al-Ghossain (Gossayn) Family in South Africa
The first Hadath al-Jubbeh al-Ghossain to immigrate to South Africa was Betrous (Peter) Moses al-Ghossain, who was registered in South Africa by a civil servant. The civil servant decided to write the family name as “Gossayn,” which is still used today by the family in Viljoenskroon in the Free State, as well as by descendants of Peter’s brother Ghossain (Gossayn) Moses al-Ghossain, and by the descendants of Peter’s first cousin Younis Massoud al-Ghossain in Krugersdorp.
After Peter had immigrated, their father forbade all his other children to follow suit, while he was still alive. So Ghossain (Gossayn) followed his eldest brother Peter after their father, Mousy (Moses), died. Ghossain left Lebanon – as he recorded in Arabic on the cover of one of his many history books – on December 5, 1909. He landed in what is now Maputo on January 6, 1910, and travelled by train to Kimberley to search for his brother Peter.
He found Peter by accident after two years of searching, when a Boer, who knew Peter as Mnr. Pieterse, mistook Ghossain for his brother, greeting him as Mnr. Pieterse. Although Ghossain’s understanding of Afrikaans was poor, he realised that the man knew his brother, whom he eventually found with the help of the Boer gentleman.
Their third brother, Boulus (Paul), who was younger than Peter but older than Ghossain, met Deebi, the widow of Hanna (John) Lewis al-Chedrawi, who had returned to Lebanon from South Africa with her children after her husband’s death. She was a beautiful woman, and Paul was a handsome, charming, young man with a beautiful singing voice. They decided to get married but kept their marriage a secret for seven days.
A secret in a mountain village did not last long, and Paul’s mother, Franjieh, who was also a Ghossain from the Antoun al-Ghossain branch, discovered what had happened to her son, the apple of her eye. A kind of funeral was enacted in the al-Ghossain home.
Paul, with his wife and her son Joe, left for South Africa, leaving her three daughters: Youmna, who later married Paul’s younger brother Joseph; Azizi, who was married in Lebanon; and Audette, who later became a nun known as Sister Sinclaire.
The three brothers eventually settled in Wolmaransstad. Peter never married. Ghossain (Gossayn) married Najeebi, the daughter of Daniel and Hawa (Eva) Shahin. The name Shahin was misspelled as Shahim, and “Shahim” is still used by the Shahin (Shahim) family in Viljoenskroon, Free State.
When Viljoenskroon was declared a town, Daniel and Hawa Shahin (Shahim) and their family moved to Viljoenskroon, followed by their son-in-law Gossayn, who started a butchery business in the growing town.
They had three daughters and three sons.
Ethel married Emile Saad from Ermelo, Hanoon married Alex Kayat (Khayat) from Durban, and Franjieh (Frances) married her first cousin Daniel, the son of Yousef (Joseph) Gossayn and Youmna.
Daniel married Yvette Khallil (Kalil) from Bloemfontein; Elias (Alec) married Clemance Nasser from Johannesburg; and Moses married Salime Joseph (Sfeir) from Potchefstroom.
Paul and Deebi had a son, Moses, who died very young, and a daughter, Julia, who never married.
Paul built a house on his farm in Wolmaransstad using cut stones, as done in Lebanon. Due to the urgent requests from his wife and daughter, who wished to live in town, he sold the farm to Mr. Oosthuizen, who later dug in the vicinity of the farmhouse and discovered a large amount of diamonds.
Gossayn bought his first farm, about 150 hectares, for the cattle to graze. These cattle were then slaughtered for his butchery.
His eldest son, Daniel, developed a liking for farming and was sent to agricultural school, which he left as soon as possible to begin his farming career. He convinced his father that using a tractor for ploughing was a better alternative to ploughing with cattle. He laid the foundation for a very successful farming family.
In the early 1950s, Daniel Joseph al-Ghossain visited his uncles in South Africa and fell in love with, and married his uncle’s daughter, Frances. In the 1960s, they moved from Ghana to South Africa and Daniel became one of the successful farming Gossayns.
The most recent arrival of the second generation of al-Ghossain was Tannous (Tony) Doumit al-Ghossain, the son of Doumit, the youngest brother of Peter, Paul, Gossayn, Joseph, and Romanus. Tony al-Ghossain (the writer of this article) left Lebanon on January 6, 1967, and arrived in South Africa on January 7, 1967. He farmed with his cousins in Viljoenskroon until 1970 and then moved to Krugersdorp.
His first marriage was to Lorna Abiet (Obaid) from Krugersdorp, which produced two boys, Doumit and Paul. Tony is presently married to Elham Antoun from Lebanon and lives in Klerksdorp.
Tony was elected national president of the WLCU in South Africa on October 3, 1993, and served for two years. He maintained a long family tradition of singing in the Maronite church, like his father Doumit, his uncles Joseph and Paul, and their uncle, Massoud.
Today, the third generation of al-Ghossain (Gossayn) family members – Daniel’s Jerome and Dalene; Alec’s Gregory, Beverly, John and Derrick; Moses’s Mitchel, Neville, Karen and Ronald; Daniel Joseph’s Nesby, Shirley, Joe, Peter and Wendy; Hanoon’s Eugene & Cheryl and Ethel ‘s Patricia, Alida, Allan, Janet and Eileen, and Tony’s Doumit and Paul – are marching into the future armed with the good name and resilience of their forebears, the great al-Ghossain family of Mount Lebanon.
Stories of the al-Ghossains (Gossayns) in South Africa
The Farmers’ War
It was called the "War of the Farmers" in one of the major South African newspapers, The Sunday Times. Daniel Joseph al-Ghossain (Gossayn) had one of his farms bordering the farm of a feared local farmer, a huge man who did whatever he wanted, and nobody dared challenge him.
One fateful day, the man shot the tyres of Danny's tractors which were being used to open a trench to allow floodwater, as permitted by law, to flow naturally to the neighbouring farmer’s land.
Danny was called by his terrified African labourers to the scene where he faced the giant of a man, who wielded a rifle and challenged Danny with his booming voice.
Danny crossed over the fence, daring the man to shoot, and when he was close enough, he received a blow from the man’s rifle butt, which required 14 stitches. Danny unleashed the famous Ghossain fearless temper and proceeded, with his bare fists,0 to physically and mentally defeat the man.
The case went to the highest court in the land, where the presiding judge was completely confused. He asked the lawyers if what he saw before him was possible. It was. Danny was 170 cm tall, the other man was about 190 cm, and nearly one and a half times Danny’s weight.
Danny won the case.