Willem Jacobus has proven a difficult man to place correctly in the Booyens family tree, not least because his name is incorrectly given as Willem Johannes on more than one document. We have not been able to find any birth or baptism information for him. However, we have clear birth and baptism information for his siblings, and a reasoned date of birth for his sister Sara. We therefore conclude he is born ca. 1896. That would also be consistent with the date of birth of his first child in early 1916 and the age of his wife.

He marries Marthina Johanna Caalsen at some point around 1916, likely in the Free State where we can place her family. His first child, Pieter Johannes, typically named for husband's father, is born in Fouriesburg in the East Free State on 31 March 1916. This leads us to list Willem as the child of Pieter Johannes Booyens an Maria Gesina Botha. It also leads one to believe that his marriage was in that general area circa 1916. That child is baptised in Ladybrand, a Free State headquarters of the wider Booyens family.

In fact, he registers [#1] as a member of the Ladybrand Congregation of the Dutch Reformed Church in Ladybrand on 14 October 1916. At the time he is recorded as transferring from Fouriesburg. Ladybrand is the same parish where Marthina Johanna Caalsen is confirmed 4 years earlier in 1912. She is now just over 20 years old, and has borne him their first son some six months earlier.

For the references, see below^#