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might have sourced that information about events over a century earlier was not revealed.

(Figs. 2.24 & 2.25.)

The early farms in the Valley, 1808 - 1883

After occupying the Cape for the second time, the British began to grant private title to

various farms, and the first sites in the Silvermine Valley were granted to Francois Smit by
Governor Caledon in 1808. The layout of these first grants is interesting, as they comprise

Farm 925, made up of two separate rectangles stretching across the valley, totalling the

relatively small area of six morgen (5.1 hectares) (Fig. 2.26). It seems strange that, of all the
land in the Silvermine Valley, these two sections were transferred in isolation. Perhaps the

answer lies in the 1805 map in Die Grote Atlas, as these could have been two of the potential
defensive positions surveyed for General Janssens. Both sections straddled the centre of the

valley to the west of the Silvermine River.

These two sections, making up Farm 925, were sold to Willem F. Kirsten in November 1811.

He was the grandson of one of Simon’s Town’s post holders, Johan F. Kirsten, who owned
the farm Alphen in Constantia. Within the next two years it appears that the full extent of the

potential farmland in the valley was surveyed, as in October 1813 Willem Kirsten was
granted the whole of the lower section of the valley, Farm 923, over 130 morgen (112

hectares) (Fig. 2.27). This farm completely surrounded the two rectangles making up Farm
925, and the 1813 transfer diagram indicates that a house had been built between the two

rectangles. This Silvermine farmhouse may have been built by Kirsten in 1812/13, and it still

stands today. The farms 923 and 925 were later consolidated into the new Farm 925.

In 1821 Kirsten sold Farm 925 to Jacobus A. Hurter, who had also been granted half of the

saltpan area at Noordhoek. Eleven years later, Hurter was granted Farm 922, a new area of
275 morgen (235 hectares) higher up the valley, with its northern boundary stretching up to

Bokkop peak. Farms 925 and 922 were then consolidated, again as Farm 925. At this stage
the size of the Silvermine Farm was at its largest, measuring some 411 morgen (352

hectares.) In 1834 Farm 925 was purchased by Pierre Rocher, who at the time owned
Imhoff’s Gift and the other half of the Noordhoek saltpan. Four years later it was sold to Paul

J. de Villiers, in 1855 to his brother Jan G. de Villiers, two years later to Nicolaas J. van