Samuel Eusebius Hudson : portrait sketched by Lady Anne Barnard in 1797
This is the first time that substantial selections from the voluminous diaries of Samuel Eusebius Hudson (1764–1828) have been published. Written by an early British settler of humble social origin but of uncommon education, they are Pepysian in quantity and quality, rich in perceptions, and the more valuable for being unrevised. They cover four periods in the history of the Cape Colony between 1798 and 1828. In the first period, 1798–1800, they present a rare ‘downstairs’ counterpoint to Lady Anne Barnard’s ‘upstairs’ account of the first British occupation. In the next period, 1803–1806, we have Hudson’s later recollections of life at the Cape under Batavian rule. Moving on to the second British occupation, the diaries uniquely preserve the rumours, true and false, swirling through Cape Town in the third period, 1823–1826, and the ‘collective consciousness’ of protest building up against the repressive governorship of Lord Charles Somerset. In contrast, the concluding fourth period, 1826–1828, covers the reforms introduced by his successor, Sir Richard Bourke. In short, this volume provides rare perspectives on the Western Cape from the variety of social positions occupied by Hudson during the first thirty years of British rule.

“Roman Catholic Church [Harrington Street]” sketched by Hudson circa 1824
Born the son of a country gravedigger, Hudson was exceptionally well educated for a man of such modest origin, thanks to a scholarly clergyman who had tutored him benevolently throughout his childhood, giving him the lifelong intellectual curiosity and Evangelical faith which marks his writings. These include several novels, one of which — written on his way to the Cape in 1797 and embellished in 1826 — makes him South Africa’s earliest known novelist. But it is for his essays on Cape society (some written in 1807, some later) and his voluminous diaries (1796 – 1828, of which only twelve years have survived) that he is chiefly remembered.

Greig’s Bookshop from Parade in 1830 by Henry C de Meillon
Joining in the entrepreneurial ventures of his friend Frederik Korsten in the Eastern Cape, Hudson attempted to establish a farm on the Gamtoos River in 1818, but this proved impracticable. He then tried trading at Cradock Place (near Algoa Bay) but, with his health deteriorating and an economic recession looming, his store failed in 1821. A further attempt to trade at Uitenhage in 1822 forced him into bankruptcy, after which he had no option but to return to Cape Town and to rely on friends for board and lodging.
Living from 1823 to 1826 with the Heurtley family in Dorp Street, and thereafter with the Sala family in Keerom Street, he eked out a bare subsistence as an artist, copyist and teacher of art, waiting in vain for his bankruptcy proceedings to be wound up, so that he could return to England. He died in Cape Town in September 1828, leaving an abundant archive of manuscripts, most of which are now in the safekeeping of the Western Cape Archives and Record Service.
The diarist Samuel Eusebius Hudson (1764–1828) arrived at the Cape on 5 May 1797 as footman to the Cape Colony’s first British Secretary, Andrew Barnard and his wife Lady Anne Barnard. In reality he had been exiled from England in consequence of an adulterous affair with Lady Anne’s youngest sister, Lady Elizabeth Hardwicke (1763–1858), whose footman he had been from 1792 to 1796.

“Custom House, formerly the Port Admiral’s” sketched by Hudson in 1823
Once at the Cape, he was soon found a job in the Customs Department, which he held until the colony reverted to Dutch rule in 1803. With his shopkeeper brother Thomas, who had joined him in 1799, he opted to remain during the Batavian Interregnum (1803 – 1806), opening a hotel on Cape Town’s Keizersgracht and — against his Evangelical conscience — buying slaves to staff it.
However, after the colony’s recapture by British forces in 1806 and the arrival in 1807 of Lord Caledon (Lord Hardwicke’s future son-in-law) as Governor, Hudson sold up and returned to England, probably summoned to assist in removing his illegitimate son from the Hardwicke succession. When he came back to the Cape in 1814, he found that his brother, in financial straits, had committed suicide.

The Theatre on Riebeeck Square circa 1828 by Henry C de Meillon
EXTRACT FROM THE TEXT
Saturday 21st February 1824
…There has been a serious riot as they call it in Graham’s Town upon the arrival of the Commissioners. The Military were out and, however Government may have glossed over the affair, exculpating [Sir Henry] Somerset and Rivers no one has a doubt but these two headstrong unprincipled Men have been the cause of the disturbance, as ’tis their own language which they have retorted upon the opposite party.
It seems [Dr] Phillips and Bishop Burnet are to be sent to the Cape to take their trial for their daring attack upon the honour of the Plantagenets and censures upon the Government of Lord Charles- more _unpleasant work for the Fiscal [Denijssen]. Burnet will have no more mercy than his present Antagonist has, who has studied the language of Anthony over the Corpse of Caesar and attacks with weapons not to be parry’d nor to be punished. There are Times when the galled horse must have his withers wrung and the bashawism of presumptuous arrogance bend to the independent spirit of British liberty. The time is nearly at an end of these toad-eating, servile, cringing sychophants who have hitherto lauded it uncontrouled without let or hindrance. They must now give way and in their waning shew the cloven foot that has but clumsily been concealed. There will be no good done till the whole of the public Offices are cleansed from this Augean race of spoilers who are, and have been, fattening upon the public Spoil & at the same time betraying their trust by unblushing ingratitude. We shall find more Bussines when their Accounts come to be examined. I prophesy that there is one Office that will be half a Million deficient and still they keep up all the insolence of office which integrity never assumes. But they act consistently, thinking their Villiany may be cloaked by their Impudence….
… Large notices stuck up that the whole of the trial of Edwards, Cooke and Hofman at the suit of the Fiscal [Denijssen] is to be inserted in tomorrow’s Paper. It has created a stir and will not terminate without a more serious consequence than the imprisonment of Edwards.
… The newspaper has given us the particulars of the Trial of Edwards, Hoffman and Cooke, which has astonished the Cape people that any man could dare to use such bold language to their Dagon. Tomorrow the cause comes on again and there are placards pasted up at the Corners of the streets truly expressive of the Indignation of the generality of the people, which the Officers are tearing down.
EDITOR
Edward Hudson is a graduate of Oxford University, where, as an open scholar at Wadham College, he was tutored by Lawrence Stone and acquired a lifelong interest in eighteenth-century social history. He retired early from an executive post in the International Civil Aviation Organization in order to research ‘mentalité’ in eighteenth-century rural France. But since discovering, twenty years ago, that one of his relatives, an early British settler at the Cape, had left a voluminous, largely unexplored, archive in Cape Town, he has been researching, and writing about, the picaresque life and prolific writings of Samuel Eusebius Hudson. He has contributed articles to peer-reviewed journals in South Africa, the UK and the US, and has co-edited the publication of one of Hudson’s novels. He is preparing a biography of Hudson and an electronic edition of the complete text of his diaries.