Page 10 - Bulletin 12 2008
P. 10
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During the ensuing years numerous operators vied for the limited custom along this
route and with mixed fortunes. William Brown, having parted with Norkett, tried to
continue this passenger and postal service to Kalk Bay and Simon's Town on his own by
operating on the days not appropriated by Melville. In April 1848 Henry Green, who
was proprietor of the British Hotel at Simon's Town and who had been Melville's agent
there, offered an afternoon service from Cape Town three times a week, returning the
following morning. He was successful in outbidding both Melville and Brown for the
Royal Mail contract at the end of the year and in February 1849 Brown gave up after
failing to regain the contract.
However, Green's tender must have been too low and he withdrew from this side of the
business and so the contract returned to Melville who retained it for a further ten years.
But Melville’s passenger service left much to be desired. In 1854 a correspondent to De
Zuid-Afrikaan wrote: “Let them look at the conveyance between Cape Town and
Simon's Town, a distance of only 22 miles, where passengers are obliged to pay seven
shillings and sixpence for a seat in a miserable jolting old cart.” (Translated into
English.)
Various other omnibus operators now entered the scene. In October 1849 Thomas
Brady began a daily passenger mail carriage each way between Simon's Town, Kalk
Bay and Cape Town. The journey took three-and-a-half hours. In 1862 William Grout
introduced a daily service which he later that year increased to twice daily. But when, in
1864, the railway to Wynberg opened all omnibus operators – Brady, Grout, and
Cutting and Boyce – ran their services between the railhead and Simon’s Town only. In
this year a new operator, R. Hayes, commenced a passenger cart from Wynberg to Kalk
Bay and Simon's Town, so the area was very well served.
About this time, Mrs Louisa Ross, wife of Dr William Ross, wrote in her dairy on
Thursday 27 February 1862 about taking one of Cutting’s omnibuses to Kalk Bay for a
picnic:
