Elise Sophia Ottilie Smith (née Halboth), born in South Africa 14 March 1887. Sixth child of Maria Margaretta Kathrina Kranz, born 3 April 1856 in Coburggotha(?), Saxony(?), who married a one-time soldier John Nicholas Halboth from Germany (born 12 Nov 1848). Our Granny was more commonly known as Ottilie than Elise.
This part of the family background is more fully described on the 'mother's family' page for which click here. (Use Back button to return.)
Elise married George and they had nine children. In the back-row (early '30s pic) left to right are Ruth, Patsy, Stella, Joan, Muriel (our Ma) and Brenda; front row George, Rita and Frank. These can all be found via our mother's family page or surfing by NAME in Quick Surf.
The picture on the left shows Elise with our mother Muriel on her knee, in about 1910. She grew much fatter after the other eight children, as you can see from the right-hand pic (she's middle left.)
Perhaps the most lasting legacy from Elise to the family was the style and quality of her cooking. No doubt this owed something to her German background. In spite of pressures towards processed and junk food an appreciation of good home cooking and a taste for sauerkraut and similar delicacies is still to be found several generations down the line.
We brothers saw little of our Granny as she lived 1000 miles away and died before we were out of short pants. I can offer only a few illustrative memories and other bits of information picked up. My abiding impression is of a genial, plump, loving, motherly type, fond of kids. Her geniality may have had something to do with her partiality to Cape sherry (I have this from two independent sources). Yet again a fondness for alcohol appears in our background.
Her plumpness was obvious. I recall Piet one Christmas feeling her arms affectionately and asking whether she inflated them with a bicycle pump. Her response was equally affectionate.
At the Christmas in Capetown of 1943 or 4 Granny presented Graeme, Tricia and me, Paul, with cowboy suits she had made out of hessian. They has fringes down the sides like the buckskins worn in the movies. Tricia's had a skirt rather than trousers. (Graeme was crazy about cowboys.)
Granny was particularly fond of Graeme. He had the privelege of plucking "pig's whiskers" from her aging face with tweezers. She once told me proudly about Graeme's school ahievements saying that he had got a star in what sounded like "Chrisitan Doctoring". We didn't have that at our school. It must have been a couple of years before I heard the phrase "Christian Doctrine" and the penny dropped.
Click one of these for
| Intro Brothers FAQs Parents Father-Side Mother-Side Kids Grandkids Creatures Snaps Contact Annex Search |