A town that gave its name to a Canadian city

Ladysmith, located in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, was named after Juana María de los Dolores de León Smith, the wife of Sir Harry Smith, the Governor of the Cape Colony from 1847 to 1852. The town held strategic importance during the Second Boer War, being besieged between November 1899 and February 1900.

In 1900, the unincorporated town of Oyster Harbour on the east coast of Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada, was renamed Ladysmith by James Dunsmuir in honour of the lifting of the siege of Ladysmith in South Africa. The shared name and history between these two towns makes for an interesting tale.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons