David Hume (1796 Berwick,

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

- 1 February 1864

Grahamstown Makhanda, also known as Grahamstown, is a town of about 140,000 people in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. It is situated about northeast of Port Elizabeth and southwest of East London. Makhanda is the largest town in the Makana ...

) was an explorer and

big-game hunter Big-game hunting is the hunting of large game animals for meat, commercially valuable by-products (such as horns/ antlers, furs, tusks, bones, body fat/oil, or special organs and contents), trophy/taxidermy, or simply just for recreation ...

who lived much of his life in Cape Colony. David Hume was born in Berwick, Scotland and went to Cape Colony with

Benjamin Moodie Captain Benjamin Moodie (1789 - 2 April 1856) was the 10th Laird of Melsetter who led a party of 200 Scottish immigrants to the Cape Colony in 1817, three years before the arrival of the 1820 Settlers. Moodie served in the Ross and Caithness Militi ...

's Scottish settlers in 1817. He became a pioneer trader, explorer and renowned big-game hunter. Starting in 1829 when he accompanied Robert Moffat, he arranged trips into

Mzilikazi Mzilikazi Moselekatse, Khumalo ( 1790 – 9 September 1868) was a Southern African king who founded the Mthwakazi Kingdom now known as Matebeleland, in Zimbabwe. His name means "the great river of blood". He was born the son of Mashobane kaMan ...

's territory and was one of the first Europeans to meet this chief of the Matabele. In 1830 he explored the region north of the

Limpopo River The Limpopo River rises in South Africa and flows generally eastward through Mozambique to the Indian Ocean. The term Limpopo is derived from Rivombo (Livombo/Lebombo), a group of Tsonga settlers led by Hosi Rivombo who settled in the mountain ...

searching for gold. He was also the first recorded European to enter

Bamangwato The Bamangwato (more correctly BagammaNgwato, and also referred to as the BaNgwato or Ngwato) is one of the eight "principal" Tswana chieftaincies of Botswana. They ruled over a majority Bakalanga population (the largest ethnic group in Central Dis ...

, the present-day

Botswana Botswana (, ), officially the Republic of Botswana ( tn, Lefatshe la Botswana, label= Setswana, ), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory being the Kalaha ...

. Hume heard reports of the existence of

Lake Ngami Lake Ngami is an endorheic lake in Botswana north of the Kalahari Desert. It is seasonally filled by the Taughe River, an effluent of the Okavango River system flowing out of the western side of the Okavango Delta. It is one of the fragmented remn ...

, but in 1836 lacked the funds to mount an expedition. He had settled at

Kuruman Kuruman is a small town with just over 53,000 inhabitants in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. It is known for its scenic beauty and the Eye of Kuruman, a geological feature that brings water from deep underground. The abundance of water ...

with his family and annually sold the products of his hunting on the Market Square in

. On 2 April 1851 he sold of ivory for £5,260 and karosses and ostrich plumes to the value of £5,802. In 1854 he was elected as one of eight municipal commissioners of Grahamstown.

Death

Hume died in

on 1 February 1864.

Family

Hume married Margaret Pirie on 12 Dec 1829 in Grahamstown; she had immigrated with her father in 1820, aged 11. She had been born in England about 1807 and died on 20 August 1897 in Grahamstown. Details are known of only one of their children - David Robert Hume born about 1841 and married Mary Ann Abigail Thomas, also born about 1841 in Albany and died 17 November 1865 at "Glen Cliff", Bedford.

References

External links

Rootsweb entry on David Hume.
1796 births 1864 deaths Explorers of Africa People from North Berwick British emigrants to the Cape Colony Cape Colony explorers Cape Colony hunters {{explorer-stub