Ngcobo (formerly Engcobo)[2] is a town in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. Ngcobo is the main town of the Engcobo Local Municipality, which falls within the Chris Hani District Municipality of the Eastern Cape. It is situated in the western part of the former bantustan of Transkei. On 1 November 1859, a day known in the Christian calender as All Saints Day, Chief Fubu of the amaQwathi met with Archdeacon Waters and the Rev John Gordon of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (SPG). As a result they were granted a stretch of land in the Xuka valley, and soon thereafter the All Saints mission station was founded on the site under the leadership of the Rev Gordon. In 1876 Walter Stanford arrived at the station to take up his appointment as Resident Magistrate to the amaQwathi. He established the seat of his magistracy some some 8km from the station on a site known locally as Engcobo, a Xhosa term meaning "a green place next to a stream". In 1879 the amaQwathi rose in rebellion and, during the ensuing hostilities, both the mission and the magistracy were burnt to the ground, forcing their residents to flee. Following the surrender of the amaQwathi, the magistracy was re-established at Engcobo in 1881.