They were the sons of Johan Marinus Struben (1806 Oosterwijk, Holland), a South African Republic official, and his wife Frances Sarah Beattie of Scottish origin.

Having been hard hit financially by the First Anglo-Boer War (1880–1881) Struben embarked on mining ventures with his younger brother, Frederick.

At the time their efforts focused almost entirely on quartz reefs, little realising that gold on the Witwatersrand was confined primarily to conglomerate beds.

Their mining activities attracted other fortune-seekers to the area, and the extremely rich Main Reef conglomerate was found on the farm Langlaagte in 1886.

His Recollections of adventures: Pioneering and development in South Africa, 1850–1911 (Cape Town, 1920) was revised and edited by his daughter Edith.