Oloff Johannes Truter

Oloff Johannes Truter (Cape Town, 7 August 1829 – Koblenz, Germany, 29 August 1881) was a South African civil servant in the Orange Free State, miner, Landdrost and Acting Government Secretary.

Biography

Family

Truter was the second son of Olof Johannes Truter, consul for the Netherlands in South Africa, and Catharina Geertruida Claris.

Truter was married to Sarah Hutchinson with whom he had three daughters.

On 21 July 1872 the government appointed Truter Landdrost of Bloemfontein in which position he was also an official member of the Executive Council (Uitvoerende Raad) of the republic. In 1879 Truter was temporarily appointed Government Secretary, after the sudden death of the incumbent F. Kaufmann Höhne on 19 April of that year. Truter only held the job for a month, as President Brand appointed P.J. Blignaut to the job almost immediately and the Volksraad confirmed the appointment on 20 May 1879. Truter stayed in his old job. In 1881 he went on sick-leave to Europe where he died.

In the 1870s, while living in Bloemfontein, Truter developed a lively interest in farming. He became a member of the Orange Free State Agricultural Society and assisted in the organisation of the first Agricultural Exhibition in Bloemfontein in 1875.