South African Military History Society

SOUTH AFRICAN MILITARY HISTORY SOCIETY EASTERN CAPE BRANCH
SUID-AFRIKAANSE KRYGSHISTORIESE VERENIGING OOS-KAAP TAK

Newsletter/Nuusbrief 191

August/ Augustus

Our meeting of 13 July had to be aborted due to a power failure and our Chairman and presenter for the evening were left high and dry. The presenter was to have been Barbara Kinghorn who is our Chairman’s wife and her subject was to have been, “Knit your bit-patriotic knitting”. Following this development we have put into place a plan to ensure that should our host be once again subjected to a spell of darkness at this critical meeting time there are at least two other members who will be in a position to take over at short notice and to proceed with the meeting.

It is not known when we as a Society will once again be able to meet on a personal basis and to ensure that we all keep up to date with each other. It is our intention to hold a second meeting every month – more of a social nature. Included in the 40 minute period we will have a short member’s slot of five minutes and then thereafter enjoy social discourse among ourselves. A number of outings are in the offing and as regulations ease it is our intention to continue with our planned events including our annual one day trip to Grahams ‘Town (Makhanda).

Our first social meeting will then take place on Monday evening 27 July at which Franco Cilliers will chat on his subject for five minutes. The log in details are supplied herewith below. Barbara Kinghorn will be returning on Tuesday 11 August to deliver her postponed presentation and we look forward to the occasion. The log in details are also included and please note that this meeting is being held on Tuesday 11 August and not the previous day which is a Public Holiday.

Members are encouraged to submit their names to Andre Crozier should they wish to deliver a five minute presentation. It could cover a variety of subjects for example a lonely grave, a war memorial, a forgotten battle site or perhaps a military character who may not be internationally known but remembered more locally for his own career.

The question on the format of future meetings was discussed at a recent Committee meeting and it was wondered if the days of a meeting taking place in a room complete with projector etc would ever really take place again?

Your scribe for almost a decade managed the old boys union of his school of which there are some 8000 members. One of his duties was to organise the Annual Dinner and the guests always totalled in excess of 600 but it was found in recent years that the older generation was not present in any significant number.

An investigation followed and it soon revealed that the missing older folk were rather wary of travelling at night as they felt insecure, hence their absence. So then what took place? A luncheon was organised for all those older than 70 years of age and it was booked out in days.

There are among our members those who travel long distances at night and at considerable expense.

The security aspect affects all of us and hi-jackings appear to be the order of the day. Perhaps the time has arrived to hold virtual meetings from the comfort of your own home and yes, we will continue to have our outings and visits. We see no reason to change that and a meeting arrangement could be put in place to accommodate the Remembrance Day Service that takes place on 11 November. But at this stage we will continue to Zoom and take things as they come. As with any organization or society we need to take note of the changing environment and keep our members happy. It was remarked upon at a recent Zoom meeting that we had a number of members and other interested parties who reside in far flung areas who had actually zoomed in!

Our next meeting - a social meeting - will be held on 27 July at 19.30hrs and it will be a Zoom meeting.

Our monthly will be held on Tuesday 11 August at 19.30. Monday is a public holiday hence we meet will on Tuesday and on which day our host should not be scheduled for power loss. The subject will be

“Knit your bit- patriotic knitting” – by Barbara Ann Kinghorn.

Ian Pringle - Scribe.

-------------------------------

Chairman: Malcolm Kinghorn culturev@lantic.net
Secretary:    
Scribe (newsletter):Ian Pringle. pringlefamily@telkomsa.net

* * *


South African Military History Society / scribe@samilitaryhistory.org