113 YEARS OLD.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 193, 15 August 1936, Page 12

113 YEARS OLD.

NATIVE WOMAN'S CLAIM. CENSUS OFFICER DOUBTFUL. DURBAN, July 3. One hundred and thirteen and still going strong. This amazing old-age claim is made by a native woman living in the Xwartkop Location near Maritzburg, Natal. She was one of the "finds" of the census officer in May. Her age is assessed by her answers to the officer's questions.

The old woman walked five miles to where the census officer carried out his enumeration, and when asked her age she said that when Chaka, the famous Zulu king, died (1828) she was old enough to understand what was meant by news of his , death;

The census officer was dbubtful of the accuracy of her claim, and the cliief of the tribe was called upon to produce the oldest inhabitant of the location to give evidence as to the woman's ' °When there appeared an old man walking with, the aid of sticks the old woman laughed. "He was only a child when I was a married woman with cliildrcfl," she said. From investigation of the old man's age, it was possible to compute it at 00, and he readily admitted that when he was a toddler she was a young mother.—South African Morning Newspapers.