A courageous Settler once saved the village of Salem, between Kenton-on-Sea and Grahamstown. Gavin Foster takes a drive to the old frontier area that is littered with relics of nine wars that raged up to the late 1800s.

It was a Quaker called Richard Gush who brought Salem to my attention back in the ’70s. By then he’d been dead for well over a century, but one of his descendents was a school friend and through him I first heard of the town his illustrious ancestor had saved.

Gush, a carpenter, headed a group of 1820 Settlers who sailed from Gravesend on 15 February 1820. His two-year-old son, Thomas, was one of seven passengers who died during the three-month journey to Port Elizabeth.

Any illusions the pioneers had that life would be easier once they landed, were soon dispelled. After they had set up camp on their allotted land near the Kowie River the settlers were arbitrarily uprooted and moved to less salubrious surroundings when the fertile farmland they’d been given was reallocated to a crony of the governor. Their new settlement they called Salem.

Gush, a pacifist, earned his fame in 1834 during the Sixth Frontier War. Early one morning, a band of 500 marauding Xhosas drove off the settlers’ cattle and prepared to attack the villagers, who grabbed their muzzle-loaders and holed up in the little Methodist church they’d built two years before.

Rather than fight, Gush undertook to negotiate with the hostile raiders who had gathered on a hillside beyond the village green.

He approached the warriors on horseback and asked them why they hated the harmless folk who prayed for them every day. The chief replied that his people were hungry, and Gush asked how that was possible when they had stolen all the settlers’ cattle.

“Yes, but we want bread,” replied the chief. Gush returned to Salem for bread, a roll of tobacco and twelve pocketknives, and the tribesmen left the village in peace.

Unsung stalwart

For my trip from Port Elizabeth to Salem I drove an Isuzu KB 240 double cab LE 4x4. I specifically requested that model because manufacturers and the media tend to concentrate largely on the upmarket vehicles for road tests, and I wanted to see if the cheapest in GM’s double-cab 4x4 line-up was as underpowered as everybody seemed to think.

The trip covered roughly 325km, of which less than half was on good gravel roads and the rest on tar, so the journey can be done as a day jaunt or, if you have time to spare, over a weekend to explore alternative gravel roads and smell the ancient cannon smoke along the way.

Much to my surprise the Isuzu’s four-cylinder petrol engine’s 94kW and 207Nm did a good job of moving all that steel and plastic down the road.

Acceleration isn’t startling but the engine is smooth, quiet and reasonably economical, and I found I could cruise at 150km/h when I wanted to. Comfort levels were great – more car than bakkielike – and quickly I settled into a groove enjoying the scenery without feeling too disadvantaged in terms of power.

Some 100km from Port Elizabeth on the N2 heading towards Grahamstown I turned right onto a dirt road signposted for Salem. With no further signs along the way I managed to cover 35km where 20 should have done, but the scenery was good and the drive was fun so what on earth could I possibly complain about?

Salem grew fast in its early days, and a year after its birth there were 75 homes in the village – some of stone, some wattle and daub, some wood. Within a further year, though, two thirds of the original settlers had left. In the 1830s things picked up again due to a boom in the wool industry, and a number of brick houses sprang up.

Richard Gush may have saved his townsmen from the Xhosa raiders once, but in 1846 the village was attacked and a number of homes were burnt down. Apart from some of those that were rebuilt there’s been little construction in Salem since. Ruins of some early buildings still stand, and many of the historic cottages are still lived in, while the immaculate original church built in 1832 stands proudly alongside the bigger one dating back to 1850.

From Salem I headed off for a 30km stint on the tarred R343 that runs through it from the N2 southwest of Grahamstown to Kenton-on-Sea. From there it was a short hop down the R72 and a dirt road to Boknesstrand. Via Cannon Rocks and the Alexandria Coastal Forest Reserve with its superb milkwood, yellowwood and coral trees, I continued along the dirt road along the coast to Alexandria on the R72, which spits you out on the N2 47km northeast of Port Elizabeth.

The whole frontier area is steeped in history, and there are countless gravel roads leading directly back to the 1800s. For most of them a 4x4 isn’t really necessary, although a sturdy vehicle with short overhangs and adequate ground clearance is always a good idea.

A trip to the Eastern Cape with a little time to dwell on our heritage should be high on every traveller’s agenda.

Where can I stay?

• Woodlands Country Cottages (Kenton-on-Sea): cabins and chalets, from R400 per night for a two-sleeper cabin, and R550-R600 for a six-sleeper chalet. Bev Smith 046 648 2867, 082 808-5976; woodlands@accommodation-kenton.co.za, www.sa-venues.com/visit/woodlandscountrycottages/
• Stanley’s Camping Ground (Kenton-on-Sea): self-catering chalets, B&B or full board (from R150 pppn). About 30 caravan stands (some electrified) at R50 pppn. Mandy Butt 046 648 3036, 082 550 0115; cabutt@telkomsa.net

Originally published in Drive Out #43 | March 2011