New Brighton Train Station

During apartheid, there were two separate entrances, one for whites and one for blacks at the train station. The bridge that ran over the railway lines was also barricaded down the middle to separate races. Raymond Mphakamisi Mhlaba, was an anti-apartheid activist and the chairman of the Port Elizabeth branch of the ANC from 1947 to 1953. The spirit of resistance and opposition to apartheid and police brutality was ignited by the Defiance Campaign against unjust laws. The campaign was nationally launched on the morning of June 26, 1952, when Mhlaba led a group of 30 people into the "Europeans Only" section of the New Brighton railway station. They sang freedom songs fully aware that on the other side of the bridge, the police were waiting to arrest the group. Mhlaba was the first to be arrested for disobeying apartheid laws during the nationwide Defiance Campaign of 1952. It was South Africa's biggest non-violent protest ever. Defiance campaign volunteers planned to break the new apartheid laws fully aware that they would end up being arrested. Mhlaba was sentenced to two months of hard labour or a fine of 10 pounds, with half the sentence suspended for six months. All of the volunteers served their jail sentences as they were not able to pay the fines. According to Mhlaba, he and his comrades were not aware that they were the first to defy the race laws and be arrested in the campaign. Mhlaba and his comrades fought for liberation from the very start. They inspired others to defy the unjust system and consequently boosted recruitment for the ANC. More than 70% of defiance campaign arrests happened in the Eastern Cape, with most of them occurring in Port Elizabeth.