Johannes Jurgens Lee (Hans)

Pioneers of Rhodesia - Individuals

• He was born in the Transvaal in 1863 and was the son of John LEE by his first wife.
• He was brought by his mother to his father's farm at Mangwe c.1866.
• H. LEE was at New Bulawayo in late July 1888.
• For guiding Randolph CHURCHILL (1849-1895) in 1891 he was given the farms Kolbooi and Sterkfontein in the Manila area.
• His first wife was Martha, a daughter of F. GREEF.
• And after her death he married Laetitia PRESCOTT.
• LEE was a good shot and African linguist.

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Death:
https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:939N-CXS4-TV?i=237&cc=1...

Mother on DN = Katherine van Wyk
Father - John Lee

Death:
https://www.ancestry.com/mediaui-viewer/tree/27963554/person/260167...

Named in Baptism of : Ralfus George Lee, with Johannes Jurgens Lee as the father and Letitia Charlotte Prescott, as the mother of the child:
https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:6CTK-2D6R

Letitia Charlotte Prescott's Spouses and Children
Lee Ralfus George
Child
Name Lee Ralfus George
Baptism Date 29 Aug 1909
Baptism Place Bulawayo, Southern Rhodesia
Baptism Place (Original) Bulawayo
Birth Date 6 Jun 1909
Parent Name Johannes Jurgens Lee
Second Parent's Name Letitia Charlotte Prescott
Event Type Baptism

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GEDCOM Note

An early visitor to the country in 1891 was Lord Randolph Churchill, father of Sir Winston Churchill and a shareholder of the BSA Company, who was paid £100 for each letter he wrote for the Daily Graphic describing his travels. His entourage included HC Perkins, a well-known American mining engineer and a collection of Captains and Majors all familiar with trekking so as not to expose Churchill to the difficulties of frontier life.

Churchill had considerable personal gifts, but also an overbearing personality and was famously described in Salisbury (now Harare) as someone who would offer you tea; whilst he himself drank champagne!

His letters must have alienated him to a broad sector of the population in South Africa, that of all Afrikaners, but then again perhaps they did not read the Daily Graphic.

His reports on the gold mining prospects of Rhodesia were not positive. Lord Randolph Churchill’s accounts were very different from all those that promised “a new Eldorado.” “In my opinion, at the present time all that can be said of Mashonaland from a mining point of view is that the odds are overwhelmingly against the making of any rapid or large fortune by any individual.”

For Lord Churchill the whole journey was a glorious hunting trip which is why Hans Lee, son of John Lee of Mangwe Pass fame was part of the expedition. He shot antelope of all kinds, sable, wildebeest, eland and hartebeest, enjoyed chasing ostrich on horseback and thought the presence of lions added an exciting variation.

There is no mention in his book of the artist who drew the Daily Graphic sketches shown below.

Churchill died on 24 January 1895 so he was touring within five years of his death. There have been many rumours that his irascible behaviour was conditioned by syphilis and reference is made to this in the body of the article.

http://www.rhodesiana.com/rsr/rsr2-006.html Although the township of Plumtree never developed to any great extent, it has been the home of some great Rhodesian characters. Amongst its residents was for example Hans Lee, a pre-pioneer whose early claim to fame followed the shooting of his first lion at the age of 12 years, while it was attacking a cow in the cattle kraal at the family farm at Mangwe. He had become a very well-known hunter and a remarkably fine shot. He was engaged in 1891 as the guide and hunter to accompany Lord Randolph Churchill, who trekked through Mashonaland from Tuli, via Fort Victoria and Salisbury. Hans Lee gave Lord Randolph some excellent sport, and he was able to recount many of his experiences with Lee in his book Men, Mines and Animals in South Africa'. Lee died whilst walking to Plumtree Post Office on January 9, 1939.

GEDCOM Note

REFN: 488