Did You Know?
The Polisiestasie en selle (Police Station and Saddles) in Putsonderwater, Northern Cape, was established around 1914 as a small police station and jail facility. Putsonderwater, meaning 'well without water,' is a remote settlement on the edge of the Kalahari Desert, originally a railway siding on the line from De Aar to Upington. The jail was likely a modest structure used for temporary detention of local offenders, reflecting the sparse population and limited law enforcement infrastructure of the early 20th-century Karoo region. The site is now largely abandoned, with few remaining structures, and is not a formally declared heritage site. The broader historical context includes the expansion of the South African Police into rural areas after the Union of 1910, with such outposts serving as both administrative and detention centers.
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