Jacobus Hendrik Louw was die seun van Jacobus Willem Adriaan Nel en Jacoba Hendrika Louw.
DG: Jan Abraham Nel, sy vrou wife Anna, Jan Johannes Steenkamp en Mara Catharina Elizabeth Nel
Uit hulle ma se sterfkennis van 1895:
FAMILYSEARCH
(https://www.geni.com/people/Jacobus-Hendrik-Louw-Nell/6000000017736081892)
(https://www.geni.com/people/Martha-Jacoba-Nell/6000000017736109717)
(https://www.myheritage.com/person-5018933_148888701_148888701/jacobus-hendrik-louw-g1h2-nel-a1b8c1d3e3f1g1h1)
(https://www.myheritage.com/person-5018988_148888701_148888701/martha-jacoba-nel-v1-gebore-deetlefs)
He was a farmer in the Kakamas district as a young man. JHLN experienced a number of severe setbacks during this period,
losing most of his livestock in the rinderpest epidemic of 1896
- 1897. The epidemic killed between 80% and 90% of all cattle in southern
Africa. Shortly after that, when the Anglo-Boer War (aka Tweede
Vryheidsoorlog or
South African War) broke out, he went off 'on commando'. He is recorded as
having been a burgher in the Calvinia Commando. He would have been married to his first wife at the
time and they apparently had seven children together. Little was known of her
until 2015/2016, when both Anton Nell (son of Joseph Benjamin Nell and
therefore my mother's cousin) and Jan Jakob de Klerk (grandson of Casper Nell
and therefore my third cousin) found documentary evidence giving her name and
other important details of her life. She and two of her children died within a
month of one another in 1900, victims of the typhoid epidemic spread by the
British army during the war. Her name (Anna Maria van Tonder) is now recorded
on the family tree and the documentary evidence relating to her is archived on
her profile. The death certificates of Anna Maria and her children
indicate that they died on the farm Schietpan in the Barkly West district of
what was then the Cape Colony, so this must have been the name of the family
farm. Anna Maria's occupation on her death certificate is given as 'stock
farmer'. According to a report on a fire in the district,
published in the Volksblad of 10 September 2010 and accessed by by Jan Jacob de
Klerk, the farm - still called Schietpan - was then owned by a Mrs Alwene Ford
and her son Arthur. In April 1901, JHLN married his second wife, Martha
Jacoba Deetlefs (my great-grandmother), apparently coming into town (Kakamas?)
at great risk to do so. The exact events of these years are unclear. According
to family tradition, everyone left on the farm after JHLN went back 'on
commando' after his second marriage was later interned in a concentration camp,
and everything - including buildings, livestock, equipment, crops and stores -
was burnt by British forces as part of Kitchener's 'scorched earth policy' According to both my aunt Hilda Wallace Keyte and my
aunt Olive Wallace McGregor, my great-grandmother nearly died in a camp. She
was later (understandably) very anti-British.. What I have been able to confirm is that Martha
Jacoba's father, his second wife, all of the children from that marriage, an
older child from his first marriage, and everyone else living on the farm Ver
Van Hier (Vervanhier) at the time, were interned in the Kimberley concentration
camp in 1901 At some point after the Boer War, JHLN and his family
moved to the diamond diggings near Sydney-on-Vaal, where he procured a claim
that he called Louw's Koppie. According to Anton Nell, JHNL swopped his farm
for a wagon and a case of brandy before going off to become a diamond digger. Louw's Koppie was apparently about fifteen miles from
Sydney-on-Vaal, beyond Droogveldt. According to my aunt, Hilda Wallace Keyte,
the nearest neighbours were about three miles away. Louw's Koppie was apparently about fifteen miles from
Sydney-on-Vaal, beyond Droogveldt. According to my aunt, Hilda Wallace Keyte,
the nearest neighbours were about three miles away. In addition to the seven children from his first marriage, JHLN
had fourteen children with Martha Jacoba, so he had twenty-one children in
total. Of the fourteen children born to JHNL and Martha Jacoba, a pair of twins
and another child died in infancy. Eleven children survived into adulthood. All
of these children grew up on the Louw's Koppie claim. My mother and her sisters visited 'Oupa' and 'Ouma'
there often when they were children, frequently taking lunch for 'Oupa' from
the house to the claim. At the time, only their youngest child, Elia (Elie)
Nell was still living at home. When JHLN became ill with cancer, he and his wife
moved to Johannesburg to live with one of their children in Fairlands. JHLN died at the Kensington Sanitorium and is buried
at the Fairlands Cemetery. (https://www.geni.com/people/Jacobus-Hendrik-Louw-Nell/6000000017736081892)
