I have received the following information from a friend currently in South Africa. Rene Anderson Quote: Many thanks for the history regarding the Moodies. It is of great interest to us as we lived on Thomas Moodie's farm in Chipinge. Unfortunately for him he died of blackwater fever not long after settling at Waterfalls. He and his family are buried there and we tended the graves when we lived there. Further up the Rusitu Valley was Melsetter which Moodie named after the Moodie home in Orkney, it is now known as Chimanimani. There was a trek monument there which, post independence, was moved to Waterfalls graveyard and we also maintained that. I don't know what has become of that now; it is probably rather overgrown and unkempt. We know that Thomas Moodie was recruited by Cecil John Rhodes to trek into south east Rhodesia and from there try to lay claim to an area along the coast. Unfortunately for Rhodes the Portuguese got there first and it became part of Mozambique instead of Rhodesia. Chipinge and Chimanimani are very close to the border as is Mutare( formerly Umtali). Another Scottish connection with the Chipinge area is through the Ballantyne family. They were publishers based in Edinburgh. There was a brother and sister who for some reason made a pact they would never marry so when they died all the land in Chipinga was left to the farm manager an Afrikaaner named Odendaal. Upon his death those farms passed to his sons and there are still descendants living there to this day. Perhaps there was an earlier connection between the Moodies and the Ballantynes which may explain recruitment of people from Edinburgh and may explain why Ballantyne ended up in the same part of Rhodesia as Thomas Moodie. This is conjecture on my part but may be an avenue worth exploring. UNQUOTE ----- Original Message ----- From: <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2012 10:52 PM Subject: [DUMFRIES-GALLOWAY] Capt Benjamin Moodie's 1817 emigrants to SouthAfrica | As part of the SCOON one-name study, I've been trying to follow up two | brothers Robert (b c 1789) and James (b c 1792) SCOON who travelled to Cape | Town in 1817 on The Brilliant. They were part of a group of about 200 | skilled artisans from various parts of Scotland who were indentured to | Benjamin Moodie who was involved with several other groups to the same area from | all over the UK. | | The South African records tell us a lot about the brothers' lives (and | deaths) in South Africa, but unfortunately very little about their ancestry. | All we know for sure is that Robert came from the Hawick area, but that | James described himself as a 'native of Dumfriesshire' in his 1826 will. | Robert, originally a cooper, became quite a renowned explorer before | dying unmarried in 1837; James stuck to his trade as a blacksmith and farrier | in Cape Town, married and fathered 3 children before dying in 1827. | | The most likely explanation for this is that they were they sons of Walter | Scoon and Mary Elliot b 1788 and 1790 respectively at Todshawhill a few | miles SW of Hawick. Their elder brother Walter moved to Langholm | (1800-10) and became a master blacksmith, so it would well have been possible for | his younger brother James to have followed or gone with him and learnt his | trade in Langholm - hence the description in his will. | | However, this is very much in 'best guess' territory and I would be very | interested to hear from anyone who has more information about the pair or | indeed has any connections with the group of 200 as I have found it very | difficult to find out where or how they were recruited - did Moodie perhaps | visit Langholm or somewhere nearby? | | Donald Grant | Scoon One Name Study (GOONS #5642) | www.donjgrant.me.uk/schp.html | | | ------------------------------- | To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message