World Prisons
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South Africa

Breakwater Lodge

Low
Verified
Aging · 5mo ago
Sources last reviewed on

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Photograph of Breakwater Lodge

Gallery

From Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-SA where not otherwise stated).

  • Breakwater Campus 1.jpg

    Photo by HelenOnline via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

  • Breakwater Campus 2.jpg

    Photo by HelenOnline via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

  • Breakwater Campus 3.jpg

    Photo by HelenOnline via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

  • Breakwater Campus entrance.jpg

    Photo by HelenOnline via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

  • Breakwater Lodge in Cape Town, 1997.jpg

    Photo by BKP via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

  • Breakwater Lodge model building.jpg

    Photo by HelenOnline via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

  • Breakwater Lodge.jpg

    Photo by Rodw via Wikimedia Commons (Public domain)

  • Breakwater Prison 20.JPG

    Photo by Lennon Fletcher via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Background

The Breakwater Lodge in the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront, Cape Town, South Africa was built as a prison in 1859. It is now part of the University of Cape Town and a hotel. The original prison was built in 1859 for convicts from Britain at the suggestion of John Montagu who was the colonial secretary to the Cape of Good Hope from 1843 to 1852. They were transported to The Cape to work on the construction of the breakwater which would allow the harbour which is now the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront to be built. The remains of a treadmill on which prisoners were punished can still be seen.

Source: Wikipedia article lead, CC-BY-SA.

Capacity

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Current population

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Occupancy

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Year opened

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Operational

Figures from official sources · verified 29 May 2026 · methodology

Facility profile

Operator

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Population held

Mixed/unknown

Opened

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Region

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Security level

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Death-row facility

No

Conditions

No conditions summary available yet.

Visiting

No visiting information available.

Mailing

No mailing information available.

Practical info

Contact the operator's website for inmate-specific procedures.

Known issues

No major issues documented in our database.

Contact & address

No public contact details available.

Conditions Risk Score

Derived signal — not a judgement. How it's calculated

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Insufficient data
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Related facilities

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Data completeness

16%

How many of our profile fields are populated. We surface this so families and researchers know the limits.

Sources

Cite this page

Under CC-BY-4.0. Include the URL and access date; the site is a living reference and entries can change.

APA
World Prisons. (2026). Breakwater Lodge. Retrieved October 20, 2026, from https://worldprisons.com/prisons/breakwater-lodge
Chicago
"Breakwater Lodge." World Prisons. Accessed October 20, 2026. https://worldprisons.com/prisons/breakwater-lodge.
BibTeX
@misc{worldprisons-breakwater-lodge,
  author = {{World Prisons}},
  title = {Breakwater Lodge},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://worldprisons.com/prisons/breakwater-lodge},
  urldate = {2026-10-20}
}