3-039-158 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Dutch church, Cradock, Cape of Good Hope, 1871. 'This handsome and substantial building, said to be the finest and most commodious church in South Africa, has recently been completed. It is estimated to accommodate nearly 1500 hearers. It has been built by Mr. G. Wallis, of Capetown, under the direction of the Incumbent, the Rev. J. H. Du Plessis, from a design by Messrs. Welchman and Read, architects...It is built of a remarkably hard, impervious, grey sandstone. It must be admitted, though the building may not agree with the ideas of severe critics in ecclesiastical architecture, that it does great credit to the zeal and liberality of the Dutch Boers resident in the division of Cradock, no less a sum than £27,000 having been expended on its construction. Cradock is one of the principal inland towns of the colony, and carries on a large business in wool and other produce from the interior. It is on one of the direct roads to the main seaport, Port Elizabeth, from the diamond-fields of the Orange and Vaal river districts; also from the gold-bearing country of the Tatin, assumed to be the renowned Ophir of Solomon. The Engraving is from a photograph by Mr. E. A. Austen'. From "Illustrated London News", 1871.