Roll of Honour

The Roll of Honour of the black South African soldiers buried in France numbers 445.*

It starts with the driver J Lutas buried in the Abbeville Communal Cemetery Extension and ends with Lance Corporal Alpheus Zwane buried at Arques-La-Bataille Military Cemetery in Deppe.

It includes the name of 3009 Private Beleza Myengwa, buried at the Bleville Community Cemetery just north of Le Harve, but in June 2014 exhumed and re-interred at the South African Memorial at Dellville Wood.

Private Myengwa is considered the first casualty of the South African Native Labour Contingent to die in France, and his, the only gravestone exhumed and reinterred, placed in the middle of the Dellville Wood Museum ‘represents all members of the SANLC whose deeds were not acknowledged in the past’.

Beleza Myengwa landed at Le Havre in France on 20 November 1916, part of the 1^st South African Native Labour Contingent, comprising 1479 men, 20 officers and 409 of other ranks. Later that day, it left for work at Dieppe, one of the key points for supplying the Western Front.

He died in unknown circumstances on 27 November 1916. That’s just seven days after arriving.

When war broke out in 1914, the government at the time issued an initial to let black South Africans participate in the campaign, but the decision later met the harsh reality of war, and their participation was accepted with conditions similar to those that restricted movement and aspiration at home.

Crucially, they would not be carrying arms but providing the labour to enable others to do so.

Nevertheless, more than 90 000 answered the call to mobilisation by the African National Congress, then known as the South African Native National Congress, to assist in the various campaigns in Africa (former German   Africa and former German East Africa), Europe (France) and the Middle East (Palestine).

In France, the contingent serviced from November 1916 until January 1918 with the main headquarters at Rouen. They were mostly concentrated at Le Havre, Dieppe, Rouen, Abbeville, Dannes, Abancourt, Saignville, Bethune, Montauban, Fricourt and Meault. Unarmed, their purpose was to help meet the increasing demand for manual labour at the ports and on the lines of communication in France.

The built and repaired roads and railways, felling the wood required for the duckboards, salvage discarded items for repurpose and reuse, and carried the food, ammunition, fuels and water needed by the men and the vehicles at the front.

The decision to move his grave was to make sure the memorial at Dellville Wood reflects the contribution made by so many in the wars in Africa, Europe and the Middle East.

*The total number of black South Africans died in the service of WW1 remains unknown but is estimated to be above 1600 and includes the 616 who drowned when the SS Mendi sank in 1917, on its way to the front.