Andries Hendrik Potgieter
Overview
Head of State
A head of state is the individual that serves as the chief public representative of a monarchy, republic, federation, commonwealth or other kind of state. His or her role generally includes legitimizing the state and exercising the political powers, functions, and duties granted to the head of...
of Potchefstroom from 1840 and 1845 and also as the first head of state of Zoutpansberg
Zoutpansberg
Zoutpansberg was the north-eastern division of the Transvaal, South Africa. This was the district to which Louis Tregardt and Jan van Rensburg, the forerunners of the Great Trek, journeyed in 1835. In 1845 Hendrik Potgieter, a prominent leader of the Voortrekkers, moved there...
from 1845 to 1852.
Potgieter was born in the Tarkastad
Tarkastad
Tarkastad is a small Karoo town in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. Tarkastad is on a plain to the north of the Winterberg mountain range...
district of the Cape Colony
Cape Colony
The Cape Colony, part of modern South Africa, was established by the Dutch East India Company in 1652, with the founding of Cape Town. It was subsequently occupied by the British in 1795 when the Netherlands were occupied by revolutionary France, so that the French revolutionaries could not take...
, the second child of Petronella Margaretha and Hermanus Potgieter. He grew up to be a wealthy sheep farmer and fought in the Fourth and Fifth Frontier Wars
Xhosa wars
The Xhosa Wars, also known as the Cape Frontier Wars, were a series of nine wars between the Xhosa people and European settlers, from 1779 to 1879 in what is now the Eastern Cape in South Africa....
.
