Indwe is a small town situated at the intersection of the R56 Provincial Route and the R396 Regional Route in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa.
The town is located between Dordrecht and Elliot (also known as Khowa) on the R56 Highway.
Several farms with a large number of merino sheep and cattle ranchers surround Indwe town.
Indwe comprises five townships, namely Manyano, Mavuya, Mzamomhle, Sonwabile, and Phumlani.
Mavuya is the biggest township in Indwe and one of the oldest townships in South Africa. Mavuya township is considered to be older than Langa (Cape Town) and Alexandra (Johannesburg).
Indwe falls within the Emalahleni Local Municipality and the Chris Hani District Municipality in the Eastern Cape Province.
History
The town was founded in 1896 as a centre for coal-mining activities, which started in 1867, and attained municipal status in 1898.
The town takes its name from the Indwe River, named after the blue crane (Anthropoides paradiseus, Xhosa: iNdwe), which lived there in great numbers.
Indwe was the fourth town after Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Kimberley to have electricity.
The “Indwe Railway Collieries and Land Company” was formed in Kimberley in late 1894. De Beers played a big part in it. The railway line was completed in March 1896. By 1899, the mine produced well over 100,000 tons of coal a year.
By 1917, the coal mine closed down since, in the intervening years, better quality coal had been discovered in the Transvaal.
Indwe Railway Station was one of the busiest stations in South Africa, offering people from the rural Transkei a port of entry to Johannesburg and Cape Town up until 1994.
