When the British German Legion arrived in British Kaffraria in 1857, many new villages with German names sprang up throughout the territory: towns like Potsdam, Stutterheim, Berlin and Breidbach. Nearer the coast, however, two villages were created which were given English titles: Panmure and Cambridge, the latter being named after the Duke of Cambridge, Commander-in-Chief of the British Forces in 1856. Here the German soldiers were given small building plots, one-acre lots further afield and ten-acre agricultural lots along the Nahoon River. When the East London Municipality was formed in 1873, Cambridge was not included. Instead, it formed its own Village Management Board in April 1882 and became an independent municipality in 1902, incorporating the area that today marks the suburbs of Berea, Nahoon, Stirling and Vincent. An attempt in 1914 to bring Cambridge into the East London Municipality failed and it would wait until as late as 1942 before the two municipalities were united.

Dr Keith Tankard