Francois Renier Duminy 1747-1811 - Duminy

2005 first edition very large hardcover in good condition. R45 postage in SA. 193 pages.

The passage of time obliterates and distorts with amazing rapidity. A hundred years after François Renier Duminy’s death in 1811, very little was known about him among his descendants. Only about 20 years after his death, a family tree compiled by a member of the family described him as “Fransowa Duminy van Lorry”. A hundred years after his death the whereabouts of his grave was unknown. Sand blew over the lost ruins of his farm, Compagniesdam, at Bloubergstrand (Blaauwberg).
In 1938 the Van Riebeeck Society published a selection of François Renier Duminy’s journals (some had been lost for ever), together with the cash book and diary of his wife, Johanna, edited by Professor J. L. M. Franken. This book, long since out of print, was meticulously researched and contains an enormous amount of information about Duminy’s career in the French East India Company before 1776 and at the Cape as a servant of the Dutch East India Company between 1781 and 1793. Duminy’s journals, however, are largely bland records of his sea voyages and Franken was unable to relate them to the history of topics such as slavery, Freemasonry and astro-navigation that has attracted so much interest in recent years. Although Franken uncovered much of interest about Duminy’s career at sea and about his farming activities after 1793, and also a great deal of information about his children and their families, it has invariably been Johanna’s diary that has attracted greater attention, for it provides invaluable insights into the social life at the Cape at the end of the 18th century and the origins of the Afrikaans language.