Costume in Natal: Sydney Bartle Gadsden

Sydney Bartle Gadsden (1880-1953), my grandfather, was the son of Thomas Alfred
Gadsden and Eliza Ann Bell (daughter of Capt William Bell, Port Captain of
Natal). Born in Durban, Sydney Bartle married Maud Alice Swires and they had one son,  my father William Bell Gadsden. Sydney Bartle was a marine engineer and Works Manager of the company James Brown (later James Brown and Hamer).

Maritime adventures at Natal 2: Earl of Hardwicke and Lord George Bentinck

Captain William Bell had his fair share of shipwrecks to cope with during his time as Port Captain at Durban. 

The 1860s were particularly busy, as the volume of sail visiting the port increased and the difficulties of the harbour entrance, with varying depths of water over the Bar, had yet to be overcome. This was also the decade which saw the beginning of immigration of Indian labour, with ships sailing from Madras and other Indian ports to Natal carrying large numbers of migrants. 

Each shipwreck which occurred in the environs of the port would be the subject of an enquiry by the Harbour Board and the findings published in the local press. Bell and George Cato as well as the Lieutenant Governor and the Surveyor General sat on this Board and were closely involved in the harbour works proposed by John Milne, Harbour Engineer. 

The Earl of Hardwicke was a British wooden ship of 903 tons commanded by Captain Maddison. She was wrecked on the Back Beach at Durban on 26 Sept 1863 during a north east gale after a voyage from Madras with a cargo of Indian Immigrants. Fortunately no lives were lost. [Natal Mercury 4 December 1863]

There had been a similar incident on 3 January 1861 when the Lord George Bentinck another British barque of 592 tons, commanded by Captain George Case, was wrecked on the Back Beach in a north-easterly wind. She was carrying Indian immigrants and had sailed from Madras. [Natal Mercury 10 January 1861] 

The Adelaide was wrecked during a strong easterly gale on 8 Feb 1866. This ship was also carrying Indian immigrants. Several men were drowned in the incident.

[Natal Mercury 8 February 1866]

Scrimshaw: Sailing vessel on whale ivory.

Maritime adventures at Natal 1: the Princeza and Bell

This snippet from the Natal Mercury 21 July 1859 emphasises that once a ship reached its destination, Natal, there could still be any number of complications before a passenger actually set foot ashore. The Reliance dragged her anchors and nearly came to grief, but was eventually hauled to safety. The Jan Van Brakel lost both her anchors, spares being supplied from the shore. This incident led to a lawsuit. On board the Van Brakel were nearly fifty Dutch immigrants destined for New Guelderland on the Natal North Coast, part of Colenbrander's scheme. 

The Princeza mentioned in the above report was a schooner of Liverpool commanded by Captain W Lee. She was almost the cause of a disaster in September 1854 when the Port Boat - whose crew on that occasion included Captain William Bell and the harbour pilot/coxswain George Archer - coming ashore in the early hours from the schooner which lay outside at anchor, had a narrow escape from drowning. The night was very dark and the Port Boat filled with water in the heavy surf. Bell and his crew were immersed chest-deep before they abandoned her and slowly groped their way to land without a light. If the incident had taken place a yard or two nearer the deep water channel all the men would have been lost. 

[Source: The Natal Mercury Supplement 27 September 1854 ‘Boat Accidents’.]

Schooner

Souvenir Saturday: Bell/Martin marriage Durban 1874

Entry in the marriage register for the Colony of Natal
 in the parish of Addington, Durban, 16 April 1874:

James Evans Pascoe Martin, Engineer of the SS Basuto, to Jessie MacGregor Bell aged 17, daughter of Captain (deceased 1869) and Mrs. William Bell. The ceremony was performed by Archdeacon Lloyd at the bride's home, Conch Villa, on the Bluff. One of the witnesses was Douglas William Bell, brother of the bride.

Jessie was only 13 at time of Bell’s death. 



If your ancestor married in Natal check the following for a civil marriage certificate:

South Africa, Natal Province, Civil Marriages, 1845-1955

Description

Civil marriage certificates for Natal Province sent to the Registrar General in Pretoria. Marriage certificates may include date of act, date of registration, name of bride and groom, ages, place of marriage, birth place, occupations, and residence at time of marriage. Records are usually filed by date of registration and include registrations of Blacks, Coloureds, Indians and Whites. Text of original records is in English or Afrikaans. When searching the index, researchers should be aware that in some instances individuals only have a single name versus having both a given name and surname. Original records are conserved at the National Archives, Pretoria, Republic of South Africa.

https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/2063749

Bell Memorial Plaque

Bell Plaque: West St Cemetery. Inscription: 

 In Memory of Capt. William Douglas Bell  25 years Port Captain of This Port

 Died 10 April 1869 Aged 62 Years

At the Taking of Port Natal from the Insurgent Boers he rendered valuable Service by towing into Port under fire of the Enemy the Boats of the Southampton Frigate, and through his after Career in life was held in Esteem as a Faithful Servant of Government, a Good Husband, and Affectionate Father.

Shipwreck survivors 5: wreck of Earl of Hardwicke 1863

This interesting report (Natal Mercury 4 December 1863) on the wreck of the ship Earl of Hardwicke clearly emphasises some of the difficulties found when a ship was entering the port of Natal during the 1850s and 60s and beyond.

Masulah Boatmen introduced by Bell 1861

The Natal Almanac includes among its port entries a group of 'Masulah boatmen'. One might be forgiven for believing 'Masulah' to be, in a Natal context, a contemporary error for 'Zulu', but not so. The terminology is correct.

These boatmen were engaged, from 1861, by the always innovative Captain William Bell, who persuaded the authorities to import special surf boats from Madras. This city had a sandbar problem not unlike Natal's, with all ships being forced to land offshore due to the silting up of the entry channel. The lightweight Masulah boats would transfer the cargo - and passengers - through the surf back to port.

Masulah boatmen bringing boats in to shore at Madras.

It is quite possible that Bell (who is recorded as sailing from Calcutta on at least one voyage) had seen the fearless Madrassi oarsmen in operation in India. The concept proved equally successful in Natal and shown in the annual list of Port Office employees from 1861 in the Almanac are eleven Madulah Boatmen 'at 18 pounds each' (per annum).

When their contracts expired, many of these Indian sailors remained in Natal, bought or built their own boats and went into business as fishermen.

Masulah boat and crew

www.thehindu.com/features/metroplus/society/masulah-boatman-of-madras/article6621621.ece

www.nmmc.co.uk/index.php?/collections/featured_objects/indian_masoola_surf_boat

Captain Bell's narrow escape 1854

William Bell was an active Port Captain, not spending every hour at Natal writing reports or making lists of passenger arrivals. 

The frequent trips which Bell undertook in all weathers in the Port Boat between the harbour and the vessels at anchor, were hazardous. He narrowly escaped drowning in September 1854, when coming ashore in the early hours from the Princeza. 

The night was very dark and the Port Boat filled with water in the heavy surf, Bell and his crew being immersed chest-deep before abandoning her and slowly groping their way to land without a light. If the incident had taken place a yard or two nearer the deep water channel, all the men would have been lost.

From The Natal Mercury, Supplement 27 September 1854

Tracing a Master Mariner 6

By the 1860s Captain George Henry Caithness was a well-known local figure in the Eastern Cape.

Street scene: Old Uitenhage

Whether he ever lived in one of the nine cottages he bought in Port Elizabeth in 1867, or whether they were simply a property investment, is not recorded but by 1869 he had evidently been residing in Uitenhage for some time. 

According to the Centenary publication, Uitenhage Past and Present, in that year he was on the Board of Commissioners of the town. Uitenhage had been founded in 1804 on the Swartkops River not far inland from its estuary at Algoa Bay, about 28 kms from what would later be Port Elizabeth, and initially formed part of the district of Graaff-Reinet.*

'The Commissioners then in office were
 ... George Caithness' etc

Did George find time to tear himself away from civic duties to attend the wedding of his niece Emily Mary Ann Caithness to Herbert Lee Carige at Christ Church in the parish of Addington, Durban, on 12 December 1863? If so, he would have seen his nephew James Edward/Ernest Caithness who was present. It’s possible that George’s sister Mary Ann Bell nee Caithness and her husband William Bell, the latter still in office as Port Captain at Durban, were among the guests. 

Captain William and Mary Ann Bell

As already noted, in the late 1860s/early 1870s George made at least two trips to England as a passenger on Union Line steamers Cambrian and Northam and in 1873 presented some stones from the diamond diggings to the Hartley Institution (the modern day Southampton University).** He may have been the Caithness who in August 1870 joined Slater’s party to the fields though it’s more likely this was James Edward/Ernest. Seven years later James would marry Eugenie Westmacott in London and settle in India.

In 1875 George’s daughter Caroline Ann married John Loftus and became 4^th Marchioness of Ely. It’s not known whether George attended the wedding in Chelsea, London. 

During the 1880s George Henry Caithness kept a low profile, no doubt enjoying a peaceful retirement in Uitenhage. When his wife Leopoltina Cornelia Frederika died on 10 August 1894 George survived her by only a few months, dying at the Royal Hotel, Uitenhage on 28 December 1894. His Death Notice gives his ‘condition in life’ as Sea Captain.

A brief line appeared in the Colonies and India edition of 9 February 1895:

‘Captain Caithness, one of the oldest inhabitants of Uitenhage, South Africa, died there recently.’

Note: There is a Caithness Road in Port Elizabeth, about 400 metres south of Bakens River; it seems likely this street was named after James Ramsay Caithness since James's Death Notice describes his residence as being on the south side of Bakens River. There's a Caithness Road in Simonstown which may also owe its name to James. If anyone has further information regarding these two streets it would be most welcome.

* The city of Uitenhage was incorporated in the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Municipality together with Port Elizabeth and the town of Despatch in 2001

** www.southampton.ac.uk/archives/exhibitions/University_images.html

Acknowledgement

Tom Sheldon

The Shipwrecked Mariner and the Spanish Ladies 1873

Sturges Bourne Bell was born in Port Natal on 17 July 1852 to Captain William Bell and his wife Mary Ann nee Caithness. Apart from his birth and baptism, records concerning Sturges were scarce.

However, an unusual pair of forenames can be an advantage when tracing an ancestor - especially in that mine of information, contemporary newspapers. So it proved in the case of Sturges Bourne Bell.*

Apparently he stayed with family tradition and became a mariner. In 1873 he turns up as crew member on the collier Beckton sailing from Cardiff to Malta, when on the night of 28 November this screw steamer struck a sunken reef in heavy fog about three miles off the coast of Spain. There was a strong gale whipping up the sea and within minutes it was evident that the ship would soon break up.

The crew launched a lifeboat but it was immediately swamped, with the loss of eleven men. An attempt to launch the jolly-boat also failed. Several seamen including the mate leapt into the waves or were washed off the vessel. Only the captain and Bell were left on deck. Bell managed to get a lifebelt to the captain, who could not swim, but the captain was swept away and Bell then decided to try and make for land, stripping off all his clothing except his shirt.

As he swam he called out for any possible survivors in the water and was answered by the mate, the two men swimming together for some distance. When the mate’s strength began to fail, Bell found him a plank and the mate clung to this but was unable to continue, asking Bell to go and see his wife and five children to tell them how he’d died. Later the mate’s body was washed up, still clasping the plank. The bodies of seven other seamen and that of the ship’s cook followed.

Bell reached the shore alive, though severely bruised and cut from his passage through the reef. He might have bled to death if he hadn’t torn his shirt into strips and bandaged himself as best he could. After four hours in the sea he lay exhausted and helpless on the beach until eventually found by two young women and assisted to the nearest village. The local inhabitants tended his wounds and Bell afterwards spoke warmly of their kindness. When he was sufficiently recovered they sent him on to Corunna where the packet Onward took him on board. Bell was duly landed at Plymouth, the Shipwrecked Mariners’ Society offering him a temporary refuge at the Sailor’s Home.

It had been a dramatic wreck, with over 20 lives lost, Bell being the sole survivor. He seems to have acquitted himself well and his actions in assisting others showed some heroism. Accounts were published in several British newspapers, identifying him as Sturges Bourne Bell, aged 20, from Port Natal. He is variously described in the reports as Ordinary Seaman and Able Seaman.

Crew members listed: Central Press 17 Dec 1873

According to one news column, when Bell left Plymouth he headed for London but at that point he drops out of sight. It hasn’t yet been established whether his family in Natal ever saw him again or heard about the shipwreck and his miraculous escape from the deep.

As Sturges Bourne Bell sailed away from the shores of Spain, perhaps he whistled the old Navy refrain:

‘Farewell and adieu to you, Spanish Ladies,
Farewell and adieu to you, ladies of Spain;
For we've received orders for to sail for old England,
 But we hope in a short time to see you again.’

Spanish ladies: Raquel and Manuela by Sir William Russell Flint

Lloyd's Register entry 1873/74 for the Beckton; here her captain's name
is given as Howley; she was built in Newcastle in 1869, and sailed between
London and Mediterranean ports; it is noted that she was wrecked.

* For more on the origin of his forenames:

molegenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/09/caithness-and-bell-mystery-solved.html

Acknowlegement

Tom Sheldon 

Souvenir Saturday: Miss Bell

Of all the most tantalising items there can be nothing to beat an unidentified, or mis-identified, photograph. A handwritten note on the back of the above photo claims that the winsome young lady is Miss Bell, 'a sister of Captain William Bell'. 

This is hardly likely, as her costume tells us she is of a much later generation than Captain Bell's (he was born in 1807). There is, however, some family resemblance, reinforced by a companion photograph showing a Mr Bell who certainly could be a close relative of the Captain, though again of a later date.

For the moment, Miss Bell remains a mystery lady. The 1871 Census for Drumburgh, Bowness-on-Solway, shows Thomas Bell (the Captain's father), a widower aged 87, and blind. The other occupants of the house are Elizabeth, granddaughter, aged 38, unmarried, and a grandson, John. It was tempting to consider this Elizabeth as a contender for the Miss Bell in the photo portrait, but the date and age simply do not fit. Back to the drawing board ...

Ships and Mariners: 19th c Cape and Natal 16 Bell

Following on the heels of the petition by Durban residents to the Cape Government on behalf of Captain William Bell came the resignation of John Douglas, who had in the interim filled the dual role of Port Captain and Pilot at Natal, necessitating the urgent appointment of a suitable person in the latter's place.

The post was offered to Bell ‘at his former emoluments’, though the authorities, who were beginning to get Bell’s measure, had Lieutenant Joseph Nourse in reserve in case Bell declined.

Bell accepted on Christmas Eve, 1849. Without further delay, he and Mary Ann packed their belongings and the family embarked on the schooner Douglas for Natal, arriving on 19 January 1850. 

Captain Bell, Mrs Bell and four children recorded as passengers on the schooner Douglas,
under Captain R Clarkson. Note Captain Smerdon was also a passenger on this voyage to
 Port Natal January 1850*

As he stood on deck watching the familiar sight of the headland known as the Bluff come into view, Bell must have felt a profound relief that the uncertainties of the past few years were over and that he was about to enter the sphere for which he had long been destined.

* NAB EI Vol 73 

Ships and Mariners: 19th c Cape and Natal 15 Abercrombie Robinson/Waterloo

Advertisement for the sale of the Waterloo wreck;
 W Bell and Conch For Algoa Bay
South African Commercial Advertiser
31 August 1842 

In August 1842, not long after their return from action at Port Natal, Captain William Bell and Conch were in Table Bay preparing for a run to Algoa when the remains of the convict ship Waterloo were put up for auction. 

A singularly tragic wreck, the Waterloo under Captain H Ager had been bound for Tasmania but, putting in for water at the Cape near the mouth of the Salt River on 28 August, had encountered a gale-force north-westerly to which she had speedily succumbed, her rotten hull timbers breaking up. 

Bell no doubt voiced strong opinions on ships which were unfit to be afloat being sent off from England to the Antipodes on a wing and a prayer. 190 people, of whom 143 were convicts, were lost in the Waterloo. Among the dead were 18 women and children.

Abercrombie Robinson wreck

Only a few hundred metres away, the British troop transport, Abercrombie Robinson, 1425 tons, Captain John Young, on a voyage from Dublin, was wrecked in the same gale. This ship was carrying 700 souls, including detachments of the 27^th Regiment and Cape Mounted Rifles as well as the 91^st Argyllshire Regiment (numbering 450), but due to the discipline of all on board, everyone was saved. This story ranks alongside that of the Birkenhead for human courage and selflessness while in peril on the sea.

Wreck of the Waterloo. 28 August 1842

For more on the two dramatic shipwrecks at Table Bay see:

molegenealogy.blogspot.com/2010/05/newspaper-shipping-reports-in-family.html

molegenealogy.blogspot.com/2010/05/19th-c-south-african-press-reports-of.html

Ships and Mariners: 19th c Cape and Natal 13 Bell

At the beginning of the 1840s the winds of change were ruffling Cape waters, a breeze that would soon blow into a gale. Steam was the new watchword and its effects would be far reaching in the mercantile marine. Bell would no doubt have had some pithy comment about odious comparisons made in the press concerning the new coastal steamer, Phoenix, and his schooner Conch.

The great advantage of Steam communication on our coast is strongly exemplified at the present moment. The steamer Phoenix and the Conch, one of our fastest sailing Coasters, put to sea on Thursday the 3^rd …  the latter was compelled in consequence of the strong south-easter to put back on the 7^th and still remains in Table Bay, whilst … the Phoenix arrived in Mossel Bay on Saturday morning and left again on Sunday morning at 7 o’clock for Algoa Bay. Her return [to Table Bay] is advertised as expected tomorrow.

The Enterprise, 1825

Steam navigation made its initial impact on the Cape two decades earlier, when the Enterprise became the first steamship to reach South Africa on 13 October 1825. Captain James Henry Johnston, an ex Royal Navy man with a sense of the dramatic, brought her into Table Bay, reporting that though they had been off Table Mountain at midnight on the 12^th he thought ‘the inhabitants of Cape Town would be disappointed if we anchored in the night, [so] lay to until morning and ran in about 9 o’clock.’

The populace, seeing the unaccustomed smoke, thought a ship was on fire and a crowd gathered. When the significance of the historic event dawned upon them, commotion ensued, people pouring forth to every viewpoint. During the Enterprise’s short stay before she continued her voyage to Calcutta, it’s said that 4 000 of the town’s residents had boarded the ship to sightsee.

Enterprise was a paddle steamer, with two engines of 60 h.p. each, and sails (barque-rigged) for back-up. ‘The mechanism was so elaborate and took up so much room that no cargo could be carried as all the remaining space, apart from the accommodation for passengers and crew, was required for coal.’ There, in a nutshell, was the difficulty: quarters were cramped, stowage of fuel led to some accidental fires, which, though speedily quenched, alarmed passengers. Shovelling coal out of the ballast tanks proved exhausting for the crew – Johnston had to make an unscheduled stop en route to allow them to recover - and as the ship steamed full ahead everyone became covered in coal-dust.* 

Surely there could be no future for such an intolerable mode of travel? How could it ever compare with the graceful lines and clean progression of the sailing ship?

It would be some time before regular steamship services became feasible at the Cape, because the small coastal sailing vessels filled most needs. The Enterprise, a ship which (almost) passed in the night, is remembered while the early coasters and their mariners are largely forgotten - except perhaps by the latter's descendants. Let's keep their light burning bright.

The Nemesis, first iron steamship to round the Cape of Good Hope, 1840.
The East India Company frigate, Nemesis, 700 tons, was on her way to Chinese waters and her appearance in those parts caused considerable consternation among the local pirates who found a steamship a novel and uncomfortable proposition to tackle.* 

*Ships and South Africa: Marischal Murray (OUP 1933)

Ships and Mariners: 19th c Cape and Natal 12 Bell Caithness

At the Cape two children had been added to the Bell family: a daughter, Ellen Harriet, born in May 1846 and named for the child lost two years before, and a son James Colquhoun born in Cape Town on 28 December 1847. The celebrations were scarcely over when James Ramsey Caithness’s brig the Lady Leith was wrecked on Thunderbolt Reef on 27 February 1848. Her remains were sold at auction.*

In September 1847 and February 1849 Bell appears as Master of the schooner Louisa, previously one of the ships sailed by H G Caithness, the disappearing mariner husband of Pamela Halt Okes. 

May 1848 and August 1849 saw Bell commanding the brig Workington: at this stage he was taking whatever voyages were offered by the ship agent. He may even have been the W Bell listed as master of the Bucephalus on a voyage from Calcutta to Table Bay arriving on 9 March 1848.

His services rendered in 1842 weren’t entirely forgotten, though the authorities needed a push in the right direction. They received it towards the end of 1847 when the inhabitants of Port Natal petitioned the Lieutenant Governor for Bell’s reinstatement ‘in the full enjoyment of his former office and Emolument’.

The signatories, who included the Cato brothers, Richard King and other prominent citizens, expressed their ‘strong conviction of what is due by them to Captain Bell, as a worthy, faithful and meritorious Public Servant against whom … no charge of any dereliction of duty, or of any inferiority for the perfect fulfillment of the hazardous and responsible functions of his office has been preferred’. They acknowledged the ‘deep obligation’ they owed to Captain Bell ‘for the preservation of their life and liberty, while adhering to the Standard of their Queen and Country’.

These views were forwarded to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, who subsequently considered that Bell had a fair claim to employment by the Natal Government.

William Bell must have felt indebted to his corps of supporters at Port Natal. It would not be the last time that George Cato stepped into the breach on behalf of his friend. 

Sextant 19th c

*http://molegenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/06/wreck-of-lady-leith-1848.html

Souvenir Saturday : Captain William Bell 1807-1869

Born 2 October 1807 at Glasson, Bowness-on-Solway, Cumberland, and baptized in the parish of St Michael’s, Bell was the son of Thomas Head Bell (1784-1872) and Elizabeth, b Millican or Milliken (1785-1867). His grandparents were William Bell and Barbara Head.

Bell’s baptismal entry does not include the middle name, Douglas, which appears in most of his colonial records.

William Bell married Mary Ann Caithness at Algoa Bay (Port Elizabeth) on 29 June, 1838. By this time he was master of the schooner Conch engaged in coastal trade in Cape waters. In recognition of his services at Natal in 1842 he was appointed Harbour Master at that port in 1844 but relinquished the position when no satisfactory agreement could be reached with the Government as to his duties and salary. He became Port Captain of Natal in 1850 and remained so until his death on 10 April 1869.

During his time Natal was at the height of her settler era and Bell oversaw ship arrivals and departures; many of his handwritten passenger lists survive as archival records. Between 1850 and 1863 he witnessed and compiled reports on over fifteen shipwrecks within and outside the Bay and as a member of the Natal Harbour Board was closely involved in the investigations into their causes. He was a member of the committee which reported to the Natal Legislative Council on the continued efforts to improve the harbour, as well as accompanying Dr Sutherland, the Government Geologist and Surveyor-General, on an expedition along the North Coast to find and chart suitable harbours or landing places.

Bell and Mary Ann had twelve children, whose descendants are now spread across the globe. 

Bell's mariner's telescope, seen under his arm in the photo portrait,
was of brass, by Dolland.

Ships and Mariners: 19th c Cape and Natal 8 Bell

There had been a groundswell of opinion, in both Cape and Natal circles, that Captain William Bell was deserving of reward for his actions in June 1842. A letter to the Cape Frontier Times, written from Port Elizabeth on 13 November 1843 and signed Justitia, left nobody in any doubt that the Government so far had been remiss in failing to acknowledge Bell’s gallantry under fire ‘by something more substantial than praise’.

Captain Smith's camp, Port Natal, 1842

We remember the sympathy felt here for the almost helpless situation of parts of the 27^th Reg. confined there within their entrenchment … Captain Bell going with the relief was considered as going to almost certain death. Yet, in defiance of all the promptings of prudence he proceeds … he enters the narrow channel, where more than ordinary caution is requisite, in the coolest frame of mind; a double range of guns from sheltered enemies stare him in the face … Captain Bell … without personal interest, save in the company of kindred brave hearts, without arms, but his hands placed on the helm, takes his measures as coolly, shapes his course as steadily, exposed to the hottest fire of the secreted enemy … [and] endangered his little all.

 We have heard that Captain Bell has been nominated as Port Captain of Natal. He well deserves such a situation to look after the well-being of a place which he so mainly contributed to preserve. 

This letter was republished in the Carlisle Patriot of 26 July 1844, under the headline ‘Captain Bell of the Conch’, as ‘of some local interest, Captain Bell being a native of Glasson, in the parish of Bowness, in this county.’*

It’s interesting to note that despite this clarity Bell’s birthplace continued to be stated (even by members of his family) as Dumfries, Scotland, an error perpetuated in the comparatively recent reprint edition of his Narrative of the Conch.

Sir George Napier KCB

Perhaps in response to such public promptings, on 16 December 1844, Sir George Napier offered Bell the position of Harbour Master at Port Natal at a salary of 200 pounds per annum. There was a proviso that Bell would also act as Pilot for ships entering the port and that he would have to furnish a Boat and a Crew out of his own salary. The offer was gratifying and Bell accepted the conditions, undoubtedly recognizing the benefits of a regular income and a settled home as well as an end to the hazards of coastal voyaging.

In March 1845 the family duly arrived at Natal on the schooner Pilot but the new post wasn’t to be all plain sailing. There were difficulties in obtaining a crew for the Port Boat and Bell’s remuneration wasn’t enough to meet the expenses involved, the Boat Crew alone costing 136 pounds a year.

It was then proposed that the Government should provide the Crew as well as the Boat but that Bell’s salary would be reduced to 125 pounds. His appointment as Harbour Master would be terminated and he would be employed as Port Captain and Pilot. The tortuous workings of colonial bureaucracy thus undermined the spirit of the original offer and Bell declined the post. He was asked to reconsider, but stuck to his guns. In April 1847 the Government appointed a temporary Port Captain at Natal in his place while Bell returned to the Cape at his own expense.

He would continue sailing in coastal waters though not with Conch, which had been taken over in June 1845 by Captain W Moses. On 18 December 1847 the back page of the Grahamstown Journal carried the following report:

We regret to hear that the Conch was wrecked on the 7^th ult. on the Bar of the St Johns or Umzimvoobu River. But we are glad to be able to add that no lives have been lost. The greater part of the cargo has been landed, chiefly in a damaged state. 

Port St John's: the mouth of the Umzimvubu River

*Glasson, Bowness-on-Solway, Cumberland