Gebuza Nungu: A Zulu warrior in Pennard

Gebuza Nungu (22/07/1870-1949) was a resident of Pennard, Swansea in the 1930s until his death in 1949. He built a bungalow called The Kraal on East Cliff where he lived with his wife Mary Nungu.

Gebuza was born in Ulundi, the onetime capital of the Zulu kingdom on 22^nd July 1870. He came to the UK in 1898 aged 28 with "The Savage South Africa Show". Footage of the arrival of the company can be seen in a film held by the British Film Institute. We cannot know for sure that Gebuza is in this footage or identify him if he is, but the film gives a flavour of what the show entailed. Gebuza toured and performed with the show for a number of years before it disbanded almost certainly caused by the onset of the Boer War.

Watch The Landing of Savage South Africa at Southampton online - BFI Player

An article about Gebuza from the Anglo Zulu War Journal (Gentle giant a link with epic Rorke's Drift battle (anglozuluwar.com)) states he was a lion tamer travelling with the famous Bostock and Wombell Touring Menagerie. Such touring shows became increasingly popular in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century throughout the country. In a poster for the travelling show, the lion tamer is depicted as a black man; perhaps this illustration is based on Gebuza? There is no way of knowing for certain, but it does tell us there were non-white faces involved in the shows production.

In the 1901 Census, Gebuza is 31 and living in Edinburgh, boarding with Samuel and Jessie Bradford and their four children. He gives his occupation as a circus performer. His birthplace is noted as Zululand (Brit subject) and he is apparently married. However, when searching for a record of his marriage, there are two records of a Gebuza Nungu getting married in the UK. One is in 1901, in November (after the 1901 Census was taken), and another in 1907 in Pontypool.

In November 1901 he married Mary Alice Feran (b.04/01/1873) in All Saints Church Bolton. In 1907 he married again in Pontypool, under what circumstances we do not know but his new wife was also called Mary.

By the time of the 1911 Census, a now 40 year old Gebuza is living at 74, Greenhill Road, a six-roomed house in Sebastopol, Monmouthshire. It seems like a rather large house for a single occupant; a few doors along a family of ten reside in a similar house! Gebuza is listed as married but his wife is not with him on Census night. His occupation in 1911 is furnace man at the steelworks, possibly the nearby Panteg Steelworks.

By 1916, Gebuza is living in Toft Place, Llanelli and working at the Gorse Galvanising Works in Dafen. We know this from a report in the Cambrian Daily Leader describing the case of Catherine Thomas, an 11-year-old girl found guilty of stealing Gebuza's laundry. She was fined £1 for her transgression.

By the time of the 1939 register, Gebuza is living in "The Kraal", Hunts Bay, Southgate (25, Eastcliff) with his wife Mary Nungu. From the electoral registers, we know they both lived there together until Gebuza's death in 1949. After which, Mary continues to live at The Kraal until her death in 1964.

Whilst living in Pennard, Gebuza served in the Home Guard in the 15^th Glamorgan (Gower) Battalion. From the register of members, we can see many of Gebuza's neighbours served in the guard alongside him. He joined up in May 1940 and retired from service in August 1944.

What does Gebuza's story tell us? His eventful life and career tells us that although he arrived on UK shores as part of a spectacle show, he settled here and lived his life as a proud Zulu in South Wales. It would have been all too easy for him to change his name to something more mundane sounding, (there is mention that some people called him George Black) but on all official documentation we see him holding onto his original name. He named his Pennard bungalow "The Kraal": an Afrikaans word for an enclosure for cattle. It suggests he was very proud of his heritage and felt no need to dilute his identity. Zulu, lion-tamer, steel-worker, home guard; he lived out his declining years in a quiet, traditional, rural corner of Gower, playing his part in the community in wartime as many of his neighbours did.