Every small town has its characters. It also has a host of stories of good,
honest mischief that are told over and over again and are refined in the
re-telling until exact details become unimportant as long as the general outline
remains. Who doesn't have a story of a memorable night at the Club, fishing
trip, 21st, golf trip, cricket tour.....and don't forget the odd bulls party!
Greytown is no exception.
The story of the church bell is probably the longest single episode with it
being stolen (or is that too harsh?) and buried in 1873 and only to be found
again over 70 years later in 1946.
Legend has it that:-
certain of the Braithwaites used to position themselves and their 303
rifles on a high hill beneath the path of the Dakota carrying mail from
Jo'burg to Durban and........well...... fortunately they missed!
there was a cricket match in Eshowe starting on Saturday morning and
scheduled to finish on Sunday afternoon. The committed Greytown team left
for Eshowe on Friday night. On arrival they were told that there had been a
severe storm and the ground was unplayable causing the game to be cancelled.
It was too late for them to return home immediately
and.......anyway....accommodation had already been arranged so they couldn't
be rude. A good weekend was had by all. They returned home very late on
Sunday night as scheduled with a well rehearsed version of the game.
Unfortunately an inexperienced youngster had gone home on the Friday night and
there were some expectant households on the Friday night.........and the
Saturday morning..........and the Saturday afternoon...........and Saturday night.....and......
a New Year's Eve Party at the Club hit the back pages of The Sunday
Express
one of our number was able to down a beer on every stroke of the clock at
12...........midnight or noon!
Jimmy Egner hit 9 sixes in a row at Wartburg
the Stationmaster at Sevenoaks had his hands full when someone placed an
advertisement in the press "Please send all unwanted cats to ..........
C/O Seven Oaks Station"
a recent visitor to our site confessed that he had grown up in Greytown
and in his younger days was responsible for spreading fine soot on the tennis
court just before an important event. The soot wasn't immediately visible
but as the balls bounced and the wind blew the whites didn't become whiter.
It soon became apparent that something was amiss as everyone was covered from head to toe in fine, black soot!
during the World War II, Greytown mothers gathered together and made up food parcels for the men "up North". On one occassion Mrs Vial, wife of the local town clerk and mother of one of the soldiers, found to her horror that her diamand had got dislodged from her wedding ring while making muffins and they all presumed that it had to be in a muffin. Rather than opening up hundreds of parcels to take out all of the muffins to search, the mothers put a note in each parcel that if anyone should find the diamand in his muffin, he should give it to Corporal Vial so that he could return it to his mother when he came home after the war. By incredible co-incidence, the diamand was found by none other than corporal Vial in the parcel he received out of hundreds!
