Greylingstad, in it's heyday a busy place as it was close to the NAZSM railway line that ran from KZN to Johannesburg. I smiled as I read up on the town with one person recalling the Natte and Sappe having frequent brawls in the Greylingstad Hotel (at the bar I would guess) whilst someone was playing his concertina in the backround. Like most towns it was now pretty run down. I wanted to ride up into the hill, there was a SR (Scottish Regiment) sign clearly visible from below built with stone and recently painted white by some local folk who are trying hard to keep things together. I had no luck with most dirt tracks being dead ends or locked gates. I would not say it's a ghost town yet but it's close.
From a M&G article :
A regiment of Scottish Rifles took several artillery pieces on to the hill overlooking the town and built themselves a warren of walled fortifications from the remains of a Stone Age settlement that had stood there, undisturbed, for thousands of years.
The action between the British and the Boers was brief and inconclusive. The Boers would hurry down off the hills opposite the British fortifications on their ponies and harass and make mischief, often to ambiguous ends, and the British dragooned the local black population into a nearby concentration camp, making them repair the damage to the railway line caused by the Boers. The graves of the black concentration camp dead number several hundred. They are tucked behind a clump of bushes not far from the town itself and have only recently become the subject of curiosity.
The town did offer one big surprise and that is the NG church built on the hill close to Willemsdall overlooking the town. It was truly beautifull and well kept, one of the best NG churches I have ever seen. The style was more like the ones normally found in English churches. Built from sandstone and completed in 1913, even the clock on the bell tower was still working. After reading up on it's history it became quite evident as it was designed by an English architect taking part in a competition overseen by Herbert Baker. I could not help but wonder for how long this lovely building would still be here in this condition, let us have faith.
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