Bethelsdorp is a town in Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipality in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa, 20 km north-west of Port Elizabeth.
History
The town was established in 1803 by Rev. J.T. van der Kemp on the farm Roodepas of Theunis Botha as a mission station of the London Missionary Society. The name is derived from the Hebrew word Bet-el (בית אל), meaning 'House of God'.
Under the previous political dispensation, Bethelsdorp was a township almost exclusively inhabited by coloureds (Afrikaans: Kleurlinge). This changed somewhat with the end of Apartheid in South Africa in 1994, as living and trading in the township is now freely open to all races.
References
