This site is dedicated to those wanting to know more about the Parkin family in South Africa and also provide a forum for all descendants of John Parkin to share information about the family.
John Parkin, an 1820 settlers, was the first Parkin to set foot in South Africa, in Algoa Bay on 20th May 1820. He was accompanied by his wife Elizabeth Abraham (nee Howard) and his first four children, William, John, Jane and Robert. Initially settling on the farm designated by the British Government to the Parkin party, some 14km south west of Bathurst in the Eastern Cape, he moved into Port Elizabeth soon after and during the early years of the cities existence, quickly acquired a large portfolio of the Port Elizabeth real estate.
Today, not much (if any) of his original land remains in the Parkin name, with only a few items in the city remaining as an acknowledgement of his input into the beginnings of Port Elizabeth, namely Parkin Street in North End and a memorial plaque in a park in Stella ave Fernglen, close to where his original homestead was.
Marrying a second time, John Parkin's offspring could have made up a rugby team, all of 15 kids. Upon his death in 1856, his estate was never settled as a number of his children had moved on from Port Elizabeth and some thought to be dead. In the years that followed, some of his property was purchased from the estate by the government of the day for in order to build the Port Elizabeth Railway Station, where it still stands today. In the 1960's, a descendant of John Parkin, (N.P. Sellick) interested in determining who still had a claim to the estate, researched the Parkin genealogy in conjunction with the HSRC and wrote a book "John Parkin of Baakens River farm and his family, 1820 to 1970", which gave the basis for the family tree that can be found on this site.
To this I have added my direct family from information my father could still remember before his death in 1993 and more recently, through contact with Parkin Family on the net, have managed to update other lines in the family tree.
In order to see if you,your parents or grand parents are listed in the tree, do a "find" search on each of the pages in this Blog Archive (bottom right of this page) 2009, October, showing the various generations. As a guide, birth dates for the various generations are as follows
- 2nd generation birth dates between 1810's and 1840's
- 3rd generation birth dates between 1830's and 1890's
- 4th generation birth dates between 1860's and 1910's
- 5th generation birth dates between 1890's and 1930's
- 6th generation birth dates between 1940's and 1970's
- 7th generation birth dates between 1970's and 2000's
- 8th generation birth dates between 1990's and 2000's
- and now the 9th generation in the 2000's
I would be happy to hear from anyone that has more information about the family or your particular lineage in order to updated the family tree.
You can find my contact details here http://www.blogger.com/profile/00702972045824582781
