Krotoa

Krotoa, or Eva, was the niece of Autshumato, a Khoi leader and trader. While she was young, she worked in the household of Jan van Riebeeck, the first governor of the Cape colony. While still a teenager, she learned Dutch and Portuguese and like her uncle, worked as an interpreter.

By 1664 she had married a prominent member of the Dutch colony, junior surgeon Pieter van Meerhoff, who was then assigned to be superintendent of the prison on Robben Island.

Eva returned to the mainland in September 1668 after her husband was killed on an expedition and returned for a time with her children to the mainland.

Suffering from alcoholism, she left the Castle in the settlement to be with her family in the kraals. In February 1669, she was imprisoned at the Castle and then banished to Robben Island.

She died in 1674.

There is evidence that many prominent South Africans who were legally white, descended from Krotoa. These included Transvaal President Paul Kruger, Prime Minister Jan Smuts, and President F.W. de Klerk. By legal necessity, these and other public figures hid their non-white ancestry. [http://www.southafrica.info/about/history/mixedmarriages-genealogy.htm]

ee also

*History of Cape Town

External links

* [http://www.robben-island.org.za/departments/heritage/gallery/krotoa.asp Robben Island Museum page]