November 17, 2006 The Ringing World- 1099

A 23 bell carillon/chime w¥ installed in The ,_.·Bells -in the.Province of Southern Africa Settlers Campanile in Port Elizabeth in 1936. The bells were cast in Croy~on (LOnaon) by by Colin A. Lewis Gillett and Johnston that year. The bourdon weighs 3,314 kg in A -(Gi¥ett and Johnston Location Under British rule bells were imported from Bell Records, 1877-1957). ?iPett and Johnston .B:Otain for church, clock and other use, such as . . The (Anglican) Church of the Province of also cast a 23 bell carillon fmr Germiston Tow~;~ Southern Africa encompasses South Africa, the bells imported in 1834 and cast in Hall, Johannesburg, in 1934-.6, with a bourdon Lesotho, Swaziland, Namibia, the islands of Greenock, Scotland, by Caird and Co. in that of -725 kg (Morris, 1951). Ifor the City Hall, St. Helena, Ascension, Tristan da Cunha and year. One of these bells, of 525mm diameter at Pietermaritzburg, Gillett and Johnston cast a other ·South Atlantic groups and extends into the mouth, was sent to a mission station on the chime of twelve bells in1.899: "the tenor is Mozambique and Angola. This is the area, then frontier of the Colony of the Cape of about a ton" (Sheppard, 1959). Gillett and with the exception of Angola and Namibia, Good Hope. This ·bell hangs at the church at Johnston also cast eight bells ~ung as a chime at covered by this exploratory article. Further Hertzog, near Fort Beaufort in the Province of Michaelhouse College, neat Pietermaritburg research will, no doubt, add much information the Eastern Cape (Lewis, 1997). (Gillett and Johnston Bell Records, 1877-1957). on the bells of the Province: Between 1803 and 1806, ~hen The Cape The Dutch founders, Petit and Fritsen, cast a was again under Dutch rule, bells were cast by chime of 12 bells that hangs at Clover Dairies The earliest bells the Bochum Verein for Stellenbosch. Three in Durban. They also cast a fhime of 12 bells exist, bearing the date 1805 (Sheppard, 1959). The first bells known to have existed in the . . for the Easter Exhibition ~ ~rounds, Rand, area now covered by the · Province were . Johannesburg, a chime of nine bells for the The Gre;;~t Trek reported from St. Helena in. 1S88, when City Hall, Pretoria and another set of nine raptain Thomas Cavendish wrote that on the .Following the Great Trek of 1835 and bells for the Reformed Church, Totiusdal. Petit '· '---.and there was "a church ... [and] a frame ... succeeding years, when Afrikaner frontier and Edelbrock cast 14 bells for the City Hall, whereon hang two bells." At that time St. farmers moved beyond the limits of the Parrow,y ear Cape Town. Helena was used by Portuguese seamen and the (British) Cape Colony (Venter, 1985), churches . An American founder: Tlie Ohio Bell Co. bells were probably imported from Portugal. were gcadually built in what is now the interior cast a chime of six steel bells for a They apparently hung outside a church .in the of South Africa imd· -in KwaZulu"Natal, Nonconformist chapel in Alibe, in the Eastern valley in which Jamestown is now sited. No although in the latter area many were built by Cape, which has since been ~emoved · from the trace of them now exists (Lewis, 2004a). British and other non-Boer settlers. Bells of tower (Lewis, 1997). diverse origins were hung in such churches. In 2005 a swing chime of three bells, Dutch rule operated by electric motors, was installed at the Mozambique The first permanent settlement of Europeans German Lutheran Church, Ptf-etoria. The bells, in South Africa was established by the Dutch Within Mozambique, which was formerly a which had been tuned by the Whitechapel· East India Company in 1652, at what is now Portuguese colony, there are long waisted Foundry in London, we e supplied by Cape Town. Their first church was built in bells, such as . those at Catandica, that were Nicholson's Engineering df England. The 1665 at the Castle 1n Cape Town (Oxley, probably cast in Portugal. largest, of 325 kg, was cast ~t Whitechapel by 1992). The oldest bell known in South Africa Mears in 1824. The other two!bells were cast in Rings of bells (apart from bells in museum collections) was London by John Warner and Sons in 1888. cast in 1697 by Claud Fremi of Amsterdam By August 2006 there were eight sets of I Clock bells and hangs above the entrance to the Castle at bells hung for full-circle ringing after the I Cape Town. "The elaborate decoration, -Latin English style and one set hung for ringing-after Clock bells are widespreaq in South Africa, in.scription, and. founder's mark:; V. 0. C., are the Veronese fashion (Mauli, 1991). The as at The City Hall, Durban (five bells, by beautifully executed" (Sheppard,l959; V. 0. English-style rings, are at Grahamstown (10 Gillett and Johnston), the lrown Hall, Port C. is not the founder's mark but the [Dutch] bells), Woodstock (Cape Town) (8), Cape Town Elizabeth, (Gillett and Johnson, five bells, tenor '+Utials of the Dutch East India Company). Cathedral (10), St. Paul's, Durban (8), St. . 550 kg in A), Grey High Schd,ol, Port Elizabeth '---..1 During Company rule other churches were Mary's, Greyville; Durban (10), St. George's, (Gillett and Johnston, five bells, tenor 235 kg in ·subsequently built at Stellenbosch (168 1~ 1 - Parktown, Johannesburg (8), Hillandale, near D), Queenstown (Post Office, also Gillett and Drakenstein (1691), Cape Town (the Groote Grahamstown (6) and All Saints, Founilays Johnston), Christian . Bothe r~ College, Green Kerk, opened in 1704), Tulbagh (1743), Gardens, Johannesburg (3, in a 6 bell frame). Point, Cape Town (five bJ'ells, Gillett and Malmesbury (1745), Cape Town Lutheran The above bells have already been described in Johnston 1936, tenor 269 kg in C: after many church (1780) and Gril:ff-Reinet (1792). The The Ringing World (Lewis, 1999, 2001a; years silence .these bells and! their clock were Groote Kerk (Dutch Reformed Church) in 2006). A ring of six bells in an eight bell frame being restored for use in 2005), Umtata Town Cape Town)ad a bell of about 500 kg "which is planned for St. Cyprian's Cathedral, Hall (three bells by Gillett an~ Johnston, cast in fell down the tower in 1725" (Sheppard, Kimberley. The Veronese style bells are 1907), the Dutch Reformed! Church, George 1959). The bell was recast by Jan Albert de located in the Roman Catholic cathedr~ in (three bells by Gillett and Johnston, cast 1906), Grave in Amsterdam and now hangs in the Durban but appear to be unringable at present. · Lovedale College, Alice (:five pells, cast in 1926 tower of the church. Two bells hu~g for full circle ringing. exist in by ·Gillett and Johnston), S~. John's Collel{e. the central tower at St. Michael and All Saints, Johannesburg; St. Andrew's College, British rule Queenstown, Eastern Cape. They were cast by Grahamstown and elsewhrre (Gillett and The English occupied "The Cape" in 1795, John Taylor and Co at Loughborough and .left Johnston Bell Records,18p-1957; Lewis, but withdrew in 1803. They reoccupied it in the foundry in 1923 as the treble and tenor of a 1997). They include three bells at the Dutch 1806 and gradually extended their control over planned ring of eight (Pickford, 1997). The Reformed Church, Dordrecht (Gillett Bland and the remainder of what became South Africa. plan awaits completion! Co., Croydon, 1883) and a !lingle !Jell at the Lesotho and Swaziland became British Dutch Reformed Churr;h, Barkly East (J. Protectorates. Under British rule many Carillons and chimes Wamei: and Sons, London 1880; Lewis, 2002b). churches were built, initially in what is now A 37 bell carillon, cast by John Taylor and the Eastern Cape, as at Grahamstown (St. Co. of Loughborough, England, exists at the Single bells and manual swing ch1mes George's, now the Cathedral: 1824) but later at City Hall in Cape Town. Taylor's initially cast Although Anglican churches usually seem many other sites. By permission of the Dutch five clock bells for the City Hall in 1905. In to possess bells cast in England, Dutch Church authorities Anglican services in Cape 1925 thirty-two more bells were cast and Reformed churches possess bells cast in The Town were held in the Groote Kerk unti) St. added to form a carillon of three chromatic Netherlands, Germany and locally. Matthew George's Church, Cape Town (now the­ octaves (Morris, 1951). The bourdon is -2,350 O'Byrne, the bellfounder of Dublin in Ireland, Cathedral) was opened in 1834 (Oxley, 1992). kg (Sheppard, 1959). cast at least nineteen bells for Roman Catholic 1100- The Ringing World November 17,2006 churches. in South Africa, the largest of which Market and other bells exist in a number of cast many small bells for Roman Catholic weighed ·.-1,300 bellfounding business to Charles· Carr of and the Whitechapel Bellfoundry, are known . English and Dutch foundries, but some have Smethwick in 189.1' (Pickford, 1997). Cathcart . to exist at Grahamstown, Cape Town, been cast within the Province while .others was established as part of a settlement of Durban, Pietermaritzburg, Johannesburg and were cast in Ireland, Scotland, . Germany, German soldiers who had been recruited to.form Queenstown. School and other handbells, Switzerland and elsewhere. the German Legion to fight for Britain in the fitted with wooden handles, are cast at the References Crimean War. ~er the war they were offered Johannesburg Foundry (Lewis, 1995). land on the the? frontier of 'British' territory in Beal Preston, D. M. 1976 The story of a frontier the Eastern Cape of South Africa .(Schnell, Bellfounding in the Province of town (Tarkastad). 1954). Henry Bisseker, whose surname may be Southern Africa Cannan, E. 1992 Churches of the South Atlantic Islands, 1502-1991. of Germanic orlgin, may have had connections Little is known of early attempts at Lewis, C. A. '1995 ·"Bell founding in South with the ·Germb community that led to him bellfounding, although it is possible that bells Africa", The Ringing World, 27.10.1995,1095. being asked to ~rovide the bell for Cathcart. were cast in The Western Cape when it was Lewis, C. A. 1997 ''Bells and bellfounders of the A number o~ bells with ornate canons exist, under Dutch rule. In the Eastern Cape . an Eastern Cape, South Africa", The Ringing World, as at the Moravian Church in Clarkson, west of attempt was made in 1850 to cast a bell, by 14.2.1997, 161-2. Port Elizabeth.JThese may have been cast in members of the Moravian Mission at Goshen, Lewis, C. A. 1999 "New bells, new founder. Germany, as were at least some of the bells near Tarkastad. "The brethren were so excited Hillandale, South Africa", The Ringing World, hung in Lutheran churches. Czech founders about the bell they were casting that they dug 25.6.1999, 598-9. have also sold bells to South Africa. it up before the metal had cooled completely Lewis, C. A. 2000a ''A Scottish bellfounder'', The Ringing World, 9.6.2000, 582. Aniong the most interesting single bells is and it cracked" (Beal Preston, 1976). A · ~wis, C. A. 2000b "John C. Wilson: a Scottish that of St. Francis Xavier's church, Barkly subsequent attempt was successful and this bellfounder", The Ringing World, 4.8.2000, 763. East, which wps cast in 1940 in Changhai, bell is on display in the Queenstown Museum. Lewis, C. A. 2000c "T. Blackbourn, bellfounder'', China. This bell, 580 mm in diameter at the The first commercial founder ·known to have The Ringing World, 31.3.2000, 334. mouth, has a statue of The Virgin and Child · cast bells in Southern Africa was John Jolly Lewis, C. A. 2001a "Bells and bell .ringers in cast on one side of the waist of the bell, and a (1835-1898). 'Jolly came from Chepstow, in South Africa, 1835-2000", The Ringing World, statue of Joseph and the Child on theopposite Moiunouthshire (Wales) and emigrated to South 6.3.2001, 341-3, 367; 27.4.2001, 425-8. side and 'is a beautiful example of the craft of Africa. In 1880 he traded as the Albany Iron and Lewis, C.A 2002a "John Jolly: the Grahamstown ·, bell founding (Lewis, 2002b). Brass Foundry, in Grahamstown. Jolly cast bells bell founder", The. Ringing Worl4, 2.8.2002, 787. Lewis, C. A. 2002b ''Barkl[e]y East bells and the 1\vo bells by Eayre and Lewis, cast at the for Basutoland, one of which still exists in the British Empire", The Ringing World, 9.8.2002, 818. Xmeco Foundry in Port Elizabeth in 2003 and New England area, near Barkly East, and is 375 Lewis, ·c. A.2004a "The bells of Jamestown, 2005, hang as ! a swing chime at Camphill mm in diameter at tlie mouth (Lewis, 2002a). He South Atlantic Ocean", The Ringing World, Farm Community near Hermanus in the may have also cast bells for other areas. Another 24.9.2004, 917-9. Western Cape. founder who is reputed to have cast bells was Lewis, C. A. 2004b "The bells of north western School bells include an example by Thomas Thos Peacock of Bloemfonfein, but none of his Transkei, South JUrica", The Ringing World, Blackbourne of Salisbury, England, c·ast in bells have been discovered (Sheppard,1959). 2.7.2004, 632-3 . . 1901and hung at Diocesan Girls' School, During the 1980s-Mr Bekker of Despatch, Lewis, C. A. 2006 "The Johannesburg project", Grahamstown (Lewis, 2000c; Massey, 2000; who had learned bell founding in ·The The Ringing World, 3.3.2006, 196-9. Massey, G. W. 2000. "Thomas Blackbourn, Skelton, 1976), where there is also a bell by Netherlands, cast a number of bells in the bellfounder and bellhanger", The Ringing World, Eayre and Lewis cast by Xmeco in Port Eastern Cape, one of which exists at the Cuyler 21.4.2000, 395. Elizabeth. Eayre and Lewis bells also exist at Museum in Uitenhague (Lewis, 1997). Tower Mauli, G. 199! .Campane nei secoli. St. John's College, Johannesburg; Kingswood bells of 20 kg and of 80 kg, as well as school Morris·, E. 1951 Bells of all nations. College, Grah'amstown and St. Andrew's handbells, were cast at the Johannesburg O'Byrne, M. 1962 Matthew O'Byrne Bell College, Bloemfontein. Foundry in the 1990s using gun metal (10% Catalogue 1962. Ships' bells are used in various island tin) instead of bell metal. The tower bells were Oxley, J. 1992 Places of worship in South Africa. churches, as at !st. Mary's, Tristan da Cunha thin in the soundbow -and had a distinctive · Pickford, C. 1997 "Bells in South Africa", The (from the Mabe1l Clark, which ran aground in tone. The Denville Foundry, also in the Ringing World, 21.3.1997, 285. · Schnell, E. L. G. 1954 For men must work. 1878); and at St. Helena and the Cross (from Johannesburg area, cast bells of up to 90 kg in Sheppard, V. 1959 "Let loose in Africa", The the Mutlat, dated 1856) and Rupert's Valley the 1990s. Their bells were squat, like an old Ringing World, 6.3.1959, 157; 13.3.1959, 173. (from HMS St. Helena), in St. Helena (Cannan, fashioned beehive (Lewis, 1995). Skelton, N. 0. 1976 "Thomas Blackbourne, 1992). Ships' ·bells are also used on the · Xmeco Engineers of Port Elizabeth, a firm bellfounder", The Ringing World, 9.4.197(), 320. southern African mainland, as at Wilderness. ·established by John Exley from England, " Venter, C. 1985 The Great Trek.