1926 in South Africa

The following lists events that happened during 1926 in South Africa.

Incumbents

• Monarch: King George V.
• Governor-General and High Commissioner for Southern Africa: The Earl of Athlone.
• Prime Minister: James Barry Munnik Hertzog.
• Chief Justice: James Rose Innes.

Events

March

• 13 – The first commercial air route from South Africa is established when Alan Cobham does a return flight between London and Cape Town.

October

• 8 – 124 coal miners die due to a methane explosion in the Durban Navigation Colliery disaster
• 10 – The South African National War Memorial next to Delville Wood outside Longueval, France is opened.
• 10 – The Sabie Game Reserve is renamed to Kruger National Park.

Births

• 23 May – Joe Slovo, politician in Obeliai, Lithuania (d. 1995)
• 11 September; Gerrit Viljoen, government minister (d. 2009)
• 24 December – Ronald Draper, cricketer (d. 2025)

Railways

Railway lines opened

• 18 January – Transvaal – Villiers, Free State to Grootvlei, .
• 7 June – Free State – Harrismith to Warden, .
• 18 August – Cape – Upington to Kakamas (Narrow gauge), .
• 1 September – Cape – Addo to Sunland, .
• 15 September – Natal – Mtubatuba to Candover, .
• 19 November – Cape – Katberg to Seymour (Narrow gauge), .
• 22 November – Transvaal – Citrus to Plaston, .
• 8 December – Cape – Klawer to Landplaas, .

Locomotives

Three Cape gauge locomotive types enter service on the South African Railways (SAR):

• The first twenty-three Class 15CA 4-8-2 Mountain type locomotives.
• Four Class FD 2-6-2+2-6-2 Modified Fairlie articulated steam locomotives.
• To address a shortage of suitable shunting locomotives, the first of twenty-one ex Natal Government Railways Class D1 tank locomotives are rebuilt to Class 17 4-8-0 tank-and-tender locomotives.

References