1908_in_South_Africa
1908 in South Africa
List of events
The following lists events that happened during 1908 in South Africa.
- Governor of the Cape of Good Hope and High Commissioner for Southern Africa:Walter Hely-Hutchinson.
- Governor of the Colony of Natal: Matthew Nathan.
- Prime Minister of the Cape of Good Hope: Leander Starr Jameson.
- Prime Minister of the Colony of Natal: Frederick Robert Moor.
- Prime Minister of the Orange River Colony: Hamilton John Goold-Adams.
- Prime Minister of the Transvaal Colony: Louis Botha.
- January
- 30 – Mahatma Gandhi is released from prison by Jan Smuts after having been tried and sentenced to 2 months in prison earlier in the month.
- March
- 4 – The Pretoria branch of the Transvaal University College, precursor to the University of Pretoria, is established.
- October
- 7 – Mahatma Gandhi is arrested in Volksrust, along with fifteen other Indians, for entering Transvaal without registration certificates and is sentenced to two months imprisonment with hard labor.
- November
- Unknown date
- Bosman de Ravelli composes the first Afrikaans art song
- 5 March – Arthur Wegelin, composer.
- 23 April – Bram Fischer, lawyer and champion against apartheid, is born in the Orange River Colony. (d. 1975)
- 2 July – Andries Johannes Bester de Klerk, writer and secretary of the Cape Province, is born in Williston, Cape Colony
- 10 July – Wally Hayward, South African athlete (d. 2006)
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Railway lines opened
- 4 January – Cape Eastern – West Bank, Buffalo Harbour to Chiselhurst, 4 miles 35 chains (7.1 kilometres).[1]
- 6 February – Transvaal – Machadodorp to Breyten, 55 miles 3 chains (88.6 kilometres).[2]
- 8 April – Free State – Hamilton to Beaconsfield (Cape), 99 miles 52 chains (160.4 kilometres).[2]
- 28 May – Cape Western – Milnerton to Ascot, 2 miles (3.2 kilometres).[2]
- 3 June – Natal – Esperanza to Donnybrook (Narrow gauge), 94 miles (151.3 kilometres).[2]
Locomotives
- The Cape Government Railways places two 4-6-2 Pacific type narrow gauge tank steam locomotives in passenger service on the Walmer branch in Port Elizabeth.[3][4]
- Report for year ending 31 December 1909, Cape Government Railways, Section VIII - Dates of Opening and the Length of the different Sections in the Cape Colony, from the Year 1873 to 31st December, 1909.
- Statement Showing, in Chronological Order, the Date of Opening and the Mileage of Each Section of Railway, Statement No. 19, p. 186, ref. no. 200954-13
- Paxton, Leith; Bourne, David (1985). Locomotives of the South African Railways (1st ed.). Cape Town: Struik. pp. 113, 156. ISBN 0869772112.
- Dulez, Jean A. (2012). Railways of Southern Africa 150 Years (Commemorating One Hundred and Fifty Years of Railways on the Sub-Continent – Complete Motive Power Classifications and Famous Trains – 1860–2011) (1st ed.). Garden View, Johannesburg, South Africa: Vidrail Productions. p. 232. ISBN 9 780620 512282.