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From: Eileen & Marty Russell <>
Subject: Re: What a way to celebrate 2000 - in your ancestors' town!
Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2000 07:21:33 +0200


Hi Anne
Thanks for the interesting titbits you post from time to time. This one about the
descendant of Cornelis and Reynet van de Graaff who saw the New Year in at
Graaff-Reinet has me puzzled.

How did this family manage to produce 15 generations in 220 years? Our ancestor
Cornelis Botma was a veldkorporaal and burger of Graaff-Reinet in the late 1700s
and early 1800s. We have only managed 8 generations since then! Perhaps the
reporter used a little poetic licence.

Best wishes for 2000

Eileen
Richards Bay


Lehmkuhl wrote:

> 02 January 2000, Sunday Times newspaper in South Africa:
> Report by Prega Govender
> Dutch blueblood descends on 'his' town
> A DIRECT descendant of one of the governors of the Cape made a special trip
> from the Netherlands to a small Eastern Cape town to see in the new
> millennium. Peter van der Graaff, 45, a 15th generation Dutch descendant of
> the famous Van der Graaff family after whom the town of GraaffReinet was
> named, yesterday (Saturday) paid homage to the small platteland town.
> "Graaff-Reinet is steeped in ancestral history and I couldn't think of a
> better place to celebrate the new millennium," Van der Graaff said. A
> descdendant of Cornelis van der Graaff, who was the governor of the Cape in
> the 1780s, Van der Graaff said he still had in his possession letters

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