Soldiers who served in the Irish Brigade during the Anglo-Boer War are believed to have played the game on the veld. Immigrants from County Wicklow who had arrived to work in the explosives factory in Umbogintintwini formed a team c. 1915–1916. A major burst of immigration in the 1920s led to the foundation of the "Transvaal Hurling Association" in Johannesburg in 1928. Games were traditionally played in a pitch on the site of the modern day Johannesburg Central Railway Station every Easter Sunday after Mass.