THE SWISS IN SOUTHERN AFRICA 1652-1970 - swissroots-za.ch

therein by his friend Bernardus La Fontaine (a Frenchman by trade a tailor) both of
them threatening the Deputy in a most violent and brutal manner. With clenched fists
held in his face, they told him he would proceed with the sale at the expense of his arms
and legs which they would break. La Fontaine also threatenend to use a sjambok (whip
made of hide) on him, while Orffer ran about in an outrageous and distracted manner,
repeating his threats to Spasie that he would kill her of she appeared. Their language
throughout was outrageous, calling the Deputy a vagabond and thief and many names
which could not be repeated.
Both were arrested for resisting the law and pleaded guilty in court. La Fontaine
declared he was drunk and did not know what he was doing – he realized only the next
day, when told, what had happened. Orffer pleaded that he too had had too much wine –
this and the sorrow that his creditors must lose so much money had made him
completely intoxicated. They were found guilty to short terms in prison at Worcester.
Orffer immediately petitioned to serve his term in the Cape Town goal, which was
granted. 8 There. a month later, he submitted a second petition requesting remission of
his remaining period of confinement. This was turned down on the grounds that one
petition had already been granted and that in any case, his sentence was very lenient. 9
In the meantime his wife Susanna, having lost all her possessions accumulated over
ten years of hard work, and with her husband in prison, returned to her widowed mother
living on the farm of Jnr. Scholz at Paardeberg. There Orffer joined her and the children
after his release, a broken old man at the age of 56, and there he died a year later 10
survived by the three children:
1. Christiaan Johannes born 20.1.1822 married at Daljosafat, Wellington 22.8.1854,
Maria Susanna Retief . In 1883 both he and his son Christiaan Johannes as well as
Frederik, son of Frederik Furter of Basel and his son farmed on Vondeling at
Twenty-Four River near Gouda. 11
2. Dirk Roeloff born 22.2.1826.
3. Maria Catharina born 28.9.1827.
/ 1 KAB, BO 195-6; 2 Cape Almanac 1811, p. 14; 1813, p. 14; 3 Cape Almanac, 1812-
1816, always p. 19; 4 KAB, J 41; 5 KAB, CO 4316, 18.2.1814; 6 KAB, 1/STB/22/34:
Huweliksnotulen, 4.12.1819; 7 KAB, 1/WOC 2/15 Preparatory Examination 12.1.1829;
8 KAB, CO 4323: 516, 2.3.1829; 9 KAB, CO 4323:638, 28.3.1829; 10 KAB, J 296 and
1/STB/16/148; 11 South African Directory, 1883/4.
Concord, L. of Neuchatel, about 1802 visited the Lodge Goede Trouw at 18 Plein
Street, Cape Town. / Griesbach, F.T.R.: A History of the Lodge de Goede Trouw, No.
26, p. 11.
Habluetzel, Johannes Jakob born Trüllikon
ZH 24.10.1779, son of Johann Heinrich
Hablützel and Elisabeth born Runger. 1
Arrived 1802 with the Batavian troops
reoccupying the Cape. On 29.6.1802 he was
appointed Second Surgeon’s Mate (2 nd
Surgeon) and served at the Great Military
Hospital. 2 At the second British occupation of
the Cape he took service with the British
without first obtaining his discharge from the
Batavian troops for which the departing
Governor, Geneal Janssens, branded him a
deserter with aggravating circumstances. 3
Habluetzel obtained permission from the
British to remain at the Cape 4 and initially
made his living as a surgeon. In his
hometown Trüllikon Habluetzel had been
described as an engineer. 5 When, in 1807 the
British regulated the medical profession at
the Cape, Habluetzel could neither show a
medical diploma nor was he ready to be examined by the newly constituted medical
113