San Ambroso chapel in the Knysna forest, Garden Route

By Roxanne Reid
Did you know there’s a pocket of Italian history tucked deep in the forests near Knysna? Take a road trip to the little San Ambroso chapel in the Knysna forest and discover a little known part of South Africa's  Garden Route history.

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Up in the cool Gouna Forest, about 10km along a gravel road, you’ll find a lush garden that’s pink with pelargoniums and bottlebrush. Here you’ll hear the call of peacocks and find the little chapel of San Ambroso.

History comes alive
The tiny church has just four pews on either side of a central nave, which leads to a brightly painted fresco on the back wall. Two small rooms off to the sides house photos, documents and other historical info, turning the chapel into a museum.

I’d searched out this church about ten years ago, intrigued because of my own Italian heritage. Now we were back and browsing the photos and documents when a voice boomed through the building. 

It was Rayno Sciocatti, wanting to know if he could help answer any questions. A fourth-generation descendant of the Italian immigrants the chapel was built for, he was born in Knysna and now lives nearby.

He talked about how 32 Italians arrived in 1881 from Northern Italy – three families and a few single men, with names like Fardini, Polonia, Sciocatti and Robbolini. They had been lured by an invitation from English gentleman-farmer Henry Barrington – he of the Rheenendal Road’s lovely Portland Manor, which is a luxury guest house today.

The Italians were spinners and they were under the impression that they’d get land, houses, mulberry trees and a living wage. All they would need, they thought, were their silk worms and their skill as spinners. 

​Things turned out differently.

They arrived at the port of Knysna on the SS Natal and endured what was back then a three-week ox-cart trek to the Gouna Forest, only to find there were no houses waiting for them. More shocking was the discovery that the indigenous mulberry trees (Trimeria grandiflora) that grew here were not the kind that silkworms fed on, and the right kind (Morus alba) wouldn’t grow. They had to turn to working on the roads, as woodcutters and farmers, whatever they could to survive.

The San Ambroso church was built in 1891, ten years after they came to the forest. It was named for San Ambrogio (Ambrose), the patron saint of Milan.

Restoration
Rayno has lived in the area for much of his life. When he sold his farm, his idea was to buy property in Tsitsikamma, but he got wedged at Gouna when he decided to renovate the church that held so many memories for his forefathers.

​He told us that a hippy family had been living in it and had to be evicted. They’d ruined the floor and taken the yellowwood ceiling planks with them. Everything had to be rebuilt and restored. The building alone cost R600 000 to refurbish, not counting the furnishings. The chapel museum opened to the public in 2005.

​I asked Rayno what he thought of the factual accuracy of Dalene Matthee’s true-life story about the Italian immigrants in her book Moerbeibos, or The Mulberry Forest. ‘Not so much,’ he said. ‘She made them out to be poorer than they were, and managed to get some of the names muddled.’ 

Rayno Sciocatti outside the chapel he restored

It’s a fascinating piece of local history and a darling little church that few people know about. We can thank Rayno for restoring it and preserving a touch of Italy in the Knysna forests.

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