other types of birds in those reeds.   I can remember that Auntie Gertie kept Rhode Island Red fowls while Granny Foxcroft kept the beautiful Sussex fowls which were white with black laced neck feathers and black tail feathers.

            Uncle Will was a fun loving man and he and my dad were the very best of friends all their lives, but regrettably we did not see much of each other after we moved to the Eastern Cape.   Many years later, when Eric was farming for his dad, they sold “Mooihoek” and bought a farm in the Ficksburg district of the Eastern Free State.   Both Uncle Willie and Aunty Gertie are buried on that farm.

Their three daughters are now all getting on in years and Olive is in her eighties, but Eric is long gone.   His widow, Nancy, gave me the most wonderful gift, and that was the family bible of Grandpa John Henry Whittal and our Granny Sarah Ann.

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Gertie (Whittal) Foxcroft as a Young Woman.
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