Page 58 - Bulletin 14 2010

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Information on personalities and events of the early colonial era provides insights into the
development of subsequent routes across the Peninsula. The relevant information has been

organized along a time-line divided into two eras.

Era 1: 1652 - 1741: Early explorations of the south Peninsula.

 1652: Van Riebeek established a victualling station at Table Bay and the first farms were

established along the Liesbeek River in 1655.

 1659: The first exploration of the Fish Hoek valley was undertaken by Corporal Elias
Giers.

 1666: The Kirstenbosch road was extended over Constantia Nek to the Hout Bay timber

forests. This was the first pass in the Cape Peninsula.
 1682: The first farm in the Constantia Valley, Zwaanswijk, was established at the base of

Steenberg Mountain.

In Wallace’s thinking Zwaanswijk Farm played a central role in his story of the so-called Ou Pad
and a number of people of great character owned it over the years. The historian Jane Mulder has

written a fascinating history of it and much of the following narrative is drawn from her work.

The story begins with feisty Catharina Ustings of Lübeck near Hamburg who, as a widow of 22,

arrived in the Cape in 1662 aboard the Hof van Zeeland. It seems that her husband, a surgeon,

had died on the voyage. She soon married Hans Ras, a free-burgher who owned a farm on the
Liesbeek River. Hans nearly didn't return from their nuptials, however, as on the way home he

was drawn into an altercation with a drunk wagon-driver and was stabbed, almost fatally. He
recovered and they had four children. Sadly, she was widowed again in 1671 when Hans was

killed by a lion that had invaded their Liesbeek farm during a drought. Legend tells us that this
courageous woman mounted her horse, hunted down the lion and killed it.

A year later she married Francois Schanfflaar who went hunting with friends near Macassar and
was killed by a local Khoisan clan. So, in 1673 she married and had two more children by