‘I love Matjiesfontein, it is my shrine,’ wrote Olive Schreiner. ‘It is a curious and very attractive mixture of civilisation and wild untamed freedom.’

Jimmy Logan

Had the seventeen-year-old Jimmy Logan not been caught poaching rabbits he would probably have remained a minor railway official at Reston in Berwickshire. To escape prosecution, however, he boarded the Australia-bound Rockhampton, which was forced to put in at Simonstown after it became severely waterlogged in a storm. Logan liked what he saw, disembarked with five pounds in his pocket, walked the fifty kilometres to Cape Town and joined the fledgling Cape Colonial Railways as a porter.

The Cape Railways at the time was experiencing a boom: first diamonds were discovered at Kimberley and then gold on the Witwatersrand. It was the perfect place for an ambitious young man to make his mark and Logan’s rise through the ranks was meteoric.

Within a few years he was promoted to stationmaster at Cape Town Station and shortly afterwards was sent to Touws River as district superintendent for the stretch of line between Hex River and Prince Albert Road. Here, it did not take him long to realise the huge potential in providing refreshments to the hordes of rail commuters whose needs were poorly catered for on the trains.

Matjiesfontein

He first obtained the refreshment concession for Touws River Station and others quickly followed until he monopolised every franchise from Cape Town to Bulawayo – an impossible achievement had he not at the same time amassed a fortune, as well as a great deal of political influence, by wheeling and dealing. Moreover, the clear Karoo air cured the chest complaints that had plagued him since childhood, and in 1883 he moved permanently to the siding at Matjiesfontein, around which he had acquired vast tracts of land.

Here, over the next fifteen years, he developed a Victorian health and holiday resort that became internationally renowned. The ‘village in the desert’, shaded by blue gum and pepper trees, included a luxury lodge, cricket pitch, courthouse, jail, church, chapel, bank, post office, coffee house, stables, as well as a turreted hotel with heavy doors and deep verandahs furnished with wicker couches.

The hotel was completed with ornate filigreed metalwork on the exterior and sweeping staircases, dark panelling and velvet curtains in the interior. Olive Schreiner returned again and again, as did Cecil John Rhodes, Cape governors, British aristocracy and leading socialites who would take evening walks along lanes lit by London streetlamps. 

David Rawdon

But, as road transport began to displace rail, so the popularity of Matjiesfontein waned – especially after Logan’s death in 1920. It required the vision of another extraordinary maverick to begin resurrecting it in 1968.

David Rawdon’s parents worried that he lacked ambition as none of the suggested careers or offers to send him to university appealed to him. Rather, he convinced them that they should give him the money they intended spending on his tertiary education so that he could start a mobile general dealer’s business.

They agreed and while he was searching for a suitable van he invested the money in high-risk shares that quickly doubled in value before he found a three-tonne military dental truck that he had converted for his purposes by an undertaker. He used the profits from this enterprise to purchase a property at Nottingham Road with the intention of building a hotel that everyone advised would be a disaster. On the contrary, Rawdon’s Hotel was a goldmine and he was able to go on to purchase a string of establishments including Lanzerac near Stellenbosch and Matjiesfontein – run down, but untouched since 1920.

An Act of Love

‘The others I bought for business purposes,’ said the elegantly dressed Rawdon as we sipped a brandy in the Laird’s Arms bar. ‘Matjiesfontein, however, was because of my love for Victoriana. I never expected to make a profit from it and never will. That I was able to save this incredible place for future generations is reward enough.’

Much of the fortune that Rawdon has spent on the village has been to restore it to its former glory so visitors can walk the streets as the Sultan of Zanzibar did, and Rawdon can work the dining room from table to table, as Logan did a century ago, to make everyone feel as if they are his personal guest. But there are unmistakable touches that are pure Rawdon.

Honky-tonk

In the Laird’s Arms a rotund, bowler-hatted honky-tonk pianola player still huffs and puffs as he works the pedals, but there were never the theatrical women’s hats behind the counter that are now passed round for patrons to wear when the mood is too staid. It is also unlikely that Logan slept in the minute prison cell, as the tall Rawdon prefers.

Rawdon’s influence is also evident in the station dining room that he converted to a museum for his extensive collection of Victoriana that features hospital bedpans and commodes – with pride of place going to a flushing mahogany campaign one used during the Boer War.

Rawdon’s passion at Matjiesfontein has ensured that the past and the present are inseparably intertwined. So much so that it is not surprising to find that some of the guests are staying forever – maybe even in your room.

Ghosts in Your Room

After ordering another brandy, Rawdon told me of the ghosts that haunt the place and its surrounds. Among them are the apparition of Logan, which resides in the elegantly decorated lounges towards the back of the Lord Milner; the wispy Kate, who haunts the lookout at the top of the central turret of the hotel; the injured British soldier sometimes seen at the Boer War cemetery outside the town; and the Highlander who occasionally plays the bagpipes on the hill overlooking the graves.

Then there are the two figures seen on the stairs who disappear on reaching the landing; faces in windows; a woman in long white dress in the garden of Tweeside Lodge; and the sounds of a piano coming from Olive Schreiner’s Cottage. Notwithstanding the fact that I am sceptical, I loved these stories because they add spirit to the rich character of the place.

Lucy’s Room

‘Which room are you staying in?’ asked Rawdon as the barman topped our glasses for the last time.

Already at an advanced stage of slur, I avoided answering directly by pointing to the tag on my room key that was lying on the mahogany counter.

‘You’re in luck!’ exclaimed Rawdon. ‘That’s Lucy’s room. Wearing only a negligee, she’s often spotted in the corridor. I don’t know what happened to her, but residents report hearing a fearful row taking place in the room in which you’re staying, followed by the sounds of smashing glass. Perhaps a long forgotten crime of passion?’

Walking back to the hotel I was more aware of the strong breeze whistling through the tall cypresses and blue gums. Shadows appeared deeper. Alive. I jumped as I caught the movement of a cat stretching on a chair on the verandah. In bed, I turned the light off, but my saucer like eyes refused to shut and I shivered as the net curtains billowed in the wind.

Was it colder? I got up and closed the window, but this did not help because the cacophony of sounds, creaks and moans from the old building were suddenly magnified. There was nothing else I could do, but switch on the light.