Elisabeth Marie Pfefferkorn
(born Stapf)
June 1923 -
3 July 2009
Our mother, Elisabeth, was born Elisabeth Marie Stapf in June 1923. She was the 3rd of 4 children, Rudi, Irma and Werner. She was born at home in Bad Blankenburg, Thuringia in Germany, the daughter of Emma Martha (born Grieshammer) and Otto Reinhold Stapf. Otto was an electrician (Elektromonteur) by trade.
Otto and Martha Stapf - our Grandparents 
Extract from the cookbook she was given as a present when she finished working on the farm for the Arbeidsdienst
When Word War 2 broke out, she was enlisted in “Arbeidsdienst” She worked on a farm, worked as an au pair in Frankfurt and worked in Hamburg, reporting on weather conditions for the pilots.
My mother and father on their wedding day - 21 January 1950
She met our father, Alfred Pfefferkorn, through her aunt who lived in Berlin and owned a roundabout. They married on the 21st January 1950 and also went onto the showground circuit with a childrens’ ferris wheel. Sabine was born and although our father was a trained optometrist, he couldn’t find work after the war. They happened to see an advertisement in the newspaper from the Lutheran Church saying that Australia was looking for immigrants, they would get the passage to Australia free and would even get 5 pounds start-up money! As our Aunt on our father’s side was already in Australia (Queensland), they decided to apply. Within a short time they were packing up the few belongings they had and were off to Australia with a boatload of other immigrants on the SS JV Oldenbarnevelt. This was in 1954.
Alfred Pfefferkorn
Our mother often said that was a wonderful trip. Click here to see extracts from her diary. They first landed in Fremantle and then went on to Melbourne and Sydney where they caught a train up to my Aunt in Cairns, Queensland. Once there, the only work my father could get was laying railway tracks and our mother worked in a sawmill factory and a peanut factory. They started off living in a shack in the middle of a field with no knowledge of english.
Sabine and Christine in Queensland, 1959
Elisabeth Pfefferkorn
Christine was born in 1959 and a year later, our father obtained a job in Melbourne with Volkswagen as a tool and die maker. Our parents bought a house and to make ends meet, they took in lodgers and our mother worked shift work in the Bosch factory in Melbourne. In 1965, my father was given the opportunity to live and work at the German Consulate in Melbourne as the caretaker. Times were still hard and our mother worked as a cleaner for the Consulate after hours.
The Pfefferkorn family
In 1973, our father was given the opportunity to be employed by the German Foreign Service and was given a posting in Jakarta, Indonesia. This was the first time our mother didn’t have to earn by taking on an extra job. We lived in Indonesia for 6 years and then our father was given a posting in Cape Town in 1979. In the meantime Sabine had married and was now Sabine Anderson. She gave birth to two sons, Frank E and Hannibal and eventually moved to the US with her husband Frank who is a US citizen. After 6 years in Cape Town, our parents moved to Freiburg in Germany. My father was diagnosed with prostrate cancer and died on the 19th April, 1991. In the meantime, Christine stayed in South Africa and married Neels Bothma. Our mother continued to live by herself in Freiburg, until she becme too frail to look after herself. In 2002,she moved back to South Africa to live with Christine who was now living in Pretoria. She lived in Pretoria until a serious fall in November 2007 which meant she had to move to a frail care facility at the German Old Age Home in Johannesburg. She stayed there until in April 2009, she again had a serious fall from which she did not recover and died on the 3rd July 2009.
After having travelled the world, her ashes will return home to Bad Blankenburg in Germany.
She will be sorely missed by her daughters, Sabine and Christine, her son-in-laws, Frank and Neels, her grandsons Frank E and Hannibal and her great-grandchildren Chloe and Frank. She is also greatly missed by her surviving brother Werner Stapf and sister Irmi Hake.
Contact Christine on christine@stapf.co.za