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Did You Know?

The Groottrek Gedenkteken (Great Trek Memorial) in Fauresmith, Free State, was erected in 1938 to commemorate the centenary of the Great Trek, the mass migration of Dutch-speaking settlers (Voortrekkers) from the Cape Colony into the interior of South Africa during the 1830s and 1840s. The monument is located in the historic town of Fauresmith, which was founded in 1849 and named after the Reverend Phillip Faure and Sir Harry Smith, a British governor. The memorial is part of a broader wave of Afrikaner nationalist monuments built around 1938, including the Voortrekker Monument in Pretoria, which was also inaugurated that year. The site typically features a stone obelisk or similar structure, often with inscriptions in Afrikaans, and serves as a symbol of Afrikaner heritage and the centenary celebrations of the Great Trek.

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