 During World War I he personally part financed the South African war effort and for this he was knighted as well as for services at the Paris Peace Conference 1919.David Graaff was the fourth child of Petrus Novbertus Graaff and Anna Elisabeth.He was born in the small town of Villiersdorp, named after his maternal grandfather, Pieter Hendrik de Villiers, who founded the town in 1841.