ASHBURNHAM, John Anchitel (1865 – 1939)

MR. JOHN ANCHITEL ASHBURNHAM, the present Resident Magistrate of Bloemfontein, has seen a great deal of South Africa, having been in the country in various capacities for the past twenty-two years.

He is the eldest son of the late J. W. Ashburnham, Esq., and comes of the well-known Sussex family of that name, one branch of which has its seat at Ashburnham, near Battle, and the other at Broomham Park, close to Hastings. Born in 1865, he was educated at the well-known Lancing College and later proceeded to Exeter College, Oxford. It was his original intention to take up the law as a profession, but after studying at the Inner Temple, London, for a time he was forced to relinquish this idea. He accordingly accepted a position (in 1885) as Registrar to Mr. Justice (later Sir Sidney) Sheppard, and accompanied him in the same year to Bechuanaland, where he was appointed Secretary to the Bechuanaland Administration, and subsequently Resident Magistrate at Taungs and Upington, remaining there till 1895, in which year he became Assistant Commissioner of the Bechuanaland Protectorate, and later, in 1901, Acting Resident Commissioner. He was promoted Resident Magistrate for the capital of the Orange Free Colony at the end of 1901, since which time he has meted out justice to all who come before him without fear or favour. For six months in the year 1903 he was appointed Acting Colonial Secretary during the absence of the Lieut.- Governor in England.

Mr. Ashburnham was present at the Conferences, firstly at Blignaut Point in 1890 and then at Colesberg in 1893, between Lord Loch (then High Commissioner for South Africa) and the late Paul Kruger, as Confidential Secretary to the High Commissioner.

During the late Anglo-Boer war, Mr. Ashburnham was connected with the Rhodesian Field Force under General Plumer, for which he received the medal and clasp. He is on the committees of the St. George's Hospital and St. Andrew’s. A member of the Diocesan Board of Finance, and the Turf Club Executive Committee. He is a thorough sportsman, and is the vice-president of several athletic clubs. His clubs are United Service and Bloemfontein, of which latter he is the chairman; he is also a member of the Ramblers’ Club.

In the year 1894 he married a daughter of the late Rev. J Price. Mr. Ashburnham resides in Bloemfontein with his wife and two daughters.

Footnote: John Anchitel ASHBURNHAM died at the age of 74 in the Bova Nursing Home in Durban.

Source: Men of the Times, published by The Transvaal Publishing Company, Johannesburg, Cape Town & London, printed by Eyre and Spottiswood, His Majesty’s Printers, 1906, p.526