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Questions about 'Sandula'
Paul Bryant-Quinn


Joined: 14 Oct 2007
Posts: 551
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I've been advised to re-post a query in this forum which I had originally put in the 'Off Topic' section.

Can anyone help with a reference?

I am interested in how long the toponym Sandula or Isandula continued to be in use. Emily Pfeiffer's poem 'The Fight at Rorke's Drift', which uses this form of the name, is usually dated to 1882. Does anyone happen to know whether this poem might have first appeared in 1879, or was 'Sandula / Isandula' still an acknowledged variant as late as 1882; and if so, how late did it continue to be used?

Also - and this may have been discussed elsewhere - apart from the ones we know about in Nottingham and Tywyn (in the old Merionethshire), were there any other streets named for Isandhlwana or 'Sandula'?
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Re: Questions about 'Sandula'
The Scorer


Joined: 27 Nov 2006
Posts: 338
Location: Newport
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Paul Bryant-Quinn wrote:
I've been advised to re-post a query in this forum which I had originally put in the 'Off Topic' section.

Also - and this may have been discussed elsewhere - apart from the ones we know about in Nottingham and Tywyn (in the old Merionethshire), were there any other streets named for Isandhlwana or 'Sandula'?


A simple check on Google Maps doesn't reveal any other streets, roads etc. in the UK using either version of the name.

However, it's interesting to note that Isandula Road in Nottingham is one of six streets with an AZW theme in the same area. The others are Chard Street, Chelmsford Road, Durnford Street, Ekowe Street and Zulu Road (no Bromhead Street, sadly!).

I wonder why this grouping came about? The streets are in the Bridgeford / West Bridgeford area, north of Nottingham. There doesn't seem to be any connection with Ruddington, where three defenders are buried, as this is in the south east of the city.

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SIR BCP


Joined: 04 Mar 2010
Posts: 22
Location: Chudleigh. Devon
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Down here in Devon there is a splendid stained glass memorial window in St.Mary's Church, Ideford. re Captain Mostyn (k.i.a Isandlwana)

The copy I have of the Chudleigh Weekly Express dated October 5th 1887 describes the opening of the Church new Chancel, and the memorial window inscription which reads:

"William Eccles Mostyn, Capt, 24th Regiment, who fell at Isandula, January 1879"

If we assume the building of the new Chancel & the window therein took several years, the word "Isandula" must have still been in use in the mid 1880s
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Julian whybra


Joined: 03 Sep 2005
Posts: 437
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Paul
There is a Lake Isandula near Ulverstone in Tasmania, named presumably from the resemblance of its shape to the profile of the mountain - though when, how or why I don't know. I've requested an answer from the Tasmanian Fisheries institute.
Julian
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Alan
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Joined: 30 Aug 2005
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Location: Wales
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Don't see a great resemblance.


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Rob D


Joined: 01 Sep 2005
Posts: 93
Location: Melbourne Australia
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Alan
Look at the top-line profile on the little map on the right-hand side of http://www.bonzle.com/c/a?a=p&p=166188&cmd=sp. The resemblance to some views of Isandlwana seems pretty clear to me.
Rob
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Alan
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Rob,
I see your point but it's certainly not the first thing that would strike me. I might have been tempted to call it Lake Dromedary.

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Might just have had the same name, or borrowed it, rather than anything to do with it looking like the mountain. I mean, how many people see it from the aerial view.

Apparently, there is an Isandula road nearby, though nothing to do with the similarity to the track on the battlefield.

Why would Isandula have any importance to Australia ? - later battles/wars ?

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Peter Ewart


Joined: 31 Aug 2005
Posts: 1797
Location: Near Canterbury, Kent, England.
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All depends when it was named (or renamed) Isandula, as the lake and the Tasmanians were there long before 1879. Assuming it's not from the indigenous language, both above possibilities look plausible - its rough resemblance to a sphinx when seen on a map, or the renaming in memory of the battle in or after 1879. Or both.

The latter would be perfectly in keeping with tradition. There are many placenames all over the world which have been changed in order to commemorate moving events thousands of miles away, even when there was no national, cultural or even linguistic connection. Examples such as Lidice (only one until 1942) come to mind. Isandlwana/Isandula was reported in the Tasmanian press as soon as word arrived and the shock would have been no less than anywhere in the Empire, barring perhaps South Africa, London, Brecon, Birmingham or Woolwich. Tasmania was as British as Natal (well, much more so, really) or Canada, India, New Zealand etc. Do we know whether the well known Isandula Rd in Nottingham was the only example, for instance?

Paul: Since you posted your question I've come across some fairly late examples now & again but keep forgetting to note them!!!

Peter
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Rob D


Joined: 01 Sep 2005
Posts: 93
Location: Melbourne Australia
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Alan
Now you're just trying to give me the hump, aren't you? Very Happy

Peter
Well answered. To lend a bit of support, there are Melbourne suburbs called "Alamein" and "Balaclava", streets named after "Inkerman" and "Alma", and so on. Oh, and one country town was renamed "Churchill" not so long ago...

Rob
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John Young


Joined: 30 Aug 2005
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Location: Lower Sheering, Essex
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Coll,

Why would Isandula have any importance to Australia ?


At least one Australian-born soldier died at Isandlwana, that I know of.

Lieutenant Edgar Oliphant Anstey, 1st Battalion, 24th (2nd Warwickshire) Regiment was born in South Australia.

John Y.
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Alan
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There was also a block of fats in Peckham named after Nelson Mandela.

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John Young


Joined: 30 Aug 2005
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Alan,

Are you still driving the Reliant you bought from the brothers at that address?

John Y.
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Keith Smith


Joined: 30 Aug 2005
Posts: 540
Location: Northern NSW, Australia
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Perhaps the best-known Australian, who was out with Chemsford on 22 January 1879, but who brought the news of the Zulu sack of the camp, was Commandant Rupert Lonsdale.

Rupert La Trobe Lonsdale was born in Melbourne, Australia on 23 August 1849. He was the fourth son of William Lonsdale (1799-1864), Chief Agent of Government, Police Magistrate and Commandant for the Port Phillip region of Melbourne, Australia, and one of the original founders of the city in 1836. (Rupert�s second forename was in honour of Charles Latrobe (1801-1875), who arrived in Melbourne in October 1839 as Port Phillip�s first Superintendent and succeeded Lonsdale senior as General Agent of Government. ) Both Lonsdale and La Trobe are remembered by Melbourne streets for whom they are named and there is also a La Trobe University in Melbourne. William Lonsdale�s father, James, married Jane Faunce, thus bringing that name into the family. William had at least two brothers, Alured and James Faunce.

KIS
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Rob D


Joined: 01 Sep 2005
Posts: 93
Location: Melbourne Australia
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Not wanting to sound too snippy, but I seriously doubt that either Anstey or Lonsdale would have considered themselves to be Australian/South Australian/Victorian or anything other than British, and I suspect that they may well have agreed with the Duke of Wellington's retort when someone called him an Irish peer: �Being born in a stable does not make one a horse.�
Rob
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Questions about 'Sandula'
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