Once upon a time, in those very early days, there were no more than a handful of families in this vale of Vishoek (as Fish Hoek was first called). Of these, the Van der Polls became an integral part - a big, happy, hardworking family of five boys and two girls. One little sister died at the age of 12 and was buried in the Kirsten graveyard at the Silvermyn which belonged to the grandparents of Mrs. Van der Poll.
On the grandfather’s side there had been the huge estate of Pollsmoor - the original Van der Poll home - so no wonder the boys were toughened to farming life - no easy job in those days of no electricity, nor water - tending the lamps and wood for the big coal stoves and getting up at dawn to milk the cows and feed the horses; a hard life, but a glorious one.
In fact, the Van der Polls have memories of a never-to-be-forgotten dawn after a mid-winter’s night in August 1899 when Mr. Van der Poll senior was carrying his lantern outside to hang in the cowshed and two rough, unshaven men came staggering up the mountainside to their Brakkloof home.
These men had been shipwrecked from the Kakapo on Noordhoek beach and had seen a pin-point of light all that distance away at the Van der Poll farm-house and staggered on and on until they found refuge!
This is the grave stone of the 12 year old girl Michael referred to, "Magdalena Jacoba van der Poll".
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