Etruria Park

Streets set out around Etruria Park

A number of streets of terraced houses laid out below the parks are named after South African towns prominent in the South African Wars (1899-1902), also known as the Boer Wars, a conflict in southern Africa between the British Empire and the allied, Afrikaner-populated Transvaal (or South African Republic) and Orange Free State (modern Free State), in what is now South Africa.

2008 Map of streets around Etruria park

Dundee Road
The coal mining town of Dundee is situated in a valley of the Biggarsberg mountains in South Africa.
Peter Smith, a Scottish settler started sending wagonloads of coal which was discovered close to the surface to be sold in Pietermaritzburg. This actually started the coal industry in this area and in 1882 a town was laid out and named after Smith’s Scottish hometown Dundee.
The British start massing troops at Dundee and was given an ultimatum by the Boers to remove the troops. On 20 October 1899, the first shots of the Boer War were fired.

Ladysmith Road
Ladysmith was founded by the British in 1850 after they annexed the area. It was named after the wife of Sir Harry Smith, the then governor of the Cape Colony.
In October 1899, during the early months of the South African Wars, the British forces at Ladysmith were surrounded by the Boers for 115 days until they were relieved by Sir Redvers Buller on February 28, 1900. During this siege 3,200 people died, both in the defence of the town and from lack of food and medical supplies.

Kimberley Road
Kimberley, city in central South Africa, capital of Northern Cape Province.
Kimberley is the centre of a diamond-mining region. The principal industries include diamond-cutting, the processing of lime and tungsten, and the manufacture of cement and bricks. The city was founded in 1870 after the discovery of diamonds on a nearby farm.

Pretoria Road
Pretoria, city in north-eastern South Africa, in Gauteng Province, on the Apies River. The settlement was established by Marthinus W. Pretorius in 1855 and named after his father, Andries W. J. Pretorius, the Boer soldier and statesman.
It became the capital of the South African Republic in 1860. The Peace of Vereeniging, ending the South African Wars, was signed here in 1902.

Belmont Road
The Battle of Belmont is the name of an engagement in 1899 of the Second Boer War in the town of Belmont where the British under Lord Methuen assaulted a Boer position on a near by hill.