Bernardus Zibee Stegmann

Founding member of Willowmore.

"The main focus of Macmillan’s research in Willowmore was on the contemporary situation, but he inevitably collected some historical information. The oldest of his informants was Bernardus Zibee Stegmann, a founder of Willowmore in 1864 – the congregation there had broken away from the northern congregation of Rietbron. Stegmann, who was born in 1832 had begun work in 1852 as a clerk/salesman for Port Elizabeth or Cape Town merchants in Graaf Reinet, then the only town in the region. He pointed out that people in the area aimed to have half a dozen farms so as to provide some protection against drought. He was well paid as a trader and eventually acquired the farm, Kruidfontein, and must have gradually increased his holdings to about 25,000 morgen. He bought some of the land directly from the government at two shillings and sixpence a morgen" Source: Macmillan's travels - Rhodes University Hugh Macmillan

Brenthurst Library, Johannesburg, South Africa, July-October 2006, and Dorchester on Thames, Oxford, England, February-March 2007.

Today there is a primary school on his old farm " Kruidfontein": Stegmann Primary School