Mr BAIN and Dr ATHERSTONE, SOUTH AFRICA’S PIONEER FOSSIL HUNTERS.

Alan Cohen M.B.B.S., Dip.Archaeol.

email: ab.cohen@tesco.net

ABSTRACT

Although a few explorers had reported the finding of fossils in South Africa during

the eighteenth century, the first important collections of fossils were made during

the 1830s by interested amateurs. Many new species were discovered and sent back to

London, for further study by the newly emerging class there of professional

palaeontologists such as Richard Owen (1804-92) of the British Museum’s Natural

History Department. As a result of a few pioneers like Andrew Geddes Bain and

William Guybon Atherstone, the study of South African geology and palaeontology was

placed on a firm footing by the 1860s. Their contributions to these new sciences

were publicly acknowledged by Owen in 1876 in his monumental study of the fossil

reptiles of South Africa.1

On 12 October 1843 Nathaniel Wallich the Superintendent of the East

India Company’s Botanic Garden in Calcutta 2 wrote from Grahamstown in

the Eastern Cape Province, to Robert Brown at the British Museum’s

Natural History Department in London. 3

I have looked into a small part of what, profoundly ignorant as I am

in matters of Geology, I cannot help considering as a very interesting

1

collection of Fossils made by Mr. Bain in the Eastern districts of this

Colony. He appears to me to be an observant clever man. I hear he is an

excellent land-surveyor, especially a road-maker. I believe he has both

diagrams and local observations to accompany the specimens, which he

proposes to offer to the Geological Society on condition of his expenses

being reimbursed. I told him I could offer no opinion upon this subject

beyond that as he intended to employ an Agent at home and to address either

the Secretary or the President of the Society, the sooner he despatched the

Collection via Port Elizabeth in Algoa Bay the better. He begged of me to

interest some Members on his behalf; and this I now do by stating the above

facts and begging that you will be so kind as to mention them to Mr.

Stokes,4 to whom please to remember me most kindly - In the very act of

writing this Mr. Bain sends me the Frontier Times of this Town containing

some notices of the specimens, which I cut out and enclose. 5

Andrew Geddes Bain was born at Thurso in Caithness, Scotland in 1797.

His parents were simple country people and died when he was very young.

His uncle Lt.Colonel William Geddes of the 83rd Regiment took pity on

the youngster and when he returned to duty in South Africa in October

1816, Bain went with. He became a saddler in Graaff-Reinet, and two

years later married another orphan Maria Elizabeth von Backstrom,

daughter of an ex-officer in the Dutch regular forces who had died in

1812. By 1822 Bain owned property in Graaff-Reinet, and remained there

for thirteen years. He had a large family of eleven children, one of

whom, Thomas, became an engineer and road-builder, following in his

2

father’s footsteps. His second daughter, Johanna Elizabeth, married

Frederick Rex who was also a surveyor, and a son of the famous George

Rex of Knysna, who was widely rumoured to be an illegitimate son of King

George III.

Bain was probably the first to take out a license to trade across the

Orange River when he visited Kuruman with Benjamin Kift in 1825. The

next year he visited Bechuanaland with Lieutenant John Burnet Biddulph,

and in 1829 they set out again, travelling north via Natal and Pondoland

as far as the Umzimvuba River. They produced the first proper

description of the country north of the Fish River and come home loaded

with valuable ivory. In 1825 Bain had written to the Editor of the South

African Commercial Advertiser suggesting improvements in the road from Graaff-

Reinet to Cape Town that could cut the journey by one hundred miles or

so. Shortly after his return from the Umzimvuba he was given the job of

constructing a pass up the Oudeberg for the benefit of the District of

Graaff-Reinet. In 1832 Bain superintended the building of another pass,

for which the grateful citizens of Graaff-Reinet gave him a medal

inscribed ‘For gratuitously superintending the construction of Van

Ryneveld’s Pass, 1832’. In 1834 he set out to fulfil an American

commission to capture live animals and procure rare skins; after

travelling for the first month with Dr Andrew Smith’s expedition6 he

reached the Molopo River near modern Mafeking, and over 200 miles north-

east of Kuruman. However the trip ended disastrously when some of Bain’s

3

party tried to steal cattle from the local Matabele chief Moselekatse

and all his wagons were taken in retaliation. Bain was lucky to have

escaped with his life.

During the Sixth Frontier War in 1834/35 Bain was a Captain in the

Graaff-Reinet Burgher Force serving under Colonel Henry Somerset

clearing the Zuurveld and Bushman’s River district. By July 1835, he was

in command of Fort Thomson. The period from April to September 1836 is

covered by a hand-written journal which gives a good account of the day

to day problems faced by a typical local agent in dealing with matters

of minor administration and law keeping. During this period Bain had

successfully persuaded the local chief Tyali to take up ploughing and to

irrigate the land, hoping that others would follow suit and become

agriculturalists instead of continuing their role as cattle rearers and

warriors. The policy of attempting to persuade the Xhosa to take up

agriculture was in part an attempt to solve the problem of cattle

stealing that was rampant in the frontier region. It was also hoped to

persuade them to adopt the Christian missionary ideals of ‘improving’

the status of women, so that they would look after the household while

the men tilled the land instead. However the relinquishing of the new

Queen Adelaide Province (also known as British Kaffraria) by the British

administration put an end to this idea. Bain recorded that Tyali said

to him one day

4

Tyali has altered his mind since he got his land back....he is not going

to spoil his oxen with ploughing while he has plenty of wives to till the

ground for him. (The Xhosa used their oxen for racing and not as beasts of burden) 7

By the end of the War Bain had moved to a farm at the confluence of the

rivers Tyumie and Gaga where the modern town of Alice now stands. Bain’s

application for the land had been endorsed by the Cape Governor Sir

Benjamin D’Urban, especially as it would help establish a settlement in

this new province. When D’Urban was forced by the Home government to

give up the Province, Bain lost his farm and his livelihood but gained

employment with the Royal Engineers in April 1837 supervising the

making of military roads on the frontier. The chief of these works was

the construction of the Queen’s Road, named in honour of the new young

Queen Victoria, from Grahamstown through Fort Beaufort to the

Winterberg. Bain was so successful that he was soon given the job of

building a road north-east from Cape Town through Bain’s Kloof and

across the Michell’s Pass. Bain’s road is still much as it was in 1854

when it officially opened and just as spectacular as when he first

discovered the trackless kloof which enabled him to cross the first

range of hills out from Cape Town.8 He went on to build most of the

major roads opening up the hinterland of the Western Cape. In the words

of Geoffrey Jenkins and Eve Palmer in their excellent Companion Guide to

South Africa

5

Cape Town had always had the freedom of the sea; it was Andrew Geddes

Bain, and later his son Thomas, who gave it the freedom of the land as

well.9

To fill his spare time while he was working on the Queen’s Road he

borrowed books from his commandant Captain Colin Campbell, including a

copy of Lyell’s Principles of Geology10 and then on a visit to Grahamstown

managed to buy for himself Dean Buckland’s Bridgewater Treatise on

Geology and Mineralogy.11 He became fascinated by this relatively new

science of geology. It was barely twenty years since William Smith had

published his Strata Identified by Organized Fossils, his seminal paper with which

he had more or less founded the study of stratigraphical geology.12 In

1824 Dean Buckland had described the remains of a large reptile found

near Oxford, that he had named Megalosaurus and the following year Dr

Gideon Mantell published his description of some large fossil teeth

that his wife had found some three years earlier on the Sussex Downs.

Mantell proclaimed them to be from an extinct reptile similar to a

modern Iguana and named the creature Iguanadon. A few years later he

discovered fossil remains of another new creature that he named

Hylaeosaurus. It was not until 1841 that Richard Owen, a leading

comparative anatomist, realised that these reptiles were so unlike

modern species that they deserved classification on their own in a new

‘tribe or suborder’ which he called the Dinosauria. It was these British

6

discoveries that so inspired Bain to look for fossils in the

geologically virgin territory of South Africa.

The Queen’s Road has an easily accessible thick and continuous section

through the upper part of the Cape System, the Dwyka and Ecca beds,

especially where it passes over a small river today called the Brak but

in Bain’s day called the Ecca. The fossil evidence there is meagre and

it must have been difficult for Bain to keep up his enthusiasm which had

been fired by the many excellent descriptions in the books he was

reading. Bain found his first fossils in the Sunday’s River Valley in

1838 when he was exploring with his friend M.J.H. Borchards, the

Resident Justice of the Peace at Fort Beaufort. A mile north of the town

they found a small piece of fossil bone,

… which I have ever since preserved with as much religious veneration as

a good Catholic does a piece of the true Cross. 13

Two days later at Mildenhall, some five miles south of Fort Beaufort

Bain found another piece of bone protruding from a rock. He broke off

the rock and took it home. On examining it more carefully he discovered

it to be a skull of what at first looked like a tiger with two large

canine teeth. Closer examination revealed it to be the skull of a

hitherto unknown creature which had only two teeth, and Bain therefore

gave it the name of ‘Bidental’. At this time Bain was engaged in taking

7

the construction of the Queen’s Road through the forest up to the

Winterburg and blasting through the Beaufort Beds of the Karoo series of

rocks. These were thought to be of equivalent date to the Trias of

Europe, and proved to be of great fossiliferous interest. In a letter to

the Geological Society of London Bain later said of these rocks

1FOOTNOTES:

? Richard Owen, Descriptive and illustrated catalogue of the fossil reptilia of South Africa in the collection of the British Museum,

(London, 1876), iv-vi.

2Nathaniel Wallich (1786 -1854), a Danish surgeon, was captured by the British in Bengal in 1813 and

joined the service of the East India Company. He became Superintendent of the Company’s Botanic Garden

at Calcutta. A member of the Medical and Physical Society of Calcutta, he made an extended visit to the

Cape in 1842-3. There he met, amongst others, the botanists CWL Pappe, Baron von Ludwig, Ecklon and Carl

Zeyher, the astronomer Thomas Maclear, and Arabella Roupell whose flower paintings he later showed to

Sir William Hooker, the Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. They were published in 1850 under

the title of Specimens of the Flora of South Africa by a Lady and created great interest. On retiring in 1846,

Wallich settled in England. Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press 1992).

3 Robert Brown (1773-1858), Librarian to Sir Joseph Banks, and later Keeper of the Herbarium and

Department of Botany at the British Museum. He was the discoverer of the molecular ‘Brownian’ movement.

DNB.

8

Whole forests of calcified trees, of large size, are found in the

neighbourhood of Sunday and Bushman’s Rivers, in a most perfect state of

preservation, imbedded horizontally in the rock. Ferns, zamias, and

fragments of wood in a lignitic state occur, mixed up with fragments of

gypsum and reptilian bones, together with marine exuviae - Trigonia,

Ammonites, and various other molluscs.14

4 Sir George Gabriel Stokes (1819 -1903) mathematician and physicist, famous for discoveries in

hydrodynamics, fluorescence and spectral analysis. Secretary of the Royal Society for thirty years 1854

- 85 and President from 1885 - 90. DNB.

5 Geological Society of London Secretary’s letterbooks LR8/115 and 115a.

6 Dr Andrew Smith M.D., K.C.B. (1797-1872) was appointed as Director-general of the Army Medical

Department by the Duke of Wellington in 1851. In 1834 he was in charge of an expedition sent from Cape

Town to explore the interior of Africa. DNB.

7 Journals of Andrew Geddes Bain, (Cape Town: Van Riebeek Society, 1949), 163 – 190.

8 Bain’s account of this discovery is in his letters to Atherstone, especially SM 5501(17).

9 G. Jenkins and E. Palmer, Companion Guide to South Africa (London: Collins, 1978: 241 )

10 Charles Lyell, Principles of Geology, (London: John Murray,1830-33).

11 Bridgewater Treatises on the Power, Wisdom and Goodness of God as Manifested in the Creation

sponsored by the Earl of Bridgewater and published in 1839; included the treatise on Geology and Mineralogy

Considered with Reference to Natural Theology.

9

Within a short time his collection was so large that he had to hire a

room in Grahamstown to keep it in. In 1844 he offered the collection to

an institution in Grahamstown on condition that it should form the

nucleus of a new museum. His generous offer was rejected, one of the

directors commenting “What are we going to do with a parcel of old

stones?”15 Instead, Bain decided to offer the fossils to the Geological

Society of London. In the meantime a lengthy and well-documented

article about them was published in a local newspaper, the Cape Frontier

Times, and as a result many people asked to see the specimens prior to

their dispatch. According to the writer the highlight of the collection

was an immense reptile skull with fifty-six incisor teeth that Bain had

found in 1838 on the new Blinkwater Road just north of Fort Beaufort and

christened the ‘Blinkwater Monster’.16 The writer further commented that

12 William Smith (1769-1839), a canal engineer who had by 1799 noticed that different layers of rock and

earth could be recognised by the different fossils they contained and that there was a regular

succession of the layers, and published the results of his work around Bath. In 1815 he published his

Geological Map of England and Wales, and commenced publication of his Strata Identified by Organized Fossils in 1816;

this continued in four parts to 1819. DNB.

13 A. G. Bain, Reminiscences and Anecdotes connected with the History of Geology in South Africa, or

the Pursuit of Knowledge under Difficulties, Transactions of the Geological Society of South Africa, 1896, vol II part

V: 60.

14 Transactions of the Geological Society of London 2nd series 1856, l 7: 184

10

“lovers of palaeontology may expect to have a treat equal to any since

the discoveries of Cuvier in the Paris basin, and those of Dr. Mantell

in the weald of Sussex.”17 Bain’s friend William Ogilvie offered to store

the fossils and also to pay for their packing and shipment to England,

so the collection was put on public display at Ogilvie’s hardware store

in Grahamstown. 18 It was there that Nathaniel Wallich saw them and was

sufficiently impressed by their importance to report them to his friend

Robert Brown at the British Museum.

Robert Brown told Charles Konig,19 the Assistant Keeper of Minerals about

the letter from Wallich. He also realised the importance of Bain’s

15 A. G. Bain, Reminiscences, 63.

16 Later named by Owen Pareiasaurus serridens, Ow. and illustrated in plates VI and VII of his catalogue of

South African reptiles

17 A. G. Bain, Reminiscences, 64-65.

18 William Ogilvie (1795-1850) arrived in Grahamstown in 1816 with Lord Charles Somerset, having served

in the 42nd Regiment The Royal Highlanders and fought at Waterloo. He owned a hardware shop in

Grahamstown and imported guns from Westley Richards the Gunsmiths of Birmingham, England; visited

England in 1850 to discuss the convict problem with Lord Grey and died after an accident on the way

home. His daughter Fanny married William Richards, gunsmith of Birmingham. Information from I. Mitford-

Barberton and V White Some Frontier Families (Cape Town, Human & Rousseau, 1968), 213-216.

11

fossils and immediately contacted Richard Owen, the leading

palaeontologist of the day

Having just received the particulars, cut out of a Cape Newspaper,

of the remarkable discovery of some entirely unknown osseous remains by

Mr Bain, I lose no time in sending enclosed to you the paragraph with the

request that you will lay it before the Trustees at the Committee

tomorrow – the account in question has by some been looked upon as a hoax

from some person sufficiently acquainted with palaeontological

nomenclature to make his story plauseable, but this supposition must fall

to the ground, for in a letter to Mr R. Brown, Dr Wallich states that he

has seen Mr Bain’s collection. That letter I suppose I may procure

tomorrow from Mr Brown – you will see by the printed account that the

proprietor intends to transmit these objects to the Geological Society,

but I have reason to know that the society is not prepared to receive

them. Under those circumstances Mr B, who is no doubt unacquainted with

the Museum collection and the means we have of working the bones out of

the rock which still partially envelopes them, may perhaps be inclined to

dispose of those specimens in a different manner, and the Trustees on

their part may think it expedient to take steps to make him acquainted

with those circumstances – should the latter be the case they will

perhaps request Sir John Herschel, who is known to take great interest

also in discoveries of this nature, to use his influence to obtain the

objects in question for the British Museum —20

19 Originally Carl Dietrich Eberhard König (1774-1851). He entered the employ of British Museum in 1806.

He was Keeper of the Mineral department at this time. DNB.

12

As a result the Museum Trustees’ Committee requested Konig to approach

the Geological Society and to “ascertain the intention of the Society in

the event of the offer alluded to by Dr Wallich being made.”21 They also

asked him to obtain various opinions as to the scientific value, the

extent, and the possible cost of Bain’s collection to the Museum. Konig

wrote to Henry Warburton M.P. the then President of the Geological

Society on 6 February 1844

I beg to acquaint you and the Council of the Geological Society, that the

attention of the Trustees of the British Museum has been directed to a

newspaper article respecting a collection of osseous remains discovered in

Southern Africa, and likewise to a letter on the same subject to Mr.R.Brown

in which allusion is made to a conditional offer of that collection to the

Geological Society by the proprietor Mr.Bain at the Cape of Good Hope.

In accordance with the desire of the Trustees to ascertain the

intention of the Geological Society as regards the acceptance of such offer

(supposing it has been made) and to receive my report upon the subject as

soon as I shall have obtained the desired information, I take the liberty

of making the enquiry by addressing this letter to you.

20 Owen Correspondence DF 105/13 dated 26 January 1844 (In the archives of the Natural History Museum,

South Kensington, London).

21 Minutes of the Trustee’s committee meeting held 27 January 1844.

13

In case the Geological Society should have declined the offer, it

could be conferring additionally obligation were I enabled by this

communication to mention in my report the expense which will probably be

incurred by procuring the collection in question22

It was not actually until 29 April 1844 that Bain himself wrote from

Fort Beaufort to Sir Henry de la Beche, the Foreign secretary of the

Geological Society, describing his fossils and giving a sketch of the

geology of South Eastern Africa.23 Bain stated that the collection was

being sent via his agent Westley Richards, the gunsmith of Bond Street,

London 24 who had been recommended to him by William Ogilvie. There are

two other letters in the Geological Society archives relating to Bain.

They are both from Richards, who lived in Birmingham, and were addressed

to Warburton. The earliest is dated 30 January 1845 and appears to be a

response to the announcement of the Council’s award of the balance of

the Wollaston Fund to Bain

22 Geological Society of London, Secretary’s Letterbooks for 1844, LR8/115a.

23 This letter was read to the Society on January 8th 1845 and published in the Society’s Transactions vol

VII 2nd series.

24 Westley Richards was the owner of a gunmaking business based in Birmingham and founded by his father

William Westley Richards in 1812. From 1826 - 1872 they also had a shop at 170 Bond Street, London and

were gunmakers to Prince Albert. Information from Howard Blackmore Dictionary of London Gunmakers (Oxford:

Phaidon-Christies Ltd., 1986)

14

… for his extensive geological exploration of South Africa, and

particularly for his original discovery in that country of the remains of

Bidental and other reptiles ... When the papers were read, all praised

the sagacity of Mr. Bain in discovering the peculiarity of structure in

these reptiles. Not one in ten thousand persons, in the situation of Mr.

Bain, and with his limited opportunities of information, would have made

such a discovery. Mr. Owen’s paper was deservedly admired for the clear

manner in which he traced the various analogies of the new reptile to

Crocodile, Plesiosaurus, Turtle, Lizard and Serpent, and no man’s

discovery ever had more justice done to it than the discovery of Mr.

Bain. 25

The importance of the collection lay partly in those specimens that Bain

had already described as Bidentals.26 He realised that these were new to

knowledge at the time and once they arrived in England they could be

properly studied by Professor Owen. Owen came to the conclusion that

Bain had found at least three and possibly four species of this new

genus which he named Dicynodon. They are now considered to be mammal-like

reptiles which were very successful herbivores living in the first half

25 Geological Society of London, LR9/36 and LR10/195

26 Andrew Geddes Bain, On the discovery of the Fossil Remains of Bidental and other Reptiles in South

Africa. Transactions of the Geological Society of London, 1845, 7: 53 and also in the Quarterly Journal of the Society,

1845, 1: 317.

15

of the Triassic period, and part of the therapsid group of reptiles

which eventually gave rise to the mammals themselves. Of especial

importance is the dicynodont Lystrosaurus which is commonly found in

Africa as well as Europe, Asia and Antarctica and provides compelling

evidence for the existence of the supercontinent Gondwana. By 1845 even

Parliament had recognised the importance of Bain’s discoveries. The Earl

of Lincoln wrote to Warburton on 15 August

Before the end of the Session of Parliament, I applied to Sir H. De

la Beche and Professor Owen (in consequence of your having called my

attention to the services of Mr. Geddes Bain to the cause of geological

science) for their opinion of the value of his discoveries and the merit

of his exertions. Their answers were so highly favourable that I brought

his name and services under the notice of Sir Robert Peel, with a view to

some assistance being rendered by Government to enable him more

opportunities to prosecute his investigations.

Sir Robert Peel has written to me saying that he shall have great

pleasure in presenting him with the sum of £200 as an acknowledgement of

the services he has rendered to science.27

The exhibition of Bain’s fossils in Grahamstown had yet another long-

lasting result. One of the visitors was Dr William Guybon Atherstone, a

local medical practitioner, who was so fascinated that he asked Bain for

permission to make some sketches and notes, and determined to begin the

27 Quoted in A. W. Rogers, Pioneers in South African Geology 1937: 27.

16

study of geology at once. Atherstone wrote in his journal “When I saw

Bain’s geological and fossil exhibits in Ogilvie’s store, I was

astounded, as I had no conception that fossil remains were so vast. From

that moment on whilst sketching the fossils, I decided to devote myself

to study geology and, after my family, it became my greatest passion.” 28

Until that time Bain and his friend Borcherds had made up the sole

members of the local fossil-hunting team and were rather looked down

upon by other local amateur scientists as a bit eccentric. They both

congratulated themselves that they had added to their ranks “the

transcendental talents of Dr. Atherstone, who soon imbued our minds with

elevated ideas, and gave fresh vigour and stimulus to our pursuits.”29 A

firm and life-time friendship developed between them and they spent many

fossil hunting expeditions together. Indeed Bain relates one episode

when returning from an expedition to the Gamtoos River

After a hard day’s work, covered with dust and mud, and with our long

hammers dangling at our sides like mighty broadswords, and our well-

filled haversacks around our shoulders; we called at a little cottage in

the midst of a wood to enquire the way, when the owner, a coloured man,

Scotsman-like answered our question by another, “You are masons,” said

28 Nerina Mathie, Atherstone Dr W.G. man of many facets 3 volumes (Grahamstown: privately published, 1998)

1:.53.

29 A. G. Bain, Reminiscences, 66.

17

he, “seeking work, as I can see by your hammers, and as I want to add a

little to my cottage, you may have the job if we can agree a price.” Here

was an opportunity of making our fortunes which we could not withstand,

so we dismounted, gravely examined the proposed addition required, and

after giving a rough estimate of the cost and having the way pointed out

to us, we jocularly promised to return as soon as possible to execute the

work, and then cantered off to Van Staden’s River. We returned home by

the way of Enon and Zuurberg richly laden with the spoils of the former

worlds, and never were six weeks of my life spent more intellectually. 30

However he leaves to the reader’s imagination as to whether they ever

returned to “execute the proposed extension.” Bain had a rather

mischievous sense of humour. In his reminiscences he recalled that

during his discovery of what he called the ‘Blinkwater Monster’ he was

busily engaged in his camp chiselling out the skull when a young Boer

passed by and asked what he was doing. “Don’t you see” Bain replied “it

is the head of a petrified wildebeest.” “Alamagtig, how came the

wildebeest in the stone?” “Do you read your Bible?” said Bain. “Did you

never read that when Noah was in the ark that one of the wildebeests

jumped overboard, and before Noah could get out his life-buoy, it was

drowned?” The poor Boer looked rather bewildered, but not wishing to be

thought deficient in Bible lore, scratching his head and looking as

sheepishly as possible, said “Ja tog (yes, I remember).” “Well then”

continued Bain, “you know of course that the waters covered the tops of

30 A. G. Bain, Reminiscences, 59-75.

18

the highest mountains, and that at that time Noah was floating above the

lofty Winterberg, and the wildebeest, falling into the Fishback, became

petrified there, where he has lain ever since till I took him out the

day before yesterday.” “Alamagtig, het is tog wonderlijk (it is

wonderful)” said the Boer and rode away. The next day a whole deputation

of Boers from the Winterberg, including the Elders of the Church, turned

up at the camp to see for themselves this wonder of Noah’s newly

discovered wildebeest. 31

In 1845 Atherstone had arranged to meet Bain and three of his children

who had taken a ‘holiday excursion for the purpose of geological

exploration’ but he was delayed by an urgent call from a patient. When

he eventually caught up with them on the Bushmans river about half way

between Grahamstown and Port Elizabeth he was greeted by Jeannie Bain

staggering under a heavy load of stones. When he went to help he found

that her stones were fossil bones “bigger than those of an ox!” Bain and

Atherstone recognised from the texture of the bones that they were

reptilian in origin, but needed something more diagnostic. The next day

they found an upper jaw with a row of black serrated and fluted teeth.

At the time they felt that these remains were of a creature related to

the Iguanadon which had been found and described a few years previously

by Gideon Mantell and his wife Mary in Sussex, and so named it the “Cape

Iguanadon”. Their find is now recognised as the first discovery of a

31 A. G. Bain, Reminiscencs, 62-63.

19

dinosaur in South Africa, although the correct identification had to

wait until 1981 when Peter Galton and Walter Coombs established its true

taxonomy as a stegosaurian dinosaur and named it Paranthodon africanus. 32

Interestingly, many years later in 1878 Atherstone’s sister-in-law, the

well-known natural historian Mary Elizabeth Barber, was bathing with her

daughter in the Vaal River when she found

… upon the slaty rocks that were cropping out into the river, the

footprint of one of the creatures of “the days that are no more,” it

might have been the impression of a bird’s foot, two of the toes were

quite perfect, the third was only partly visible, owing to the rock

having crumbled away by the wear and tear of atmospheric influences, this

foot print greatly resembled some of those, which are pictured in Lyells

introduction to geology.— 33

32 P. M. Galton & Coombs, W. P., Paranthodon africanus (Broom): a stegosaurian dinosaur from the lower

Cretaceous of South Africa. G,obios, 1981, 14: 299-309. For the full story of this find and its

identification see an article on the web by B de Klerk, Curator of Earth Sciences at the Albany Museum

in Grahamstown. The URL is http://www.ru.ac.za/departments/am/paranth.html

33 Letter from Mary Elizabeth Barber to Roland Trimen. Trimen Correspondence box 18/106 dated from Vaal

River 29April 1878. Royal Entomological Society, Queen’s Gate, London. For further details of this

lady’s fascinating life see my article, Mary Elizabeth Barber: South Africa’s first lady natural

historian, Archives of Natural History 2000, 27 (2): 187-208.

20

Mary Barber’s description is almost certainly the earliest recorded

finding in South Africa of what appear to be the footprints of such a

dinosaur. Although she obviously did recognise what she had found,

unfortunately Mary could not realise its true importance at the time as

there was not yet sufficient information on the topic available.

In 1845 as a result of a reorganisation in the Colony’s Engineer’s

Department, Bain was removed from his post as military road surveyor and

appointed Inspector of Roads under the Central Road Board. This created

a great furore amongst his scientific associates in England and a scheme

was put in train by Westley Richards and Henry Warburton to get him

reinstated so that he could devote more time to his geological studies.

Although there were at the time very few professional geologists

anywhere and certainly none in the Cape Colony, it was becoming to be

appreciated that the emergence of this new breed of professional

scientists was highly important as a means of exploring and exploiting

possible new mineral resources in the colonies. The sudden appearance of

a gifted amateur such as Bain could therefore be of great importance to

the Home government, always keen to gain something from the colonies at

minimal expense. However Bain, when approached for his opinion replied

that in fact he was in a better position than he had earlier hoped and

was now (June 1847) quite happy to remain in his new position. He was at

the time commencing work on the Mostert’s Hoek mountain pass about

eighty miles from Cape Town, and overseeing a work force of some two

21

hundred convicts, overseers and constables together with about thirty

free workers, a magistrate, a chaplain and a surgeon. He also comments,

in this long letter to Richards, that not only had his salary been

raised but that he had every cause to be contented and proud of his new

situation, especially as it actually gave him more liberty to pursue his

geological interests than he had before. So notwithstanding the demands

of this new post he continued to find and send new fossils to London. In

1855 Professor Owen described a skull of another dicynodont in the

British Museum which had been sent to him by Bain in 1849

This skull surpasses in size that of the largest walrus, and resembles

that of a lion or tiger in the development of the ridges ... associated

with the temporal biting muscles. 34

He therefore decided to name it Dicynodon tigriceps.

In his June 1847 letter to Westley Richards, Bain mentioned a geological

map he had been making of the whole Colony instead of just the Frontier

District. He had been discussing many aspects of the process with

Atherstone over the years, and acknowledged the latter’s help frequently

in their correspondence. In 1848 John Montague, the Secretary to the

34 R. Owen, Description of skull of a large species of dicynodon (D. tigriceps, Ow.) transmitted from South

Africa by A.G. Bain.

Transactions of the Geological Society of London 2nd series vol. 7, 1845-56: 233-240.

22

Government of Cape Colony, tentatively suggested that Bain attempt to

produce a geological map similar to that being produced by De la Beche

in Great Britain, without of course realising how impossible a task that

would be without the full-time staff, working with already good

topographical maps of the area, that De la Beche had at his disposal. De

la Beche was himself of independent means and had become interested in

geology and mineralogy at an early age. He had in the 1820s commenced

his own geological map of England in much the same way as Bain was now

doing. In 1832 his request for additional funding from the Board of

Ordnance resulted in the offer of a post as Geologist to the

Trignometrical Survey of Great Britain and he thus turned his hobby into

a profession. It was largely his persistence and influence that had

persuaded the British Government to set up the Geological Survey of

Great Britain in 1835.35 Ten years later there were still no professional

geologists working in South Africa, and Bain was forced to rely on the

Cape Surveyor-General’s office for maps which he found inaccurate and

poorly labelled anyway. However by 1848 Bain was writing to Owen

I still require a better acquaintance with the district of Clanwilliam

and the great southern peninsular of Africa at Cape Agulhas before I can

complete my map. These I expect very soon to make, as well as a general

35 Biographical information from T. Sharpe and P.J. McCartney The papers of H.T.De la Beche (1796-1855) in the

National Museum

of Wales, (Cardiff, National Museum of Wales Geological series no. 17, 1998), 7-9.

23

tour of the whole Colony, when I shall be enabled to lay before the

Geological Society the first attempt at a geological map of South Africa

as far as the 29th degree of S. Lat.36

In 1851 Charles Bell, Surveyor-General at the Cape took up the cudgels

on Bain’s behalf. He wrote to the astronomer Sir John Herschel 37

As I know you retain a kindly interest in South Africa and all that

relates to it, I venture to bring to your notice the work of an old

friend of mine, Mr. Andrew Geddes Bain, who was connected with our

exploratory expedition of 1834-5-6, and who has of late years been

acquiring for himself an English, or rather a European, reputation on

account of his remarkable discoveries in geology … The general map, the

result of his long continued labour, will be sent to England by the

36 Quoted in A.W. Rogers, The Pioneers in South African Geology and their work, Annexure to Transactions of

the Geological

Society of South Africa (1937), 39: 31.

37 The son of Sir William Herschel, the discoverer of Uranus and founder of sidereal astronomy. John

Herschel (1792-1871) also became a noteworthy astronomer, his chief work being the study of the

southern skies during a four year stay at Feldhausen in the Cape of Good Hope, from January 1834. His

astronomical observations were published in 1847 in his book called Cape Observations. He also invented the

process of photography on sensitized paper independently of Fox Talbot in 1839, and was the first to use

the terms ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ with relation to photographic images. DNB.

24

steamer … and if you should have any opportunity of directing the

attention of geologists to it, so that thereby the value and consequent

sale of the collections may be increased, I would venture respectfully to

offer my opinion that a worthy man who has sacrificed much for and

deserves well of science will be therefore much relieved.38

Herschel also received a letter in similar vein from a fellow astronomer

Thomas Maclear,39 recommending Bain’s geological map. In addition Maclear

pointed out Bain’s connection with Andrew Smith’s expedition of 1834

with which Herschel had also been involved. Herschel therefore wrote to

Sir Roderick Murchison who had published The Silurian System in 1839. This

book included a description of fossils collected by Dr Andrew Smith in

the Cape Colony. Herschel suggested that if Bain’s fossils were so

extraordinary, perhaps the British Museum might purchase them.

Murchison passed the request on to Richard Owen, who replied

By the next Council I shall have sent a report recommending the

Trustees of the British Museum to give £100 for the fossils in the rough,

now in the crypt at the Geological Society. It will cost about as much

again to clean them and make them intelligible; there will be some good

things to work on.

I wish you every success in your good endeavours for the discoverer

of the Dicynodon and other wonders of the old South African lake.40

38 Quoted in A.W. Rogers, Pioneers, 33.

39 Thomas Maclear (1794-1879) was the royal astronomer at the Cape of Good Hope from 1834 to 1870. DNB.

25

In the event Bain received £150 from the British Museum Trustees for his

“parcel of old stones”, a very generous sum of money as his salary at

the time was £440 per annum.

In 1852 the Geological Society finally published Bain’s map. The

original, which was the first comprehensive geological map of South

Africa to be undertaken, was drawn up by him at Bain’s Kloof and dated

20 November 1851. It measures about 4 feet by 2 and a half feet, and is

beautifully coloured and annotated by Bain. The positions of three

cross-country sections are shown. Section I runs from Cape Town north to

the Little Fish River; section II from Algoa Bay across to Somerset,

then to Graaff Reinett, then north to just west of Colesberg; section

III runs from Bathurst to Beaufort, then to Great Winterburg then east

of north until halfway between Smithfield and Aliwal North. This

original copy which Bain sent to the Geological Society of London, is

held in their archives.41

As a result Murchison again tried to help Bain further his career by

recommending to the British government that a Geological Survey of the

Cape Colony be set up with the appointment of ‘a proper person to

develop the mineral and geological structure of that important Colony.’

40 Quoted in A.W. Rogers, Pioneers, 35.

41 Geological Society of London archives no. LDGSL 166.

26

At the time there were very few professional geologists anywhere, and

most of the well known experts were men of independent means. It was

therefore a fairly revolutionary step to propose such a post in a small

colony. The person he had in mind, of course, was Bain. Murchison

enlisted Herschel, Bell, Owen, and De la Beche to endorse his opinion

that Bain was the most suitable geologist for the job. However the

suggestion got bogged down in the difficulties of deciding whether it

should be a full-time or part-time post and how it should be funded. In

1854 the Lieutenant-Governor of the Cape, C.H. Darling wrote to the

Secretary of State raising the matter of a geological surveyor once

more, but recommended that such a person be appointed from outside the

Colony so as to avoid

the jealousies unhappily incident to long residence in small communities

which could hardly fail to throw doubt in a greater or less degree upon

the entire trustworthiness of the reports and the soundness of the

conclusions of any gentleman of local nomination ...42

Obviously the Cape Colony was still new enough for officials sent out

from the Home government to mistrust the intentions of the ‘colonials’

in possibly over-promoting the benefits of their new environment. As a

result Andrew Wyley from the staff of the Irish Survey, was sent out as

the first professional Government Geologist, not without some protest

42 Quoted in A.W. Rogers, Pioneers, 41.

27

from his chief that all the best men were being sent out to the

colonies, and none were left to work at home for the Mother Country. It

was not until 1895 that the Cape Government finally appointed a

Geological Commission to organise a proper geological survey of the

Colony, followed over the next few years by similar surveys of the

adjoining areas which now form the Republic of South Africa.

Bain continued to discover new fossils. In 1856 he announced another

discovery near Fort Beaufort.

There were many skulls entirely without teeth, which we first thought

belonged to the Chelonians or Turtles; but afterwards finding that the

animals had distinct narrow ribs, which Chelonians have not, we put them

down also for something new, and named them ‘Oudenodons’, or toothless

animals. 43

They were duly sent to Owen for study. By this time he had been

appointed Superintendent of the Natural History Department of the

British Museum and was being snowed under by administrative work. It was

not until 1860 that he described Bain’s new fossils in the Quarterly Journal

of the Geological Society of London together with a collection sent to him by Sir

George Grey in 185844 and which came from the sandstone rocks at the foot

43 Eastern Province Monthly Magazine September 1856.

28

of the Rhenosterberg. In this article Owen came to the conclusion that

as a result of both collections he could differentiate three species of

this new genus, two from Bain and one from Grey, and named them

Oudenodon Bainii, Oudenodon prognathis and Oudenodon Greyii.45

Guybon Atherstone continued to occupy his spare time from his medical

practice with his geological studies. In 1854-55 as there were no

professional geologists in the country apart from Andrew Wyley who had

just arrived, Atherstone was commissioned to explore Namaqualand for the

Grahamstown Prospecting Company, searching for metal ores, especially

copper, but reported that mining was not economically viable there.46 In

1857 he published his chief geological paper ‘The geology of Uitenhage’

which was probably the first major geological study to have been

published in South Africa. In 1867 he identified the first diamond to be

discovered in the region and thereby laid the foundations for the whole

South African diamond industry. One day in 1867 an unknown Hottentot

child on a farm in Hopetown far to the north west of Grahamstown, gave

44 Sir George Grey (1812-98) was Governor of the Cape in 1855-59.

45 Richard Owen, On some Reptilian Fossils from South Africa, Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London,

1860, vol 16 part I: 49-63 & plates 1-3.

46 Atherstone’s Report to the Syndicate was published in the Eastern Province Monthly Magazine in 1857, number

13: 7-8 with the

comment that ten of the mines he had predicted would fail, had since failed.

29

to his white playmate a small round glittering pebble that he had found.

The children played with it for a few days then left it lying around the

house. A neighbour, Schaleb van Niekerk, passing by saw it and picked it

up. He offered to buy it but the farmer’s wife told him to take it if he

wanted it. He showed it to a local trader John O’Reilly who thought it

might have some value and in turn took it to someone that had some

geological knowledge in Colesburg. The Acting Civil Commissioner Lorenzo

Boyes thought it might be a diamond but the local chemist Dr Kirsch

disagreed. He thought it was a topaz. They decided that the best person

to advise them all was Dr Guybon Atherstone who was now known throughout

the colony for his geological expertise. One day the post-cart drew up

at Atherstone’s house with an unsealed letter. Out tumbled a small round

glittering pebble about the size of a hazelnut. To his astonishment when

he examined it with his new polarising microscope it proved to be a 21-

carat diamond of the first water, the first to be found in South Africa.

He showed it to a number of people in the town including his friend the

Roman Catholic Bishop who scratched his initials on a pane of glass

together with the legend “Initials of the Rt Rev James David Ricards,

cut with the first Diamond discovered in South Africa. 1867.” In his

reply to Boyes, Atherstone commented “I congratulate you on the stone

you have sent me. It is a veritable diamond, weighs twenty-one and a

quarter carats, and is worth £500. It has spoiled all the jewellers’

files in Grahamstown, and where that came from there must be lots more.”

47

30

Atherstone realised the great importance to the economy of the new

Colony of this discovery and suggested to Richard Southey, the Colonial

Secretary, that the stone be purchased by the Governor Sir Philip

Wodehouse and that it be sent to the Paris Exhibition. It duly appeared

at the great Exhibition that same year, but surprisingly attracted

little attention.48 The following year other stones of similar kind were

found in the Vaal River valley. When the news reached London, Harry

Emanuel a senior diamond merchant, decided to send out an expert to

investigate. After a superficial examination of the area, the

mineralogist James R Gregory wrote in the Geological Magazine of May 1868,

that it was not suitable for diamonds and in his opinion was a bubble

scheme got up entirely to promote the sale of land. Emanuel wrote in the

Journal of the Society of Arts on 13 November 1868 that he had sent Gregory who

he stated “is clearly of the opinion that no diamonds have, or ever will

be, found in the Cape Colony-saving such as are there deposited for a

purpose”. Atherstone countered by stating that his researches had shown

that there was sufficient cause to justify a thorough search of the

countries to the north of the Orange River from which he surmised that

the diamond had been washed down. In this he was supported by several

other authorities, including his friend Nathaniel Rubidge,49 and Andrew

Wyley the Cape Government Geologist. During February 1869 Dr John Shaw

47 Quoted in A. F. Williams, Some dreams come true 1948: 61.

31

of Colesburg published accounts of the geology of the Vaal River valley

in the Grahamstown Journal and about the same time WB Chalmers also

published statistics of the diamonds found so far. The general opinion

in South Africa was against Gregory and a letter from Edgar Layard the

Curator of the South African Museum to Joseph Hooker at Kew Gardens

explains this

...What a mess Messrs Emanuel & Gregory have made of the Diamonds. We

believe here, that they have perpetrated a letter game to raise the

market, like the former has to his stock., or shares, or something. No

one here doubts the Diamonds, & many more have been found which have not

been reported. Gregory stole two photographs of diamonds from the museum!

So I have good cause to doubt his honesty in other matters!... 50

48 This diamond, now called the Eureka, is in the Library of the Houses of Parliament in Cape Town. It

was presented to Parliament by Harry Oppenheimer in 1952 to celebrate the tercentenary of the Cape.

49 Richard Nathaniel Rubidge (1820-69) was apprenticed to Guybon Atherstone’s father as a student

surgeon. He qualified in medicine in London and returned to South Africa to practice chiefly as a

hospital doctor in Port Elizabeth. He became interested in geology as a result of his connection with

Atherstone and Bain and made his major study that of metamorphism. He also first recognised the

relationship between the Glossoptera of the Karroo and India and Australia, and had a species of

dicynodont named for him Dicynodon rubidgei. The Geological Society of London published a number of his

articles in their Transactions.

32

Soon the discoveries of diamonds in Griqualand West started coming thick

and fast. The first organised party of prospectors to explore the Vaal

River valley were a group of Natalians under a Captain Loftus Rolleston

in November 1869. They were joined by two Australians, Glennie and King,

who found the first diamonds in January 1870. At about that time a party

arrived from British Kaffraria, sent by Mary Elizabeth Barber’s nephew

Gray Barber and led by his friend A. McIntosh.51 These groups began

randomly working up and down the river and diamonds were soon found in

large quantities at Klipdrift on the north, and Pniel52 on the south bank

of the Vaal river. The Natal party collected about half a tumblerful

over two months and the Kaffrarians about a hundred diamonds weighing

from one to thirty carats within ten weeks. The news quickly spread and

both river banks quickly became covered with tents for miles with a few

wooden shacks scattered amongst them. Within a year the numbers of

prospectors had increased from ten Europeans to nearly 10,000 spread

over one hundred miles of country.

50 Directors Letters Kew vol 190/186 dated February 29th 1869. Held in the archives of the Royal

Botanic Gardens at Kew, London.

51 Unfortunately every writer on the topic tells a slightly different story. Mine gathers details from

several sources that more or less tally with Mary Elizabeth Barber’s version as related in her letters.

52 Pniel was a station of the Berlin Missionary Society and a Korana settlement before diamonds were

discovered.

33

A few years later Atherstone was directly involved in the discovery of

what became known as the Kimberley mine, the richest source of diamonds

at that time. Contemporary photographs show him in 1871 sorting the

ground for diamonds in the middle of a group of friends including the

Rhodes brothers, Cecil, Frank and Herbert, who had arrived there in May.

In July he toured the diamond fields for the first time since he had

recognised the first diamond, visiting Jagersfontein, Bultfontein and

the new diggings of Du Toits Pan and De Beers. There he met his

relatives the Barbers on a cold frosty day when the piles of debris from

the diggings looked like hills of snow, and the vlei was frozen over.

Gray Barber produced a fifteen-carat diamond for him to examine, and

Mary and Guybon entered into a detailed discussion as to the variations

in sizes of cameel doorn tree and whether they were different species.

The next day Guybon, Mary and her son Hal drove out to Spitskop where

they ‘geologised’ and found numerous ancient arrowheads and fossil

plants in the shales and sandstones. During his excursions Guybon had

measured the extent of the diamond-bearing areas and noticed the

similarities between Jagersfontein and De Beers. On 16 July 1871 he

pointed out to the Barbers and his brother-in-law Charles Cumming a

nearby kopje which he felt was indicative of a bulge in the

diamondiferous dyke and should produce even better diamonds.

I urged my friends to prospect there at once, being still unable to do so

myself (He had been laid up for a few days with a thorn in his knee). Five days afterwards

34

a few diamonds were found, and De Beers New Rush was pegged out. I

reported this prediction to Landdrost Truter,53 offering corroborative

evidence, and two claims, as usual, were promised to me ... The name was

afterwards changed to Colesberg Kopje, and ultimately Kimberley. Such is

the history of the Kimberley Mine 54

Atherstone’s interests in all things scientific never waned, even when,

as an old man he became virtually blind. His inventive mind enabled him

to devise a method of writing in the dark so he could continue his

correspondence and his researches as his sight deteriorated.

Geddes Bain considered that it was his successful relationship with the

Geological Society of London that persuaded both Atherstone and Rubidge

to start geological societies in Grahamstown and Port Elizabeth. However

neither society lasted long, Bain died suddenly in 1864 on his return

from his only visit back to the ‘home country’, and Rubidge in 1869.55

Atherstone became too involved in his medical practice and local

politics to devote much more time to his geology. Bain’s work was

53 Olof Johannes Truter was the Orange Free State’s Commissioner of the Diamond Fields at Pniel; he

became landrost at Du Toit’s Pan on February 22nd 1871 and retired to Bloemfontein when the fields

became British.

54 Quoted from Atherstone’s paper on “Kimberly and its diamonds” read to the South African Geological

Society on 12 August 1895.

35

continued by his son Thomas, who had studied to become a professional

road surveyor, but remained an amateur palaeontologist. It was not until

the discoveries, first of diamonds in 1867, and then of gold in the

1880s that there was any incentive for an influx of professional

geologists into the country who followed in the wake of the amateur

treasure-hunting prospectors. Until that time the local amateurs like

Bain had to rely on obtaining all their information and technology from

the professionals at ‘home’. The colonial process of the British Empire

consisted of Britain retaining the fount of knowledge, economic power

and processing skills while the colonies supplied the raw materials to

keep the wheels of science and industry turning. Bain and his

colleagues accepted that situation and continued for many years to send

their ‘finds’ back to London for study. In spite of this reliance on the

expertise of the home country, Bain and Atherstone laid the groundwork

for the continuing study of both geology and palaeontology in South

Africa, Bain himself being acknowledged as the “Father of South African

Geology” during his lifetime. However it was not until 1895 that there

was a sufficient core of both interested amateurs and professional

geologists and mining engineers in the colony to enable a Geological

Society of South Africa to come into being under the presidency of

another medical doctor, Hugh Exton.56 Atherstone being still alive and

active, although almost blind was elected an honorary vice-president and

in August 1895 was one of the first members to present a paper to the

36

society, on ‘Kimberley and its Diamonds’. The society continues to

flourish today.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

My thanks are due first to Alison Roberts and Peter Mitchell who

introduced me to these fascinating characters. I must also thank the

many people who helped me to track down biographical information. In

particular Lesley Price, Archivist at the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew,

Fleur Wyn-Jones and Cecilia Blight of the Albany Museum and Cory Library

in Grahamstown, and the staff of the Natural History Museum Kensington,

for access to their files of correspondence. Also to many others in

several continents, and especially to Kate and Zoe Henderson in South

Africa, who have contributed useful snippets of information.

55 The family interest continues today, as the Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research at

the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, has as its Director Professor Bruce Rubidge, a

descendent of Nathaniel Rubidge’s brother.

56 Dr Hugh Exton FGS (1833-1903). Medical practitioner, geologist, explorer and museum curator. Born in

Huddersfield, and apprenticed there, he then studied at London and Leyden and qualified in medicine at

Giessen in Germany. He went to South Africa in the 1850s and practiced for over forty years in many

parts of the colony, taking an active interest in natural history, ornithology, geology and civic

affairs wherever he was. He was the first President of the Geological Society of South Africa.

37

CONTRIBUTOR

Dr. Alan Cohen is a retired medical practitioner in England, who has had

an interest in archaeology for many years. A recent research project for

the British Museum led him to discover a small group of dedicated

amateur scientists living during the nineteenth century in the Eastern

Cape Province of South Africa. Closely connected, either by friendship

or family, their work contributed greatly to the establishment of the

study of natural history, and the earth sciences in South Africa. He is

presently engaged in a biography of Mary Elizabeth Barber, who was the

linchpin of the group.

ARCHIVES

Much of this article is based on original letters written by the people

mentioned. Bain’s correspondence with the British Museum is included in

the Owen Correspondence in the Archives of the Natural History Museum,

South Kensington (DF 105/13 and Volume II/33). Other letters dealing

with the topic are held in the archives of the Geological Society of

London (Secretary’s letters, book LR8) and the British Geological Survey

(GSM 1/5). The De la Beche archive is in the Archives of the Department

of Geology, the National Museum Cardiff. Letters by Bain to Atherstone

dealing with the period are in the Albany Museum, Grahamstown (SM

38

5501/1-31). Unfortunately only one of Atherstone’s replies exists (SM

5501/32), but Nerina Mathie’s ‘pseudo-biography’ of Atherstone is an

invaluable extra source of information. Other biographical data was

obtained from the Dictionary of National Biography: from earliest times to1985,

published in 1992 by Oxford University Press or from various volumes of

the Dictionary of South African Biography published by the Human Resources

Research Council of South Africa.

REFERENCES

Atherstone, William Guybon, The geology of Uitenhage, Eastern Province Monthly

Magazine June 1857.

Bain, Andrew Geddes, On the discovery of the fossil remains of bidental

and other reptiles in South Africa. Transactions of the Geological Society of London

2nd series volume 7, 1845-56: 53.

Bain, A. G., Reminiscences and anecdotes connected with the history of

geology in South Africa, or the pursuit of knowledge under difficulties.

Transactions of the Geological Society of South Africa, volume 2 (5) 1896: 59-75.

Blackmore, Howard, Dictionary of London Gunmakers, (Oxford: Phaidon-Christies

Ltd., 1986).

Buckland, Dean William, Geology and Mineralogy Considered with Reference to Natural

Theology, 4th edition (London: William Pickering, 1837).

Cohen, Alan, Mary Elizabeth Barber: South Africa’s first lady natural

historian. Archives of Natural History 2000, volume 27 (2): 187-208.

39

Jenkins, Geoffrey and Eve Palmer, The Companion Guide to South Africa, (London:

Collins, 1978)

Lister, Margaret Hermina (ed). , Journals of Andrew Geddes Bain, (Cape Town:

Van Riebeek Society, 1949).

Lyell, Sir Charles, Principles of Geology, (London: John Murray,1830-33).

Mathie, Nerina, Atherstone Dr W.G. man of many facets, 3 volumes (Grahamstown:

privately published, 1998).

Mitford-Barberton, I. and V. White, Some Frontier Families, (Cape Town, Human

& Rousseau, 1968).

Owen, Richard, Description of skull of a large species of dicynodon (D.

tigriceps Ow.) transmitted from South Africa by A.G. Bain. Transactions of the

Geological Society of London, 2nd series volume 7, 1845-56: 233-240.

Owen, Richard, Descriptive and illustrated catalogue of the fossil reptilia of South Africa in

the collection of the British Museum, (London, 1876).

Rogers, A. W., The pioneers in South African geology and their work.

Annexure to Transactions of the Geological Society of South Africa volume 39 1937.

Smith, William, Strata Identified by Organized Fossils (1816-19).

Williams, A.F. Some dreams come true (Cape Town, Timmins 1948).

40