The eGGSA Passenger List Project has been updated and now includes the Natal Immigration Board's list of immigrants 1850 to 1904, as well as the passenger lists from the departure notices in the British Mail 1879 to 1881. The database includes details of 27,000 passengers and 800 voyages.

This is an ongoing eGGSA project and the finished, searchable data is provided on the eGGSA web site.

The volunteers who are doing the work (photographing the records, co-ordinaing the transcribers, transcribing, proof-reading and database creation) are members of the eGGSA, Eastern Cape, Natal Midlands, West Gauteng and Western Cape branches of the GSSA and live on four contintents, Africa, Europe, America and Australia. .

A new section has been added to the web site to bring together the many transcripts we have available. Here, at South African Records Transcribed, you can now find the Muster Rolls, and the Cape Baptisms and Marriages 1665-1696. These have been revised and corrected by Corney Keller and he has just added to them a transcript of the Cape Town NGK marriages 1696 to 1712. You will also find some earlier baptisms and marriages found in the De Stael letters to the Amsterdam Classis, that Corney found in the Amsterdam Archives who have given permission for the letters themselves to be transcribed - letter reports to Amsterdam from Peter Stael, siekentrooster at the Cape from 1654 to 1663. Also there is a transcript of the French baptism register of Drakenstein, 1694 to 1713, with translations into English.

In addition Corney has acquired scans of 25 soldijboeken of early 17th and 18th century settlers at the Cape which are displayed with the permission of the Nationaal Archief, Den Haag, Nederland, and also provided a transcript to a few of them.

I am the niece of a '19 year old lad' from Manchester England who found himself in a war and a country I am certain he had little knowledge of. He tragically lost his life in January 1943 and is buried in Stellawood Cemetery, Durban. His name is Bernard Vaughan Healey, born to impoverished parents who had 7 children to feed and clothe. His childhood was miserable and before he had a chance at making a better life for himself, lost that life at such a young age. He was buried thousands of miles from home and of course no family members ever visited his grave. He has been long forgotten, his parents and siblings all long dead. I never knew him, being born 15 years after he died.

But because of the fantastic work you all have done, including those who tend and care for the graves, Bernard Vaughan Healey has been cared for more in death than he ever was in his short sad life.

He is 'at peace' in a beautiful corner of the world being watched over by angels who at the least deserve heartfelt thanks and praise for the dedicated work you all do. I will always think of you all with gratitude and praise.

Yours sincerely
Dianne Dever
Manchester

When the eGGSA branch first started on Project S (the transcription of the whole of the letter S in the 1984 South African Voters' Roll, 296 668 names and addresses) we were simply just going to type forever!! You must know when the S's first arrived at my desk, I sommer put the computer off for 2 weeks, not knowing where to start. eGGSA's initial plans for handling the transcriptions were also put to bed and we had to come up with a new approach. The simplest for us was to approach anybody with even the remotest interest in the S-surnames, family and friends were also not safe.

The first of the S's were typed with the start of the Soccer World Cup in 2010. In the first quarter of this year we set ourselves a deadline for completing Project S by the end of December 2011. We typed right through the Rugby World Cup and today we won the S-CUP!!! The transcription of the letter S is now complete - 31 days BEFORE the deadline!!