Francis Porrill

Francis (Frank) Porrill was born on the 10th August 1864 in New Hanover, Natal, South Africa to Matthew and Elizabeth. He was the second eldest of four brothers and five sisters and his youngest sibling was seventeen years younger than him. His parents had married four years earlier in Pietermaritzburg, where they had met after migrating from the United Kingdom. Matthew, had migrated in the Haidee in 1850 and his mother, Elizabeth, migrated in the Priscilla in 1859.

The Haidee settlers were predominantly farmers who had come from the East Riding area of York and settled as a community in a village they set up near New Hanover called York. The family lived there until 1878, when Matthew bought a new farm near Frere, which he called Mount Elizabeth after his wife. he also set his sons up on their own farms as follows:

Frank: Gevonden, located Robert: Matthew: Charles:

his parents bought and moved to a farm near Frere, which they named Mount Elizabeth after his mother. Matthew set Frank up with his own farm named [http://maps.google.com.au/?ll=-28.739211,29.683905&spn=0.002507,0.0... Gevonden] when he was in his twenties and gave . He was described him as a rough man who drank too much and never married. He was the first of his brothers and sisters to own a car and he used to get one of his farm workers to drive him around as he was said to have been usually too drunk drive himself.

Frank had an agreement with his brother Robert that he would leave his farm, Gevonden, to Robert's son, Matthew on condition that Matthew worked for him for the rest of his life. Under the agreement, Robert set Matthew's brother up on his own farm, Retreat and moved to another farm named Bluebell, which was on the other side of the Tugela river from Gevonden. Matthew lived with his wife and young family at Gevonden from ___ to ___ and continued thereafter, as per the agreement to work for his uncle.

Frank died at in ____ and it was only then that it was discovered that he had changed his will and left his assets to other nieces and nephews. It was then discovered that he threw the agreement in the fire in a pub one evening, however, after someone questioned whether he could trust Matthew. The issue caused the family a great deal of shock and unhappiness.

2.FRANCIS EDWIN PORRILL born never married. His mother never approved of the girl he wanted to marry so he remained single. He lived alone at “Dawn Spruit” on the banks of the Tugela River a few miles out of Colenso and did cattle farming. He also owned “Gevonden” where we lived and Dad worked for him. We children were frightened of him as he had a loud voice and was often drunk. He had a green car driven by an African man and when we saw his car coming down the road we disappeared into the pig runs or the cattle kraal and refused to eat our meals at the table with him and preferred to eat with the African servants. He had never done us any harm but he was usually dirty and unsteady on his feet and often wet his pants. He was known to be very kind as he helped Granddad start up again when he lost all his cattle with rindepest. He helped Dad get up and going and although he broke his promise about leaving his inheritance to Dad he gave it to others less fortunate. It was hard on Dad but he was not destitute so we had much to be thankful for. A lot of his money went tohelping Aunt Jayne’s family. My brother Frank had his names. We sometimes visited him with Dad at “Dawn Spruit” but played outside as he did not like noisy kids like Granddad.