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Origin of Bluff street names: final audit

Researched and compiled by Duncan Du Bois

KONTWIN Place: No local link. Possibly of Asian origin.

Lancelot Avenue: Possibly refers to Dr Lancelot Parker Booth, a medical surgeon who was outspoken in condemning the exploitation of indentured Indian labour from 1879 onwards.

Lobelia Road: A botanical reference, the name of a flowering plant.

Loudon Road: No link traced.

Marchant Road: George Marchant was a 1850 British settler.

Maristow Avenue: No local link. Probably refers to Maristow, a large, stately, country house near Plymouth in Devon, UK which was originally built in 1560.

Marlight Road: No reference could be traced.

Maxwell Avenue: Although not related, Patrick Joseph and Francis Severn Maxwell were 1850 British settlers. Patrick Maxwell was one of the first white settlers in the Umzinto area.

Millett Road: Alfred Millett was a 1850 British settler.

Millwood Crescent: No particular local or British significance. May refer to the previously very wooded character of the area in which the road is situated.

Netford Road: No local link could be traced, perhaps of UK origin.

Norman Road: In all probability named after a 500-ton ship, the RMS Norman which was a caller at Durban harbour in the 1860s and which brought settlers to Natal.

Oakland Road: Possibly a reference to the once wooded nature of the area. The road might also be named after Oakland sugar estate which was founded near Verulam in the 1850s.

Price Place: Named after Robert Price, an eleven-year-old cabin boy on the British East India ship Grosvenor which was wrecked off the Pondoland coast in 1782. Robert Price was one of the few survivors to reach Port Natal.

Serowe Road: No local significance. Probably refers to a town in Botswana.

Seymour Road: No particular historical reference unless it refers to Francis Seymour Haden, a senior colonial official who became colonial secretary in Natal in 1887.

Sunnycliffe Place: No trace of anything significant. British origin.

Worthing Avenue: No local link could be traced. A seaside town in Sussex.

Wyburn Road: No local relevance. British origin.

Yardley Avenue: Named by the development which laid out Marlborough Park.

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