
The Rosendal Post Office
The beautifully restored, well-appointed and historic Post Office, is situated in the heart of Rosendal’s heritage district. Three en-suite bedrooms, all uniquely furnished. Can accommodate 10+ people.
An historic character home with charm and unique detail. Consists of a large open plan ground floor with separate kitchen and pantry with loads of counter space, large dining room table, a sitting area with wood stove and a tucked away corner quiet zone, plus a floor-to-ceiling library.
The upstairs “Attic Room” is accessed by a large wooden staircase and through a trap door with counter weight. Two double and two single beds and bathroom with claw foot tub.
Spectacular north and east views of the Witteberg mountains. Room works for couples or as a weekend kids’ corner.
The master bedroom is housed in the former “Exchange Room”, from where telephone and telegraph services operated. Queen size bed, fireplace, walk-in closet and spacious bathroom with claw foot tub. Third bedroom—“The Post Master’s office”—consists of double bed and pleasant bathroom with shower and hex tile flooring. There is a sleeping loft (suitable for kids) in the hall between the two bedrooms.
Also includes a laundry room, large covered back stoep with braai and outdoor dining area plus off-road parking. Building insulated to Canadian standards for those cold Free State winters. Property has its own borehole.
Much character and historic detail. This includes a secret under-floor telecoms bunker—now a wine cellar—and a plaque noting the 1942 “Rosendal Coup” when the Ossewabrandwag took over and captured the Post Office.
Restoration of the Rosendal Post Office
The beautifully restored and historic Post Office, is a character home with charm and unique detail. It has three en-suite bedrooms, all uniquely furnished, with six beds and can accommodate 10+ people. The building and grounds were lovingly restored over 2018-20 and with much of the building’s former history and unique features uncovered.
The Post Office was purchased by the current owner, Douglas Mason, in 2018. A Canadian journalist, ex-diplomat and UN peace keeper, who had spent a career working in the war zones and hotspots of central and southern Africa since the mid 1990s, Mason settled in Rosendal in 2012, continuing to work from there.
In 2018 he set about restoring the Post Office, uncovering much of the building’s architectural and historic detail. The front of the building had been the Post Office with a service counter near where the two French doors open from the foyer.
The foyer—now the library—had been a covered area with open doorway that housed the town’s post boxes. A former owner enclosed the door way and opened the area to the main room through the passageway on the west side.
The upstairs attic had been opened by a former owner, with a makeshift ladder. The current stair case with landing was built and the loft area more fully converted.
The Exchange Room
At the back of the house is the former Exchange Room. Telephone services operated here from the 1920s until the mid 1960s when it was replaced by direct dial technology. An operator staffed the exchange on back-to-back shifts, making use of a cot during the night.
The original telecommunications cables are still in place, in a cellar under the bedroom floor.
The under floor telecoms bunker had been sealed but was discovered during the renovation and fully restored. It is accessed through a floor trap door, with a ladder leading to what is now a wine cellar.
History of the Rosendal Post Office
A Postal Agency was opened in Rosendal in 1912, probably at a local business or farmhouse where residents could collect mail, before an official Post Office was opened on this site in 1919. It is the town’s first public building and incorporates a simple, functional design of local sandstone with tall ceilings and sash windows. Telegraph and telephone services included a public Call Office (pay-phone) and an Exchange Room that operated until the mid 1960s.
Postal services were accessed through the main entranceway and, after the Separate Amenities Act of 1953, at a door on the south-east corner (now bricked over) for non-whites.
A post master’s home was situated at the back of the property—since torn down. The Rosendal Post Office operated from these premises until 1982 when relocated to Botha Street. Since then the building has been a store, a private home and, now, a guest house.
This is a living building, many or Rosendal’s original residents can recall their own parents or relatives having worked here.
The 1942 Rosendal Coup
In 1942 the “Rosendal Coup” took place when the Ossewabrandwag mounted an assault on the town and captured its Post Office.
The Afrikaner nationalist group the Ossewabrandwag (Ox-wagon Sentinel) and their paramilitary offshoot, the Stormjaers, were active in the eastern Free State during the Second World War, engaging in acts of sabotage and subversion. In a series of coordinated attacks on January 30 th 1942 the group cut electricity, railway and communication lines throughout the Transvaal, Cape and Orange Free State. The farm Biddulphsberg, 35km north of Rosendal, was a well-known base for the Stormjaers and from where the group hijacked a lorry and entered town, cutting telephone lines, hoisting the Vierkleur flag and singing patriotic songs associated with the old boere republics. Storming the Rosendal Post Office and shouting “die Afrikaner is nou hier baas!”, the group took a hammer to the exchange room, smashing the sentrale equipment. Before they could escape the police arrived and the group were arrested.
Daan Erasmus of Biddulphsberg farm—who helped plan “The Rosendal Coup”—remained a fugitive from justice for another two years.
These types of acts were too much for most Afrikaners sympathetic to the nationalist cause and the leader of the National Party at the time, DF Malan, ordered a break with the Ossewabrandwag shortly after.