1918 in South Africa

Decades:	1890s; 1900s; 1910s; 1920s; 1930s;
See also:	; List of years in South Africa;

The following lists events that happened during 1918 in South Africa.

Incumbents

An estimated 50 people die in the 1918 flu pandemic in South Africa, the fifth hardest hit country in the world.^[2]

14 – The Three Minute Pause, initiated by the daily firing of the Noon Gun on Signal Hill, is instituted by Cape Town Mayor Sir Harry Hands.^[3]

4 – RMS Kenilworth Castle, one of the Union-Castle Line steamships, collides with her escort destroyer HMS Rival while trying to avoid her other escort, the cruiser HMS Kent.
5 – The Afrikaner Broederbond, a confidential cultural organisation, is founded in Johannesburg.

14 – German East African troops are informed of the armistice on 11 November.
25 – General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, commander of German forces in the German East Africa campaign, signs a ceasefire at Abercorn in Northern Rhodesia.

14 January (in Mozambique) – Dimitri Tsafendas, assassin (d. 1999)^[4]
21 January – Frederick Guy Butler, poet, academic and writer. (d. 2001)
1 July – Ahmed Deedat, Sunni Muslim missionary. (d. 2005)
13 July – Larry Taylor, actor. (d. 2003)
16 July – John (Jack) Frost, Second World War fighter pilot. (d. MIA 1942)
18 July – Nelson Mandela, activist and President of South Africa. (d. 2013)
27 August – Alina Lekgetha, nurse, chairman of South African Nursing Association and politician. (d. 1992)

5 December – Schalk Willem Burger, Boer officer, lawyer, politician and statesman. (b. 1852)

2 February – Cape – Kootjieskolk to Calvinia, 43 miles 47 chains (70.1 kilometres).^[5]
16 September – Cape – Kootjieskolk to Sakrivier, 27 miles 21 chains (43.9 kilometres).^[5]

Three new Cape gauge locomotive types enter service on the South African Railways (SAR):
- The first batch of twenty Class 14C 4-8-2 Mountain type locomotives.^[6]^[7]
- The first of thirty Class 15B 4-8-2 Mountain type locomotives.^[7]
- Eight Class MJ1 branchline 2-6-6-0 Mallet articulated compound steam locomotives.^[6]^[7]

^ Archontology.org: A Guide for Study of Historical Offices: South Africa: Governors-General: 1910-1961 (Accessed on 14 April 2017)
^ Colds and flu: 1918 - South Africa's death toll Archived 7 September 2008 at the Wayback Machine (Accessed on 17 April 2017)
^ Royal Canadian Legion Branch # 138."2-Minute Wave of Silence" Revives a Time-honoured Tradition. Accessed on 5 June 2014.
^ Beresford, David (11 October 1999), Obituary: Long-jailed assassin of South African premier in The Guardian. Archived by WebCite at [1] Retrieved 8 July 2009.
^ ^a ^b Statement Showing, in Chronological Order, the Date of Opening and the Mileage of Each Section of Railway, Statement No. 19, p. 188, ref. no. 200954-13
^ ^a ^b Holland, D. F. (1972). Steam Locomotives of the South African Railways. Vol. 2: 1910-1955 (1st ed.). Newton Abbott, England: David & Charles. pp. 34, 36–37. ISBN 978-0-7153-5427-8.
^ ^a ^b ^c Paxton, Leith; Bourne, David (1985). Locomotives of the South African Railways (1st ed.). Cape Town: Struik. pp. 58–61, 88. ISBN 0869772112.