Touring South Africa: National Women’s Monument

During the Second Boer War in South Africa, an estimated 27,000 women were reported to have died in British concentration camps. Some historians and researchers put the estimated figure much higher than the official 27,000 stated by public records. This is the foundation of the famous National Women’s Monument in Bloemfontein, South Africa.

Construction of the monument began in the early 1900s a few years after the Boer War had ended in 1902, and was completed and commissioned in 1913 precisely on the 16^th of December that year.

The monument aims to commemorate and remember the 27,000 women and children who lost their lives while being kept in British concentration camps at the peak of the war. The standout monument at the grounds is a sculptured bronze statue depicting women and a dying child in one of the concentration camps designed by Emily Hobhouse who herself had been held in one of the concentration camps during the war.

There are also several other smaller statues and monument at the grounds and tourists are usually taken on a tour by tour guides who even double as historians and tell the history behind every monument to the visiting tourists.

The monument is free to visit grounds and is usually frequented by tourists who visit Bloemfontein for the first time.