Postholder Deneys’ Gravestone

2001

Bookkeeper, later deputy merchant Adriaan Deneys was the second postman at the VOC’s outpost in the winter harbor of Simonsbaai. He was appointed in 1751 and died at the outpost in 1761. His grave is by the sea.

During construction in that area, the stone on his grave was moved to the village cemetery. In the 1990s, members of the VOC Foundation found the stone in the old churchyard in Simonsstad, where it had been planted upright. The municipality warned that it is not a head stone but a cover stone, and therefore must lie flat.

Soon after, it fell over and broke into three pieces. The Simonstown Museum was approached to take it into custody. One of their management committee was a high naval officer, and the SA Navy (Adm. J. Louw) provided transport and labour to bring it to the museum and place it on a prepared bed to the right of the museum’s steps.

The inscription reads:

In Memory of

The

Lord Adriaan de Nys

In His Life Deputy

Merchant

And Head of the

False Bay

Born 27 Sep 1711

And Died

[The] 1 March Ano 1761

Postholder Deneys was the progenitor of this family in South Africa. The stone is made of foreign rock and may have arrived as ballast on a VOC ship.