1. History

2. Heritage sites

3. References

Ferreirasdorp (or Ferreirastown)^[2] is an inner-city suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa located in Region F of the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality.

First known as Ferreira's Camp ({{lang-af|Ferreiraskamp}}) and later Ferreira's Township, it is the oldest part of Johannesburg.^[3][4] Sometimes referred to as the "cradle of Johannesburg", it is where the first gold diggings started, and where the first diggers initially settled.^[8] The city grew around the mining camp in the Ferreirasdorp area,^[5] and Johannesburg’s Main Street developed from a rough track where the present Albert Street led off towards Ferreira’s Camp.^[10]

The suburb is named after Colonel Ignatius Ferreira, leader of the original group of diggers who settled in this area in 1886.^[6]

History

The suburb's origins lie in the Turffontein farm set up by Colonel Ignatius Ferreira, a Boer adventurer from Cape Colony.^[7] Ferreira had acquired a dozen claims in the vicinity and opened the reef in a cutting. The ore from both sides had a high gold content.^[7] The first tent on the site was erected in 1886, two months before gold digging started in earnest.^[14]

In 1886 Hans Sauer, who combined a medical practice with prospecting on Cecil Rhodes’s behalf, was guided from Ferreira’s Camp to the main group of gold reefs by a son of the widow Petronella Oosthuizen, the owner of a farm at Langlaagte, on which the main gold reefs had first been discovered.^[8]

Following reports of new gold finds in the Witwatersrand, Rhodes and Rudd set off for Ferreira's camp.^[7] Already at the time of Rhodes' visit, a little crowd of diggers were at work, and in the week that had passed since Sauer had been away, an Englishwoman had run up a reed and mud building called Walker's Hotel.^[9]

Within a fortnight of Rhodes' arrival in July 1886, Ferreira's camp was crowded with tents and wagons from across southern Africa.^[7] The tent town eventually became known as Ferreira’s Camp.^[14] In July, the Diamond Fields Advertiser was already reporting that the population of Ferreira's Town was 300 persons.^[6]

Gold was discovered in September 1886.^[10] On September 8, 1886, Landrost Carl von Brandis read President Paul Kruger’s proclamation, confirming the gold fields of the Rand as public diggings.^[5] When, in November 1886, a portion of the farm Randjeslaagte had been laid out as a village and named Johannesburg, the Government took over Ferreira's camp and had it properly surveyed and named Ferreira's Township.^[11]

The first building to go up in Johannesburg, the Central Hotel, was located in Ferreira’s Camp.^[12] The first barber shop in Johannesburg, the first bar, the first pub and the first brothel were all opened in Ferreira's Camp.^[13] So were the first circus, Fillis's Circus (in September 1886); the first café, Café Francais (in 1886), and the first school (in November 1886).^[13] It was also the location of the first bank branch on the Witwatersrand gold fields, when Standard Bank started doing business in a tent in Ferreira's Camp, in 1886.^[14] On 11 October 1887, Ferreirasdorp was incorporated into Johannesburg.^[15]{{rp|116}}

As the city expanded, Ferreirasdorp quickly degenerated into a slum.^[29] By the 1890s, the western side of Commissioner street, where the Johannesburg Central Police Station is now located, had developed a reputation for its brothels and the gangs that controlled them.^[16] The name Ferreirasdorp itself ultimately became "synonymous with practically everything that is vile and violent" about Johannesburg.^[17]

By the turn of the century, many contemporary sources referred to the western part of Ferreirasdorp as the 'Cantonese quarter'.^[3] The area became home to a large coloured community, and in 1898 a site was set aside for a church (St. Alban’s Anglican Mission Church) to service the coloured Anglican community.^[2] In 1925, the Communist Party of South Africa opened a school offering night classes to blacks, but it was closed during the party purges of the 1930s.^[18] In the 1960s, under the Group Areas Act, the coloured community was forcibly moved.^[2]

Heritage sites

A number of cultural heritage sites are present in the area:^[19]

• The location of the Ferreira’s Camp, i.e. the area bounded by Commissioner, Ferreira, Alexander and Frederick Streets.^[19]
• The location of the Ferreira’s wagon (apparently in the vicinity of today's Wesleyan Girls Hostel).^[19]
• Ferreira’s Mine stope, preserved within the Standard Bank precinct as one of Johannesburg’s first sub-surface digging mines.^[19] Standard Bank was the first bank to establish itself in Johannesburg, in October 1886.^[20] In 1986, exactly one hundred years after the mine (and Standard Bank) started in Johannesburg, Standard Bank built its head office over this mine.^[20]
• St. Alban’s Mission Church, founded in 1898 to serve the local Coloured Anglican community, designed by F.L.H. Fleming.^[19]
• Chancellor House, where Nelson Mandela and Oliver Tambo had their first law practice.^[19]

References

• Arnaldo Castillo
• Arnaldo Caverzasi
• Arnaldo Conti
• Arnaldo de Barbazán
• Arnaldo dell'Ira
• Arnaldo dell'ira
• Arnaldo de Mattos
• Arnaldo de Novais Guedes Rebelo
• Arnaldo de Novalis Guedes de Rebelo
• Arnaldo de Novalis Guedes Rebelo
• Arnaldo de Villanova
• Arnaldo Ferraguti
• Arnaldo Girombelli
• Arnaldo González
• Arnaldo Hernandez
• Arnaldo Hernández
• Arnaldo José da Silva
• Arnaldo Mattos
• Arnaldo Mesa Bonell
• Arnaldo Oliveira Silva
• Arnaldo Rivera
• Arnaldo Roche Rabell
• Arnaldo Rodriguez
• Arnaldo Rodríguez
• Arnaldo Sabater