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to justify a bold scheme: supplies from the back of the mountain could be brought through the

Twelve Apostles to feed the Molteno Reservoir. He identified dam sites which could be used
to store winter rainfall for consumption during the dry summers.

His duties, spread throughout the Colony were so extensive – and so successful – that the

government allowed him an assistant. Thomas Stewart arrived in the Cape to take up this post
on 1 January 1883.

While in South Africa Gamble met and married Miss Constance Brounger, the daughter of
the Colonial Railway Engineer William Brounger, and they produced three daughters. He

took a keen interest in the SA Public Library, the Philosophical Society and other scientific

and cultural institutions at the Cape, and became an examiner and Council Member of the
South African College.

In 1886 the world and the Colony experienced something of a depression, and with short-

sighted zeal the government abolished the office of Hydraulic Engineer. Gamble returned to
England, and shortly afterwards was appointed to a similar post in Ireland. He immediately

set to work on assessing schemes for the Shannon and Barrow rivers, and with Parliamentary

approval he produced designs and surveys for the proposed works. He did not live to see his
projects implemented. Ironically, having survived the rigours of foreign climes, he

succumbed to typhoid fever in the British Isles and died in November 1889.

It is quite obvious that Gamble, who was affectionately known as “Honest John”, was a

personality of some status, both professionally and socially. His opinion was sought on
various engineering matters, and he was awarded the Telford Medal and three Telford

premiums for papers presented at the ICE. He is described as a person who “combined great
mental gifts with a singular sweetness and modesty of character”. As mentor to several

engineers he made a considerable impression on the profession and he can rightly be called

the father of irrigation and hydrology in South Africa.

Cometh the Hour …

Thomas Stewart was born in Craigend, Perthshire, Scotland, in 1857 and as a sixteen year-old
entered into a pupilage with Mr D.H. Halkett, who on completion of his time after three years