Guest House, Bed and Breakfast accommodation in Grahamstown Eastern Cape South Africa
137 High Street Grahamstown
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Grahamstown itself was founded in 1812 as a military outpost on the frontier of the Cape Colony by Lt-Col Graham and was part of a chain of forts along the Cape frontier at the Fish River.
In 1820, Lord Charles Somerset, the governor at the Cape, introduced a scheme to introduce British settlers into the region both to stabilise the frontier and to relieve unemployment in Britain. The small plots allocated to the settlers were, however, quite unrealistic and many failed to make a go of farming and drifted to Grahamstown which began to develop.
In 1836 a military barracks was constructed in the town as well as Fort Selwyn on Gunfire Hill, to command the approaches.
The town flourished and in 1852 it became the seat of a bishopric; in English custom a place with a cathedral ranks as a city, regardless of size. At this point it was the second city of the Cape and, indeed, the Cape Parliament held a session here in 1864, the only session ever to have been held outside Cape Town. The city has become noted for its churches, of which there are some 40, and its educational facilities as well as its rich history.
