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Served: Bethulie.

ABO (Burger J. R. Swanepoel). City Coins August 2014. Kaplan Auctions, November 2017

This is a rare instance of an ABO medal being approved to a “Hensopper” On his Vorm B Swanepoel claimed seeing action at Stormberg, Penhoek, Jamestown, Bethulie and Wepener (at the bridge). He also stated that he was captured in the De Wetsdorp Hospital and afterwards imprisoned in the Bloemfontein Goal up to the end of the War. With the limited data available in the early 1940”s his claim was accepted at face value and the medal issued. The UCT computerized database on British Concentration Caps tells a different story. He is listed as having taken the oath of Neutrality at De Wetsdorp in March 1900 and at Bethulie in July 1900. He transferred from Bloemfontein refugee camp to the Bethulie refugee camp on 2 August 1901. Left for his home in Bethulie with his wife and son on 18 August 1902. Type 2 suspender WW II naming

ABO (Burger J R Swanepoel). City Coins October 2018.

Picture courtesy of Spink

ABO Burger J. R. Swanpoel.)

J. R. Swanepoel took part in the Battles at Strommeberg, Penhoek, Jamestown, Bethuie, and Wepener, and Modder River. He claimed to have been captured in the Dewetsdorp Hospital and imprisoned in the Bloemfontein gaol until the end of the war. However the U.C.T. database of concentration camp inmates has him listed as having taken the oath of neutrality at Dewetsdorp in March 1900, and at Bethulie in July 1900. He was transferred from the Bethulie Refugee Camp to the Bloemfontein Refugee Camp on 2 August 1901, and left the camp for home in Bethulie with his wife and son in August 1902.