Virginia is a gold mining town located on the banks of the Sand River in the Lejweleputswa District Municipality and on goldfields of the Free State province in South Africa.
The town is situated on the R730 Regional Route and R73 Provincial Route, approximately 139 km north-east of Bloemfontein, the provincial capital.
The town was laid out in 1950 near the farm Merriespruit on the Sand River banks during the gold rush. The town’s name Virginia was derived from two railway surveyors from the State of Virginia in the United States of America who etched the name of their birthplace in a boulder.
Virginia has the deepest pipi-mine on the planet and maize is the main source of commercial farming.
The majority of Virginia’s residents speak Afrikaans and Sotho.
History
In 1890, two railway surveyors from the state of Virginia in the United States of America etched the name of their birthplace on a boulder near the farm Merriespruit. When a railway siding was eventually established at this spot, the name was adopted, and it stuck after the discovery of gold in 1949 which resulted in a mushrooming settlement on the banks of the Sand River.
In 1988, the Sand River burst its banks and flooded parts of the town. In 1994, the Merriespruit tailings dam disaster occurred just outside Virginia, killing 17 people.
On 5 December 2000, Virginia was incorporated into the Matjhabeng Local Municipality along with the city of Welkom and the towns of Hennenman, Allanridge, Ventersburg, and Odendaalsrus.
During the apartheid era, black people lived outside Virginia in the location of Meloding. The town itself boomed during the gold mining years’ golden age and gold mining is still responsible for most of the town’s economy.
