Cllr earns his PhD

WARD 66 councillor, Duncan Du Bois completed three years of hard study to earn his doctorate in Philosophy from the University of KwaZulu-Natal on Monday, April 7.

His 280-page thesis, ‘Sugar and Settlers: The colonisation of the Natal South Coast 1850 to 1910’ maps the settlement and development of the South.

“The topic came to me out of the blue four years ago. It is a region that has never been studied as an entity. The only studies of the South Coast were limited to families such as the Bazleys, Crookes and Archibalds, as well as the Norwegian settlers.

After making enquiries at UKZN, I enrolled in 2011 and commenced the task of researching the 60-year period. I found it fulfilling and fascinating. By factoring time for research and writing into my daily schedule, I was able to comb through over 1,500 files of unpublished material in the archives and 58 years of the Natal Mercury, among many other sources.

I have rendered the thesis into a book format, modified the title, rewritten parts, added a chapter and collected many images to intersperse in the text. Hopefully a publisher will accept it. In the mean time I have compiled three monographs from the research I collected. They are sketches of Umkomaas, Umzinto and Port Shepstone during colonial times.”