When Hercules Philippus Smit was born in 1763, in Tulbagh, Cape of Good Hope, South Africa, his father, Alewyn Smit, was 27 and his mother, Maria Jacoba du Preez, was 20. He married Geertruij Klopper on 2 December 1787, in Cape Town, Cape of Good Hope, South Africa. They were the parents of at least 2 sons and 2 daughters. He died in 1797, in South Africa, at the age of 34.
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The Cape Colony (Dutch: Kaapkolonie) was a Dutch United East India Company (VOC) Colony in Southern Africa, centered on the Cape of Good Hope, whence it derived its name. The original colony and its successive states that the colony was incorporated into occupied much of modern South Africa. Between 1652 and 1691 a Commandment, and between 1691 and 1795 a Governorate of the United East India Company (VOC). Jan van Riebeeck established the colony as a re-supply and layover port for vessels of the VOC trading with Asia.[2] The Cape came under VOC rule from 1652 to 1795 and again from 1803 to 1806.[3] Much to the dismay of the shareholders of the VOC, who focused primarily on making profits from the Asian trade, the colony rapidly expanded into a Settler Colony in the years after its founding. In 1795, after the Battle of Muizenberg in present-day Cape Town, the British occupied the colony. Under the terms of the Peace of Amiens of 1802, Britain acceded the colony to the Dutch on 1 March 1803.
Some characteristic forenames: Dutch Dirk, Hendrik, Maarten, Willem, Jacobus, Jeroen, Marinus, Pieter, Bernardus, Egbert, Gerrit, Harm.
Dutch, Flemish, and North German: occupational name for a smith, Middle Dutch smet, smit. This is one of the most common surnames in the Netherlands. It is also established in South Africa. Compare De Smith and Smet .
Americanized form of German Schmidt ‘smith’.
Dictionary of American Family Names © Patrick Hanks 2003, 2006.
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