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THE SETTLER HANDBOOK by MD Nash
THE SETTLER PARTIES

PRINGLE'S PARTY

No. 48 on the Colonial Department list, led by Thomas Pringle of 24 Salisbury Street, Edinburgh, a crippled journalist and poet who hoped to obtain a government clerkship at the Cape. He was recommended by his patron, Sir Walter Scott, and through Scott's influence by the Secretary to the Admiralty, JW Croker. This was a joint-stock party, possessing, according to its leader, 'some small capital, steadiness, enterprise and agricultural skill' - a claim justified by its subsequent history. The party was predominantly Scottish in origin: the Pringle family and their ploughman, James Eckron, came from Roxburghshire; Thomas Pringle's wife and her relatives, Janet Brown and the Rennie family, as well as Charles Sydserff and his servants, Mortimer and Souness, came from East Lothian (Haddingtonshire). The group travelled by sea from Leith to London where they were joined by the Ridgard family and their relative William Elliott, late additions to the party from England the Wales.

Deposits were paid for 12 men and their families, and the party embarked at Deptford in the Brilliant, which sailed from Gravesend on 15 February 1820 and arrived at Simon's Bay on 30 April and Algoa Bay on 15 May. Pringle's 'Scottish party' was unique in being the only settler party to be located in the far interior of the eastern Cape. Two other parties of settlers from Scotland had been accepted under the emigration scheme, and the colonial authorities proposed to settle all three in the Winterberg area. In accordance with this plan, Pringle's party was located on the Baviaans River, some 30 miles from the village of Cradock, and named its location Glen Lynden. In the event, the other Scottish parties never reached South Africa; a party of 500 Highlanders under Captain Grant withdrew from the scheme altogether, and a party under William Russell that sailed from Greenock in October 1820 was lost at sea when the transport Abeona caught fire and sank.

One member of Pringle's party, William Elliott, applied as soon as he reached Algoa Bay for permission to return to Simon's Town, from where he left for England to study for the ministry. He subsequently came back to South Africa as a missionary. Thomas Pringle left the Baviaans River for Cape Town in 1822, and was replaced as leader of the party by his brother William who emigrated from Scotland in that year.

LIST OF PRINGLE'S PARTY

BROWN, Janet 44 (sister-in-law of Thomas Pringle).
ECKRON, James 25. Ploughman.
ELLIOTT, William 27. Bookseller's assistant.
MORTIMER, Alexander 23. Baker.
PRINGLE, John 28. Agriculturist.
PRINGLE, Robert 65. Agriculturist. w Beatrice 49. c William Dods 11, Catherine Heatlie 9, Beatrice Scott 3.
PRINGLE, Thomas 31. Author and editor. w Margaret 40.
RENNIE, Elizabeth 44. c Elizabeth Kirkwood 17, Charles 9.
RENNIE, George 21. Agriculturist.
RENNIE, John Brown 20. Agriculturist.
RENNIE, Peter 19. Agriculturist.
RIDGARD, Ezra 29. Saddler. w Elizabeth 23. c Andrew 3, Mary Ann.
SOUNESS, James 21. Ploughman.
SYDSERFF, Charles Jervis Buchan 22. Agriculturist.

Main sources for party list
Agent of Transports' Return of settlers under the direction of Thomas Pringle (Cape Archives CO 6138/2,83). Correct names, ages on embarkation and occupations were supplied by Dr JVL Rennie, who has carried out extensive research on Pringle's party.

Further reading
Thomas Pringle, Narrative of a Residence in South Africa (London, Moxon, 1835, reprinted in 1966.
An edited version was published in 1970 under the title Thomas Pringle in South Africa);
J Meiring, Thomas Pringle: his life and times (Cape Town, AA Balkema, 1968);
Eric, Mark E and JA Pringle, Pringles of the Valleys (Adelaide, Eric Pringle, 1957).