Rev Charles Pettman

Birth, Marriage and Death information

     Rev Charles Pettman was born on 14 August 1851 at Whitstable, KEN, ENG; son of Richard Pettman and Mary nee Wells.
     He married Annie Alicia Glanville, daughter of Thomas Burt Glanville and Wilmot Watson, on 6 November 1880 at Wesleyan Chapel, Port Elizabeth, Cape Colony, RSA, (when age calculated as 29 years, 2 months and 23 days) both of full age. Witnesses Ernest and Wilmot Glanville.
     He died on 4 April 1935 at Queenstown, Eastern Cape, RSA, (when age calculated as 83.)

Other information

     Rev Charles Pettman immigrated before 1880 to RSA.
     Brought up as a Baptist, he became a Methodist local preacher while in business in Folkestone. He attended the Richmond Theological College from 1873 to 1876, where after, ordained, he went to South Africa. There he became the first minister of any denomination to serve in East London. He laid the foundation stone of the Central Methodist Church in East London; thereafter serving in Port Elizabeth, King William's Town, Graaf-Reinet, and Kimberley.
He went to Queenstown in 1907 where he remained for the rest of his life. For 5 years, he was secretary, and in 1910 President, of Conference of Methodist Church of Southern Africa. In Queenstown, he was member of Town Council and chairman of the library committee. A respected clergyman and pioneer philologist and lexicographer, he became best known for his writings about South African place names and colloquialisms, embodied in his treatise Afrikanderisms.
In his will, Charles Pettmann left his books, stamps and savings of £ 3178 / 4 / 2 to the Queenstown Library directing that "the Africana be kept together and intact".