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Alexandria is a country town in the Ndlambe Municipality, about 100kms from Port Elizabeth. The town is situated near the southern portion of the Addo National Park, and is an excellent base to explore the beautiful surrounds.
ALEXANDRIA
Alexandria is a country town in the Ndlambe Municipality, about 100kms from Port Elizabeth. The town is situated near the southern portion of the Addo National Park, and is an excellent base to explore the beautiful surrounds. To the south of the town lies the Addo Park, where unlike the areas to the north, this area is lush and is covered by indigenous and very thick coastal dune forests. In startling juxtaposition, the forest almost immediately gives way to the Alexandia Dune fields, the one of the largest sand dune areas in world. The area has excellent views across the southern Indian Ocean and Algoa Bay. To the north of the town are several game reserves and farm stays.
Alexandria is a centre of dairy and chicory farming. The town was founded on the farm Oliphantshoek meaning “elephants corner”. Oliphantshoek was the most remote area of the Dutch Reformed Church parish of Uitenhage and the Scottish minister of the area, Alexander Smith who came to South Africa in 1823 regularly had to travel to the farm Kerkplaats on the farm of Evert Potgieter. On the 8th January 1854 Olipantshoek became a separate congregation to Uitenhage which was 140kms away. In 1873 the name of Oliphantshoek was changed to Alexandria in honour of Alexander Smith.
Near to the town there is a monument to Karel Landman in the shape of a globe with an ox wagon traversing the globe. Karel Landman was a Boer farmer who left the Cape with the other voortrekkers who moved northwards and founded the old Transvaal and the Free State as part of the Great Trek. Landman was the second in command of the Boer forces at the pivotal battle of Blood River.
The grave on Nonqause, the Xhosa prophetess, whose visions gave rise to the Great Cattle Killing episode of the mid 1850s when the many Xhosa were persuaded to kill their cattle and destroy their crops in the belief that the ancestors would arise and help throw the British out of the Eastern Cape. The starvation that followed did more to cause the Xhosa submission than the preceding seventy years of almost continuous warfare. Nonqause fled to the Alexandria district where the impact of her visions was negligible and she was able to live out her days in anonymity.
Alexandia today is a pretty town, with many interesting historic buildings, and a splendid Dutch Reformed Church, the creation of the famous Eastern Cape architect William White-Cooper.
Source: Courtesy Eastern Cape Tourism Board - www.ectb.co.za
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