Gravestone memorials: Sydney Bartle and Maud Alice Gadsden, Stellawood, Durban

 

The Gadsden family plot at Stellawood Cemetery Durban. The side visible in the photo shows the names of Maud Alice Gadsden (my grandmother) and Ernest Alfred Rhodes (her great uncle). Sydney Bartle Gadsden's name appears on the other side of the memorial.

 

Kimberly Powell Photo

After the cross, the urn is one of the most commonly used cemetery monuments. The design represents a funeral urn and may symbolize immortality.

Cremation was an early form of preparing the dead for burial. In some periods, especially classical times, it was more common than burial. The shape of the container in which the ashes were placed may have taken the form of a simple box or a marble vase, but no matter what it looked like it was called an urn.

As burial became a more common practice, the urn continued to be closely associated with death. The urn is commonly believed to testify to the death of the body and the dust into which the dead body will change, while the spirit of the departed eternally rests with God.

The cloth draping the urn symbolically guarded the ashes. The shroud-draped urn is believed by some to mean that the soul has departed the shrouded body for its trip to heaven. 

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).

Costume in Natal: Maud Alice Gadsden nee Swires

A delightful portrait of my grandmother Maud Alice Gadsden nee Swires b 18 April 1890 with her only child, my father, William Bell Gadsden, b 29 June 1910, seen here aged about 6 months.

The daughter of Alice Mary nee King and James Dudley Swires, Maud married Sydney Bartle Gadsden, son of Thomas Alfred Gadsden and Eliza Ann nee Bell (daughter of Port Captain William Bell).

Both Maud and William's outfits are lavishly trimmed with the hand-embroidered broderie anglaise much in vogue at the time. Maud's hair achieves the high bouffant style through use of net and wire pads worn underneath.

Unfortunately, the photographer who took this cabinet photo remains unknown as the print at some stage (before my time, I hasten to add) became separated from its cardboard mount.

Souvenir Saturday: Bill Gadsden in Durban High School Group 1880s

                                     From 'The Durban High School Record 1866-1906'

One evening my uncle arrived at our family home unexpectedly bearing a leather-bound volume entitled The Durban High School Record. The book was in poor condition but all the pages were there. He triumphantly pointed out a group photograph entitled The School in the Eighties and drew our attention to a name in the caption: 'Bill Gadsden'. My father was the only 'Bill Gadsden' I'd ever known or heard of - and he certainly wasn't around in the 1880s, having been born in 1910.

His father was Sydney Bartle Gadsden, born in 1880, and not a contender for the 'Bill' in the photo.

This was the beginning of a search for the unknown Bill Gadsden who had attended the Durban High School during the 1880s. For a start, the caption of the photo was not helpful in identifying which boy was meant to be Bill Gadsden - the rows are made up of inconsistent numbers of boys and masters and there are some missing names. However, it seems likely that Bill Gadsden is 4th from the right in the 3rd row - the 3rd row from the front, that is, ignoring the rows' numbering given in the caption.

This Bill Gadsden, as research was to prove, was my grandfather's brother, William Gadsden of whom my father had no prior knowledge. The brother had never been mentioned in the family and the only two of my grandfather's siblings of whom my father knew were his father's sisters, Faith and Hope.

After the loss of my grandfather's parents he and his sisters were farmed out to various families until the children reached adulthood. It's possible they never saw their brother William who on leaving school was employed as an apprentice on the Natal Harbour Works, later apparently moving to Verulam on the North Coast of Natal where he worked as a carpenter. He married and had one daughter. My father had had no idea this young man existed and was astonished to see the photograph and to hear the results of my research into our mystery family member. To begin with my father was sceptical and found it hard to believe my grandfather wouldn't have spoken of such a close relation. Still, the brothers must have grown apart with the break up of the family and growing up in different foster homes. Whether there were other causes of estrangement remains unknown.

We must also consider that William died in his early twenties - 24 - of enteric fever (a common cause of death in colonial Natal resulting from impure drinking water) on 22.12.1900 at Verulam, Natal. He was probably buried at Verulam cemetery; his grave has so far not been found. His death notice refers to him as Colonial Englishman. My father William Bell Gadsden was born ten years after his uncle's death and remained unaware that there was a widow and a daughter - a first cousin - living not far away from the rest of the Durban Gadsdens.

William attended the Durban Boys' High School from 1888-1892. His address during that time was 'The Point, Durban'. His father was then employed by the Natal Harbour Works.

The Natal Witness carried a brief announcement of William's birth thus:

Gadsden 18-July-1876 (date of event), 28-July-1876 (date of advert) at the Bluff the wife of Mr Thomas Gadsden of a son. 

Thomas Gadsden's wife was Eliza Ann Bell, daughter of Port Captain William Bell. The couple lost a son named Phillip born in 1879; there is a record of Phillip's baptism at St Paul's Church, Durban. 

Souvenir Saturday: Maud Alice Gadsden nee Swires

A delightful portrait of my grandmother Maud Alice Gadsden nee Swires b 18 April 1890 with her only child, my father, William Bell Gadsden, b 29 June 1910, seen here aged about 6 months.

The daughter of Alice Mary nee King and James Dudley Swires, Maud married Sydney Bartle Gadsden, son of Thomas Alfred Gadsden and Eliza Ann nee Bell (daughter of Port Captain William Bell).

Both Maud and William's outfits are lavishly trimmed with the hand-embroidered broderie anglaise much in vogue at the time. Maud's hair achieves the high bouffant style through use of net and wire pads worn underneath.

Unfortunately, the photographer who took this cabinet photo remains unknown as the print at some stage (before my time, I hasten to add) became separated from its cardboard mount.