Anna Komincks /de Koning Bergh

In 1655 koop Jan van Riebeeck die slavin Angela van Bengale(n) by Pieter Kemp. Toe Van Riebeeck se kleindogter, Johanna Maria, die Kaap in 1710 besoek, skryf sy in ’n brief van “Ansiela”, die vrou wat haar vader en sy broers en susters (d.w.s. die Van Riebeeck-kinders) opgepas het. Sy skryf verder dat Ansiela later met ’n Hollander getroud is en dat haar dogter die vrou van kaptein “B.” was. Dit is inderdaad so dat “Maai” Ansiela, ná haar vrystelling met Arnoldus Basson getroud is en die stammoeder van die Basson-familie in Suid-Afrika geword het. (Maai is blykbaar afgelei uit moei ‘tante’ [1e keer gedokumenteer 1201-1250] wat eintlik die vleinaam is vir moeder. WNT).

Terwyl Angela nog ’n slavin was, is haar dogter, Anna de Koning, uit ’n buite-egtelike verhouding met ’n Europeër gebore. Anna was nie net mooi van aansien met fynbesnede gelaatstrekke nie, maar was ook geletterd en het met ’n vaste hand dokumente onderteken. Sy was met kaptein Oloff Bergh getroud en het op haar beurt die stammoeder van die Bergh-familie in Suid-Afrika geword.

Source: http://www.taaloord.co.za/geskiedenis.htm#Grepe%20uit%20die%20geski...

In 1655 Jan van Riebeeck bought the slave Angela of Bengal . When Van Riebeeck 's granddaughter, Johanna Maria , visited Cape Town in 1710 , she wrote in a letter of " Ansela " , the woman who lost her father and his brothers and sisters ( ie the Van Riebeeck children ) herding . She writes that Ansela later married a Dutchman and that her daughter married Captain " B " . It is true that " Beautiful " Ansela , after gaining her freedom married Arnoldus Basson and became the ancestress of the Basson family in South Africa .

While Angela was still a slave, her daughter , Anna de Koning ,was born from an extramarital relationship with a European . Anna was not only pretty with finely chiselled features, but also literate and with a steady hand signed documents . She married Captain Olof Bergh and she became the ancestress of the Berg family in South Africa.

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ANGELA (Ansela) VAN BENGALE Angela VAN BENGALE was born about 1645. She died in 1720. Anna de Koningh was born in Batavia, one of three children of the slave known as Angela of Bengal. The whole family was brought to the Cape by Pieter Kemp, a Free Burgher of Batavia, who sold them to Jan van Riebeeck (1619-1677). In 1662 Van Riebeeck sold the family to Abraham Gabbema, who when he was transferred to Batavia in 1666 set Angela and her three children free. It is not known what happened to her husband. In 1669 Angela married the Free Burgher Arnoldus Willemsz from Wesel, later known as Arnoldus Willemsz Basson; they had three children.[6] On the 15 Dec 1669 she got married to Arnoldus Willemsz Basson = b3 Johannes Basson = b3c1 Arnoldus Johannes Basson = b3c1d3 Anna Catharina Basson = b6c7 Johannes Dewalt Hattingh = b6c7d4 *Johannes Dewalt Hattingh = b6c7d4e10 Christiaan Johannes Hattingh = b6c7d4e10f4 Martha Rhyna Hattingh = b2c1d2e2f2g3h4 Anna Elizabeth Sophia van Jaarsveldt = b4c2d5e4f11g3 Jacobus Johannes Burger Combrinck = my mother = me Note:* Johannes Dewalt Hattingh was the half brother of Voortrekker leader Andries W.J. Pretorius. See pencil drawing of Andries Pretorius (19K) holding his sword. Hattingh was married to Anna Elisabeth Retief (after Hattingh passed away she married a Steenkamp) she kept a diary on the Great Trek and was the child of Francois Retief, older brother of Voortrekker leader Piet Retief. See (photo of brother (22k) of Piet Retief and also a photo of a sister of Francois & Piet Retief (16k) found in G Preller's book Piet Retief). Angela was a slave from Bengale, India. The Ganges delta had numerous company stations, such as Hougli (Head Quarters), Kazimber, and Patna. Clothing, opium and salpeter (the later used in preparation of gunpowder) was sold here. She was brought on the ship Amersfoort to the Cape (W. Blommaert "Het Invoern van de Slavernij aan de Kaap", p 6 Archive Year Book of South Africa 1938 Vol I). In Oct 1655 van Riebeeck bought a slave family from commander Pieter Kemp. Domingo and Angela van Bengale and their three children. Angela was sold by Jan van Riebeeck on 19 Apr 1662 to Abraham Gabbema, on the next day he sold Domingo, Jan, Thomas and Claesje all from Angola, to Roeloff de Man. (One wonders whether this Domingo is the same as Angela's husband). On the 13th April 1666 Gabbema signed a document which would lead to Angela's freedom six months later, see reproduction of this document which gave Angela her freedom (58k), from Boeseken p102, 103. She was the third person to be freed from slavery at the Cape. Angela tried to save a Hottentot woman, Sara, who committed suicide by hanging, unfortunately she was already dead (Familia XVI p23). Angela got married on the 15 December 1669 to the free burgher Arnoldus Willemsz from Wesel, he is known as Arnoldus Willemsz Basson, they had three children: Willem baptised Aug 1670, Gerrit baptised 12 March 1673 and Johannes baptised 5 May 1675. Basson, her husband died in 1689 and Angela died ten years later. Apparently her son Johannes predeceased her and I am a descendant of him. Angela received two properties as titles according to Cairns p 86. Angela was also the mother of Anna de Koningh who got married to Olof Bergh, there is a drawing of Anna de Koningh which I have included at the beginning of Page 1.[1] Arnoldus Willemsz BASSON, was baptised 31 March 1647 at the Willibrordkirche and he died 1698. His father was Willem Baeson who was married on 9 May 1634 to Elsken Boespinck. He was already in 1665 atthe Cape as a burgher. He had the nickname "Jagt".[7] Arnoldus got married, 1669 to the previous slave ANGELA (Ansela) VAN BENGALE (also known as Maaij Ansela). She died c1720, (according to Richard Ball) refer to her Estate Account MOOC 13/1/2, 1.[7] Jan van Riebeeck bought Angela in 1655 from Pierre Kemp. Van Riebeeck in turn sold Angela on his departure from the Cape in 1662 to Fiscal Abraham Gabbema. On the 13th April 1666 Gabbema signed a document which would lead to Angela's freedom six months late, after serving Thomas Christoffel Mullerr. She was the third person to be freed from slavery at the Cape.[7] Angela was baptised 29 April 1668.[7] Angela tried to save a Hottentot woman, Sara, who committed suicide by hanging, unfortunately she was already dead (Familia, XVI, p 23).[7] Angela received two properties as titles according to Cairns p. 86.[7] Angela had a number of 'VOORKINDERS'[8], Basson was not their father: Anna de Koning X Oloef Bergh Jacobus van As (Their father was most likely Jan van Assen) Johannes van As Pieter = 3 Jun 1668 (We do not know who his father was, he died young)[7] CHILDREN OF Arnoldus Willemsz BASSON and ANGELA (Ansela) VAN BENGALE: 1. Willem baptised Aug 1670, died 30 Jan 1713, X 18 March 1691 Helena Clements 2. Gerrit, X Johanna Rynick 3. Johannes (He died before his mother) X Zacharia Visser 4. Elsie she died young 5. Michiel = 26 Jun 1679 X Maria Daaldons 6. Elsie = 29 Jun 1681 X Reynier van der Sande 7. Maria = 16 May 1683, X C Maasdorp[7] Arnoldus Basson obtained the title of the farm Nuwedorp in Groot Drakenstein with Jacobus van As on 20 December 1689. He died in 1689.[7] Angela purchased the 22 year old slave Pieter van Malabar in 1698. She also bought the slave Arend van Bengale in 1700. When she died she owned the farm Hondswyk in Drakenstein.[7][9][7] Throughout her long life Angela endured the suicide in 1671 of the Hottentot woman (Zara) in her sheep pen; the detention in 1687 of her son-in-law (Olof Bergh) on Robben Island & removal thereafter to Ceylon; the execution in 1688 of her son (Jan van As) for kidnapping, stock theft & murder; the sexual indiscretion in 1701 of her son (Jan Basson) with the Widow Putter resulting in a bastard grandson (Arnoldus Johannes Basson who was later banished in 1739 from the Cape for aiding & abetting Estienne Barbier) & the banishment in 1716 of her grandson (Jan van As) to Robben Island for his undisclosed (unmentionable?) behavior.[10] A woman from Bengal named Mary was bought in 1653 for van Riebeeck in Batavia. Two years later, he purchased, from the Commander of a Dutch ship, a family from Bengal - Domingo and Angela and their three children. On May 21, 1956, the marriage was solemnised at the Cape between Jan Wouters, a white, and Catherine of Bengal. Later in the year Anton Muller was given permission to marry a slave woman from Bengal. From then until late eighteenth century when the import of slaves from Asia was prohibited, many hundreds, if not thousands, of persons from India - mainly from Bengal, Coromandel Coast and Kerala - were taken to the Cape and sold into slavery. Officers of ships and officials of the Dutch India Company returning to Holland usually took slaves or servants with them and sold them at high profit in the Cape. (They could not be taken to Holland where slavery was prohibited). Many others were carried by Danish, British and other ships. While most of the Indians were taken from Indian ports, a considerable number were also taken from Batavia where thousands of Indians had been transported by the Dutch as slaves. Bradlow put together available information from various studies on the places of origin of the slaves and free blacks between 1658 and early nineteenth century. The information is very incomplete after 1700 and covers only a little over three thousand persons. The figures indicate that the Indian sub-continent was the place of origin of the largest number of slaves (36.40 percent), followed by Indonesia (31.47 percent) and Africa (26.65 percent). Of those from India, 42 percent were from Bengal (including Bihar and Orissa), 23 percent from the Coromandel Coast (especially Trancquebar, Tuticorin, Nagapatnam, Pulicat and Masulipatnam); and 32 percent from the Malabar Coast (including Goa, Bombay and Surat). Angela and her three children were freed in 1666. She integrated easily into the white community. In 1669 she married Arnoldus Willemsz Basson, with whom she had three children. Her daughter from the first marriage also married a Dutchman. When her husband died in 1689, Angela took charge of the estate which had a considerable value when she died in 1720. Sexual relations between whites and Asian slaves were quite common in the 17th and 18th centuries, and several studies show that half or more of the children of slave women had white fathers. Asian ancestry did not automatically lower one's status. The grandmother of Simon van der Stel, the most prominent Governor of the Cape in the 17th century, was an Asian woman.

We learn from Adam Tas in his diary (Thursday 24 December 1705) that according to his labourers the governor Willem Adriaan van der Stel's wife had previously tried to commit suicide & that the Cape-born mestiça Anna de Coninck / Coning(h) / Koning (c. 1661-1734) - daughter of Engela / Angela aka Maaij Ansela van Bengale & Moeder Jagt & wife to Ensign Olof Bergh (from Gothenburg in Sweden) - had come to her rescue: "Fair morning. Our labourers were busy carting the corn to the homestead, and cutting what corn was still standing. They tell me this day that the Governor's wife had, in a fit of despondency, tried to drown herself by jumping into the fountain behind the house at the Cape; however, Mrs. Berg was on the spot, and ran to help her, pulling her out of the water, to whom the Governor's wife lamented bitterly that her life had become one of terror for her on account of the many scandalous acts she must daily hear and witness. A singular affair, which gives reason for not a little thought ..."[19]

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Van_Bengale-1