Thomas Bell was an early settler in the Braidwood region. This photo was taken in 1870, a number of years after Doctor Bell’s death. Image: Braidwood Historical Society.
It’s become a cliche to say ‘They don’t make them like they used to’, but in the case of Thomas Bell, a resident of the Braidwood cemetery, they really don’t make them like they used to.
Dr Bell’s headstone stands quietly among the peers of his time, now heavily worn and weathered. He doesn’t rest alone though, sharing the ground and the inscription with his wife and three of his eight children. The simple epitaphs focused on their dates of birth and death is a sobering reminder that no matter how big your life may have been, in death, little remains.
Thomas Bell’s life stretched from the frozen waters of the Arctic to the dusty roads of colonial NSW. It was big and bold and worth remembering.
He was born in Northern Ireland in 1797 and entered the British Royal Navy as a young man, training as a surgeon. It was a profession that at the time often placed doctors in the most remote corners of the world, and Bell’s early career quickly proved that point.
In 1824 he was serving as assistant surgeon aboard the Royal Navy ship Fury during an Arctic expedition commanded by the renowned explorer Sir William Edward Parry. At the time European powers were obsessed with finding the Northwest Passage, a navigable route linking the Atlantic and Pacific through the ice-filled channels of northern Canada.
The journey of the Fury was anything but straightforward. Heavy ice slowed their progress from the beginning and delayed the ships before they could even enter Lancaster Sound. By the time they forced their way through the channel, the passable weather conditions were already coming to an end.
Rather than turn back, Parry made the bold decision to remain in the north for the winter. The ship, alongside their sister ship on the journey the Hecla, established quarters in Prince Regent Inlet and the crews prepared for months of darkness and extreme cold.
Doctor Thomas Bell lived a big life but no images remain of him. You can visit his grave in the Braidwood cemetery. Photo courtesy of Clayton Talbot.
This decision meant that Bell and the rest of the expedition were the earliest Europeans to intentionally spend a winter in the High Arctic. It was a remarkable test of endurance. The sea froze solid around the ships, and the sun disappeared for long stretches as temperatures plunged far below freezing.
For a naval surgeon the challenges were immense. Bell would have been responsible for treating injuries, preventing illness and helping keep the crew in good health through the isolation of the polar winter.
When the ice finally loosened its grip, the expedition attempted to continue its search the following summer. Their efforts were cut short when the Fury was driven hard onto ice and severely damaged. After repeated attempts to save the vessel, Parry and the crew were forced to abandon it, transferring to their sister ship, the Hecla for the return journey to England.
This may seem like quite enough adventure for any one lifetime, but Dr Bell was only getting started.
Following the end of the Napoleonic Wars, naval surgeons often struggled to find steady work and this led Dr Bell to a career on the convict transport system linking Britain to the colony of NSW, becoming a surgeon superintendent to oversee the health of hundreds of prisoners during the months-long journey to the penal colonies.
Bell made six voyages to Australia in total and the responsibility of his role was considerable: managing sanitation, controlling disease and ensuring that as many prisoners as possible survived the passage.
The long trips also gave Bell a close view of the developing colony on the other side of the world, and like many others who sailed the route repeatedly, he began to see opportunity there.
By 1839 Bell had received a licence to practise medicine in NSW and decided to settle permanently. During the 1840s he became one of a handful of doctors working in the Braidwood district.
Medical practice in a frontier town was very different from life in the navy. Patients were scattered across large pastoral properties, and a doctor might travel long distances on horseback to reach them, and don’t forget, this was the frontier, a time of bushrangers, with some of the most active in the country operating around the gold fields in the Braidwood region.
Bell also established himself as a landowner. In 1840 he purchased 750 acres at Bendoura, about 11 miles south-west of Braidwood on the eastern bank of the Shoalhaven River. While waiting for his family to arrive from overseas, he leased land on Jembaicumbene Creek and named the property Bellevue after his Irish home. There he began building a homestead along with several outbuildings.
Life in the colony, however, was not always peaceful. Disaster struck just as the main house was ready in 1846 with a fire destroying the structure before it could be occupied. The fire was deemed arson, with former convict, Henry Finden later confessing to the crime in retribution for medical and executor fees levied by Bell taking all of the 50 pounds that Finden was left in a will.
Doctor Bell built Bellevue. named after his Irish home, pictured here in 2013. Photo: Clayton Talbot.
Bell could not rebuild immediately. Instead, the family expanded the smaller cottage on the property and continued living there. Over the years it became a lively household as more children were born.
Beyond his medical work, Bell also took an active role in public life. He served as a justice of the peace and as a commissioner of Crown lands, positions that placed him among the more prominent figures in the district. He was also involved in raising funds for the construction of St Andrew’s Anglican Church, which still stands in Braidwood.
Thomas Bell died in 1854 at the age of 57, and for visitors wandering through the cemetery, it is worth pausing at the headstone. Beneath it lies someone who once chased a legendary sea route through polar ice, crossed the world on convict ships and helped build a frontier community far from the place where he began.
It is quite a journey for one lifetime.
